Set for its 14th annual running this year — a few years after historic floods along the Ohio River pushed back the planned inaugural running in 2011 from Mother’s Day in May to mid-June — the Mercy Health Paducah Iron Mom Half Marathon & Half Marathon Relay brings out several hundred runners each year to the streets of this city that’s nestled along the Tennessee and Ohio rivers.
Runners follow an out-and-back loop route for the half marathon that starts and finish at the city’s landmark “Wall to Wall” murals, a series of huge mural paintings created by painter Robert Dafford that tell the story of the city of Paducah and western Kentucky along the flood walls in Schultz Park, which lies right along the banks of the Ohio River.
From there, runners head from the river in toward the city’s downtown district, starting off with a nearly three-mile straightaway stretch along Jefferson Street. These early miles of the race feature some of Paducah’s historic residential neighborhoods, and the course is quite literally flat as a pancake for the first few miles as well.