Category Archives: parkrun

Sharon Not the London Marathon 2012 (Sharon)

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You might not realise but I am training for the London Marathon. I got a place last year which I deferred and then this year I deliberated long and hard about taking up the place but decided to at least give myself the option of getting on the start line.

Anyway, I have been trying to keep to my Hal Higdon Schedule (novice 1 if you’re wondering) but things have conspired against me a little. However, here we are, 6 weeks away. 18 miles on the schedule. I’ve only run 13.2 miles before. In my head, if I didn’t do this 18, there was no way I could even contemplate standing on the start line at London.

David has blogged about what NTLM is, so I shall not do that. I had been very nervous about 18 miles, it’s quite a long way you know ;) Anyway, off we set. My plan was 11 minutes per mile, I had to really not set off too fast, which is my habit. I ran most of the first 2 laps with Emma, caught up to Ann and Jan, then along came Anna and Deb, who were a little bit late, so I ran with them for a while…kept trying to send people away as I didn’t want to slow them down but they wouldn’t go.

The miles ticked on by, I was having some gels and sports drink, before we knew it (ahem!) we were on the 5th lap. I really should have had my 4th gel about a kilometre before I did but there you go, that’s what you do these practise runs for I guess. So, last gel, then off we went onto the 6th lap. At 16.75 miles I lost the plot a bit and threw my toys out of the pram! I sent everyone away (what goes on in my head to do that?) and plodded on – still on my target pace though. Before long, Deb came back for me and I had done it. I had run 18 miles. Average pace was 10:54, so perfect.

David had whizzed along for his 18+ miles and greeted me with drinks at the end. I was feeling a bit wibbly wobbly, so drank some milkshake, got some warm clothes on and after a chat in the sunshine, headed off home. Thanks so much to Anna, Deb and Ann who ran with me for much of the time (or tried to before I banished them!).

Things went a big wrong at this point, I felt awful in the car, didn’t know what to do with myself. TMI Alert: Got home, in the front door and threw up! Luckily only into my hands as I ran up the stairs and not onto the carpet ;) All the stuff I had consumed after running, gone into the toilet. Rats. Tried to drink something else a bit later, once again down the loo. I don’t know why, there’s been a few suggestions made, I will try other things. Either way, I felt rotten for quite a few hours.

I am trying to take the positives from this run, currently the throwing up experience is over-shadowing my delight at running 18 miles…but I will try and let the delight back in later tonight :)

David Not The London Marathon 2012 (David)

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In 2009 it was suggested that a social run around the Bushy parkrun 5k course a few weeks out from the London Marathon would be a great little motivator for those long runs and also to get to share a long run with people who are running different distances – so not just for the 20+ miler club!  Not The London Marathon was born!  You can read about 2009, 2010 and the 2011 events elsewhere on this blog.

The ‘rules’ are as follows…

  • Start around 9am
  • Start at the Bushy parkrun current finish line.
  • Run the Bushy parkrun course as many times as you like, looping round the start line and finishing line trees.
  • Anyone can join in and run any number of laps at any time at any speed, either alone or in groups.
  • No official timing, time yourself if you’d like.
  • Friends and supporters congregate at the parkrun finish line to give encouragement and support, or maybe just enjoy an alfresco picnic/refreshments and a social.
  • People can run as many laps as they like.
  • It’s Not the London Marathon, cos it’s not a race, it’s not a marathon distance for everyone, and anyone can join in anytime.

The date was set for Sunday 11 March and a large number of us (around 45) found ourselves on the ‘old startline’ for the Bushy Park Time Trial parkrun.  After a quick photograph we all set off to run anything from 3 miles up to 18 or more back and forth on the Bushy parkrun route.

I’m currently in training for the London Marathon so had plans for a long run. Today I wanted (well, a book I found on the shelf at home that has some schedules in it) to do around 17 miles, but at a slower pace to my normal long runs.  If I can follow this schedule then my long runs will be slower than normal, my faster runs faster than normal and then my marathon will be spot on perfect.  That’s the plan anyway!

The start of Not The London Marathon 2012 - Photo by Suzan Baker

I set off with fellow parkrunners Hayden and Andy and the three of us had a good chat for about 12 or 13 miles.  At this point Andy and Hayden headed for the ice cream van (they’re not marathon training) and I headed for a final two ‘laps’ of the parkrun route.  I pushed a little harder this time and closer to my target marathon pace and had a lovely run.  Just shy of 19 miles ticked off.  OK, so its more than the ‘scheduled’ 17 but that’ll do.

Part way through the run it was lovely to see Roger and Gill Wilson out in the park.  Roger originally came up with the idea of ‘Not The London Marathon’ so I’m sure he was out in the park just to check up on us all and make sure that we weren’t cutting any corners!

It was a beautiful day in the park, lots of us out running and we were all giving each other plenty of support as we crossed each other multiple times during this long run.  After finishing a group of us had a good chat, some coffee, some cake and a little bit of stretching which enjoying the Sunday morning (now lunchtime) sunshine in the park.

David Sharon Sydney (St. Peters) parkrun – 11 February 2012

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G’Day! This week Sharon and I found ourselves far far away on the other side of the world for the 8am Saturday morning start of the St. Peters parkrun held in Sydney Park, in a lovely city called Sydney, in Australia!

The sun rises over St. Peters park

As we approached the end of an amazing long holiday we found ourselves at the start courtesy of our friend with a car, fellow triathlete, occasional parkrunner and now Sydney local Grant.

It was an early start for us after a great dinner/beer/wine combo the night before but parkrun is a priority, right? For us it must be as we had to change our flight back to London a few months ago so that we could take part in the Sydney event. This weeks training has been non existent with my last run being a week ago as part of the Christchurch Saturday Runners group in New Zealand.

Runners gather near the start shortly before 8am

Sharon and I (and Grant) rolled up to the starting area armed with our parkrun barcodes and proudly wearing our 100 Club t-shirts. This was the fourth running of the Sydney event so the idea of a 100 club probably meant nothing to probably 99% of the runners there.

I introduced myself to Paul, the run director and he commented our on tops. Nice. At about 7:55 we all moved to the start area and he described the route and what to do at the finish. He pointed out the first place runner from the previous runs and suggested that we just follow him!

Run briefing

I didn’t bother with my GPS watch this morning instead just running to feel (that is, feeling unfit) and with a close eye on what was happening around me.

Right on time the run started courtesy of a loud shout of GO from a child who’d been drafted in for this very important volunteering role!

We all headed off (just over 100 of us) into the park, we then turned a sharp right and then had time to settle into things. Gentle undulations were the order of the day. Next thing were were on the pavement (or is it sidewalk in Australia?) and running around the outskirts of the park. I had a few runners close by to me and was in 4th position. No idea of times/pace.

After running around most of the park you head back in to be presented with “Heartbreak Hill” – shortish but tough with a lovely little downhill on the other side. It was here I heard someone come up close behind me. You then run around a cricket pitch oval and during this part I dropped back to 5th position. Course marking was normally through big chalk arrows drawn on the tarmac paths (which were great) or a marshall.

The weather was mostly cloudy but very warm but the main difficulty for me was the humidity. It was incredibly muggy out there and really hard work. Then again hard work is the underlying theme of 5k running so you just have to get on with it knowing that it’s not too far to the finish.  Looking at a weather observations website at 8am it was 20.1 degrees with 86 percent humidity.

I managed to hang on to 5th place (fairly comfortably) but certainly without really pushing myself. Within seconds of crossing the finishing line I was offered a glass of water from another young girl which was bliss. Thank you.

If you have run a parkrun before then every event I’ve done feels like your home run. We were given finishing tokens which were the same as back ‘home’ and the timer/scanner equipment was the same. An efficient queue for barcode scanning and happy marshals made for the trademark parkrun experience.

Sharon crossing the finishing line

I then chatted to some of the volunteers and then watched Grant and then Sharon come into finish. After a chat we headed off to the cafe which is really close to the start/finish area and sat down with a drink and reflected on the pain that was Sydney parkrun. On the way to the cafe (kiosk) Sharon and I posed for a photo with our lovely black 100 club tops.

Sydney Park is beautiful and a fantastic place to run. The course is by no means easy and the Australian summer weather does little to help that! The event seems to be growing rapidly right now after some great publicity during the week. The only thing I do worry about is that the park was super busy with dog walkers this morning. I didn’t hear any complaints but if runner numbers continue to grow it won’t be long before some conflict appears. I’m sure both the runners and dog walkers can use the park at 8am on a Saturday morning together, but there may be a few bumps on the way.

The second discipline of parkrun - post run coffee and conversation

With the success of Sydney parkrun as we saw it today I can see the need for another parkrun in one of the other city districts coming real soon.

It was a great morning and everyone seemed really friendly. As I sit here writing this post somewhere over the Pacific Ocean en-route from Sydney to London (via Auckland and Los Angeles) it was so worth changing our flights around and paying a little extra to have the chance to experience a truly international parkrun.

David Bushy parkrun – 10 December 2011

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When someone asks if I ever do running speed training my answer is normally ‘no, but I do a 5k time trial most Saturday mornings.’ I rarely (read ‘never’) get to my running club for training sessions and normally rely on my weekly parkrun 5k ‘fix’ to get the legs moving quickly.

On Thursday of this week my good friend Danny convinced me to come along to the speed training session that he does on a Thursday. A few of us went along and although we got a good kicking by many of the youngsters of the Harambee running group and got absolutely soaked to the skin in the pouring rain it was a good hard session and I felt good on Friday and ready for more!

Saturday morning at Bushy was setting up to be a fast morning. Conditions were great (cold, firm ground and next to no wind) and in addition to a ‘mob-match’ between two local triathlon clubs the Harambee runners were there for a pre-Christmas blast round the park.

With the team behind the excellent parkrun show and Marathon Talk podcasts in attendance it was set to be lots of fun down at Bushy.

I planned to push pretty hard and see if I could get close to my personal best of 17:32 from a few weeks ago. After a bit of a confused start (a few chaps started early and the starting sequence got a little muddled) over 800 runners headed off towards Teddington Gate.

I don’t have much to say other than I pushed really hard throughout. The field was absolutely ‘stacked’ with fast runners and there were plenty of people around me. Lots of surging, lots of competitive running. It was ace.

Just before the 4k mark Martin Yelling came powering past me looking strong. He looked like he was on a mission and that mission was to take down parkrun show podcast host and co-presenter Danny Norman (which he almost did). The last km was tough (hmm, much like the previous four!).

Sharon was there taking photos and got a great photo at about 4.5km of Danny, Martin and myself in the background…

I crossed the line in 26th position with a time of 17:33 – one second slower than my personal best. Excellent. I have no complaints about that time at all. With four sub-18 minute finishes in the past six parkrun events (OK, we all know the southern courses as ‘soft’!) I firmly believe that I’ve stepped up a level to a new range of times in my running (well, over 5k at least).

Finally, to give an idea of the strength of the field at Bushy here’s an example – last week a friend ran 19:45 and finished 29th. This week he ran 19:43 and finished 102nd! There were admittedly around 23 percent more people this week (810 versus 655) but that means he should have been around 35th place! Talk about top heavy!

David Consistency pays off – who would have thought it eh!

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Well, would you believe it!  Now that I’m into some (un)structured long distance triathlon training I’m getting in more long runs, the bike rides are taking forever and I’m still not swimming enough!  However, the combination of regular cycling and running over the past few weeks is really starting to show.

Following on from a 10 mile personal best and a good 18:02 5k run at Frimley Lodge parkrun a couple of weeks ago.  The Frimley course is fast but has quite a few turns in it to slow you down so I was really pleased with 18:02.

A week later I was at Bushy parkrun.  I’d not run there since August (shock horror!) and had a nice little warm-up with Sharon before the start.  Conditions were ideal (cool with little wind) and as the 700+ runners set off I found myself pushing hard.

I chose not to look at my watch and just go on feel as much as I could.  As I went round the corner at the end of the first straight (about 1.1km in) I could see Mark G., Chris W., and someone else up ahead about 20m away.  I was feeling good and tried to see if I could slowly reign them in.  There was no rush.  This isn’t a sprint!

By about 2km I was with them and I tucked in close behind.  It felt comfortable being in their draft and before long I decided to push on ahead.  As I moved ahead I expected to see Mark and Chris right behind me (as they’re both much faster than me over 5k) but they didn’t.  I was then off on my own, with no idea of my time/pace other than knowing that either I’m doing very well or Mark and Chris are having a ‘mare!

At 4k I decided to take a glance at my watch.  I didn’t see the timer but did glance at my pace, which was about 5:37 per mile – a few seconds per mile quicker than my PB pace.  OK, all I had to do was try and fight through to the finish and I was looking good for a personal best.

Coming down the final straight I dug real deep – didn’t quite catch the runner ahead of me but crossed the line in 17:32 – a 19 second person best.  As soon as I saw my time I was pretty stunned – then I realised how tough it is going to be to get near it again!  Ho hum.

Fast forward a week to today and I’m on the start line at Richmond parkrun.  I’ve not run here since new years day and its a little challenging course.  The downhill is too steep to be comfortable, and there’s very little comfortable about running uphill on the way back!  I wasn’t expecting anything special today as I’d run 17 miles on Friday as part of my marathon training.  The legs were feeling it but a 10-15 minute warm-up and a few ‘strides’ got me ready.

Over 250 runners set off in ideal conditions once again and it was pretty chaotic at the start as everyone goes off in a mad rush to find clear space.  As I came round the first corner before the downhill I was probably 12th or 13th and I could see the leading two runners moving into the distance.

I pushed on at a solid pace and went through the first mile in 5:33 (there’s a fair bit of downhill during the first mile).  I’d slowly moved up to about seventh place by this point.  As we headed along the grass towards Sheen Gate I caught up with the runner ahead of me and pushed on past him.  I was feeling pretty good but know it was literally all uphill from here!

In the last half mile I caught up with another runner ahead of me and pushed past him on a short steep uphill section.  I opened up a gap and just kept on pushing.

Crossing the line in a time of 18:13 was much better than I’d hoped for at the start.  I was fourth overall and my time was 22 seconds faster than my Richmond parkrun PB of 18:35 (from September 2009).