You may well have heard of Parkrun. It started in London in 2004 and has now spread around the world. It's a weekly 5km run around a local park or fields. You just turn up and run. They have barcodes that you get scanned and your run is logged. One just started near me in Letchworth. I missed the first couple, but I saw nearly 400 turned out the first time. It looks like some people like to visit lots of events and maybe the first one counts as something special.
The course is a 20 minute cycle ride from me. I left it a bit late, so I got there just a few minutes before it started. It's mostly uphill getting there, so I wasn't in the best state to run, but I still did it. It was a freezing morning with the puddles still frozen. My hands were very cold as I just had some thin gloves on.
The course is two laps starting in a park and going around some fields. Some of it is along paths, but most was on grass an mud. Luckily the mud was still fairly frozen, but we had to jump some puddles. By the second lap I was flagging and walked a bit. I ran again for the last kilometre and that was actually pretty good. I wasn't expecting the time to be anything great. Ideally I'd like it to be under 30 minutes, but I can live with that. Next time I'll try to arrive a bit earlier so I'm more recovered from the ride. That furthest distance for February is no big deal as I didn't log my last longer run.
I didn't manage to take any snaps of the runners. I'll try to do that next time. You really cannot miss them with all the fluorescent yellow and pink. You get an email with your time and then the results are posted on the site. I'm way down in 107th place out of 151, but I don't mind too much. I'll work on improving that. I may still go for a longer run tomorrow to build some stamina. I'm sure I won't get to the Parkrun every week, but I'll try to do it when I can. You may well find there is one near you. I mostly run alone, but it's good to run with a crowd sometimes. I didn't know anyone there, but I may get to know some other runners.
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Done the Leeds one many times
I love parkrun I try and do it every Saturday when I’m not working. I’ve been doing it for about a year and 4 months and have completed about 53 parkruns. I’m glad you have found parkrun enjoy x
So you are doing several a week then! That's good going. I still want to do my own training runs where I can experiment more, but doing the Parkrun every week or two will show how I'm doing
The brilliant thing about parkrun is you can make it what you want - you can go flat out and compare to your fastest time, you can go easy and chat with fellow parkrunners or, as I encourage the runners I coach, you can use it as training, for example...
Try running 4k comfortable then blast the last km as fast as you can
Try gradually building speed so each km is faster than the one before
Try running alternate km hard and easy - 1k hard, 1 easy, 1 hard, 1 easy then finish with 1k hard.
Have a play so it can fit into your training.
I like parkrun as most weeks I try and run fast whereas when I go out on my own for training runs I run really slow!
Wow, you don't miss many!
I try not to, only when I have to work x
Great Post Mate! I live in the States and am going to look into Park run and read all about it.. Interesting enough I just started to develop a training program for myself with cycling and running yesterday but I now may have to reevaluate it and tweak it out if there are Park runs nearby me - I live about 2 hours from NYC
I've been really surprised how few parkruns there are in the States. If you don't have one nearby you could look into starting one up.
I'm involved in a team that has done just that in the UK and our first run is next month!
https://steemit.com/running/@runningdanw/another-new-running-chapter-is-near
I'd like to do more cycling. It's a great way to explore. I don't know how much cycling and running help each other, but general fitness has to be a good thing.
Although I got approved to run, it's too much pounding on my knees and hips from the decades of Sports (soccer, Lacrosse, Surfing etc). So I think I will look into getting a good comfortable Bike to ride around and get exercising in. Luckily I get good weather all year long so weather won't hinder cycling around like it could in other areas !
I never did so much sport when I was younger, so I'm making up for it now. Apparently if can be good for the joints if you don't do too much. Cycling is good too though. I plan to do more of that this year.
Nice. My closest parkrun is quite a drive away and it's at 8am. So .... that's not gonna happen! hehehe
I have to take my wife to the pool on Saturday mornings so it looks like parkruns are something I'll just have to do without for a while.
Glad to hear you enjoyed your first one though. Spring is just around the corner for you, so it should become more and more pleasant each time you go.
Looking forward to the fluorescent photos ;-)
Great post. Yeah, Parkruns are great for training, especially as they are free. I usually use them as a tempo run, or now and again as a race to see where I am fitness wise. Luckily for us we have another free 5k race just started nearby called Great Run local, just totally copied Parkrun, but hey, more choice for use runners :)
That is pretty cool I didn't know about parkrun
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I really like this article. Parkrun is a wonderful discovery
@steevc
just hear about @parkrun through your post
They don't have an account :)
Welcome to Parkrun! I have added your great post to the new Parkrun community!
Have fun doing regular parkruns! Feel free to post your parkrun experiences into this community! Thanks so much!
Great Post Mate! I live in the States and am going to look into Park run and read all about it.. Interesting enough I just started to develop a training program for myself with cycling .. Thank you so much my friend
You appear to have copied another comment. That is a bad way to use Steemit. Be honest and be yourself.
Im so sorry my friend I admit my mistake, I promise not to repeat the same mistake ,, apologize for the amount
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