News & Updates

TempoFit founder Hayden Shearman is the helping drive the Athletics NZ Virtual Race Series, which encourages New Zealander’s to stay fit and active during Covid-19 restrictions. We chat to Hayden to find out more about the innovative project, which will form the heartbeat of the Athletics NZ competitive running programme in the forthcoming weeks.

What was the genesis to the Virtual running series?

It really came about during the week when the New Zealand government started closing down mass gatherings (because of the Covid-19 outbreak), forcing the postponement and cancellation of many events. At that stage, it was becoming increasingly inevitable that Kiwis would be heading into a level four lockdown but my worry was that this could lead to major health concerns for the nation, not only physically but also for mental health. TempoFit had very much moved to a virtual mode since late-2017. Six months ago, I started a podcast called Workout of the Week, so I thought just before lockdown that this would be an appropriate time to apply the principles I’d learned, to help set up the Virtual running series.

I spoke to Athletics NZ about this and realised our thoughts were aligned. The lockdown meant the athletics clubs could not operate, so this made it the ideal time to launch Virtual running. The goal is to get Kiwis active during lockdown, not only those associated with the clubs but those beyond the traditional Harrier community.

What have been some of the challenges to getting the series up and running?

We only started putting this together in late-March and time has been a blur. The biggest challenge has been the rapid speed with which we moved to an alert level four. We initially spoke about running cross country events with rolling starts to ensure runners were abiding by physical distancing. However, as soon as we went to a level three and then to a level four status and mass gatherings were banned this became impossible. The biggest challenge was adapting our plans around the new regulations. We had to make sure people were not flouting the regulations and we’ve had to change and tweak our plans accordingly – making sure, as the running community, we’re playing our part to tackle Covid-19.

How is the series structured?

First of all, it’s free for anyone to join—you don’t need to be a current Athletics NZ member and you can choose a club to run for. We’ve divided the next three months into different blocks. The Virtual 5K Champs will be the focus from April 13 to May 3 (three weeks) where participants will be asked to submit up to three 5k runs, from home and in the neighbourhood.

We then switch to the Ekiden Relay (all of May), which is entirely a team competition. You run and submit your results individually for either 10k or 12.2k and then we work out what club has the fastest combined marathon time, with two women and two men scoring for each age group. Clubs will need to coordinate their members to submit times to ensure they get their best teams scoring. We hope the competition will create the same momentum and excitement as the club road relays – with the same level of inter-club banter!

In June we move on to the Virtual 10K and 1K Champs. The 1km event will perhaps suit participants from other team sports, looking to work on their speed endurance. As you may also have seen, we have also recently run a Virtual Mountain series event whereby we logged vertical metres gained throughout your training week – and we’ll let you know whether that is equivalent to Mt Cook, Mt Ruapehu or even Mt Eden!

How can you post a time?

You can submit a time one of three ways. Either via a Strava file, a GPS file or manually. You can even run on a treadmill – although that won’t count towards official podium positions. If you want to qualify for a top three spot you need to log the time on your watch and phone and head out to the local neighbourhood. We need to underscore that while level four restrictions are on – this is a “run from home” challenge.

How does the Virtual 5K Champs work?

Each participant posts three runs across a three-week period. The fastest time of the three counts for your competition time. Each run earns a point for your club in the participation-based Top Club competition so don’t forget to log all three runs, no matter how pedestrian they may be. The fastest times will determine the individual Virtual 5km Champs title and Fastest Club competition. A full range of age groups from men’s and women’s U18 to men’s and women’s to Masters 65+ will contest for titles.

How does the competition take into consideration the huge disparity in course types?

To record an official time the net drop cannot be more than 5m per kilometre. Although to gain a podium position it needs to be on either an out-and-back course or looped course. It may be a challenge for some to find a flat course and some might need to get a little creative, although we want all entrants to strictly adhere to the current government guidelines.

We don’t expect entrants to run a personal best because the courses many of entrants will be running on are far from ideal and these are not official national championships. It’s also important to run well within yourself for safety concerns. We want to encourage a nice, friendly competition which gives runners something to look forward to rather than just going to the supermarket once a week!

How many people have signed up so far?

At last check we’ve got around 600 members on our Strava group which is very encouraging. I’d ask anyone to jump in and be part of the community. We’ve had top Kiwi runners, Josh Maisey, Mel Aitken and Dave Ridley join, so it is a great way to see how those at the pointy end are keeping on top of their training during lockdown.

What are your hopes/aspirations for the series?

The dream scenario would be for not only the core running/cross country community to come on board but also for every committed member of the series to encourage two additional people to compete in the series – whether that be wives, husbands, partners, flat-mates or teenage kids.

More details of the Athletics NZ Virtual Race Series can be found here: https://athletics.org.nz/Virtual