European Athletics President Svein Arne Hansen attended the Royal Run in Copenhagen on Monday (21) which saw nearly 64,000 people take part in events across the programme.
One of the 25,000 people taking part in the Royal Run in the Danish capital was Crown Prince Frederik of Denmark who was celebrating his 50th birthday. The Crown Prince, a keen runner and an ardent healthy lifestyle advocate, took part in five races across Denmark on the same day, including the 10km in Copenhagen. He was also the official race starter for the Nordic 10km Championships which was held in conjunction with the Royal Run.
Among the many spectators in Copenhagen was European Athletics President, Svein Arne Hansen who lavished rich praise on the event organisers. “On Saturday I witnessed a great staging of the European 10,000m Cup in London. Now coming to Copenhagen to see a mass participation race and a royal run, it’s just fantastic. To me, right now, Denmark is Europe’s best organiser of mass participation races. I really hope that this success in coming years also will have an influence on Denmark’s performance in international athletics,” he said.
Proud to present the medal to the Crown Prince of at tonight’s Royal Run in Copenhagen with 70,000 participants! Leading by a great example.... pic.twitter.com/l8AMFGg403
— Svein Arne Hansen (@SvenPres) May 21, 2018
More than 25,000 people signed up for the 10km distance in Copenhagen, making the Royal Run the country’s largest ever 10km. Counting all five cities, more than 42,000 participants registered for the event. A one mile road race was also held as part of the programme which had the distinction of being the world’s largest ever road mile, even surpassing the famous Fifth Avenue Mile in New York.
“We have an ambition of becoming the world’s most active nation. We are extremely pleased that Royal Run has managed to attract new groups of runners. Twenty nine percent of the mile runners and 10 percent of the 10km runners had never entered a running event before. Today, they are here to run and celebrate the Crown Prince. This is extremely positive. We are very satisfied with being able to motivate more Danes towards an active lifestyle with events such as these,” said Jakob Larsen, director of the Danish Athletic Federation.
The Royal Run also succeeded in targeting a new segment of the Danes. On average, every sixth participant had never taken part in a running event before, thus embracing the first-timers and the elite athletes in this unique event.
The ‘Royal Run’ is associated with the “Move for Life” initiative, aimed at increasing the already record high activity level of the Danish population. The objective of “Move for Life” is to increase the number of Danes actively engaged in sports to 600,000 people by 2025, a goal that the Crown Prince fully supports.