After a year of uncertainty, it’s official: The Cascade Lakes Relay is on for 2021, marking the first large summer sporting event in Central Oregon this year.

The 13-year-old relay, one of the most popular sporting events in Central Oregon, was canceled last summer due to COVID-19 restrictions, and organizers were unsure if the event would be able to resume this year.

But Cascade Relays announced Wednesday its event will be held July 30 and 31.

“The relay is a unique format where participants are already in little pods and spread out throughout the course,” said Cascade Relays co-founder Scott Douglass. “Even if vaccination rates hadn’t gone up and case rates hadn’t gone down, we were still in a unique situation to potentially hold the event.”

Douglass said organizers of the event were confident it would be safe to hold the relay this summer.

“This wasn’t a decision made in two months,” he said. “This was a long-term belief in our community that we would be able to return to normalcy this summer.”

A few minor changes: Participants will be provided with a neck gaiter if they choose to mask up when they can’t be socially distanced, and they will sleep outside along the route instead of indoors.

Other popular Central Oregon sporting events were canceled this year, such as the Pole Pedal Paddle, making the Cascade Lakes Relay one of the few large sporting events to happen.

But the relay hasn’t attracted the same amount of participants as in years past. The event typically sells out in the fall before the relay.

“Last fall, we weren’t sure what the world was going to look like this summer,” Douglass said. “Teams usually form eight to 10 months in advance, so we’re not seeing our normal sign-up numbers yet, but we’re hoping that as things continue to return to normalcy, more people will sign up.”

The event usually draws around 3,500 participants each year and has provided over $500,000 in grants to community organizations since 2008, Douglass said.

This year, as in years past, the Cascades Relay Foundation is seeking “charity partners,” where community organizations provide volunteers or “hire” volunteers to help out at the event on their organization’s behalf. Each volunteer generates funds for their respective organization, and at the end of the race season, a grant will be provided to their organization based on the number of volunteer hours reported.

“COVID has caused a lot of our partners to struggle, making it difficult to put on this event,” Douglass said. “We’re putting out a call to nonprofits, community groups, school groups and other community organizations to provide us with their time, and we will provide them with a grant.”

The Cascade Lakes Relay starts in the Cascade mountains at Diamond Lake Resort. It travels through the Oregon Outback and rural country before winding back to the Cascade Lakes Highway where it circles Mt. Bachelor and then finishes in Bend.

“I think people are pumped to get back to this,” Douglass said. “You’re with your team. You’re with your friends. And people have not been hanging out with their friends this past year and a half. This event will be bringing a lot of people back together for the first time.”