photos and other things…
Time again for Aucklands annual Round the Bay’s fun run/race, our biggest annual run the country holds. A nice calm morning made for a scenic walk to the start (and warm weather for the run)
Today marked Auckland’s Round The Bays fun run – NZ’s biggest participant run. Unfortunately a recent bug left me not feeling up to competing this year (I think my first non-participate in 7 years!). However, I went down to watch the start all the same.
First off, just before the gun is the wheelchair participants. Then at the sound of the gun about 35,000 people take off for the 8.4km waterfront journey.
Below is a series of images shot to show the ‘mob’ of people approaching like the tide coming in. I then wandered down, took some closer shots, and then again went up the hill to look again. The final shot, with people still just crossing the start line was a good 15-20min after the start gun!
A bit of a montage for todays shot at Auckland Round the Bays fun run. All shot on the Samsung Galaxy s2 using the Vignette app, I combined in Gimp to show the beginning, middle and end of the 8.4km run that goes from Auckland’s CBD to St Heliers park.
As it has been most days, the weather was hot this morning! With a relatively late 9.30am start time, the sun was right up and beating down on the waiting crowd. with ~70,000 total runners, if one is not near the start line (as I was) when the race begins, you can take an additional quarter of an hour to just make it there. Weaving in and out of runners and walkers, it takes over half the race (unless you are fast) to feel like you have enough room to keep at a constant pace. Whilst some of these points potentially make it sound less than ‘fun’, Round the Bays is a great run, and all money goes to some great charities. All said and done, I’ll be back again next year, as I have been for several years running.
MikeHawkey.com 