The ninth Georgia Games Championships torch run will be the last leg in a yearlong effort to promote the 10-day amateur athletic event, which starts in Augusta on Friday.
The four-day tour of Georgia will give 19 cities throughout the state a chance to the participate in pre-championship activities. Selected individuals from most of the cities will be honored for their roles in Georgia athletics during the past year.
The torch run is divided into the two routes, both of which begin at the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame in Macon at 9 a.m. Monday. The paths span a total of about 1,000 miles.
The North Route goes through Jackson, Griffin, LaGrange, Douglasville, Marietta, Gainesville, Athens, Madison and Eatonton before arriving in Augusta. The other torch follows the South Route through Americus, Albany, Tifton, Douglas, Jesup, Savannah, Statesboro and Millen on its way to the Garden City.
The torch run concludes with the lighting of the official Georgia Games cauldron during the Opening Ceremonies at Augusta-Richmond County Civic Center on Friday evening.
Each city, with the exception of Statesboro and Jesup, will hold separate ceremonies when the torch arrives, where individuals will be given awards for categories such as the outstanding athlete, exemplary young person, outstanding volunteer, outstanding coach and local championship award.
"The awards are mainly just for recognizing some outstanding people in the communities we're going to," said Rachel Hudson Wahl, torch run director. "The purpose is to reward extraordinary people."
The local championship award will be given to athletes who won events in the regional district games, held throughout the state during June.
"It's kind of a send-off to the Georgia Games for those guys," said Wahl, who will be traveling on the North Route.
The torches will be bicycled from city to city and carried by foot once they are in downtown areas where stops are made. Fourteen Georgia residents, ranging in age from 19 to 73 will be traveling though the state with the torches, with seven following each route.
Any Georgia resident can register as a community runner by contacting their local ceremony organizer, or Wahl at (770) 528-3585 or rwahl@gagames.life.edu.
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