Parkrunner

Five week ago I started drafting a blog post but never progressed beyond the opening paragraph. Part of that was due to my own progress with exercise stalling but with things getting back on track it’s time to finish that post and tick off one of my fitness goals.

After getting over my knee injury, back at the star of June I finally started running again. By mid-June I finished the Couch to 5K program, albeit with the three runs from the final week being done over two weeks. Perhaps like a lot of people I finished by being able to run non-stop for 30 minutes rather than managing to run a full 5K distance in that time.

I then discovered that there are some extra sessions added on to the plan, the first of which is a 35 minute run. With my running pace hovering around seven minutes per kilometre I completed that first 35 minute run and managed to hit 5K during it. Since then I’ve done a couple more 35 minute runs where I achieve 5K but I had slipped out of the habit of running three times a week.

I’ve also been meaning to go and do my first Parkrun which is something I said was a goal in my first post about running but I procrastinated and completely failed to actually get up early enough and go and do one. Well today I changed that.

A few days ago a friend messaged me to say that her family were going to do the Shepton Mallet Parkrun today. A friend of theirs has breast cancer and today’s run was focused on supporting her, her fundraising efforts, and raising awareness about breast cancer. It was an obvious opportunity to finally go and take part and also to help support Sarah.

And what an amazing experience it was. Apart from the great camaraderie at the Parkrun and the fun of running with a large group of people, it was fantastic to see so many people dressed in pink and there to support Sarah and her family. She has been a long-time participant of the Parkrun and is obviously very much loved. Her daughter gave a fantastic introduction at the start of the briefing and Sarah was there to walk the 5K too. Parkrun really is like a big family of like-minded people.

And the run itself was fun. The Shepton route is really narrow in places and the start in particular was slow. But over the course, which is three laps, everyone made space for people wanting to pass them and that included a narrow contraflow footpath. The volunteers were great at cheering everyone on and the runners were all really supportive and encouraging too. It was a great experience and definitely won’t be a one-off for me.

And my result was 35:35 which I’m pleased with. Sub-35 minutes would have been ideal but my lack of recent running and the rookie error of starting off too quickly and then having to walk a bit during the last lap meant that I had been expecting to be closer to 40 minutes. I was running with a friend and his daughter and before we started he told me that his usual 5K time is around 27 minutes and, whilst he has a bad hip at the moment, they were both faster, fitter runners than me and I should have definitely paced myself better early on. But it is not a race and next time I’ll probably run solo and see how it goes.

But forget the times and forget the plans for the next runs, the main thing is that I have ticked off one of my fitness goals and it is one that six months ago, when I started all of this by eating more healthily, I’d not have imagined I could or would do.