Feature: Run under midnight sun

Nearly 3,000 Icelandic people came out of home to the bright streets on Tuesday night for a run under the midnight sun in this world's northernmost capital city of Iceland.

As Iceland's most spectacular natural phenomenon, the midnight sun is creating stunning skies and endless days during summer and bringing the longest day and the shortest night in the summer solstice.

The 2015 Suzuki Midnight Sun Run, one of the events held to celebrate the summer solstice across Iceland, takes place for the 23rd time while people can join in either of the three distances - half marathon, 10km, and 5km races.

Iceland's marathon runner Kari Steinn Karlsson won the first place of men's group, finishing the half marathon of 21.1 km with a time of one hour 12 minutes 48 seconds. He told Xinhua that he was just enjoying the race under the midnight sun.

"It was great. Great conditions and it was calm weather and the temperature was perfect. It was good to see the midnight sun, unfortunately it was a bit too cloudy, but still it was a perfect evening and I felt great," he said.

"It's definitely a different feeling running and it's still bright outside and it's so late. It gives you extra energy. It's a different kind of experience. I really enjoy it," he added.

For women runner Arna Ir Gunnarsdottir, running under the midnight sun was just to make up for the losses of time in the long and dark winter in Iceland.

"It's very nice. We like when the sun doesn't go down. We like when it's bright the whole night. And we like to use that time to do something different because it's dark almost all winter. So we like to use it quite well and it's very good to run in this good weather and when the time is so much in the evening, so it's quite nice," she said.

Describing the midnight sun run as a unique experience, Thora Rose Gudbjartsdottir said she enjoyed the colorful nature along the route.

"It's awesome. While we were running, we saw the sky was pink. It's really nice. It doesn't feel like midnight, it feels like a day," she said.

Svava Asgeirsdottir from the Reykjavik Marathon is the race manager of the Suzuki Midnight Sun Run. She told Xinhua they organized the event of this kind to make the best use of the valuable summer time.

"The midnight sun is something very special in Iceland because we have a very short summer. We have 3-month summer and 9-month winter and in winter the day is very short. It is only four, five hours and then it's just dark. But in the summer we have daylight all night long. So we are celebrating this longest day of the year, this midnight sun, we call it," she said.

She said the midnight sun run had become more and more popular as the number of participants were growing each year.

"Everyone likes to run in Iceland. I sometimes say it's because it's cold. You have to be running or cycling or walking to keep warm, because it's rather cold in Iceland," she added. Endit