Kids’ Run­ning in the News

As an advo­cate of run­ning and fam­ily fit­ness, I’m con­stantly scan­ning the news feeds for fam­ily friendly run­ning news. Here are two news­wor­thy items that I thought were worth sharing.

No run­ning in Mrs. Obama’s plan?

I, along with the rest of the fit­ness com­mu­nity I’m sure, applaud our First Lady’s com­mit­ment to fight­ing youth obe­sity. This is an epi­demic in our coun­try which has long been ignored and it’s won­der­ful to see it get­ting some seri­ous atten­tion. But is it miss­ing some­thing? Don­ald Buraglio and Mike Dove of mon​tereyrun​ninglife​.com point out in The Her­ald Mon­terey County that she has neglected to include running:

Maybe we’re para­noid, but we’ll put this one out there … we’re a bit offended that the Sur­geon General’s “Vision for a Healthy and Fit Nation 2010″ says chil­dren should have 60 min­utes a day of vig­or­ous exer­cise but doesn’t men­tion run­ning. Included in the activ­ity exam­ples are soft­ball, rac­quet­ball, kayak­ing (Really? In inner cities?), skat­ing, mall walk­ing, and wash­ing the car, but some­how run­ning didn’t make the list.

I couldn’t agree more!

See, here’s the thing: run­ning is the sim­plest, cheap­est, most acces­si­ble and most effec­tive means of exer­cise there is. Although we risk offend­ing the kayak­ing or shuf­fle­board lob­bies by say­ing so, we feel our sport deserves a much higher pro­file in fit­ness programs.

It’s almost hard to imag­ing kids at play out­doors with­out run­ning. Run­ning has always been a core activ­ity of children’s play­time, and as such should be a vital part of any children’s fit­ness ini­tia­tive. Thank you Don­ald and Mike for point­ing out this flaw in the program!

So what should we do about it? I think we should let the First Lady know how we feel. Unfor­tu­nately the blog on letsmove​.gov does not have a com­ments sec­tion, but they also have a Face­book page. So go ahead and post a com­ment on their wall! Let’s not let run­ning get overlooked.

Cops and Kids

Is it pos­si­ble for a par­ent to ever be excited about hav­ing their own chil­dren chased by cops? It is if it’s dur­ing the Spring Train­ing Clas­sic 10K Cops-​​n-​​Kids Fun Run in Jupiter, Florida!

The run takes place on March 5^th, 2010 and fin­ishes at home plate in Roger Dean Sta­dium with the kids being led by a police motor­cy­cle and accom­pa­nied (chased?) by offi­cers. Addi­tion­ally, there will be a Mobile Com­mand Vehi­cle, a SWAT team, and K9 offi­cers avail­able for instruc­tional tours.

What a great way to pro­mote fam­ily fit­ness and pub­lic safety, while intro­duc­ing our neigh­bor­hood heroes — police — to kids in a friendly envi­ron­ment. Kudos to the towns of Aba­coa and Jupiter for this fab­u­lous event! I hope it serves as an inspi­ra­tion to towns and com­mu­ni­ties across the country.

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