Saturday, October 10th there was a run hosted at Canterbury Park in Shakopee MN called the Night Nation Run. The Night Nation Run is known as the “World’s 1st Running Music Festival”. It is basically a 5k with a path of music and lights to lead you up to the finish line. However if you’re not a runner, don’t fret, you can walk, dance, jog, or run your way to the finish line!

The day before the race the participants are supposed to grab their shirt, their race bibs, and a glow stick for registering. However the group I went with couldn’t make it the day before so we had to pay $5 extra each to get our stuff the day of the race. The shirts this year were black with the Night Nation logo (as seen in the picture above) on it.

There wasn’t much a variety for food there, there was pizza inside and a few food trucks. So many people left and came back, but my group decided to sit and eat there.

The event started out with a before party that started at 6:00 pm on the stage in which a DJ played music and people on stage interacted with the crowd. They threw light up batons and light up glasses all over the place while everybody danced to the music to warm up for the run. The crowd was large and more than 2/3 of the crowd caught something they threw out.

After the before party/warm up the run started. As we ran there were selfie booths, and DJ’s scattered along the coarse. Which were a lot of fun to stop at and dance or take pictures. The only complaint we had was that there was only one water stand throughout the 5k, but there was no lack of beer and alcohol stands.

As participants finish the run they get a bottle of water. The may then go to the after party for the race. The after party consisted of DJ music, jumping up and down, dancing, and more free things being thrown into the crowd. Basically the same as the before party except that it was darker outside.

One thing that I would suggest for people who would like to participate in this event is to bring your own glow sticks to decorate yourself with. And if you are feeling really excited, glow in the dark or UV face paint and makeup was a lot of fun as well. They do sell products for participants to buy there as well, however it would be more cost efficient to buy them before the race.