Saris Cycling Group has taken its annual poster contest nationwide. The 2011 contest asks 5th graders to create a poster with the theme “Bicycling is fun…and healthy too!”

The winner will be announced Friday, May 20.

Update, May 20, 2011: 5,000 students from 17 states submitted posters. The winner is May, from Oklahoma, with the asparagus wheel poster. May will be flown to Washington, DC for the 2012 National Bike Summit.

From Dr. Janette Quarles, the Oklahoma contest coordinator, I was surprised to learn “that 66% of obese students that walked or biked to school were no longer obese at the end of the school year.” I knew biking was fun and healthy, but I didn’t know the weight loss could happen so fast.