Created in 2013, the ABUTRES TRAIL RUNNING SCHOOL (ATRS) is a trail running training project (the first project in Portugal), aimed at sensitizing children to the fragilities of their surroundings and to their preservation, conservation and the need to live in communion with the environment.

“The Trail Running is governed by certain important values (friendship, camaraderie, respect for nature and solidarity) that we intend to pass on to the younger generations,” said João Lamas, coordinator of the project.

The ATRS Mission is based on 3 pillars:

> Encourage and motivate children to practice sports;

> To promote a healthy lifestyle, based on a solid hierarchy of values transmitted by sport;

> Contribute to the harmonious development of children in psychomotor terms, building on the sport of Trail Running.

The main objectives of ATRS are:

> Transmit values ​​such as friendship, camaraderie, respect for nature and solidarity.

> Sensitize children to the fragilities of the environment that surrounds them and to their preservation, conservation and the need to live in communion (not in competition) with the environment.

> It is not intended to form elite athletes but rather better and more conscious children for various problems. If in the future they become good trail running athletes so much the better.

> Sport and physical activity have widely recognized benefits in different aspects of human development.

> In children and young people, when the practice is well oriented and respects the rhythm of biological development, the integrity of the structures and the organic systems that guarantee the proper functioning of the body and are the basis for the practice of physical activity, the benefits are even more creased. They become a habit, a healthy lifestyle.

The training has a strong recreational component based on Trail Running, but including secondary activities such as games, ecological and nutritional awareness, participation in races, contact with elite athletes, experimentation and exchange with other modalities “explained Jorge Rodrigues, who completes the trio of natural land coaches, Miranda do Corvo.

The school works on Sunday mornings at 10am at Quinta da Paiva in Miranda do Corvo and is open to all those who want to attend by simply contacting the school by email trailrunningschool@abutres.net