Lift the Curfew

In 2023, Lift the Curfew, in collaboration with the ‘This Girl Can’ campaign was launched. This

was done to raise awareness and promote a safer environment for women and girls to engage in physical activities.

You may wonder why this was the case. Well, according to research carried out by Sport

England, 3 in every 4 women feel they need to reduce or cut out altogether their outdoor

activities once the clocks go back and the longer nights set in.

Sport England, the main driver behind this, picked up on this issue. After all, it should not

matter one iota who you are, or where you live, you should feel at ease to be active outdoors at night. Advocates for women’s safety, Sport England have encouraged communities up and down the country to get on board and promote Lift the Curfew. Last week, Easingwold Running Club (ERC) brought this to the town and held a session starting from our newly lit Millfields Park, creating an opportunity for local women keen to explore opportunities and get to know likeminded others.

The event was organised by Bernie Wood, a long-standing member of ERC. Before runs and

walks of varying paces and distances set off, she highlighted the importance for societal change and the creation of a feeling of safety. Lift the Curfew presents an opportunity to address women and girls’ safety concerns, look at ways of promoting and improving public spaces, encouraging a group ethos whereby people can feel more comfortable in numbers and challenging the normalisation of women changing their behaviour due to a perceived lack of safety.

If you’re interested to find out more, simply search for Lift the Curfew or This Girl Can online and see for yourself. If you are looking for ways to keep fit and enjoy exercise during the winter months, then come on down to ERC, where we hold several sessions per week. Joining up with the club is a great way to keep active while meeting in the company of likeminded people. It doesn’t matter how slow or fast you are, the club has plenty on offer to cater, so don’t feel deterred. If you’re reading this and fancy coming to see what’s on offer at the club, visit our website at www.easingwoldrunningclub.co.uk/ - it would be great to see you!

If you’re already out there and running and you log your activities on Strava, why not tag each time? You can share your Strava activity to your social media with the hashtag

#LetsLiftTheCurfew and tag This Girl Can, explaining that these activities are to draw attention to the safety concerns preventing women getting active during darker months. If you’re sharing it to your Instagram Story, you can search for the 'Let’s Lift The Curfew' sticker in-app and add that too.

See you for the ERC Christmas edition!

Rich Freeman, Publicity Secretary