UNCW Gymnastics Club 5K: My Site News

click "ALBUMS"

*Race time: 8:30am

*Note: Packet pickups will begin @ 7:00am for our online registered participants.

Packets include your t-shirt and gifts from sponsors.

Race-day, on site registration also begins @ 7:00am at Randall Library ($15.00).

Race numbers and time chips (provided by Mike Marion of Atlantic Coast Timing Systems) will be provided at the packet pickup/registration table.

*Parking is in lot D, access via Randall Dr.

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About our 5K course, gymnastics club, & campus:

• The course crosses 3 footwalk bridges that traverse ponds and wooded wetlands in the heart of our university and also includes a loop of trails that tours our unique longleaf pine (LLP) forest on campus.

• This 5K is a fundraiser to support the training activities and travel expenses of the UNCW Gymnastics Club. Annually, they compete at several events in cities throughout NC and surrounding states. During the competitions of spring 2008, team members placed against individuals from the most competitive teams in NC, and also made a strong showing at the annual national competition held in Greensboro, NC. (Next year, Nationals will be hosted by Emory University in Atlanta, GA.)

• Furthermore, we feel pleased to host this event in the context of promoting greater awareness and appreciation about the beauty and value of our longleaf pine (LLP) forest on campus. Our forest is the last patch of LLP ecosystem remaining in Wilmington.

• As students at this beautiful university, and under the mentoring of seasoned professors (each with decades of valuable experience), we have become aware of the beauty and value of our increasingly rare wildlife habitat.

• Within Wilmington, our campus forest has become the lone refuge for several organisms listed as "species of concern." For example, our forest supports the only documented population of Quercus minima (the dwarf oak) located north of Georgia. Also, our forest serves as a critical site that sustains several threatened bird populations.

• Noting the sincere concern expressed by our professors, we have likewise become concerned about the continued sustainability of our forest for the ongoing welfare of its inhabitants. Many of these, such as migratory bird species, are documented showing annual decreases in the numbers of individuals comprising their total population. Therefore, our actions are crucial to preserve and appropriately manage our forest so it will continue in its traditional role providing optimal conditions for all its indigenous and migratory populations. Other avian inhabitants dependent upon our campus include migratory birds that are just arriving, beginning their annual cycle, and will approach or be approaching peak reproductive activity during the occasion of our 5K.

• In this age of increasing awareness about sustaining the continued capacity for productivity of all our lands and waters, we students recognize our responsibility to aspire toward progressive practices of sound environmental stewardship and sustainability. That is, we understand that to promote our personal wellbeing and fulfillment, we must behave in a manner that likewise permits the viability of crops upon our farms in addition to the biodiversity within our forests, creeks, estuaries, grasslands, and mountains. All of these landscapes have vibrant communities which have sustained and enriched our lives throughout history; and, with our diligent stewardship, hopefully will continue evermore.

• In addition to helping support the goals of the UNCW gymnastics club, we proudly welcome and commend you in joining us to celebrate the natural resource of our longleaf pine forest. Your participation will serve toward promoting sound environmental stewardship in the immediate and long term future by helping us progressively act to protect and manage our remarkably diverse LLP ecosystem on the campus of UNC Wilmington.

We dearly appreciate your participation and support! Wishing you peace and joy,

Thank you!!!

UNCW Gymnastics Club :)

To submit any comments or questions, please email Richard at:

rea2309@uncw.edu