Every Sunday morning children gear up in running clothes and head to Nunsuch Park for a weekly junior Parkrun.
EYES UK has been encouraging children and parents to take part in weekly Parkrun and have seen huge increase in participation. Initially , it used to be a drag and parents were finding difficult to motivate children to get up early on Sunday morning and take up running .
Its cold , I am tired , I don't like it used to usual excuses and it was easy for parents to get demotivated . Now its a different story. They know there will be friends. They are happy to get up and run every week .
To keep this spirit going ,In 2019, EYES UK launched a GIFT (Get Involved in Fitness Training) initiative to encourage children and parents to get involved in physical fitness training together . Under this initiative, EYESUK is partnering with local sports clubs, leisure centres, gyms and sport coaches to organise group sport coaching and events throughout the year.
As one of the first initiative this year, we have partnered with RWM (running with Matt) to provide six weeks running coaching to our parents and children. Matthew Jiggins from RWM will be coaching children and parents with best practices of running - how to warm up , stretch, pace etc.
Matt has a message for EYES UK :
‘I personally am delighted and extremely proud to be working with this wonderful community and supporting this within the borough of Sutton. This initiative is simply fantastic and I know with a healthy working relationship with EYES UK. I am looking forward to our partnership and further initiatives to blossom.’
We will provide further update on how we progressed with our sessions and experiences.