Dundalk IT junior parkrun celebrates its 1st birthday on Sunday.

Sunday the 21st of August at 9:30am in DKIT College the sports pitches there will be in full celebratory mode for junior parkrun’s first anniversary. Planning started in January 2020 with the support and help of Louth Sports partnership and parkrun Ireland, but it was not until the 18th of August 2021 the core group finally welcomed children from 4-14 years old to attend the first inaugural junior parkrun in Co Louth. Junior parkrun is a free, fun, and friendly family event every Sunday morning. Children as far as Monaghan and Kilbroney have travelled to attend regularly, as junior parkruns in the country become more widespread. There have also been parkrun tourists from children originating from all parts of the country, Wales, England and even Australia. Families on holidays or visiting family and friends, expanding their parkrun tourism, experiencing different courses and locations.

In the past 50 Sundays junior parkrun has taken place, there has been an average of 29 children weekly, with 256 children attend to date. They have run, jogged, walked, or skipped 2928kms which is the Distance from Dundalk to South of Greece. Junior parkrun is run by a volunteer core group with support of parents, grandparents, and other members of the parkrun community volunteering weekly to help marshal, distribute finish tokens, scan barcode or time keeping. There has been a total of 87 volunteers so far and their help has been vital to keep the event going and very much appreciated.

If you would like your children to attend simple register at www.parkrun.ie/register/ print or save the scannable barcode on your phone and take this every time you attend a parkrun anywhere in the world. An incentive for children to participate regularly is the milestone wristbands when they achieve half, full or ultra-marathon distance. There is a fun warm up routine before the start and the whole aim of junior parkrun is to provide a free, fun, and active event weekly for all the family with parents and guardians walking and running with their kids.

We welcome everyone to register and attend especially on 21st for our anniversary, we have special guests attending and will have refreshments after. If you have any queries, contact us at dundalkitjuiors@parkrun.com or find us on Facebook Page