Run For Health

Project’s specific objectives

The project’s objectives have been set as follow:

• To investigate the impact of running events on:

1. Individuals’ physical activity levels before and after participation in a running event;
2. Participants’ well-being and engagement in an active life style;
3. Social welfare, as measured by socialization, community pride, and social cohesion.

• To measure participants’ motivation, attitudes and expectations for participating in running events, in relation to health-enhancement physical activity promotion and retention. These data are necessary for organizers in order to design the events in a way to fit participants’ expectations, as it has been proposed by Alexandris et al. (2017).
• To study event-related factors which influence participants’ experience when participating in such events, and in relation to health-enhancing physical activity participation after the events. These factors will be categorized as core ones (e.g., operational asepcts such as race itself, support units, etc.) and peripheral ones (e.g., socials, accompanied events, games etc). The service quality model proposed by Alexandris et al., (2017) will be used as a base.
• To study indicative examples of successful European running events in order to identify the key factors for maximizing the health, social, and economic benefits.
• To develop a proposal (management plan) with the best practices for promoting health-enhacning physical activity through running events and maximizing the health, social, and economic benefits of running events. These guidelines will benefit event organizers (local, regional, government level, sport federations, sport clubs and private associations) and will be related to event planning, operations, marketing and communication. The guidelines will also be used as educational material for university students, who study sport / event management.
• To develop policy recommendations for authorities, federations and associations which are involved in sport and health policy formulation (local, regional and government level) in order to address the role of running events in promoting health-enhancing physical activity and social welfare.
• To stimulate the development of national and international networks among sport event organizers and authorities for exchanging knowledge and disseminating good practices for organizing successful running events.
• To propose strategies for promoting running events among the public (citizens) in order to motivate them to participate in such events.