Underwear is everywhere, but not always underneath, especially on Thursday during Ironman Week in Kailua-Kona.
That’s when hundreds of people strip down to their skivvies for the Underpants Run, a brief fun run that raises money for Big Island charities and has become a tradition in the days leading up to the Ironman World Championship.
Besides leaving little to the imagination, this year’s participants attempted to set a world record while running along Alii Drive from King Kamehameha’s Kona Beach Hotel to Uncle Billy’s Kona Bay Hotel.
Guinness World Records Adjudicator Johanna Hessling said the goal was to beat the previous record for the largest gathering of people wearing only underpants or knickers, which was 2,270 and set in 2011 by the participants of the Utah Undie Run.
During Thursday’s event, a couple of the pack’s leaders unabashedly called out to spectators to “drop your pants and be a part of history.” Their invitation mostly drew laughter and raised eyebrows.
For the first time, underpants athletes received timing chips and race numbers for verification purposes. They were counted three times. They also had to meet specific guidelines to break the record. Men had to wear nothing but underpants while women had to wear a shirt or a full coverage bra while in underpants. Participants also could not share a pair of large underpants and instead had to wear their own.
At the end of the event Thursday morning, Hessling said her record management team was going over the logistics, some technicalities and official numbers. Underpants Run officials said the result would be revealed to them later and “to come back next year” if the record wasn’t set. By Thursday afternoon, slowtwitch.com had reported the participants did not break the record, falling 40 short of the goal.
In 1998, Chris Danahy, Tim Morris and Paul Huddle conceived the Underpants Run as a protest against Ironman World Championship athletes who were not working out and wearing Speedos in all the wrong places, such as stores and restaurants. The friends had seen enough — well, Speedos, that is. The event then was simply a way to poke fun at these athletes and show just how silly they looked, said Roch Frey, one of the Underpants Run organizers and a multisports.com coach.
Since then, the Underpants Run has evolved into a much-anticipated prerace spectacle. Often bigger than the featured britches, it attracts not only exhibitionists of all ages, shapes, sizes and athleticism, but also a large crowd of staring, sometimes gawking, onlookers and lots of international media attention.
Last year, Frey estimated there were roughly 3,000 participants. He attributed the popularity of the event to two things. First, it’s an opportunity for triathletes to blow of some steam, wind down and enjoy some good, clean fun before Saturday’s grueling 140.6-mile challenge. Second, it’s a chance to give directly back to the communities that host this pinnacle of endurance events and all of its many athletes and their supporters year after year.
Early on, Frey said the Underpants Run organizers saw how they could use the event as a platform to do good. So they garnered support from sponsors, asked for a $20 donation from participants, and have raised more than $200,000 for local charities over the past 17 years.
The first group to benefit was Special Olympics West Hawaii, a nonprofit that provides year-round sports training and athletic competition in a variety of Olympic-type sports for children and adults with intellectual disabilities. At the time, Special Olympics West Hawaii had lost state funding.
Special Olympics West Hawaii Director Denise Lindsey said it’s “an honor and a blessing” to be part of the Underpants Run, which “solidifies the aloha spirit, gets so much of the community involved, and raises monies which stay on the Big Island to support local nonprofits.”
She recalled the event’s modest beginnings, which comprised of a handful of people in basic tighty-whiteys on a jog on Alii Drive, all hoping the Speedo offenders “got it.” The following year, there were 20 or 30 people, and the event has grown each year since.
Special Olympics West Hawaii athlete Brandon LaCuesta has participated in the Underpants Run since the early years. Fellow Special Olympics West Hawaii athlete Adrian Cleintuar is also a regular, often appearing as the Green Hornet, Lindsey said.
The other beneficiaries of this event are the Visitor Aloha Society of Hawaii, Ahuena Heiau and Mokuaikaua Church. In regard to VASH, Frey said several of the organizers know of people who have benefited from the assistance that group provides. VASH helps visitors cope with and recover from a variety of unfortunate situations, such as crime victimization, medical situations and death of a loved one. He added, Ahuena Heiau and Mokuaikaua Church are special historic sites found in the heart of Kailua Village that deserved to be preserved for future generations.
Frey hopes participants will take the time to learn more about all the highlighted charities and find out how they can help. He said it’s not unusual for donations to be sent to multisports.com after the event in support of these groups.
Hawaii Island Humane Society Executive Director Donna Whitaker brought eight staff members and three four-legged friends to the event. She said this was more than a fun staff bonding moment. It was a chance to bring awareness about the Humane Society, its mission and work. It also gave two of the shelter’s dogs, Kelly and Kuupio, much needed exposure, which will hopefully lead to adoption into good homes. And of course, all three of the participating dogs wore underpants, which were a task getting on, said Cindy Kennedy, the Humane Society’s accountant.
Terri and Dave Jones of Charleston, S.C., decided to participate in the Underpants Run because “it sounded like something fun to do as a family.” So with their daughter and son-in-law, Ashley and Robin Huston, they de-robed as superheroes — Wonder Woman, Batgirl, Super Man and Marvel Man to be specific. Running around in their underwear is not something they had ever done before and definitely not in their hometown. “In South Carolina, you would be put in jail for that,” Dave Jones said.
Jones is an administration specialist who is “so thankful and blessed” to be competing in the Ironman World Championship for the first time among such “talented and amazing athletes.” He thought the Underpants Run was a huge stress-reliever that helped take the edge off what’s to come for him. What he appreciated most about this silly social jog was how it gives back to the Big Island community and how the triathletes have really embraced the event, even turned the whole initial protest thing back around.