Many people are summarising how their parkruns went this year and so I thought it would be a good way for me to reflect on my journey. Never have I had much of a plan other than to just keep pushing forward and keep moving. My main reason for parkrun is, and always has been, to make sure that our children realise that exercise is important. I am really pleased to say that when our son at university isn’t caving (which is very physical) he does also go to parkrun!
Parkrun Attendance 2024
This year we tried much harder with parkrun. This not involved a bit more parkrun tourism but actually trying really hard not to miss any. Made all the more difficult by my stress fracture early in the year – but a stint volunteering and then walking in a fracture boot meant we kept up the 100% attendance.
Parkrun Attendance Challenges
There are different parkrun attendance challenges you can unlock as it were. They are:
- Bronze Level Obsessive – participate in 30 events in one calendar year. This I achieved in 2017.
- Silver Level Obsessive – participate in 40 events in one calendar year. Again I had already achieved this in 2019.
- Gold Level Obsessive – participate in 50 events in one calendar year. Finally achieved this here in 2024, whereby I managed 52 parkruns in a year, plus one volunteer.
- Platinum Level Obsessive – participate in 55 events in one calendar year. This used to be possible in the UK if you didn’t miss a week and did both Christmas Day and two on New Year’s Day. There are no longer two on New Year’s Day so you will have to travel abroad to complete an extra “Special Event” Day. Unfortunately this means you have to be a moving participant in each one – as volunteering on its own doesn’t count. Therefore, there was no point us going abroad for it was I could only get 54!
Parkrun Challenges
In 2024 I have managed to complete the following parkrun challenges:
Starting with the Festive Double – this is to run Christmas Day followed by New Year’s Day. We managed to get the family to do Christmas Day last year; but they’ve done neither New Year’s Day, nor Christmas Day, in 2024. They will not be doing New Year’s Day 2025 either.
This year I have been to 38 new to me parkrun locations, bringing my parkrun locations up to 56. This meant that I became an official parkrun Tourist (20 different locations) and joined the Quarter and Half Cowell Clubs. Cowell named after the first person to do 100 different parkrun locations.
Also ticking off the parkrun challenge (a location that starts with the first letter of the word parkrun); Stayin’ Alive (3 Bees and 3 Gees); Queen Elizabeth II (participate in 70 events following 8th September 2022) and Bushy Pilgrimage (which was for their 999th event).
Volunteering
In 2024 I volunteered 15 times. This also brought me into the v25 club and completed the Volunteer Tourist challenge. This makes my volunteering total to 33 – a ratio of 13%.
In total 11 of these have been report writer, with 9 marshal credits, 7 tail walker, 3 finish tokens, 2 parkwalker and 1 first timers welcome. Personally I know I have done more than these (the first timers welcome when it was a new role) for instance. But I don’t help for the credit I haven’t bothered the core team.
Also I volunteer weekly in a capacity that isn’t parkrun currently, volunteer at races – and am about to take on yet another weekly volunteer role – which again won’t be recorded anyway. It saddens me that people feel that they can look up people’s stats and judge!
Other Challenges Close to Finishing
Other challenges that I have almost completed are the Alphabeteer Challenge. Completing all the letters possible in the uk (including a sort of X) so just abroad for a Z now! Need a C to finish the Pirates Challenge and have one second left on the Stopwatch Challenge.
Family Stats Beaten
It has been a great year for my now smaller family in terms of parkrun PBs. The boys haven’t gone every week but a lot of them.
Teen
Notably our now 17 year old – who has joined a running club and managed his first half marathon in sub 90 minutes. He has had an incredible year going from a 21m 05s PB previously to a 19:32 (officially, but 19:18 on his watch).
He goes into 2025 with a best age grade of 70.14% (although his leg is still hurting).
Youngest
Our youngest started the year with a parkrun PB of 26m 58s. He wasn’t really running that fast and so really surprised me with a PB of 24m 48s at Hereford during pacer week, and then 23m 35s at Victoria Dock. He leaves 2024 with a new PB of 22m 51s – which he ran at Tetbury Goods Shed with said Teen brother. This makes him have the biggest time improvement of the four of us overall!
He goes into 2025 with a best age grade of 60.9%.
Husband
My husband entered 2024 with a lifetime PB of 25m 48s. On the 1st of June he got his fastest time of the year which gained him a new age grade. 6 weeks later he improved on his age grade again. Seven and eight weeks later he kept beating his age grade. Then two weeks later, at the same place teen got his overall PB, he got a new PB (and age grade) of 25m 36s.
He goes into 2025 with a best age grade of 54.1%.
My parkrun Times
My fastest parkrun time going into 2024 was 27m 34s. However, the fastest parkrun time I managed in 2023 was 28:31, back in May. In fact up until the point where I fractured my foot all my parkrun times were around 30 and a half minutes and above. All I wanted was to get back to sub 30!
It was on the 4th May that I got my first fastest time of the year at 30 minutes and 3 seconds. Annoyed that it wasn’t quite sub 30 on the one hand but on the other so glad I had been able to manage to Jeff that quickly.
Then it wasn’t long until I did get my sub 30 with a 29:33 on the 1st June. With the end of August seeing me getting back to sub 29 at Isabel Trail parkrun. Still jeffing I knocked another few seconds off at the start of November.
The Overall PB Smashed
However, the following week we were on holiday and it didn’t feel appropriate to Jeff as there were just too many people that I would get in their way. Our speedy son had hurt his leg during his second half marathon so he said he’d do a “slow one” with me.
Also he is great with negative splits, so he gently guided me around Exmouth parkrun encouraging me not to walk and that I could smash my PB. Making me run faster and faster without even realising it! Indeed I did get a new PB with an official time of 27:27.
Since then I have been trying just running. A few times I have mentally given up and walked. One parkrun I got a 5k time of 27 minutes on my watch, but as I started further back in the crowd I had to run for longer, so my 27:27 parkrun time remains.
I go into 2025 with a best age grade of 58.41%.
Not Just Times
Of course it isn’t just about the improvement to our health and better times. Parkrun is about mental well-being. I have been lucky enough to discover a world of fantastic people through social media. Some of whom I have been lucky to meet in real life too!
But also it’s the fleeting connections with strangers. Those amazing over 60s who are just flying! The gentleman that let me hug him when he expressed that he had come to rely on parkrun since he lost his wife to Cancer. And so much more.
It has been a fantastic year and I can’t wait to see what improvements we can all make in 2025!
It has been a really good year for your family at parkrun!
Well done on attending so many. Sadly I missed out on running/ walking three this year – but I was volunteering for one of them, so I only failed to attend two. My husband only missed out on running one – on the stormy weekend in December.