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AdventHealth Watermelon 5K going virtual this summer

ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. — Local race organizer “Track Shack” is getting creative to keep Central Florida running.

Track Shack has already postponed three of their races and announced this past week that they are making their popular Advent Health Watermelon 5K a virtual race. Runners will still receive a shirt and medal like usual, but will do the 3.1 mile run on their own.

“Coronavirus

Track Shack co-owner John Hughes is still encouraging the runners to get up early on July 4th and start the race in your red, white and blue.

“We’re utilizing some software where you can have the map of the Watermelon 5k with you on the phone," he said. "Your friends and family can track you just like they would regularly in a big-time race. When you go by the mile splits it will let you know when you’ve hit those mile splits. We’ll have a lot of fun and encouraging interactive stuff on that map, both pre- and post-race.”

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As for those postponed races, like the Corporate 5K, Hughes said they are meeting every day to try and find ways to make the races happen safely.

“We’re all just working to figure it out and get back to some part of normal and really go back to our main goal which has always been to keeping Central Florida fit and healthy," he said. "That’s really what we want to do and that’s what we love to do.”

Read: Looking ahead: What Phase 2, 3 could look like when reopening

On the retail side, Track Shack will re-open it’s doors on Monday, May 4th. Betsy Hughes, Track Shack co-owner, told Channel 9 they will limit the capacity to 5 customers at a time to abide by the governor’s phase one reopening guidelines.

“We’re opening just one door. We’re making sure the store is clean. Our shoe fitting area will be spread out. We’ve also decided to allow our customers to decide if they even want to come inside, and perhaps we’ll do shoe fittings outside, so we’re going to give them some options,” she said.