– The delivery of Beat the Street is funded by the National Charity Partnership — a collaboration between Diabetes UK, the British Heart Foundation (BHF) and Tesco —
Together, the community of Sandwell has travelled more than 100,900.5 miles in seven weeks playing Beat the Street, the walking and cycling challenge.
The competition ended at midnight on the 13th April with more than 22,000 local people taken part and All Saints C of E Primary School winning the overall points leaderboard. They will win £1000 worth of Decathlon vouchers.
Second and third placed teams were St Mary Magdalene C of E Voluntary Controlled Primary School who will win £500 worth of sports vouchers and Ocker Hill Academy who will win £250 worth of vouchers.
On the average points leaderboard, Options for Life were the victors and will also win £1000 worth of vouchers. Ocker Hill wins a further £500 for second place on this leaderboard and St Mary Magdalene wins a further £250 vouchers for third place.
Options for Life team member Deborah Pillow said the competition had been hugely enjoyable and that she had personally clocked up 350 miles on foot. She said: “It is great for setting goals for health. I think it is human nature to naturally want to beat what you did before so we have gradually increased our activity. We easily achieve three hour walks now whereas before we were quite a sedentary couple.
“We have been walking for ‘Options for Life’, I really want them to benefit from winning as they are a small charity that support adults with learning disability. This is the driver that gets us out for hours but having said that we have found the benefits to our health are incentive enough.”
The Beat the Street campaign was funded by the National Charity Partnership with the aim of promoting healthier lifestyles for people of all ages. Sandwell is one of six areas where the National Charity Partnership is funding the programme as part of their commitment to helping support 40,000 families in areas most at need across the UK to get active and reduce their risk of Type 2 diabetes and heart and circulatory disease. Supporting these areas is part of the Partnership’s ‘Let’s Do This’ campaign which aims to inspire millions of people to take small and achievable steps to a healthier life.
Jenna Hall, Programme Director for the National Charity Partnership, said: “Congratulations to each and every person who has taken part in Beat the Street.
“Being inactive can lead to a multitude of health problems for children, including an increased risk of developing Type 2 diabetes and heart disease in later life. It has also been associated with concentration and behavioural issues in the past. The benefits of physical activity outside of the classroom and within the community are vast. Walking just half an hour a day will improve health, quality of life and wellbeing so we’d urge you to continue the good work you’ve started beyond the end of the Beat the Street competition.”
The National Charity Partnership between Diabetes UK, BHF and Tesco was announced in 2015. Its aim is to help save lives, by helping millions of people to eat better and get active. This will help reduce people’s risk of cardiovascular disease and Type 2 diabetes, both of which are largely preventable through healthy lifestyle choices. Through the money raised by Tesco colleagues, the partnership will deliver a variety of preventative and informative initiatives like Beat the Street.
