NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. – Halloween is still a couple days away, but at the National Harbor, the walking dead came back to life at the Zombie Run Saturday.
The 5K urban assault course features more than 100 actors dressed in tattered clothes and stage makeup.
Runners wear a belt with three velcro flags, — or “lives” — and the infected zombies try to steal the flags. The runners without any flags at the end are given an infected medal.
Kate Ebner and Lyndsay Eberle volunteered to be zombies. They have boils, cuts, and bruises all over their faces. Their thrift store clothes are dirty and ragged.
“We took some bricks… scraped it…cut it… painted it. Put some blood on it,” they said. “My husband put lighter fluid on his jacket and pants and burned his clothes,” Ebner says.
The pair calls themselves the Moldy Limb Danglers. “I went on Google and I asked it ‘How do I zombify my name?’ It said ‘Kate Moldy Limb Dangler,” Ebner says. “And I was like, perfect! That’s our team name.”
Union soldiers, nurses, farmers and even soldier zombies came back from the dead to seek their revenge.
District residents Mia Ellis and Terri Tutt say they’re excited to battle the zombies because the unique race is fun and active.
“I was coerced into coming to this by Terri, who is my bestie,” Ellis jokes. “I’m just hoping that I can haul ass across the finish line.”
The rugged terrain course loops around the Gaylord National Resort.
“We’re going to do the best we can. If we fall, we fall. Gotta get up and keep moving,” Tutt says.
Some of the proceeds are donated to Smile Train, an organization that provides cleft palate surgery.
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