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Auburn "Cake Race"

HISTORY OF THE “ODK CAKE RACE” AT AUBURN UNIVERSITY
by
Dr. Dale A. Coleman, Faculty Secretary
Omega Circle of OΔK

      Auburn University’s Omega Circle of Omicron Delta Kappa was chartered May 22, 1928. Auburn’s Head Track Coach at the time was Wilbur Hall Hutsell out of the University of Missouri - known widely for consistently producing winning track teams and was notably bestowed the honor of serving as Assistant Track Coach for the 1928 U.S. Olympic Team in which his 4 x 1000m relay team set a new Olympic record. In recognition of his conspicuous leadership in athletics and service to Auburn’s students, Coach Hutsell was tapped for initiation into Auburn’s Circle of OΔK in the Spring of 1929 and soon after accepted the role of Circle Sponsor.

      In the Fall of 1929, Coach Hutsell, along with the other athletics coaches, were looking to the incoming freshman class, or “rats,” for new varsity talent, and Coach Hutsell approached OΔK’s student leadership to jointly sponsor a “Cake Race” in which all freshmen male students would be required to participate. As prizes for the top 25 finishers, the Athletics Department would give two weeks credit for the then required physical training class. OΔK would promote the race and provide cakes for the top 25 winners. As excitement over the race grew, local bakeries offered to donate the cakes, including one bakery owned by the parents of a freshman who would run in the race, and other stores contributed more prizes.

      On the day of the race, Friday, December 13, 1929, University President Bradford Knapp let all freshmen out of class at 3:00 p.m., and they were required to assemble at the starting line on Drake Military Drill Field at 3:30. It’s reported that some students showed up in track uniforms ready to seriously compete, others in bib overalls and work boots just hoping to survive. A pistol shot at 4:00 p.m. started some 400 “rats” on the 2.7 mile course through campus. Officially, 273 participants made it across the finish line. The winner, Marshall Caley crossing the finish line in 15 minutes and 38.9 seconds. Kappa Alpha won the fraternity division with the highest-placing four members. As a special recognition, the Auburn chapter of the national track honorary, “Spiked Shoe” sponsored a banquet and dance that evening with the top 25 finishers as their guests of honor. Coach Hutsell and others were very pleased with the campus-wide show of athleticism and hoped that the “OΔK Cake Race” would become an annual event.

      And so it has - with Auburn’s ODK Circle sponsoring the 80th running of the annual Cake Race this past November 5, 2008. Over the years, the Cake Race became part of our Homecoming week celebration, being run on the Wednesday afternoon before the Saturday Homecoming football game. The course of the race has changed several times to accommodate campus growth but is still 2.7 miles. Women were welcomed into the event in the mid 1970's and now have their own Top 25 bracket. And the race is now open to all comers - students, faculty, alumni and towns people. Somewhere along the way the tradition of kisses for the winners was added - the Top Male receiving a kiss from Miss Auburn (our official campus hostess), and the Top Female being kissed by the SGA or OΔK President or other male student dignitary. The Cake Race is still strongly supported by the Athletics Department and Student Recreational Services as a way to promote physical fitness among students. Cakes provided by OΔK members are still awarded to the Top 25 male, and now Top 25 female finishers, along with commemorative t-shirts (always a hit on college campuses!). Fraternities still receive group recognition - now in the form of “Spirit Points” for priority seating at football games in the Fall. But all-in-all, the Cake Race tradition lives on, basically in the same format as it was first run in the Fall of 1929. And I’m sure Coach Hutsell would be proud to see that Auburn students still gather each Fall, in running clothes or street clothes, to run or jog those 2.7 miles of the OΔK Cake Race he helped initiate some 80 years ago and that it has become such a time-honored tradition in the hearts of the Auburn faithful.