I am the last person that anyone would ever think would be talking about a love of running. Up to the Covid Lockdowns I was focused on my art and exhibitions and really nothing else. Running was the last thing on my mind, ever. Sure, like everyone else I had the odd medal from sports days back from childhood. But, since that age, I never really took any notice of sport, especially athletics. My childhood, from primary school, was taken up with exams, poetry, art and drama clubs.
But then came Covid and the Lockdown. Everything was shut. No work, no events and a 5km radius imposed on movement. I spent my time micro-volunteering for social media tasks online.
Then I discovered Virtual Running. I remember the moment vividly. I went to my PC and typed in ‘activities within 5Km’. Up popped Virtual Running. As there was nothing else to do, I clicked on a few links, and it opened a whole new world of activity.
The way virtual sports work is first you find an event you want to participate in, then you register for it. You do the run in your own time, record the time on your pedometer or phone app and submit the evidence to the event page. For some events you can even register to receive a finishers medal or T-Shirt.
The time of the first Lockdown was difficult, but the weather was beautiful and there was practically zero traffic (every runner’s dream ). I can remember making my runs around Barna at the time.
This was quite a novelty, as pre and post Lockdown the Barna road is almost impossible to cross or navigate with the heavy traffic. Also, during the pandemic, there was an unusual system for navigating pathways. I think people made it up themselves as I never saw any guidelines on it. If you met someone on the path each person would try to move about a meter sideways to keep their distance, so that was an added challenge.
During this period a lot of sports organizations were feeling the pinch of the lockdown too. They couldn’t hold athletics events in a single location. So, they had virtual running events.
I entered the Athletics Ireland Virtual 5Km. I did my 5km and then sent in my results and that’s what started it all. Then I noticed a lot of other virtual runs going on with different athletics clubs around the country. Even Connacht Rugby had a Virtual ‘for the love of the club’ 5km.
Of course, a lot of these virtual events were one off, but there is no shortage of different organizations holding virtual races. I noticed that there were some Irish themed races online, such as a St Patrick’s Day race and Hibernia races too. It was nice to run with an Irish theme in mind. All the races at this point were still about 5km each.
Tourist spots
Later, I discovered the international ones. Some races will pick a famous tourist spot such as the Inca trail or the Pyramids. They usually have an online map that tracks your progress, and you can use their tracking page on their website to drop in and see the sites.
Yes, I did the Pyramid one, it was interesting and a little educational too. There are also races that run alongside actual marathons. Luckily, by the time I was entering longer races, the Covid restrictions were easing.
Of course, after going through the learning curve above, the Lockdown was over, and I was back to work. However, I was doing 10km and sometimes Marathon level runs. The Marathon would be clocked up over a few days though but with virtual races you can do some of them in your own time.
There are also a lot of charity and novelty races too. I did a run for Aware and a Permanent TSB ones for charity. I had to do those on specific days and all in one go. So, it was a bit more challenging.
Some organizations in Ireland still do virtual runs for charity and Athletics Ireland still do an annual virtual run. (Which I have already registered for ).
I honestly believed that my interest in virtual running would disappear as soon as normality came back, but I still run today. I think it’s the challenge of having a specific distance to run and I find it rewarding to complete the run itself. When you watch the Olympics, they can be inspiring, but they give the impression that winning at athletics is everything.
And to be honest, that’s probably why I wasn’t that interested in sports to begin with, because you had to beat people and it seemed very competitive. But I have learnt through my own experience, that it is not always about winning.
Sport and athletics can be about the event itself and completing the task. Running can be personally rewarding, finishing a challenge is a great feeling.
You can track John’s running (and still some art ) through his social media: https://linktr.ee/dr.johnjennings
