Hundreds of runners continue to 'Fly' on Saturday mornings
Weekly Fly 5K thrives as runners face up to Lockdown 2.0
Fly 5K, the weekly run, set up by Hertfordshire-based Graham Smith is going from strength to strength. Fly 5K was established in June after coronavirus had halted parkrun in its tracks and decimated the racing calendar.
Five months later Fly 5K is a regular weekly date for hundreds of runners. Graham Smith told runABC: "We’ve now passed 1,000 members altogether, and had a record attendance on 7 November, the first Saturday of Lockdown 2.0, with 244 taking part."
Graham continued: "We now have runners from more clubs getting involved, with members of over 70 clubs having taken part, still pretty much all from the south of England, and also our international friends in Australia and other places. We’re reaching out to clubs in London and Surrey at the moment."
7 November also saw 40 clubs take part the 7th inter club competition as part of the usual Fly 5K, which Havering AC won, with Cornwall AC second and St Albans AC in third place. The men’s winner was Kieran O’Hara (Havering AC, 16:48) and Lesley Locks (Aldershot, Farnham & District) was the women’s winner, taking her tenth Fly 5K victory with a great time of 17:54.
Fly 5K is free and anyone can take part joining via the Facebook group or by submitting their time on the event website. Run anywhere anytime from 8-12 on Saturday morning and submit your time by 1pm to be in the official results. Results and a race report are published the same day.
The event team is planning to have Christmas Day and New Year's Day Fly 5Ks in addition to the normal Saturday runs, and organisers are anticipating increased interest in the Fly 5K community over the festive season.
The success of Fly 5K is attributed to the regular Saturday morning format and the mutual support and participant interaction via social media. Fly 5k is also straightforward to take part. The arrival of Lockdown 2.0 appears to have given the Fly 5K format a further boost and it seems that this concept created to cope with our 2020 troubles will have a future in the post-COVID world.
Be part of the Fly 5K fun. Find out more at the event website.
Image courtesy Graham Smith (Fly 5K)
