Hickman County Elementary and Middle School students and parent volunteers prior to the Chicken Fest 5K. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website, obesity still remains at about 17% among our nation’s young people ranging in ages 2-19 years even though the rate of obesity in 2-5 year olds has been on a downward slope. 

This is the second year for this program because the local support and interest in this program had grown tremendously. The Hickman County ANR, FCS and 4-H Agents teamed up to form our second Ready Set Run Club. Ready Set Run is more than just running, it’s a character building program that targets youth ages 8-13, or (3^rd-8^th grades) to participate in a 5K run. The club met twice a week, Tuesdays and Thursdays, after school for a duration of 13 weeks. During this time youth are being equipped with physical training and goal-setting mentality to accomplish their personal running goals. Issues such as growing confidence and self-esteem, respecting authority and dealing with peer pressure are just a few topics covered. Proper nutrition is also covered to help kids understand that all aspects combined can create a healthier person. 

Because of the high number of youth and differences in each youth, each agent, 3 consistent teen leaders and four parents attending each time to help with our youth “runners” as they all run at different paces. We were able to obtain one of our local banks as a sponsor.

This year our program grew form our twenty eight students last year to forty four students this year. Several youth were returnees and we also extended this to the 8^th grade. Students walked/ran a total of 1, 088 miles. Participants overall increased their timed run/walk pace by an average of 2.7 minutes for a timed mile.  

Parents responded with comments after the program:

“My son came home and said ‘You know Mom, the Ready Set Run Club is helping me in gym class because this is the first time I’ve been able to run laps with my class without stopping.’ Thank you guys for building his confidence and self-esteem. He is so proud of himself.”

“My child loved the run club. It motivated her to make sure she is active every day. She said she felt so good afterwards knowing she run so many miles.”

“In the beginning he didn’t want to do it. After the last week or two he really enjoyed running and started looking forward to it. He has now set a daily goal that he created himself on how many steps he wants to set in a day. Definitely a positive experience, thank you.”

Because of the success of this program, we look to continue Ready, Set, Run in the future.