Berlin Braves Presents: Days of Thunder x Hood Laps

Berlin Marathon Weekend, 2018

As a both a running team captain and Creative Producer for the Berlin Braves, a community sports club based in Kreuzberg, a big part of my job was increasing our presence within Berlin’s urban sports scene. To  activate the youth community in Berlin and introduce urban sports to a younger demographic. The ‘Days of Thunder’, our special spin on the 2018 Berlin Marathon weekend, would be our latest initiative. 

Every year, we organise and host a myriad of events for the Berlin Marathon weekend with support from Nike. We invite running crews from every corner of the earth to join us for a weekend of social activity, creativity and athletics. We do this as part of the greater Bridge The Gap movement - an initiative that connects running crews cities all over the world - and by hosting events like this year’s Days Of Thunder weekend. My involvement with these weekends is that of a project manager, as well as producer of any video content that we create in tandem with these events.

Hood Laps

Earlier this year, we activated a group of 40 kids (ages of 16 and 24) from various communities around Berlin and trained them for 8 weeks, leading up to our annual ‘Homies Half’ - the Berlin Half-Marathon weekend - which takes place in April. We called it The Journey, and it was a HUGE success (as well as a whole lot of fun).

Since then, most of the kids we recruited have stayed on board and become active members of the Braves running team and creative family. For this year’s full marathon, we knew that we’d had to do something unique to make running more accessible, as well as more exciting for more young people. Getting a group of kids (or anyone, for that matter) to get excited about running 42 kilometres is no easy task. 

We wanted to do something local, something fast, and something in the spirit of the Berlin Marathon weekend. We played around with hosting a relay race in the neighbourhood where our headquarters are located, experimenting with different possible routes, distances and obstacles. After testing the logistics, getting the proper licenses and gathering support from the neighbourhood, we went ahead with the idea and put things in motion. We called it ‘Hood Laps’.

3…2…1… GO

On the day of the race, we had 16 teams composed of 5 runners each - all between the ages 16 and 24. Our ideal target audience. We’d mapped out a route through the neighbourhood that was exactly 400 meters long, with enough open space and straight aways to ensure a fast, fun, but also 100% safe race. We organised a flea market, music, drinks and catering to set the backdrop for the race, and to get the surrounding community involved in what we were doing. Suddenly we had a huge crowd, and people who’d probably never cared about running in their life were dancing, singing and cheering for all of our young athletes.

The entire event was a great success. So much so that ‘Hood Laps’ is now annually supported event by Nike Berlin. This past September, the Berlin Braves hosted the event for their second year, doubling the crowds and number of participants from the previous year.

For more information about the Berlin Braves and our community initiatives, check out this article from our neighbours at Highsnobiety. For more Braves content and info about upcoming events and activations, find us on Vimeo and on Instagram, @berlinbraves.