Round the Bays fun: meet Team Brexit

Last year Sinead Loughnane drank coffee in a Kohimarama cafe before taking photos of her husband and his friends crossing the finish line at the Ports of Auckland Round the Bays fun run.

Simon Loughnane, Sinead’s husband, and his friend Ian Benet ran with almost no training.

This year there will be no relaxation or lack of preparation.

Instead, alongside spa therapist Esther Laverick, they’ll be running the race after six weeks of intense training together as Team Brexit.

Fairfax Media, publisher of Stuff.co.nz, is providing Team Brexit with a membership to the Tepid Baths gym, pool and running club to help them on their journey.

Three years ago Simon, a project manager, and Sinead, an accountant, moved to Auckland from Bedfordshire ’’the furthest point from the sea in the United Kingdom’’ with a 12 month visa and couldn’t help but stay on.

Ian, who works in public relations, went to school in the UK with Simon and got in contact when he decided to move over two and a half years ago.

We’ll be following Team Brexit over the next six weeks tracking their progress as they train for glory.

‘‘We’re coming at this from the preventative angle, if we were still in the United Kingdom we’d all be fat,’’ Simon said.

While Team Brexit are all active, they’re not natural runners and are wanting to improve how they run.

‘‘We want to learn running techniques, breathing exercises and strategies to run a successful race,’’ Ian said.

Each week they’ll have the opportunity to attend a 6am running club from Monday to Wednesday and personal training on Thursday evenings.

Sinead has been running once or twice a week now for the last six months in a slow building preparation, but she has rarely run more than 5 kilometres.

Simon and Ian ran the race in 40 minutes last year after doing almost no training and the main goal is to beat that time.

‘‘We’re doing it for the Brits abroad proving you definitely don’t need to be in Europe to have a great lifestyle.’’

Round the Bays is an 8.4km flat course from the Auckland CBD to St Heliers Bay.

Visit roundthebays.co.nz to register for the 2017 Port of Auckland Round the Bays on March 5.