Seems a lot of people are interested in my explanations of parkrun tourism Stats and Challenges. Therefore, I thought it was a good idea to update this post. It was initially created due to a group that has not only evolved but changed its name! However, I kept the capital P in the title to show that these are not officially linked to parkrun. Hopefully it explains some of the stats and challenges that avid parkrunners may use.
Why
This is because someone asked me about some of the challenges and it’s just easier to have an explanation here on my blog in case anyone else wants to know the same. The details are subject to my interpretation – please put in the comments any others I may not have included or how you think they should be explained.
At the end of the day parkrun is growing all the time. If you fancy a change of course, or the challenges of tourism then these challenges can help you whittle down the selection. Of course you could just stick to doing your NENDY (nearest event not done yet). There are even challenges for keep returning to your home parkrun.
How to Access Your Parkrun Information
How you get this information is all linked to your own personal parkrun profile. Some of it will also be e-mailed out to you. A lot of parkrunners also have a number of Apps that have the information pooled for us. These include 5K (now the official parkrun app), parkrunner and Running Achievements.
parkrun Stats You Might Want to Look At
I have adapted this post from it original and this was to do with stats to add in a group (as mentioned above). You can create your own challenges and there’s also many others people have created. These mentioned are the ones that the initial group asked for to be part of a league.
- Number of different Venues. That is each unique parkrun you have been to, regardless of the number of times you have been there.
- Total number of parkruns – this is how many days you have run, jogged, jeffed or walked a parkrun. This will also include if you were in a moving volunteer role – that is parkwalker, tailwalker or pacer. You can toggle this and count the static voluntering roles too if you wish.
- The highest number of parkruns you have done at one venue.
- Which country your home parkrun is located.
The Detail Stats
The age grading is part of the touchy issues surrounding parkrun stats in my opinion. This is because your gender is taken into account, along with your age and time to create a percentage – and not your sex at birth. It is a good way to look at how much you are progressing even when you are not getting new PBs. That is with yourself and your age group.
Parkrun Age Grading
Age grading takes your time and uses the world record time for your gender and age to produce a score (a percentage). This score allows you to compare your personal performance against other people’s performances even though they might be a different age and a different gender to you – the higher the score the better the performance.
The scores can also be compared across different distances – to allow you to, for example, compare a 5km time against a marathon.
No allowance is made for different weather conditions or the varying terrains of the courses.
| Age graded Percentage | guidelines as stated by the WMA |
| A. Above 100% | Usually, at least, a record setting performance for that age and distance |
| B. 100% | Approximate world record level |
| C. Above 90% | World Class Level |
| D. Above 80% | National Class Level |
| E. Above 70% | Regional Class Level |
| F. Above 60% | Local Class Level |
- Age grade today
- Best ever Age Grade
Parkrun Days
- Years parkrunning (since your very first parkrun)
- Total days attendance (see above)
Parkrun Tourism
- Current tourist streak – that is each different parkrun you have been to in a row without repeating. You can volunteer at (a repeat) one and it not count (if you just include running), or just volunteer (at a different one) and it count – or you can miss weeks from parkrun and it still to count.
- Longest tourist streak – what is the longest number of different parkruns in a row that you have been to.
Other
- P index – this is the number of parkruns that you have done that number of times. So if you have done one parkrun once then your p is 1. Two (different) parkruns twice (each) two; Three (different) parkruns three times (each) three – and so on.
- V index – the number of volunteer roles you have done that amount of times. Again one role once equals once; two different roles twice, is two – and so on.
The Wilson Index
- Wilson Index – the Wilson index is basically the consecutive event numbers you have done starting from an inaugural. If you have never done a parkrun having its first event you will be on zero. You do not need to do this in order for them to count – but for your index to get higher you must have each number. So if you have events 1, 2, 3, 5, 6 and 7 – then your Wilson would be 3. But when you do an event 4 then your Wilson would jump to 7.
- Double Wilson – the number of consecutive event numbers a runner has completed at least twice, starting from 1.
- Triple Wilson – the number of consecutive event numbers a runner has completed at least three times, starting from 1.
- Golden Wilson – consecutive event numbers starting from 1, where each one is at a different event.
- Floating Wilson Index – the most amount of consecutive event numbers in a row. So if you have from events 50 all the way to 60 then your Floating Wilson would be 11.
- There’s a question as to whether your Wilson Index includes volunteering and running.
On the 5K app you can see which event numbers you haven’t done because they are pink (background). The ones you have done most in a row are purple. Finally the others you have done are green. This includes your actual Wilson – as that doesn’t colour any differently.
More Stats
- Time today
- Age Grade Category – these are divided by male and female and into age groups.
- Clubs – select from a limited list of clubs. This includes things like Bring Back the Stats and parkrun Tourism Groups.
Additional Challenges
- Alphabeteer – attend a parkrun starting with each letter of the alphabet – excluding x. This is not possible in the UK alone as we do not have a Z.
- Cowell Club. The Cowell Club is 100 different parkrun locations – named after the first parkrunner to complete it.
- Date Bingo – attend parkrun for every date of the year. Obviously this can’t be completed in one year, and you actually need a leap year too!
- Groundhog Day – this is finishing with the same time at the same parkrun venue on two consecutive parkruns.
- Pirates – attend parkrun locations whose names start with & cs (seven seas) and an R!
More Challenges
- Position Bingo – get all the finish positions from 00 to 99. Don’t worry this includes the hundreds so you don’t need to be first finisher to achieve it!
- Snakes – 10 parkrun locations which begin with the letter S.
- Stopwatch Bingo – finish your run with all the second times from 00 to 59.
- World Tourist – attend a parkrun in every country. Unfortunately the UK is all one country – so England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are all one.
- Volunteer Ratio – ideally people like to see a volunteer ratio over 10%.
- Regionnaire – what is your % complete of your current most completed region with a minimum of 15 parkruns in it (e.g South West England).
The Periodic Table
Periodic Table – you need to participate at 118 different locations which meet the criteria of the 118 elements of the Peridoic Table.
- The first letter of the element symbol matching the first letter of the location name, but the second letter of the element symbol can appear anywhere else in the location name.
- Xe (Xenon) is the only exception. This is because there are currently no locations starting with X. Therefore a location with X anywhere in the name is acceptable.
- Letters not within the UK alphabet, including those with accents, also will not match.
- Xe (Xenon) is the only exception. This is because there are currently no locations starting with X. Therefore a location with X anywhere in the name is acceptable.
Further decision making can be made from reviews. Mine are here and I have a joint parkrun Tourist reviews Pinterest board for other people to add theirs too.
Oh my goodness! I had no idea there were so many challenges! I couldn’t keep up with all of those. At the moment I’m just happy doing parkrun every week, volunteering a couple of times a month and aiming to do one tourism event a month.
No-one can keep up with them all. The beauty is there’s lots of different ones and you don’t have to go travelling – chasing an alphabet etc to pick a venue.
Hi, This is probably a silly question but…
I have discovered that I have a floating Wilson of 22. There are a few gaps, which if filled would improve this. Is there and easy way to see which events have an upcoming number that I need?
If you go on the 5k app you can create a challenge for the event numbers you need. You can also search each week to see if there’s an event with the number you need.