Tailwalking this morning, which was lovely in the warm weather! Well timed as it was a gorgeous morning for a walk but I know a few people struggled running in the heat.
Another speedy run attempt next week! Hope it’s a slightly cooler one…
A rare occasion actually running Jesmond Dene… and so of course I decided it was a good idea to try and break my course PB from October 2019.
Geth was pacing me as he’s still not ready to run parkruns at full pelt yet. GPS is a bit dodgy in the Dene so he was going on feel for the first half, which meant we ran a bit hard up the hills and it took me the whole first lap round the park to recover! Thankfully we still had a bit of a buffer by the time we got to the final downhill section.
Previous Jesmond Dene PB: 33:11. New Jesmond Dene PB: 32:58, just dipping under 33 thanks to a sprint finish pulled from someplace unknown.
They do say those hills add a few minutes so hopefully it’s all good news for the ‘return to sub-30’ attempt on a flatter course in a fortnight’s time.
Exciting one this morning as it was our club volunteer day. About 20 of us were volunteering at Town Moor, many as pacers because it was also pacer week. I’m not brave enough to pace (largely as I don’t trust my sporadic back issues) so I was on the funnel instead. I’ve done funnel managing at Jesmond Dene before but it’s quite a different role at Town Moor due to the difference in parkrun size.
Town Moor broke their post-hiatus attendance record last week with 603, as Leazes was off. Surprisingly, they broke it again with 607 today. Maybe it was the nice weather?
The cows were very interested today. They even attended the pre-run briefing (and kept quiet, which is more than you can say for a lot of the humans!).
I have missed Town Moor – I’ve not been there since last Christmas Eve – but it always feels like you’ve never been away.
Back to my usual haunts in Jesmond Dene next week.
Tail end of a visit to the in-laws this morning so I did Pendle parkrun for the tenth time. I hoped for a Pendle PB as I seem to be on relatively good form at the moment, but it wasn’t to be – 27 seconds slower than last September. Still very pleased with my result!
The tail walker was celebrating a milestone birthday, a run milestone and a volunteer milestone today, so there was lots of cake in the clubhouse afterwards.
It was lovely to get a run in for the first time since January! Back to volunteering next week but I’ll be doing the odd run again starting in May.
It’s finally starting to feel more springlike…
I always find there’s one day in spring when Jesmond Dene starts to look a bit tropical in the sunshine if you squint. Today was that day.
Marshalling today for the first time since January. I have enjoyed the variety of doing different roles over the past few months, but it was also nice to get out on the course again. Meant I was finished a bit earlier too!
An actual run at parkrun next week. I’ve almost forgotten how to do that!
It’s been a while since I blogged about parkrun – the last few weeks have been really busy and I haven’t had much time to write – but I’ve been enjoying my Saturday morning volunteering. I was originally doing it because running parkrun didn’t fit into my marathon training plan: that plan went kaput a couple of months ago, when Geth and I decided to defer our Manchester Marathon places to next year (which eventually turned out for the best as he’s since had a complicated TLDR injury that has put him out of the running game for now), but I’ve continued volunteering anyway. I’m planning to keep doing it till the end of April and then switch to alternate weeks running and volunteering, as it’s been something I’ve really enjoyed.
The last few weeks I’ve continued doing finish area roles, variously finish tokens, barcode scanning, timekeeping and funnel managing. I like all of these as it’s nice to be at the end when people finish. I always find the roles a bit nervewracking the first time but it’s fine once I get into it, and it’s been so much more interesting than just marshalling all the time.
It’s been a cold few weeks for standing out for an hour (especially when doing the phone roles!) but it is gradually getting warmer now.
The 100th event on 25th March was a highlight – there were some Benchies (folks from my social run group) in attendance and there was cake afterwards. Event 101 this last weekend was interesting too as I was funnel managing for the first time – lots of running back and forth (possibly even more than I did on my short run earlier that morning!).
A bit of marshalling this coming weekend for the first time since January.
Back in the Dene today for my first shot at timekeeping. Nowhere near as scary as some people say – I really enjoyed it! Hope I’ll get to do it again sometime.
The weather (whisper it) is so far on unusually good behaviour for February. A nice contrast to all the storms we had last year!
A different role again next week.
