Red Deer has proven to be one of the most active communities in Canada over the past couple years.
In 2022, the City of Red Deer won the national ParticiPACTION Community Challenge, which is a program that aims to find Canada's most active community. Red Deer wasn't able to repeat as national champion in 2023, but the city was named the most active community in Alberta.
The ParticiPACTION challenge returns throughout the month of June. In the challenge's early stages, Red Deer leads all other communities participating.
On Saturday, Primary Care Network Red Deer, Red Deer Polytechnic, the Central Alberta Child Advocacy Centre, the City of Red Deer and Alberta Health Services' Move Your Mood Studio teamed up to host the inaugural Red Deer Community Better June Walk-Run at the Gary W. Harris Canada Games Centre as a way to kick off ParticiPACTION month.
"This is our fifth year promoting the ParticiPACTION in Red Deer," said Denise Fredeen, Move Your Mood co-ordinator and Red Deer's ParticiPACTION spokesperson.
"I think the reason why we're so good is because our agencies come together and work together. We've really figured out how to work together to get our community activated and participating."
The goal of ParticiPACTION is to bring communities together and to encourage people to get active, Fredeen said.
"On a community level, we want people to know that they create good connections with others when we get active," she said.
"When we move our bodies it improves both our mental health and our physical health. When people are active I try to get them to think about how they felt before and how they felt after. At first you might think, 'I don't really want to do this.' But after you might feel refreshed and energized – you improve your mood."
The Red Deer Community Better June Walk-Run featured more than 260 people participating in three separate 1K, 3K and 5K tracks. Several organizations had booths set up inside the Gary W. Harris Canada Games Centre during the event.
"We wanted to kick things off with a free event where people can come and connect, get active and have our communities agencies showcasing what they provide," Fredeen said.
ParticiPACTION had previously used an app to track how communities are doing. That has changed this year – people now have to track their actions on the ParticiPACTION website: www.participaction.com.
"You can log in as an individual. Organizations can also go on and log as a group. Say (a business) went out as a group for a walk at lunch, you could log that 20 people went out for a walk. That all goes towards Red Deer's numbers," said Fredeen.