'The World Keeps Running' launch in Manchester, UK - (l to r) Lamine Diack, Haile Gebrselassie and Sergey Bubka (©Getty Images)

Manchester, UK - IAAF President Lamine Diack announced the opening of "The World Keeps Running", a new online initiative of the IAAF which has been created and designed in line with the Athletics' World Plan with the aim of increasing the participation of youngsters, seniors and veteran athletes in our sport.

"The IAAF Athletics' World Plan was created in 2003 - and aims to drive forward reform in all areas of our sport as we approach the IAAF Centenary in 2012. This Plan has been a discussion forum and motivator and will help us achieve our goal of making the sport more universal. I am very proud of this latest initiative which I am sure will help us get closer to our goal of seeing athletics return as the number one sport in school," said President Diack.

President Diack headed an IAAF Delegation to the launch in Manchester which also included IAAF Senior Vice President Sergey Bubka who is in charge of the "Participation Team" within the Athletics' World Plan.

"Our goal is to provide all people with the greatest opportunities to participate in Athletics," said World Pole Vault record holder Bubka. "Through our athletics heroes we are aiming at extending the focus of the sport to include health and fitness."

World Marathon record holder Haile Gebrselassie, who won the Great Manchester Run 10km elite race this Sunday morning, was also on hand to support the sport's world governing body's initiative.

"This is a fantastic initiative from the IAAF to get together important advice and training programmes for runners around the world," said an enthusiastic Gebrselassie. "It is very important that we make sure youngsters keep getting involved in physical exercise, it is a crucial health issue that cannot be ignored."

'The World Keeps Running' can be accessed via the following link:  http://www.worldkeepsrunning.org/

Reproduced from the IAAF website