Showers may dampen the Broad Street Run, and expect several more days of them in the Philly region
The Philadelphia region is about to experience a rainy period, forecaster say, and it might not spare the runners.
It’s unlikely to be the best of times for outdoor activities, but by the end of next week, the plant life in the Philly region might well experience growth spurts.
In fact, this could be a prudent time to activate the mowers, said Tom Kines, senior meteorologist with AccuWeather Inc. If the grass “needs to be cut, get it cut soon,” he said.
Showers are possible almost anytime through at least Wednesday, forecasters say, and “the potential is there” for a couple of inches of rain in the Sunday-through-midweek period, Kines said.
Timing spring showers is an art that eludes even the higher orders of the virtual world, but some rain is possible when 40,000 gather for the annual Broad Street Run on Sunday morning.
The outlook for the Broad Street Run
Showers are expected to be hit-or-miss Friday and Saturday, when a strong storm isn’t out of the question, Kines said.
Then a “much wetter pattern” is likely to settle over the region, he said. It is unclear whether that takes hold Sunday or early in the workweek.
Rain during the race, which is scheduled to begin at 7 a.m. Sunday, is a possibility, said Paul Fitzsimmons, lead meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Mount Holly.
“It’s hard to be specific,” Fitzsimmons said, adding that the shower chances would persist throughout the day.
On the plus side, winds should be fairly light, about 7 mph.
» READ MORE: Everything you need to know about the 2025 Broad Street Run
What’s going on up there
“We’re definitely undergoing a pattern change,” Kines said.
For the last few months, it’s been a speedway in the upper atmosphere, with a sequence of storms and fronts zipping through the region.
But this time of year, the warm and cold contrasts that drive storm-moving winds weaken, and the traffic tends to stall.
“The big thing is that weather systems are slowing down dramatically,” Kines said.
The region is likely to experience several days of warm, moist air that will supply the raw material for showers.
All this should yield some benefits, providing the rains don’t get out of hand.
Rainfall the last 60 days in the region has been close to normal, but the flora still is recovering from record dryness in the fall. Southeastern Pennsylvania and South Jersey remain at least “abnormally dry” on the latest interagency U.S. Drought Monitor maps posted Thursday.
Not that the short-term outlook is likely to draw sustained applause.
“This is not looking like the greatest of weekends,” Fitzsimmons said.