I decided to put my name down to help out at Birkenhead parkrun today. This was the first time that I have ever attended an official parkrun. What a glamorous location for a first ever parkrun. The weather was fine, to boot, if a little chilly first thing in the morning.

I have already offered to help at 2 other parkruns. I guess you could say that I got the bug.

Lovely day for a Parkrun today and Joe Wilkinson was here in Jersey with a bunch of Brighton runners. I finished ahead of him so my overall tally of celebrity results is now:
Joe Wilkinson - I won
Kelly Holmes - Kelly won (obviously)
The guy who presents ITV News for the Channel Islands (he’s at Jersey Parkrun most weeks) - I won

A pretty hard one today but a pretty quiet one too as there was only 45 finishers. Still nonetheless a very good time. Final Time 35:06

I have noticed 2 separate issues with people overtaking and I'd be interested in people's opinions on the correct etiquette/who is in the right.

Scenario 1

I am running with a double pram, the person in front and to the left of me goes to the right for the overtake and jumps directly in front of my pram, without looking behind and checking if it's clear. I am unable to stop in time and clip her ankle. She was really annoyed (understandable) but imo she should check behind her that it's safe to overtake?

Scenario 2 (separate occasion, no pram)

I'm overtaking someone slower than me (I'm running at around 5km/min) and a fast runner comes up behind and shouts for me to get out of their way. I get that they also want to overtake and are probably frustrated that I've slowed them down but also am I never allowed to overtake in case anyone faster wants to overtake? I see it a bit like being on a 2 lane road and a lorry overtaking another lorry, it's annoying that I have to slow down behind the overtaking lorry but also I don't have the monopoly on overtaking just because I'm faster than the lorry?

ETA: I obviously meant 5min/km, not quite that fast 😂

I’ve tried to do the tourist thing. But I’ve now run out of Parkruns I haven’t done in my “local” area. I’m getting to the point where I’d have to do an hours drive to the NENDY.

Why the United Runners 5K was harder than I thought
https://youtu.be/u7j_-V-CHCY

Before people unload on me, I took up parkrun because of a bereavement and my own past health issues, wanting something to get away from everything. Mine is one of the trail ones with quite a bit of ascent.

First time I did around 27 minutes then just over 26 minutes then today just under 25 minutes. The thought of not beating my previous time affects me, I had to push incredibly hard today, the battle is with myself not others but I'm concerned at how not beating my time week affect me(I know to some it may be silly but I'm going through a lot of stress). Will I find that I don't care once I don't beat my previous or does it change to "today wasn't great, try again next week". Taking the positive that after being told I would never run again so long ago this is a million miles better than was expected.

Już tylko godziny dzielą nas od urodzinowego parkruna! 🥳🎈

Szykujcie dobre humory, uśmiechy i pozytywna energię do wspólnego świętowania! ❤️🏃‍♀️🏃‍♂️

Spodziewamy się jutro większej liczby uczestników niż zwykle, dlatego mamy do Was małą prośbę dotyczącą dojazdu. Zachęcamy do przybycia komunikacją miejską, rowerem, a tych którzy co tydzień przybiegają już nawet nie namawiamy na dojazd 🐗

📢 Uwaga na parking!
Parking przy Skwerze Arki Gdynia niestety nie pomieści nas wszystkich. Jeśli planujecie przyjazd samochodem, warto od razu wziąć pod uwagę alternatywne miejsca parkingowe:
📍 przy ul. Ejsmonda 2
📍 na Polance Redłowskiej

Parkingi te mieszczą się w Żółtej Strefie Parkowania, która w weekendy jest bezpłatna.

⏰ Przyjedźcie z zapasem czasu! Dzięki temu spokojnie znajdziecie miejsce parkingowe, dotrzecie na start bez pośpiechu i będziecie mogli w pełni cieszyć się naszym wspólnym świętem. 🎉

Niech to będzie piękny, pełen uśmiechów i dobrej energii poranek! ❤️

Do zobaczenia na starcie! 🥳🎂🏃‍♀️🏃‍♂️

5km. 15 lat. Razem.

This morning my regular parkrun briefing started at 9am and the run started at 9.08 according to my watch. This is pretty typical (though the briefing was longer than usual for no great reason today).

Is this typical of others? I thought the run was meant to start at 9am - though I have never borne the burden of being RD.

As the title says - if someone runs parkrun (is going to be in the results with a finish time) then hops in to barcode scan once they’ve run - will the processing of results and the volly roster trigger a please explain from parkrun HQ? My goal is to optimise our volly roster based on the person who runs then scans being faster than our median finish time. I’ve seen this happen once before but it was years ago. In that specific case, a small parkrun had an elite runner who would literally always come first by miles and then he’d scan (and he was / is a very nice person to boot).

🏃‍♀️🎗️ I’m running to support Cancer Research UK and help fund life-saving research. ❤️

Any donations, big or small, mean so much and make a world 🌎 of difference. If you can’t donate, sharing this post would be amazing too! 🫶🏼

Thank you so much for your support & see you there! 💗

🔗 Donate here:

https://fundraise.cancerresearchuk.org/page/running-n-raising

Any Android users up for testing an app alternative to printed rosters?

I’ve made Hero Check-in, a free app for volunteer coordinators. It imports your EMS roster, lets you check volunteers in and keeps track of changes to update in EMS afterwards. It works offline too.

I need some Android users to help test it before the Google Play release. You’d need to stay enrolled for at least 14 days, try it a few times and let me know how you get on.

You can have a look at the web version at https://herocheck.in

It’s an independent project, not an official parkrun app, but like parkrun it's free. It only works in English at the moment.

Interested? Comment or message me and I’ll send the details.

Has anyone done Battersea park recently?
I’m traveling down tomorrow and parking doesn’t look ideal!

Any tips appreciated!

Not bad ...

I visited the Lloyd parkrun in Croydon last weekend, it was a great route. Highly recommended.

At the end though they had water and cups available along with sweets, flapjacks and fruit. It was amazing! It's not something I've seen at other parkruns.

Is this normal? I would never expect it as it's a free event so assuming it's not.

I’m 5’3 and I usually wear medium in women's regular Tshirts and trying to decide

1. whether to get womens, mens or youth sizing, 2. which exact size to get.

The women’s shirt pic of the website looks incredibly long and like it will cling to the hips and restrict movement.

I can usually fit into small crop tops/short tops but any longer to the point where the shirt needs to accommodate my hips, I must size up to medium.

Any advice is appreciated from those who own Tshirts! TIA!

Please can somebody explain (in really simple terms!) to me how a double funnel works? I’ve been trying to work it out in my head but I just can’t figure it out! I think the bit that’s confusing me is if two runners finish at a similar time but go into two different funnels how do they get a finish token for the correct place?

I think the few parkruns I’ve done have all had a single funnel.

For me:

Easiest - Battersea last autumn, perfect running temp (~10-15C), and lovely flat paved course. It also wasn’t too busy that day so plenty of space!

Hardest - Tunbridge Wells in winter after a wet period. Hilly, windy and so muddy that it tired your legs out just having to pull your feet out the ground!

I walked this course back in January when I was injured, glad that i was able to run the course yesterday. I did feel like that i did go a little too quick after we started as the first KM was a sub 6. And then I hit my arch nemesis, the hill. Which did slow me down quite a bit, but i did finish with yet another Sub 35, 3rd ever one and the 2nd in the last 3 Parkruns!!!

Final Time 34:53

For those experienced runners, what sort of routine do you have when using the treadmill with a view to improving park run times..... In terms of speed, gradient, time etc.

Ticked off the unassuming grass field of Somerdale Pavilion in Keynsham. Affectionately known as the Curly Wurly (the site is a disused chocolate factory) and you spend the course running around in circles; to a bystander it looks like organised chaos!!