Wine in the Woods 2026

Join us for the 2026 Oktoberfest 5-Miler presented by Altra in Howard County! Celebrate this fall tradition with a beautiful course that winds around Columbia's scenic Lake Elkhorn, great swag, and an awesome post-race party at Black Flag Brewing Co.! A portion of the race proceeds benefits Bridges to Housing Stability in Howard County.

This race SELLS OUT, so register early and secure your spot!

Next Step Hibernation to 5K is a no frills, get to work right away program to encourage a quick start to the new year. This program is for both beginning runners and more experienced adult runners (18+) that just need to get off the couch after a long winter! Although we only train as a group once a week, participants should expect to be devoting time for 3-4 workouts each week in order to maximize their progress.

A prediction run is entirely different from other races that you’ve run in the past. Rather than finishing first or running the fastest, the object of a prediction run is to finish as close to a certain time as possible. In the case of the Howard County Striders prediction runs, the goal is to finish as close to 11:00am as possible. One way the Striders prediction runs differ from many other runs is that you get to start whenever you want – whoever finishes closest to 11:00am wins. Oh, and one important thing, you CANNOT use any sort of timing device. Also, no baby strollers, iPods, headphones or animals.

All proceeds from this event will be donated to the Tripp Scholar Athlete Fund.

The run is located at the Jeffers Hill Neighborhood Center, 6031 Tamar Drive, Columbia, MD 21045