Presidents Day weekend is approaching, and in Washington, DC, that means just one thing: It’s time for that now-annual tradition, the Washington Nationals Presidents Race tryouts.
The Washington Nationals will once again be holding auditions on Presidents Day weekend for those who want to compete as racing presidents George, Tom, Abe, or Teddy during the 2010 season.
The tryouts will be held on Saturday, February 13th at Nationals Park, and are closed to the public. To score an invitation and your chance to run in the footsteps of giants, you must e-mail a cover letter, resume and recent photo to entertainment@nationals.com with “2010 PRESIDENTS RACE” in the subject line.
Job requirements include being between 5’7” and 6’ 6” in height, and being able to run approximately 200 yards while wearing a 45-pound costume. You must be available for at least 40% of Nationals home games (a minimum of 33 games) plus the Nationals League playoffs and World Series, of course (What? I can dream.).
The part-time, seasonal job includes not only participating in the presidents race, but also posing for photos, signing autographs, and appearing at “selected outside events.”
This past year, appearances included stops at the White House, in inauguration festivities, traveled to New York to race on ice skates, visited a Wizards game, traveled with the team to Pittsburgh, and made a variety of promotional appearances around DC.
In previous years, the tryout regimen has included running against other candidates, dancing, and demonstrating celebration skills. Some coverage of last year’s event from WTOP:
Race photo by flickr user afagen
White House photo courtesy of Erik Metzroth
LET TEDDY WIN 
Wondering if you’d be willing to share the actual photo from this post — the one where it looks like Teddy has a chance to win. We have a home near the stadium and as the headboard for our 4-year-old son’s room, we’d like to blow up the photo into a 55×55 wall decal. It would be for his room only. No commercial use. Thanks for considering it!
Hi Kristin,
I think your wall decal is an awesome idea. The photo above is by a very friendly Nats fan named Adam Fagen. You can find the original here (http://www.flickr.com/photos/afagen/3597326135/) and if you’d like to use the photo I recommend contacting him through Flickr.
I agree it’s a great photo, but for what it’s worth I don’t think this particular one will look great when blown up to nearly 5 feet tall. As great as the photo is, it’s not the highest resolution and not perfectly in focus. If you’re looking for an alternative, we do have a great collection of presidents race photos you can browse through in our Flickr group (http://www.flickr.com/groups/washington-nationals-presidents-race/pool/), including several others by Adam. Most of them are posted under a creative commons license for non-commercial use.
Thanks for visiting the blog!