runners

The twins were in a marathon club at school again this year.  The club meets for 25 weeks and ends in early March with a big race day.  Each week, the kids gather after school to run or walk a mile together.  This year, they added a 50 Mile Club and a 100 Mile Club for kids who are more ambitious.  Turns out, when you factor in Disney,  the days that we would take a walk at home, as well as the days at recess when the kids and their friends walk the track to catch up... both kids logged about 60 miles over the 25 weeks.  

March 1st was the day of the big race.  This is a big deal for the school.  They hold a 5K, a 10K, a 1 Mile Race and then the 1 Mile Fun Run for the kids.  The race started several years ago to honor a little boy that our school lost to cancer.  His mother is a special needs aide in the school.  I stood with her and a couple other school people as the first race began and together we cheered the runners on.  I was volunteering with my camera as well.  I was actually pretty proud of my images for the morning.  A friend of mine from the camera club who lives on the race route helped me at the starting line, but then she headed home  to capture runners as they passed her home.  I wasn't able to capture all the runners finishing, but got a good deal of them before I had to head over to the field where the kids were warming up for the Fun Run!

How about a couple photos?
Starting the race!  10K runners took off first.....

The PE teacher ran the 5K race in that outfit because she is that cool!  There was recognition and some prize (although i don't know what it was) for any child who beat her in the race!  The Superintendent of Schools ran as well and there was a prize for any teacher who beat him.  Carl's speech therapist beat him!

 Our kindergarten teacher!

 A Brownie friend and her dad ran together!

The guy in the yellow shirt warms the crowd up every year.  

 Stretch.

 Get movin'.

Time for a quick pose with Carl's best friend, their teacher and another wonderful teacher.

 Ready?  Set?  GO!

 He is flying!

 She waved at me each time she passed me.

 Another dear friend and her dad!

They didn't run the whole thing.  Gee, can you tell they are twins?  

 But, Carl did pick up the pace as he was closing in on the end...

 We have the most awesome PE teacher!

 More super teachers!!

So, after the races, they had a sort of long awards process for the runners.  The last thing was to award the kids their prizes.  Chick-fil-A was there serving biscuits, bananas, coffee and water all morning.  After the awards, we all grabbed a biscuit and headed out.  We had to get home quickly to change our clothes and head up to Raleigh for.......    Lego Kids Fest!!!!   so, check for the next post about that!!!