The She Runs: Cardiff Summer Relay 03/07/2021
by Myfanwy Thomas
What an incredible day we had yesterday. The 3rd virtual relay held by She Runs: Cardiff was all set to be the biggest and best we’d ever had and it didn’t disappoint. Our 2 previous relays have been held exclusively within our group but this time we wanted to connect with the wider running community which is exactly what we did.
For relays one and two we supported Cardiff Women’s Aid and Huggard Homeless Centre as important charities local to us. This time we chose Kidney Wales because of a very personal connection to the cause. One of our own Running Buddies (our volunteers who help run the group), Rosie, donated one of her own kidneys to her best friend Zoe only 3 months ago. Kidney disease is incredibly debilitating and affects as many as 1 in 10 of us so it is something which has touched many of us. There are several members in our group affected by it themselves, or with relatives or friends affected by it.
We started with 8 teams from She Runs: Cardiff and added to that 19 other teams from around Wales, the UK and in fact the world! Our furthest flung team was ‘We Run Gaborone’, entered by The Gaborone Runner. If you don’t know, Gaborone is in Botswana! Which google tells me is 7,623 miles away. We also had entrants in Australia and Florida. It was truly a global event.
Here is our team list!
- WJEC
- Rondo Media
- Team Jelly Baby
- Ysgol Garth Olwg
- We Run Gaborone
- Not Fast, but Furious!
- The A-Team
- Team B-lue
- Count me In
- Not fast, but Fabulous!
- Team 2….Beat!
- Glorious in de Feet
- Reenie’s Runners
- We’ve Got the Runs
- Between a Walk and a Hard Pace
- Run on Irene
- Chafing the Dream
- #TeamBenchWatch
- CDF Runners
- Badass Mother Runners
- Just Run Penybont
- Dolly Mixtures
- Pegs
- Runk
- Team Reenie
- Ogmore Phoenix
- G C Fitgangers
The teams were arranged to cover 30 minutes slots, starting at 7am in the morning and ending at 7pm that night. The idea was to move continuously as a team and see just how far we could get! Some team members covered more than one slot with many keeping moving for 60 minutes or even 120!
The morning of the relay dawned and the weather (in Cardiff at least) was not great. But that did not dampen any spirits. We heard from Shathiso in Botswana that despite it being winter they had the opposite issue – it was too hot! But the threat of a hot & sweaty run did not deter any of their runners either. At 7am BST the first 27 runners & walkers were off.
And that was it. From 7am until 7pm and beyond that evening the buzz of the relay was phenomenal. The @sherunscardiff social media were going crazy with the hashtag #SRCSummerRelay & #RasGyfnewidMHRC trending (probably…!). The SRC social media team worked all day with hardly a pause (apart from running their own relay slots) and all the team captains were superstars encouraging their members to do their best and enjoy throughout the day. Each SRC team had a WhatsApp group, and I can tell you that by the end of the day some of them had over 600 messages in them!
From amongst our own club members there were some amazing participants who overcame many barriers to take part. Angela & Claire have only recently completed c25k and are embracing their new love of running. Gemma ran the furthest she’s ever ran by herself. Claire is only on week 3 of c25k but smashed out an amazing run despite a very difficult morning. Angharad tested positive for Covid on the morning but still completed her 30 mins on her treadmill at home. Deborah started off her team and was the biggest cheerleader for them all day. Laura was not feeling the love for a run on the morning but following her team mates encouragement went for a lovely run around Hendre Lake. The running community truly is inspiring.
So, the all important questions. How much did we raise and how far did we go?
At the time of writing our fundraising page had hit £6,323 for Kidney Wales. There’s still time to donate!
All 27 teams collectively covered a distance of 2,849 KM or 1,770 miles. How awesome is that? That’s as far as Greece! Just goes to show how important every single persons contribution to the distance was. Whether it was 1 mile or 5! And the teams that covered the most distance? In 1st we had ‘Tîm Ysgol Garth Olwg‘, followed by ‘Between a Walk and a Hard Pace‘ of She Runs: Cardiff , and in 3rd ‘Count Me In‘ of South Wales Running Community.
We even had a radio show dedicated to us! Huge thanks to Danny & Dave of The Sunrise Run. Listen again below:
Congratulations and a huge huge thank you to everyone that took part, you truly were part of something special.
Our next relay will be at Christmas time – we can’t wait!
She Runs: Cardiff - Mae Hi'n Rhedeg: Caerdydd 
This was such a special event to be a part of. We loved every minute and as always it shows just how powerful the running community is!
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I came over here from Shathiso’s blog – what a wonderful achievement and a lovely blog post to read!
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