Saba’s biggest run, back for its 9th edition. Five kilometers through The Bottom on a looping course, open to anyone who turns up: runners, walkers, children, and at least one dog.
The first edition was meant for about thirty-five people. Ninety turned up. By the third, in November 2021, there were 215 on the road, which is over ten per cent of everyone living on Saba, and the youngest finisher was six while the oldest was seventy-six. The course that year ran two laps from Saba Electric out towards Well’s Bay and back through The Bottom, finishing at the Bizzy B bakery, with the children and a few adults doing a single 2.5 km lap.
It has run every year since, twice in some years, and it has grown into three distances on the same morning. The eighth, in November 2025, put 178 people on the road: 113 over the 5K, 33 over the 2.5K and 32 children over 800 meters.
The 5K and the 2.5K go first. The children run afterwards, over 800 meters, split into a few age groups. The kids’ run started in 2023 and 34 turned up for it straight away, and that number has held steady and is creeping up since. Part of the reason it looks flat is the nicest kind of problem: children who did the kids’ run once come back the next year wanting something longer, and turn up on the 2.5K or the 5K instead. For most of them it is the first race they have ever run, and there is no better morning to start: the whole village is out, nobody is timing them against anyone but themselves, and the finish line has a bakery behind it. If you want your child moving, this is the one to put them in.
The real recorded course, on a real map. Two laps, and yes, the hill counts twice.
Nothing brutal, but nothing flat either. The same rises come round more than once.