City hosts successful Sport Relief event

By Paul Meehan & Andrew O'Brien, JMU Journalism TV

Hundreds of people gathered at the Echo Arena recently to do their bit for charity as the city hosted their stage of the Sainsbury's sponsored Sport Relief Mile.

More than 165,000 people in cities all over the UK took part in the event with around 1,500 of them dusting off their trainers for the Liverpool leg.

The events followed the live TV telethon on Friday night which saw a host of celebrities getting involved, including members of the Manchester United squad exercising with Gavin and Stacey’s larger than life Smithy character.

The events have raised an incredible £31,633,091 so far, a total which eclipses the £19.5m raised for Sport Relief two years ago. The biennial event helps make a great difference for millions of people leading really tough lives in both the UK and across the world’s poorest countries.

Some of the participants completed the circuit in fancy dress, with a camel and a troupe of dancing girls in attendance. Memorably a couple of the entrants, known on the day as 'The Two Johnnys', crawled the full mile dressed as turtles. After completing their arduous feat they said: “We wanted to do something different, something to stand out, different from the norm. It’s good to earn a bit of money for Sport Relief, so far we have raised about £600, which is great.”

Event organiser Bob Brimage, Liverpool City Council’s Running Development Officer said: “We were contacted two years ago by Sport Relief to organise one of this year’s major events, which were obviously happy to do. Anything that gets people up and doing a bit of exercise, especially for such a worthy cause, we are all for.”

As well as 2 single-mile races there was also a longer 3-6 mile event which catered to perhaps the more hardened of runners, but nevertheless still had a big emphasis on the fun element, as everyone who took part were in high spirits and fully enjoyed doing whatever they could for the great cause.

Liverpool’s Air Cadets, from the 90 Speke Squadron, were also there helping to hand out the water and goodie bags for the participants: “Everyone’s getting involved. You see kids as young as three running with their parents and they are just going for it, to help all those underprivileged people in the world, it’s brilliant to see.”

The day saw many different people of varying ages and abilities coming together to raise money for those in desperate need of help. The events proved to be a massive success nationwide. The money raised will be spent by Comic Relief.