A bit about parkrun (and training week 1)

parkrun

Anyone who follows me on Facebook will be used to seeing my regular Saturday morning posts about parkrun.  So I thought I would write a bit about it!

For those of you who are unaware parkrun is a weekly (every Saturday 9am) timed 5km run.  It is free to register and free to run.  It started 11 years ago this weekend with just 13 people in Bushy Park.  Now over 1.2 million people are registered, 110,000 people participate weekly and it is in over 700 locations worldwide and in 11 countries.  

Once you have registered you get a barcode.  You take this along every week and it is scanned when you finished, along with a position token, to give you your position and time.  This is uploaded to the parkrun website and you get a text to tell you your time and position.  

At the time of writing I have run 64 parkruns at 31 different venues (all in the UK).  I have a fastest time of 21:01 and a slowest time of 32:40 (run today).  So what keeps me coming back week after week?  There are a few main reasons.

Firstly, I love the parkrun community.  Young, old, fast, not so fast, big, small, male, female you get a true cross section of people participating.  The volunteers, out there rain or shine, cheering every runner on.  The friendly early morning chats pre-race and the post race banter of people out enjoying their hobby.  It is the same at every parkrun I have been to and it is a pleasure to be part of.

Secondly, it's a family event.  I love that Olivia and Sarah now come down from time to time to run with me. When we run together we are normally in a group at the back with other families out running.  The kids love it and for me, as a parent, having Olivia outside, active and enjoying herself is fantastic.  

Thirdly, I like the fact that I am only ever running against myself.  As I am never going to finish first it is only ever me vs. the clock.  I can therefore use the weekly trot out at parkrun as a good barometer of how fit I am and, when fully fit, as a good opportunity to bring my 5km time down.

Fourthly, variation.  I am very lucky to live in a location where I have a number of parkruns close-by.  Because of this I have started to do a bit of parkrun tourism and have been lucky to visit a number of different venues.  With the only cost being my petrol money it makes it a cheap and enjoyable way of seeing different parts of the country.  Each parkrun is different; I have visited normal parks, woodland parks, National trust properties and coastal paths.  They are run on different surfaces, they range from 1 lap to 4.  In short no two parkruns are the same. 

Lastly, it's free!!      

Training Week 1


So...first week of a 30 week training schedule and it hasn't quite gone to plan.  Despite feeling good last week my legs felt really heavy and my calf a little tight.  I therefore decided to take the week a little easier than I had hoped.  I put in an extra couple of rest days to allow my legs just a little longer to recover and took all of the runs extremely easily, averaging just over 10min/mile for the week. 

The week was topped off with a lovely (albeit hilly) 10km run around Winchester.  Even made time for a selfie at the cathedral (see left).

It felt great to be back out and running and hopefully bodes well for the next few weeks.    


Here is the breakdown for the W/B 28th September:

	MON	TUE	WED	THU	FRI	SAT	SUN
Target	4.5	6	4.5	REST	4.5	3.1	6
Actual	4.4	REST	4.54	REST	REST	3.24	6.39
Pace (Min/Mile)	09:51	N/A	10:17	N/A	N/A	10:11	10:22

and here is the plan for next week:

	MON	TUE	WED	THU	FRI	SAT	SUN
05-Oct	4.5	7	4.5	4.5	REST	17	REST

The run on Saturday is the 27km 9bar9 challenge.  This was supposed to be my 50 mile race (81km) but I'm not in the right shape so I will use the shorter distance as a training run.

Check in next week for more running ramblings...Happy running everyone!

James

Footnote

Today it was the Bournemouth and Clarendon marathons, both of of which I have run.  Seeing the results come through on social media and receiving texts from team mates made me realise how much I bloody love running!  I can't wait to get back out there pounding the streets.  

Congratulations to everyone running today, regardless of location or distance.  You are all an inspiration and it was lovely reading your stories.