Big is better for the largest one-day sports extravaganza in St. Albert.
The eighth edition of the Leading Edge Physiotherapy RunWild is gaining momentum towards finishing with 2,000 registrations for the May 6 road races.
“We’re looking for as many registrants as we can possibly get,” said Grant Fedoruk, founder and “biggest cheerleader” of the challenging, competitive and fun event with races designed for every level of runner and walker.
Registration closes April 29 at 11:59 a.m. at www.zone4.ca for the 21.1-kilometre half-marathon, 10-km walk/run, five-km walk/run and the 1.3-km WildOnes Kids MaraFun.
Visit www.runwild.ca for RunWild information.
“We’re on track to hit our goal. We always get the most registrations near the end,” Fedoruk said. “We’re prepared for more. If we go over we would be very delighted.”
Last year’s RunWild brought out the best in 204 finishers in the half-marathon, 194 in the 10-km walk/run, 305 in the five-km walk/run and 534 youths from pre-Kindergarten to Grade 6 participated in the MaraFun.
“A lot of these kids when we started this race are back now running our five and 10 K,” Fedoruk said. “It’s fostering that activity and perhaps a love of running and we want to continue that as well.”
RunWild is basically one big party for the participants, volunteers and the community to embrace.
“We’ve put a big emphasis on it being a family orientated event which I think obviously draws people back every year because we’ve tried to live up to that,” Fedoruk said. “We’ve also got two great charities involved that people really support. We’ve been able to raise awareness for the St. Albert Seniors Citizen Centre and the Zebra Child Protection Centre and the race has had an impact on these charities.
“So you combine all of that with a day outside and a beautiful community and we’ve got the recipe for this to keep growing every year and kind of maintain its popularity.
On top of that, we work hard to keep people aware of the event and make sure people know why we’re doing it.”
RunWild has raised more than $400,000 for the Zebra Centre and St. Albert Seniors Association and this year’s fundraising target is $100,000.
“We should really be celebrating that this race has had an impact on these charities,” Fedoruk said.
Everything is in place for this year’s RunWild to be the best of the best.
“We are full steam ahead and ready to go,” Fedoruk said. “The emphasis is making sure the experience for every runner is seamless and they have a great day out there.
“Our committee has been working very hard to kind of improve it this year even over from last year so there are a few changes but because we’ve been doing it so long any changes now we absorb very quickly," Fedoruk added. “It’s not necessarily about the organization, it’s about the experience and you can improve any experience and that’s exactly what we're going to do this year.”
The Victory Lane finish line will now funnel into the race village at Lions Park instead of the parking lot.
“That’s even more of an emphasis for all of us being together and celebrating everybody’s achievement,” said Fedoruk where the live entertainment, food, beer gardens and kids’ fun zone is located.
The start times have also changed for the 10 km at 8:50 a.m. and five km at 9 a.m. while the half-marathon remains the same at 8 a.m.
The start lines are in front of St. Albert Place on St. Anne Street.
The Marafun times are 11:30 a.m. (pre-Kindergarten, Kindergarten and Grade 1), 11:45 a.m. (Grades 2 and 3) and 12 noon (Grades 4 to 6) at the race village.
“With the race times changing a little bit, it allows the people that are involved in the five, 10 and half to finish in a period of time that has them coming into that race village where they will experience that whole event especially around the kids with the energy around the main stage and the music and all the activities that happens in there so we're really driving that community aspect.
“Of course there are tweaks to the program and so forth, otherwise it’s going to be as similar still as family orientated for everybody."
Medals will also be awarded to all the finishers in the five- and 10-km races and not just the half-marathoners as in previous RunWilds.
“We’re excited. It’s going to be a great day for the community,” Fedoruk said.
