How it works

Form a team of up to 24 members and tackle the miles together! Each day, log your progress and watch your team’s dot move across the map in real time. Keep an eye on the leaderboard to track your standings, and enjoy fun facts and highlights about the places you pass along the way!

Your team has until September 13 to complete the journey—that’s as few as 33.7 miles per day for your team (1.4 for each individual)! Run, walk, hike—it can all count towards your team’s mileage.

Teams

You must join a team, but you can compete as a team of one or with up to 24 of your closest friends. Then you register as individuals. You should assign one team captain to set-up your team, then they will be able to share the team name and password (optional) for others to register and join. For more information, visit our Team Captain Info page.

• Team Sizes:
  • 12-Person Team: 1-12 members 
  • 24-Person Team: 13-24 members
• Team Type:
  • Open
  • Female
  • Male

What’s included

Opportunity to earn Virtual Badges

Event Shirt & Finisher Medal

Pre-mapped 5,000k course across the country

Leaderboard and Online Map with real time standings

Virtual travel experience provided through fun facts and photos of things you would see along the route

Exclusive access to the Great American 5000 Facebook Group

Referral Rewards

The only thing better than the Great American 5000 experience is sharing it with friends & family! Invite others to join you on your journey and earn the following rewards:

• Refer 7, receive event sticker & water bottle
• Refer 15, receive sticker, water bottle, & Goodr sunglasses

Share your unique referral link (found in your confirmation email). You can share the link via email, social media, or text. Remind your friends/family to use your link to score all the rewards! To be counted towards your referrals, they must register using your unique link.

The Route

The Great American 5000 begins at the Golden Gate Bridge on the West Coast in San Francisco and traverses 12 states on its 3,107-mile trek across the U.S., ending on the East Coast just past the Empire State Building in the New York City borough of Manhattan. Along the way, you’ll pass man made structures like “The Bean” (Cloud Gate) in Chicago, run through national parks and more state parks than we can count, and see roadside attractions and oddities that are pure Americana!

Throughout your team’s journey, our group of experienced race organizers will be with you every step of the way! We’ll set up ways for you to stay connected with your team and highlight noteworthy portions of the virtual route you are completing.

Tracking

You should track your run using one of the many GPS-enabled tracking systems (e.g., Strava, Map My Run, Garmin, Wahoo, etc.). From there you will self-report the time and distance of your run based on your GPS tracking, which will update the leaderboard and move your team’s dot across the course map. Entries without GPS will be permitted but are not encouraged for the sake of running validation. If you are in the running to be in the top 10 in your division, you should be prepared to validate your mileage.

How to Log Activities 

• Participant Look Up
• Lookup Registration
• Log Activities 
  • Pro Tip: bookmark that page to easily return and log your daily mileage.
• Submit Activities

How To Edit

1. Participant Look Up
2. Lookup Registration
3. Log Activities next to event name
4. Manage Activities
5. Edit or Delete