BORN2RUN events kicked off their award-winning RUN FOREST RUN series on Saturday last with the opening race in the series taking place at Minnowburn.
A record number of runners turned up at The Mary Peters Track with over 800 partcipants keen to get their winter running season kicked off.
Weather conditions were perfect for the event which is part of the award-winning series that picked up the Silver prize at The Running Awards in London’s O2 Arena earlier this year.
Many of the runners taking part had travelled quite a distance with one visitor attending from Michigan in the US and another who travelled from Germany to take part both raving about the beauty of the setting.
The 10K was won by Kent Swan of North Belfast Harriers, followed by Queen’s University AC’s Vincent McKenna and completing the trio on the men’s podium was Colm McGarry of Belfast Running club.
In the women’s race it was Amy Bulman who took the top spot followed by Cathy McCourt in second and City of Lisburn AC’s Judith Lonnen in third.
The 5K winner was Kelly Neely who was thrilled to have beaten all the competing men to take the top spot. The top three men were Mark Harvey of Belfast running club, Scrabo strider Jared Martin (second) and Steve Briggs also of Belfast Running Club in third place.
Jodie McMullan of Markethill High School was the runner-up in the ladies' 5K and Heather McLarnon of Lisburn AC came 3rd.
The next race in the series takes place on November 18 at Drum Manor in Co. Tyrone. You don’t have to have taken part in the first race to do the second one as runners can pick and choose which races in the series appeal to them.
All runners receive a beautiful commemorative medal and runners who complete six of the eight races in the series also receive a special edition t-shirt.
For more information go to www.born2runevents.com
