Rarotonga’s week of running

Here are some video highlights of Rarotonga’s week of running, one of the Cook Islands’ popular international sporting occasions.
This video includes footage from all five events.
It started with a fun run on Thursday evening although many of the runners didn’t arrive until the early hours of Friday morning because of an eight hour delay in Auckland (I was told that Air NZ had to bring in a replacement plane from Australia).
The big one, the Round Rarotonga Road Race (for runners and walkers), began at 5.30am on Saturday with times ranging from just over 2 hours to just over 6.
Monday’s Hash House Birthday Bash was another fun affair – the after-run party was the main attraction; Tuesday’s round the rock relay attracted a lot of school teams this year as well as the regular runners; and nearly 50 people took part in the final race, the nutters coast-to-coast.
Incidentally, it’s called the nutters run because it used to be sponsored by a peanut company. The name stuck even though the sponsor didn’t. It’s definitely appropriate for people who travel across the middle of the island on a muddy, tree-root-covered track as fast as they can just for the hell of it!