The was a tremendous atmosphere in Galway this Saturday for the inaugural Spar Mile Challenge, organised in conjuction with the Athletics Association of Ireland. The citizens of Galway had been invited to the Dangan track to take on the challenge of running, jogging or walking four laps of the track and they responded with enthusiasm and in great numbers. Participants were blessed with beautiful summer weather on the day and Paul McNamara, regional development officer for the AAI , acted as host on the day. People had travelled from all over the county to take part with particularly strong groups from Craughwell and Tuam present. It was a day to enjoy the weather, stretch the legs and enjoy life.

Races were run regularly throughout the day, starting shortly after 11:00am and continuing at regular intervals until the last race at 2:45pm. The crowd was entertained through by MC Gary Thornton of GCH. Volunteers from all the Galway Clubs were there to assis with entries timekeeping and all of the other tasks that made sure the day was a great success.

The support of Spar was a huge beeost to the event and the professional touch allowed by their financial assistance was obvious and welcome. Well done Spar!!

Results will be posted at www.sparmilechallenge.com

Photos from the Galway event are available on this site at http://www.athenryac.com/image-galleries/spar-mile-challenge-2007

NB. We've had to downsize the photographs here so that they don't take up a ton of space on our server but if anyone would like the high-quality version of any of there just email me at [email protected] and we'll be happy to email back the larger photograph. There's some classics in there :-)