MISSION
TEAM
From the first event held in 2005 with 5,000 participants, Pat’s Run has grown into the largest run in the nation to honor a fallen soldier. In 2019, the 15th Annual Pat’s Run sold out in record time and 28,000 runners joined 60 Tillman Scholars in a 4.2 mile run/walk in support of the Tillman Scholars Program.
Even though this event is put on by the Pat Tillman Foundation, it tends to feel and look like a different brand then the rest of the foundation. While the focus of the foundation is the scholars, the focus of Pat's Run is really Pat Tillman and the Arizona football culture. Every year during my time at PTF the foundation sold out the race and in 2020 we sold out in record time. The marketing, merchandise and theme of the event changes every year to reflect a part of Pat Tillman's life. The four races I worked on were themed after Arizona State football, Arizona Cardinal football and Pat's time in the Army Rangers.
Our campaigns utilized steady marketing through emails and social media. Throughout the years as we built a healthy email list we were able to focus in on the runner demographic to both retain runners and reach new runners.
Michelle McCarthy - Director of Brand & Comms
Shannon Speshock - Communications Manager
Taylor Colliau - Marketing Manager
John O’Connor - Art Director / Graphic Designer
PROJECT: 2020 PAT'S RUN THEME
In the four years I worked on Pat's Run, the theme was based on one medal in a four-part medal series. The fourth and final year of the medal series paid homage to Pat's service in the 75th Ranger Regiment. This theme that incorporated consistent camo was used throughout the marketing and most importantly, the race shirt. Pat's Run is a unique road race because it's one of the only large-scale runs where the majority of the runners wear the race shirt on race day. It was always a very cool honor to see my designs being worn by 20,000 people on race day.
RACE SHIRT INSPIRATION
I wanted to represent the 75th Ranger RGT on the shirt without being disrespectful. I used multiple elements from this patch to achieve that.
Pat Tillman wore number 42 during his career at ASU. I also took inspiration from the thick outline on the jersey numbers.
I used this portrait of Pat in uniform to pull both the camo and other visual elements. Inside the two diamonds I also represented the Arizona flag.
PAT'S RUN PROMO
I cut together this quick video promo for our 2020 marketing campaign. Video content goes a long way on social media channels and the engagement we received on videos like this was well worth my time learning how to edit in Premier Pro on the fly.
PROJECT: 2019 PAT'S RUN THEME
The 2019 race theme focused on Pat's NFL career with the Arizona Cardinals. We used a lot of red throughout the marketing... The 40 jersey was a great influence on this campaign, I pulled design elements from it while also using images of it.
PROJECT: 2018 PAT'S RUN THEME
The 2019 race theme focused on Pat's NFL career with the Arizona Cardinals. I used a lot of red throughout the marketing... I included images of the number 40 jersey as much as possible. I pulled the texture from the mesh jersey and used it throughout the design work.
PROJECT: PAT'S RUN MERCHANDISE
Every year for Pat's Run I worked up an additional t shirt design to sell during registration. This was one of my favorite projects during the year because of the freedom I had. I did my best to include elements from Pat Tillman's life that Arizona fans would strongly connect to.
