parkrun

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Discussion

northandy

3,496 posts

221 months

Tuesday 19th April 2016
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madbadger said:
It's a nice course at Stewarts. Slower (hillier) than Albert park but a nice run.

I have done Parke too. My slowest time by a margin. It was drizzly when I did it and there is a massive hill near the start that was pretty muddy. just after that on a narrow bit of path a branch caught my glasses and flicked them off. Glasses must be the hardest thing in the world to find especially without your glasses on! Was near the back of the field when I found them and set off again.

Still - character building stuff. I must go back and set a proper time. smile
Parke does look like challenge so will be interesting, I will be taking trail shoes too as I had heard it was muddy. Nightmare on the glasses, I've had a shoelace come undone and ran 4.5k with it flapping around as I didn't want to stop

I think I could run Stewart's pretty close to my albert pb, I seem to do ok on the hilly bits as my training runs include some climbs.

Edited by northandy on Tuesday 19th April 20:55

KTF

9,805 posts

150 months

Friday 22nd April 2016
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Wiggle have the parkrun milestone and marshal t-shirts back in stock again.

If you have one on back order, get in quick before the official announcement goes out and rest of the community finds out wink

Halb

53,012 posts

183 months

Friday 22nd April 2016
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Vickie Park - Warry for me tomorrow morning. Hoping to improve and be as close to 26 mins as poss.
I normally run fasted, but may have a piece of fruit or gel thingy.

ewenm

28,506 posts

245 months

Saturday 23rd April 2016
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Lancaster parkrun for me today while visiting my mum. Tough hilly course but a good challenge and lovely conditions. It's 2 laps, so I took the first lap easy as I wasn't sure of the route then pushed on for lap 2. Good to see some of my old local teammates too. 1st finisher in 17:26 by my watch.

https://www.strava.com/activities/553969484


Cybertronian

1,516 posts

163 months

Saturday 23rd April 2016
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Think I've refound my running mojo after several weeks of lack of enthusiasm and life getting in the way.

Ran 18:31 at Cannon Hill Parkrun this morning - a near 15 second PB on the last that was set on the blisteringly fast and flat Cardiff Parkrun course.

ukaskew

10,642 posts

221 months

Saturday 23rd April 2016
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First ever Parkrun, 5k and organised run for me today. First run and anything fitness based for 4 years since a serious heart condition, so not even vaguely fit.

Was aiming for 40 minutes but had no real idea, came in at 34:11 which I'm thrilled with. Lovely atmosphere, great people and really well organised. Will be back again next week!

baxb

423 posts

192 months

Thursday 28th April 2016
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KTF said:
Wiggle have the parkrun milestone and marshal t-shirts back in stock again.

If you have one on back order, get in quick before the official announcement goes out and rest of the community finds out wink
Any idea how long the email takes to come through to claim the T-Shirt ? My nipper did her 10th on 27th Feb & still haven't seen it.

RizzoTheRat

25,162 posts

192 months

Thursday 28th April 2016
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In the e-mail with your time there should be a link to "Manage my profile" or similar, go in to that and there's a link for "Club Progress". If you qualify for a shirt there should be a link to get it, you'll need to create an account with wiggle and log in before you get the buy option though.

Finally got my 100 shirt yesterday, after 126 parkruns smile

KTF

9,805 posts

150 months

Thursday 28th April 2016
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baxb said:
Any idea how long the email takes to come through to claim the T-Shirt ? My nipper did her 10th on 27th Feb & still haven't seen it.
Am not sure if an email gets sent out now. The best way is to log into the profile and click on the club link. If you are eligible there will be a link there.

baxb

423 posts

192 months

Thursday 28th April 2016
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Thanks Gents, never would have found it ! Order placed.

ukaskew

10,642 posts

221 months

Saturday 30th April 2016
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Week 2, glorious weather meant a 270+ turnout in Southwick (Wiltshire), knocked a full 3 minutes off my first ever 5k time (last week), down to 31:17.

Took it easy for the first two laps, then kept targeting 'overtakes' on the last lap to really push myself. My 3rd mile was 3 minutes quicker than the first two, which probably isn't the cleverest idea but seemed to work!

smn159

12,654 posts

217 months

Saturday 30th April 2016
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169 runners at Aylesbury this morning, my first one for a few weeks. Took the dog too for his first one and together we did 27 mins.

Halb

53,012 posts

183 months

Saturday 30th April 2016
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Was rather warmish when I got up. Nice turn-out at Vickie park, and the last 1.5k, hail the size of cantaloupes.

Shaved 20-30 seconds off last week, still 2-3 mins off PB time. biggrin

northandy

3,496 posts

221 months

Saturday 30th April 2016
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madbadger said:
It's a nice course at Stewarts. Slower (hillier) than Albert park but a nice run.

I have done Parke too. My slowest time by a margin. It was drizzly when I did it and there is a massive hill near the start that was pretty muddy. just after that on a narrow bit of path a branch caught my glasses and flicked them off. Glasses must be the hardest thing in the world to find especially without your glasses on! Was near the back of the field when I found them and set off again.

Still - character building stuff. I must go back and set a proper time. smile
You were right on Parke, that was tough, snuck in just under 23 mins which is 3 mins off my pb at a parkrun, was very muddy up that bank and around the course generally. I was pleased to just finish in the end!

KTF

9,805 posts

150 months

Sunday 1st May 2016
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7th at Milton Keynes parkrun yesterday. Only 52s behind first place. Could have gone quicker had it not been for the 'zig zags' hill at mile 1.

Evanivitch

20,075 posts

122 months

Sunday 1st May 2016
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Anyone have any tips on the Wimbledon course? Should be that way next Saturday and have my running shoes with me. Website says muddy, so trail shoes best?

ukaskew

10,642 posts

221 months

Sunday 1st May 2016
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What's the general etiquette with volunteering, out of interest? There are a core group at my Parkrun which keep things ticking over nicely, but they struggle to get even a couple of people to do general marshalling, quite sad when you consider 250+ turn up to run every week.

I've seen some fairly damning comments of (generally) club runners who 'use' Parkrun every week and have hundreds of runs against their name but have never helped.

I was thinking of volunteering once a quarter, if everyone did that they'd have no issues whatsoever. Is that too little or about right?

Halb

53,012 posts

183 months

Sunday 1st May 2016
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Put yourself on the email. I have. Haven't volunteered for a while, I need to. I'll do it the day before my 10k. biggrin

Cybertronian

1,516 posts

163 months

Sunday 1st May 2016
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Once a quarter as Halb says is the expectation - some do a lot more than this and some a lot less/zero. One guy at my local has some 180 odd runs to his name and volunteered once a couple of years ago. What doesn't help is I recall a few years ago in the newsletter, the MD of Parkrun basically said it was entirely OK to not volunteer if it wasn't your thing. Not the right message at all to be coming from the top brass, IMHO.

I try and volunteer a handful of times a year; mainly if I have a race on the next day, or if I'm ill or injured.

Edited by Cybertronian on Sunday 1st May 15:08

john2443

Original Poster:

6,337 posts

211 months

Sunday 1st May 2016
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My disclaimer is that I'm Event Director for a parkrun, so with a mate we're in charge of our event.

As a guide to frequency of volunteering, think that if 10 volunteers are needed every week, that's 520 slots to fill every year. If 520 different people run during that year and they all volunteer once then the job's done.

But some of those 520 will only run once cos they're visitors or they only run once, not like it and never come back, so maybe half of them run often enough so if they all do twice a year it's all covered.

It's the core team's job to cover Run Director and Volunteer Coordinator, maybe timer at a big event, but really most of the team should be running most weeks with volunteers (ie the runners) filling the rest. We have 15 core team members, 9 Run directors, 6 VolCos who are rostered so RDs don't run 1 week in 9, VCs have done their job by 9 so can run. In general the core team are also runners so don't want to volunteer every week.

If you run nearly every week it would be reasonable to be a non running volunteer 2-3 times a year.

If you're a fast runner (top 20) you can run and then be second or third barcode scanner or you could volunteer when you're injured or have a race the next day so there are ways to do it without missing the chance to run.

Probably 90% of our volunteering comes from 10% of the people, but that's how most things in life are, some people will never volunteer, some will do it lots.

If you do volunteer please do email the team in advance (email will be youreventnamehelpers@parkrun.com, it might be that enough people will turn up at 0830 on Saturday but it lets us relax more if we're not wondering on Friday night if there will be enough people.