Top 5 reasons to be a parkrun regular

These are my top 5 reasons to be a parkrun regular:

1) You will get fitter and faster.
2) You will make parkrun friends and feel part of the parkrun community.
3) You will earn your parkrun 10 (Juniors only), 50, 100 and 250 t-shirts.
4) You will become addicted (in a good way).
5) parkrun and therefore exercise will become part of your weekly lifestyle.

You may have your own opinions. There are plenty of reasons to be a regular at parkrun, but this list is limited to my top 5, so there clearly wasn't enough room for all the many and varied reasons that we all have.

If you would like to comment and add your own ideas they would be very welcome.

parkrun stats of the week...26th January 2013

The parkrun statistics of note for this week are:

143 parkrun events run (down 12 on last week)
15,702 runners (up 3,051 on last week)
The snow and ice again got the better of a lot of parkrun events and runners this week in the UK.

The average number of runners per parkrun event run was: 109.8 (up 28 on last week!).

14 events recorded a new record attendance this week, as follows:

Event		Record Attendance
Balyang Sanctuary		128
Barnstaple		63
Cornwall Park		102
Delta		162
Eastbourne		132
Ginninderra		116
Highbury Fields		104
Inverness		85
Lower Hutt		113
Nahoon Point		321
Newy		464
St Peters		204
Torrens		97
Walthamstow		63

New national record attendances were set in each of the following countries:
Australia
New Zealand
South Africa

The longest standing parkrun attendance record is:
Amager Faelled  146 28/08/2010

And in the UK it's:
Gorleston    156    19/03/2011

The highest attendance this week was 948 at Bushy Park.

The lowest attendance this week was 4 at Mansfield parkrun.

4 new male course records set this week (1 less than last week):

Event	Athlete	Time
Chelmsford Central	Tom CAMMACK	17:47
Sandgate	Mesele GEBRE	16:48
South Bank	Liam WOOLLETT	16:26
Walthamstow	Danny NORMAN	17:48

7 new female course records set this week (2 more than last week). The women edge it again this week:

Event		Athlete	Time
Walthamstow		Elizabeth MAIDMENT	24:18
Plymvalley		Sarah PEPPER	18:38
Harrow Lodge		Lydia HALLAM	21:04
Modderfontein Reserve		Marilise VERMAAK	22:30
Wimpole Estate		Caroline PRITCHARD	20:59
Cornwall Park		Nicola O'CEALLAIGH	18:58
St Peters		Britney MCMULLEN	18:27

44 runners (up 18 on last week) ran times under 17 minutes this week.

4 of these runners (up 3 on last week) ran under 16 minutes!
The fastest parkrunner in the World was Tom Aldred running 15:41 at Highbury Fields parkrun.

The fastest 4 were as follows:

Event		Athlete	Time
Highbury Fields		Tom ALDRED	15:41
Brighton & Hove		Kevin ROJAS	15:44
Ginninderra		Mick CHAPMAN	15:48
Poole		Ian HABGOOD	15:51

The top age grade performance this week was by Jane Davies who ran 21:12 in the VW60-64 category at Bushy parkrun, recording a 95.60% Age Grade in the process. Now that is impressive!

The number of parkrun freedom runs being recorded at the moment means that the most recent 100 page is filling in less than a week. The fastest freedom run on the "most recent 100" list at the moment is:

Runner	Date	Location	Run Time
Jonathan WILLIAMS	26/01/2013	Glasgow	00:19:54

parkrun off, fair enough

I left the house as usual for parkrun having not given a single thought to check the website or social media sites. Of course it would be on. Coventry parkrun is always on.

I had been for my normal Friday parkrun freedom run a day earlier and the course had been almost completely clear. The park maintenance staff had done a superb job. Except for one short stretch the entire parkrun route was clear of all snow, ice and slush.

Based on that evidence and the failure of the predicted overnight heavy snow to materialise, there seemed no doubt it would be on.

I jogged round the corner to call for my near neighbour for our run up to the start, only to be told that it had been cancelled. At that stage I had only jogged 50 yards or so, but already I had seen how treacherous the conditions were and although a little disappointed I was not surprised.

We decided that as we were all dressed up and ready to run, we may as well head up to the park for a jog anyway.

We stuck to the road as the compacted ice on the paths made them akin to a skating rink. Even though the road was clear it was still far from ideal with plenty of patches of black ice.

Once inside the park and onto the parkrun route the reasons for cancelling became even more clear. There was no way you could allow an organised run to take place on that surface. There would have been a fallers than a bad year at the Grand National.

As we approached the parkrun start area we could see our amazing Event Director and his parents. Even though he had cancelled in plenty of time they were still there to tell parkrunners the bad news in person. That is dedication!

The two of us decided we would do a parkrun or two at a very sensible pace.

Over the next half hour or so I witnessed some great sights. We told each group of arriving parkrunners the bad news as we passed them by. Although they were disappointed, none seemed too surprised and all were perfectly understanding.

The best sights were all the different groups doing there own slow jogs around the parkrun route. So addicted to parkrun we all are that although not an official parkrun, there were many groups of people, most who would probably never have run at all before parkrun and certainly not on ice, and they were all determined to do a parkrun freedom run, even at the slowest of paces.

It was great to see that. There must have been 50 or 60 people that ran a parkrun freedom run in place of their normal parkrun. I think that is pretty incredible.

I later heard that a further group (I'm not sure how many) had heard the news early enough and made an impromptu trip to our local parkrun neighbours at Leamington Spa. 

Another example of what parkrunners are willing to do to get their weekly parkrun fix!

Thank you parkrun!