ADI Screens Support Sainsbury’s Sport Relief Mile Across the UK

ADI’s screens were in action across the UK as they supplied 9 screens in 8 different cities for Sunday’s Sainsbury’s Sport Relief Mile events.

An iCONIC 15 greets finishers at PlymouthThe events saw hundreds of thousands of people across the UK take to the streets for the Sainsbury’s Sport Relief Mile.  Sponsored participants flocked to the locations in towns and cities to run the mile course (more than once if they liked!), with celebrities taking part in a number of the larger events and extensive televised coverage throughout the afternoon. 

Another iCONIC 15 at The Hula Hoops Hoopathon in LondonADI provided LED screen and broadcast solutions for 8 of the major city events on Sunday and also provided an additional screen for free in Belfast.  In total there were nine iCONIC mobile LED screens in action at Gateshead, Milton Keynes, Birmingham, Plymouth, Southampton, Brighton, Belfast and also London, for the Hula Hoops Hoopathon in Victoria Park (more about that below!). 

All of ADI’s screens arrived onsite at around 6.30am on Sunday morning, in preparation for the beginning of each event at 9am.  For each site, ADI provided a wireless cameraman and crew to show live footage on-screen and this was mixed with VT content and graphics, which included event and sponsors’ logos as well as safety and event information.

Crowds began gathering across the country from around 9am, to take part in the sponsored runs with the option of running either one, three or six miles.  At each location there were a number of different ‘waves’ throughout the day in order to accommodate the 165,000 people that took part, many in fancy dress. 

Crowds and an iCONIC 25 encourage the runners in Milton KeynesA host of celebrities were also taking part, including comedian Eddie Izzard who – not content with running 43 marathons for Sport Relief last year – also lined up for all 8 waves in London!  Meanwhile, Radio One DJ Scott Mills had an easier ride as Ben Fogle and James Cracknell pulled him in a rickshaw all the way along the mile course…

“ADI proved to be capable and helpful partners to work with. The fact that they were able to project manage screens across so many different locations certainly helped to simplify the process and staff at each location were both friendly and professional.”

Emma Stevenson, Comic Relief

And an iCONIC 25 at Birmingham's MileOver at London’s Victoria Park, an ADI iCONIC 15 was used at the Hula Hoops Hoopathon, an attemptto break the Guinness World Record for the most number of people simultaneously hula hooping for two minutes; a feat officially achieved just after 2pm, with 1388 people taking part all over the UK!

Apart from the large iCONIC 60 screen at Gateshead, all of the screens were from ADI’s “urban” iCONIC fleet, ranging in size from 12 to 25m² and providing the perfect solution for the city centre park environments.

Because of the size of the iCONIC fleet, ADI were able to offer a scale of solution that other LED screen companies could not, by providing their own screens at such a large and wide range of locations.  For Sport Relief, this meant a simple solution as they were able to centrally manage screens at multiple locations via a single Project Manager at ADI, bringing continuity of service and screens across all locations.  The standardised technology and 16:9 format of ADI’s screens also made it far easier to create pre-produced content for all screens, and ADI worked in partnership with Sport Relief’s central office to ensure the content was optimised correctly.

The day’s events finished in early afternoon, enabling ADI’s screens to quickly derig and set off back to Preston, with all of them back that evening.  It had been a successful weekend for Sport Relief, raising an incredible £31,633,091 and still counting…