UKH

Hi. Am planning first Park Run tomorrow in Bristol. Last week it looks like they got over 400 entries. How early will I need to get there? I've printed off my barcode. 9 pm start . Thanks.

In reply to Phil1919:

Well before 9pm As it is your first time, you might want to get there in time to do the first timer briefing, but realistically just before 9am is fine, the number of runners shouldn't really have a bearing on that.

In reply to Phil1919:

5 to 9 for the briefing. If there are over 400 runners the chances are you won’t get lost!

Enjoy - not been able to do it for over 3 months now and missing it

In reply to Phil1919:

As the others said, no need to get there super early. I'd aim to get there for about 8:50ish (earlier if you want to warm up) and listen to the briefing. parkrun is great and super friendly - enjoy it!

In reply to Phil1919:

If there are 400 runners, for your first time, I would aim to be there around 8:30 unless you know parking is really easy or you're running/walking there. Then watch how quickly the parking builds up for future reference.

If you arrive after 8:40 at three of my local Parkruns you won't get parked.

In reply to DancingOnRock:

Thanks. Interested to see how I get registered then!

Haven't had a car for 4 years. I'm liberated from all car related hassel. Will be cycling.

In reply to DancingOnRock:



They’ve got a cheek calling them park runs then.

In reply to Phil1919:

You’re already registered online. There’s no registering on the day. Take your barcode, turn up, run and get your code scanned at the end.

In reply to DancingOnRock:

I think there's something strange about driving to a running event.
Especially if it's a local one.

In reply to DancingOnRock:

Still fascinated to see how they scan 400 finishers and get them in the right order. Just about to find out.....I'm off!

In reply to baron:

Yes. I agree. My local local one is 3miles away. I run to it. The next closest ‘local’ one is 10 miles away. It’s not ideal running a 10mile warm up, standing around getting cold, trying to run a PB 5k, then run 10miles home. I tried it once, but it didn’t end well. I walked the last 5miles.

Might try cycling it one day, but it turns a 25 minute run into a whole morning out.

In reply to Yanis Nayu:

Took me a while but I got there in the end.

Very good.

In reply to DancingOnRock:

Ten Miles is too far to run/walk,,especially if you don't want to spend all morning doing it or are after a PB.
And I wasn't trying to knock the idea of running.
But it has always seemed strange to me to see people driving to our local promenade (or park) and then either cycling or running along the prom.
Admitedelly it's nice scenery but I feel better just cycling or running straight from our house.
Probably just me.

In reply to baron:

It depends where they’re coming from. Another factor is it’s a very busy narrow road to my very local one. Not many people would be brave enough to run along it. People tell me I’m mad and am taking my life in my hands. I can’t see it myself.

In reply to DancingOnRock:

Yes busy roads with no pavement/path can be a major factor in deciding a route.
Go careful out there.

In reply to baron:
I'd move.

In reply to Phil1919:

Yes, that was interesting. Basically, you register at the end, which they couldn't do in a race as it is open to cheating, but a clever way of making the start hassle free. Good course. First half uphill, then retrace your steps downhill. I can see how it encourages a lot of people to excercise at a level they otherwise wouldn't.

In reply to Phil1919:


Not so. It is the normal method for league races. (I'm getting ready for one now.)
Usually they hand out numbered metal discs at the finish, having recorded a time for that number.
So a number instead of a bar code and you tell them your name. Otherwise the same system.

In reply to baron:

I often run to my local parkrun, but it is a 15 mile round trip, so I am not PB hunting* on those ocassions. Decided to visit a different one this morning, 20 miles away, so definately a drive.

* parkrun isn't a race, so I don't treat it as such. A nice steady one this morning keeping a clubmate company. Quite funny overtaking the leading lady on a narrow wooded section of the course, she was trying make herself as wide as possible when my female clubmate was passing her.

In reply to The New NickB: getting on my high horse for a minute, do you race other 5k's properly. I really like 5k as a distance for 'serious' runners as you can go at it really hard andif you can't run a good one (comparativrly) your chances of successfully racing 10k to a half is pretty compromised

Back of my high horse, well done to the op. I really like Parkrun as a concept - gets people active, time of day is right, distance is right and it's good to know other runners exist

In reply to The New NickB:


Yes, it's a race. But how you treat it is up to you.
I race every time.

In reply to David Riley:


No, it isn't a race. They are very clear about that. How you treat it is up to you.

In reply to wbo:

I race 5k regularly, more than any other distance. I usualy use parkrun as a tempo though.

In reply to Phil1919:

Did my 3rd Park run today. This time in Gloucester rather than my local park. What a great event!! I agree that it is best viewed as a tempo event rather than a race. I'll get in plenty of racing when I up my distance to 10k then 21km although I do tend to race against myself rather than other people.

In reply to Gone for good:

As an old timer I've never come across thew term 'tempo event'. I saw the Park Run as an exercise in perfect pacing which I couldn't have done without the motivation of those around me. So although I was racing myself, I couldn't have done it without being in an event. Is this tempo running?

In reply to Phil1919:

Tempo is just a term for the pace he’s running at.

It means different things to different runners. Typically it could be running at somewhere between 10k and half marathon pace.

In reply to baron:



You're lucky if you've got the option to do anything other than drive.

In reply to The New NickB:


So it's not a race but they publish lists of first finishers?

It sounds like they are trying to fool themselves and everyone who turns out to run.

In reply to timjones:

It’s a time trial.

There are no medals or prizes.

In reply to DancingOnRock:


I wasn't aware that you had to have medals or prizes to qualify as a race?

I'd say that if you have a mass start and a declared winner then it's a race, a time trial would proably have a staggered start. You can have prizes and/or medals in either option.

In reply to timjones:

I'm the Event Director for Chester parkrun.

It's a run around the park with friends. It's not a race.

Sure there's a first finisher but that's all it is. As someone who runs regularly and is often in the top 10 of parkrun events I can say unequivocally that it's training for me. Getting a good finish is brilliant but it's a very personal achievement.

My result at Farndon 10k this morning is more significant - that's a race.

parkrun events don't kid themselves - I can speak for Chester especially. We are a mass participation running and walking event where everyone gets the same chance to get fit and enjoy the community.

Great performances deserve to be noted - but parkrunners get the most recognition for simply attending regularly in the form of free milestone t-shirts. First finishers get their names put in a list of stats and no more.

My deputy and the woman I set Chester up with could barely run a mile 2 years ago when we started the journey. She's used parkrun as a running springboard. Last weekend she did Chester Metric Marathon. To her parkrun is a social event and part of her training. It's different things to everyone and all approaches are valid. If front runners want to race each other then that's great - it doesn't mean they get anything extra.

The day parkrun becomes a race is the day I walk away as Event Director.

In reply to Rampikino:

Very well put. Our running club organises the Workington parkrun, and it's very much a case of everyone welcome, and it certainly isn,t a 'race' atmosphere. Of course the really quick ones will race each other, I have a bit of a needle match and banter with my mates in the middle, people walk along at the back with toddlers and dogs. It's far more a social event than anything approaching a competition, and so it should be. It's great to see people of all ages and abilities getting out for exercise and supporting each other.

Shame people are waiting months for the t-shirts though

In reply to DancingOnRock:

It's a basic quirk of athletics rules to allow this event to go ahead without athletes having to pay the £2 non Affiliated fee.

It looks like a race, it smells like a race, but it isn't.

In reply to Rampikino:

Most current races are no different to what you describe.

I personally think the only difference is the technical rule that no prizes equals time trial, prizes means race.

In reply to Rampikino:









I'd agree that Parkrun has a superbly supportive atmosphere but by your reasoning does everyone have to act like a spoilt child for an event to qualify as a race?

In reply to Dave B:

Who would we have to pay a £2 fee to and by what right do they believe that they have to levy such a fee on anyone?

In reply to timjones:


If you take part in a UKA sanctioned race, you need to be either a member of UKA, which currently costs £14 a year, or pay a £2 levy on race entry fees.

In reply to The New NickB:

Aha, so Parkrun is a non UKA sanctioned race

In reply to timjones:
I don't understand what your loaded question is actually asking.

Seems to me you have a specific parkrun bee in your bonnet - hey ho.

P.S. under no interpretation does parkrun declare a winner except in the minds of those with a confirmation bias issue.

In reply to timjones:


No parkrun is sanctioned by UKA and isn't a race.

In reply to Dave B:

I think it is far more philosophical than a simple definition. I personally believe that parkrun is what the participant wants it to be for them personally. But it is certainly not described, advertised, promoted or even run as a race. Similar to races, yes, but fundamentally different.

In reply to The New NickB:

It’s the other way round. UKA athletes must be offered a £2 discount when running in an event as a registered athlete.

There’s no fee for running parkrun. So no discount.

https://www.englandathletics.org/england-athletics/athlete-registration

In reply to The New NickB:


Whatever fits their ruleset I guess.

I'm a simple fella, if it looks like a race and acts like a race, it's a race. To my mind a mass start and allots positions at the finish it's a race. A time trial would need to have a tsaggered start to allow you to compete against your own time without having to deal with traffic.

In reply to Rampikino:




I love Parkrun but I struggle to see how it can be defined as anything other than a race.

It's the mass start that defines it as a race in my mind, if you have to compete with traffic for position in order to improve your own time it's hard to see it as a pure time trial.

In reply to timjones:

I hear what you're saying but people running with dogs and pushing prams wouldn't be allowed to enter a race and for me that's the difference. Not only that but I would hazard a guess that at least a quarter of the people taking part in Park run would probably never enter an organised race. And it's free!!!

In reply to timjones:
Isn’t it the celebration of a winner that defines it as a race?

The dictionary definition is ‘to determine who is the fastest’.

In reply to Gone for good:

I've done a lot of races. I've only done one park run and turned up not knowing much about it. I felt that everyone was racing and using others in the field to motivate themselves. If 'Park Run' can avoid it being called a race because it suits them for one reason or another, then fine. But the mentality of all the runners I saw was the same as in all the other races I've been in once they were off. Plenty of other races attract people who also want to use them just to get fit. Running among others, it is very difficult not to get into the race mindset. If i was running the route on my own, I would be fascinated to see how much slower I would have been. I would hazard a guess of at least a minute.

Just my point of view of course.

In reply to Phil1919:

I think the point is, the volunteers are not marshalls and aren’t there to enforce rules. Also there’s no guarantee regards the distance or the accuracy of the timekeeping.

I don’t think I’ve ever heard of anyone being disqualified for ‘cheating’ either.

In reply to DancingOnRock:

Hate to disagree but all those points are not correct.

We have various volunteers, some of whom are marshals.

We have various rules that need to be enforced.

We have removed parkrunners from results for not completing the full distance.

The course is accurately measured by a 3rd party using a measuring wheel.

We use 2 professional stopwatches to try to get the most accurate times possible.

In reply to Rampikino:

http://coursemeasurement.org.uk/parkrun/index.htm

In reply to DancingOnRock:

Yes - they don't hold a certification for distance, that's correct.

It doesn't stop the distance being reliable though.

In reply to Rampikino:

The reason it is never advertised as a race as this would contravene the insurance requirements. The event is insured through uka insurance as a club activity rather than a race. Races require £2 per non Affiliated entrant, club activities don't.

I quite like events with no additional t-shirt, medals etc. Associated with them, so this part gets my thumbs up.

I have no idea if it has ever been claimed against, but having tens of thousands of runners each week each not putting anything into the insurance pot must be either being used heavily uka to promote running and/or be a very low risk indeed. Otherwise the club races are heavily subsidising parkrun.

I hope it's not costing much on claims, or the model will collapse quite quickly.

However, long term, I can see the time when Park run could struggle more financially as it will reach peak market saturation and there will be no new funding going into it (£5000 per new race!) only sponsorship.

In reply to Rampikino:

The reason it is never advertised as a race as this would contravene the insurance requirements. The event is insured through uka insurance as a club activity rather than a race. Races require £2 per non Affiliated entrant, club activities don't.

I quite like events with no additional t-shirt, medals etc. Associated with them, so this part gets my thumbs up.

I have no idea if it has ever been claimed against, but having tens of thousands of runners each week each not putting anything into the insurance pot must be either being used heavily uka to promote running and/or be a very low risk indeed. Otherwise the club races are heavily subsidising parkrun.

I hope it's not costing much on claims, or the model will collapse quite quickly.

However, long term, I can see the time when Park run could struggle more financially as it will reach peak market saturation and there will be no new funding going into it (£5000 per new race!) only sponsorship.

In reply to Rampikino:

http://www.parkrun.org.uk/results/firstfinishers/

When a winner is not a winner, but a first finisher...

Technicalities I think...

In reply to Dave B:

Do you mean that club events are subsidising parkrun from an insurance point of view? Otherwise I don't know how we are being subsidised by clubs.

Our set up was £3000, not £5000 (18 months ago) We raised it ourselves - it was easy actually. The hard work was getting the location sorted.

We have a first finisher - that's a matter of fact. A winner is something completely different. Some people want to cling onto perceived "technicalities" to belittle parkrun. We are not a race. If we were we would have many more club runners (currently about 15% at Chester) and many more runners under 20:00 (currently around 8-12 per week).

You could easily argue that once the elite runners have headed off into the sunset, the London Marathon is then not a race.

parkrun is 13 years old and continues to grow. We at Chester require almost zero financial support which does not seem to indicate that it's not sustainable. I have no idea if the future modelling suggests that there is a tipping point where it stops being worthwhile.

In reply to Rampikino:

Some of the attention has moved to growing parkrun internationally as there are several hundred events in the U.K., but it seems to me that it will still grow. One of my local ones is Heaton Park, this sometimes attracts 800 runners, it really needs another parkrun within a couple of miles to take some of the pressure off it. From a public health perspective, parkrun probably offers the best level of return on investment of any public health project, so local authorities are happy to support the development of parkrun in many areas. Certainly my local authority have supported both parkrun and junior parkrun within the borough.

In reply to The New NickB:

800 is significant.

Our comfortable level is about 250. On Saturday we had 288 and that's where the start and finish areas just start to strain. Last week we had a record 331 due to Chester marathon and that was a challenge.

We have had excellent support from the landowners, council, MP and local running clubs. Definitely a success story where we are.

In reply to Rampikino:



I really struggle to understand the sensitivity around this distinction.

Why would anyone perceive those who are no difference between a first finisher and a winner as "belittling" Parkrun?


I'm baffled, why don't more club runners turn out?

What does a "race" deliver that a Parkrun doesn't?

In reply to timjones:

Psychologically, a lot of people are put off by the term ‘race’ and the idea of competitive sport.

A lot of people struggling with their weight, fitness or confidence have a hard enough time as it is without feeling the pressure of being in a race. It’s just one more psychological barrier that is removed for them.

In reply to DancingOnRock:



Are they really taken in by the dubious claim that there is a difference between a first finisher and a winner?

I'd say that Parkruns success has far more to do with the enthusiastic endorsements of those that have experienced the supportive atmosphere than any insistence that it isn't a race.

In reply to timjones:

“Taken in”? LOL

In the same way that thousands/millions of people are ‘taken in’ to believe that the annual proscession through the streets of London in April is a race?

In reply to timjones:

One difference I would say is that because I can go next week and race exactly the same course on a hard surface, I am most interested in beating my time rather than placing higher. So perhaps i will be 'racing myself'. But I will again need the atmosphere of a 'race' and the desire to beat those around me to do so.

I think most people who do the London Marathon consider it a race, but because of its length, its not so obvious as you are running within yourself. However, take away the rest of the field, and most peoples finishing times would be a lot slower.

The success of the Park Runs i would say are that they are reliably on every week, thus serving us addicts very nicely.

In reply to timjones:

I think you're underestimating the trepidation that the term 'race' would instill in many people. Parkrun certainly wouldn't attract the number of first time runners and people who are struggling with weight and confidence issues that it does if it advertised itself as being a competitive event.

In reply to Rampikino:

You are imagining a slight against yourself which isn't there.

My points are

1) The events are insured by UKA. This costs money. If there is no income per runner then this cost is either coming from sponsors paying for it, the initial 'franchise' fee being invested to pay for the insurance, or fees taken from affiliation fees from events or UKA members. I hoped it was not borne by the last of these. The reason for this hope is that a large number of club events are entirely volunteer led without any recourse to professional staff taking any salary from 'franchise fees'. This is from someone who is both a registered parkrun athlete and someone who has been a volunteer race director.
1a) supplimental: I also expressed the hope that the rate of claims was low and that parkrun insurance fees were 'paying their way' in terms of these claims. Given the large number of persons taking part I can foresee that claims will be made. However, I would not see it to be equitable if in the insurance pot all the money way being taken out by parkrun, but most of the fees were being paid by non-parkrun events.

2) I appreciate what parkrun has done for participation, but express a concern for the future about funding. The £3000 (iad in my mind £5000 when I was looking at it several years ago, but I probbaly forgot the correct fee) affiliation fee paid will not last forever. For that you get a rather good IT system and some initial basic support from parkrun. I do not know how much new development work is being done on the IT system, but there will be an ongoing cost for servers and connections to the Internet for the IT system. They pay several staff (presumably at acceptable pay rates). You do all the rest of the work. There are (currently) no ongoing affiliation fees. There is also income from sponsorship. parkrun have committed to be free at the point of delivery to the athlete, and they will not pay for use of the facility. My worry is that when there is a drop off in the number of new parkrun events (Are we reaching this point?) , that the affiliation fees will drop, what happens then? Will they employ fewer staff, will they be more successful at raising sponsorship and if so what will those sponsors want for their cash. There is a basic rule of things like this - if it looks like its free to you, then you are the product being sold. Or 'there's no such thing as a free lunch'. I know what Paul says about this, but am unsure how true it can be. What I do like very much is the value that health authorities and councils put on it as an event that encourages participation in an active lifestyle. Thumbs up to both parkrun and public sector for this.

3) I like what parkrun does in terms of being free and getting people active, but there is a certain amount of playing with words to make it free at the point of entry in terms of the word 'race' vs 'park run'. It has it's own section in the UKA rules to make this clear. This alongside the rules for fun runs means that it would be very difficult for a competing organisation (e.g. a local club) to set up a similar system and also derive value from it . And yes, I know that Paul put money into it early on, but that wouldn't be easy today. parkrun pretty much has a monopoly in the UK on free to enter events with results listed in finisher time order with times listed under UKA rules. Fun runs cannot publish results. Otherwise to publish results it has to be race and this requires affiliation fees.
parkrun could publish results in alphabetical order by surname and not publish the first finishers if it wanted to clearly disambiguate itself from the idea of a race.



4) You said that parkrun wasn't a race as otherwise you'd have more club runners. The number and type of runners does not affect what its classification is. At a local race the number of athletes coming in under 40 minutes for 10K was under (9/600+) 3% - similar to your parkrun. This would indicate that parkrun is no less competitive than some local races. The number of registered athletes was 30% rather than your 15%, but at our local parkrun its pretty close to 20%. The claim that people are running for position (in a road race) not time is generally equally irrelevant - unless you are winning prizes at a race most people are running for a time. For most people it doesn't matter if its 201st or 202nd, but under MM minutes in a race is worth running hard for. Position is relevant for things like cross country etc as conditions are so variable. The terrain has been mentioned as has the measurement. Again this is only because of the way the rules are set up currently. There are road races that are only allowed to have very short distances of non-road, trial races which have to have at least x amount of trail, cross country races that have to be able to be run wholly in spikes, but parkrun is outwith all of these.
The reason parkrun is not a race is that it is constituted that way and is given special recognition by UKA not afforded other organisations. This is fine, but in many essence other than its consitution it mimics a race. Again this is not to 'put parkrun down', but to recognise that parkrun has a privileged position in the running community.

In reply to The New NickB:


Sheff Hallam is similar, fluctuates a bit but normally in the 600/700 range. There are 3 other parkruns within 3 miles, 2 of which get aound 250, and the one closest to the city centre around 50.

My impression is that most of the people at Sheff Hallam arrive on foot

In reply to Dave B:

It's okay Dave, I'm not offended. Sure I'm a bit defensive about parkrun, but then I care about it having set my local one up.

That being said I'm under no illusions about it either. If you were to go up the road to Birkenhead on a Saturday morning you would find a much more "competitive" parkrun. This is probably because it is a fast course and attracts a lot of club runners who like to test themselves there, both against the clock and against each other. This is something the organisers are not promoting but is happening naturally among the runners - they are racing each other and the clock. It doesn't mean Birkenhead parkrun is a race - it is only in the minds of those competing against each other.

The reason I believe many club runners avoid parkruns, and also part of the reason why I am comfortable saying that it is not a race is that dedicated club runners don't want to be tangling up with children, dogs, buggies, Nordic walkers, long lines of very slow runners, old ladies walking at the back having a chat and a whole host of other park users who are going about their business because parkrun does not get sole usage of the route. These things are not what would be found in a 5k race any given Thursday evening in Summer.

So what I am saying is not that parkrun isn't a race BECAUSE it attracts fewer club runners, but that it attracts fewer club runners BECAUSE it is not a race (and therefore has all of those obstacles mentioned above).

I was at Farndon 10k yesterday and came in 55th of 719 runners in 40:27. I believe the first 46 were all sub 40 - that's 46/719 or 6.4%. The number of club runners was in the hundreds - 329 of the 719 so almost 46%. To me this is typical of road races I go to. At Chester parkrun we had 10/288 go sub 20 and 57/288 club runners, 3.5% and 19.8% respectively - roughly half of the 10k %).

To me there is a difference, and it is absolutely because parkrun attracts social runners, people who want to keep fit and people training and developing and they do so without the pressure of this being a race and without having to pay.

To me it seems like an irrelevant argument. It's not a race - its what you want it to be. Yes you could display the data differently, but that would come across as being overly fussy about it. Data is data at the end of the day - a matter of record. There certainly seems to be a determination on the part of some of the running community to get parkrun to accept that it is a race by any other name, but this also appears to be just an unnecessarily petulant gripe, frankly.

As per your discussions about sustainability, I have no idea. There may well come a point where the support for new events adds more to the expense that can be offset against the income and that it has to increase the setup costs or start to ask for some other income sources. At this moment such a situation doesn't exist but you never know.

I know from our perspective we are 68 events in and we have not had any insurance claims as yet, and I hope we don't either!

In reply to DancingOnRock:



This is a point about parkrun that we see time and time again. We see it on social media, we receive verbal and written messages on this and we get a lot of repeat runners who love the fact that the pressure to perform, to achieve and to compete is removed with parkrun. Sure the quick guys up the front can go and run really fast, but they are not elevated onto a podium and handed a trophy and prize money at the end - the only affect their own stats. The "ordinary" parkrunner is no less or worse a participant than those who finish in the top 3 and can earn the t-shirts just the same.

I genuinely believe that if it was a race we would have significantly reduced attendance.

In reply to timjones:




Part 1, as per other response - dogs, children, buggies, walkers, Nordic walkers, other park users milling around. Basically a whole bunch of stuff that you don't have to put up with in a race.

Part 2. This questions is the wrong way around - what does parkrun give you that a race does not - well just see the answer above.

In reply to Dave B:
My understanding was that Parkrun and UKA had come to ‘an arrangement’ with the insurers. I don’t know if that’s a financial one. What are the actual risks of someone having a serious accident and suing parkrun? Has it happened yet?

There’s a blog about kids running that PSH wrote where he alluded to that aspect.

In reply to DancingOnRock:

Not sure about claims - there may well have been, in fact I would be surprised if there had not given the sheer volume of runners per week.

In reply to Rampikino:


I would have a thought it’s the attitude of the participants that determine whether an event is a “race” rather than what an event says it is, so all will have an element of racing - Park Run just has more "fun" runners than say the Farndon 10k

In reply to Rampikino:

I don't think there are fewer club runners at parkrun compared to 'races' I do however I think there are a lot more non-club participants. That is the significance.

In reply to Jim Hamilton:


You’re correct. Which is why some runners have to be reminded fairly constantly that it’s not a race. Otherwise, it would become a race, start to become less friendly and attract a different type of runner, and I have no doubt about that.

In reply to DancingOnRock:
I can't think that I've been at any "race" that was "less friendly" than parkrun. Constantly telling other runners that it's not a race doesn't sound particularly friendly at all!

In reply to Jim Hamilton:


Really.

“Don’t forget everyone, it’s not a race, we’re just here to have fun.” isn’t friendly? Weird.

In reply to Jim Hamilton:

That's a shame. If you had been at our parkrun you would have found it incredibly friendly at there is never even a mention of it not being a race. We remind everyone of the rules and ask everyone to look after each other, and we go in the pub afterwards. The atmosphere at the finish line is fantastic.

In reply to The New NickB:

It's a hypothesis I guess, but tricky to prove surely unless you interviewed all the participants around motive.

57 club runners out of 288 at our parkrun.

329 club runners out of 719 at the 10k down the road the next day.

If the second figure is typical then the first figure, by your assertion, has been inflated by non-club runners meaning that we SHOULD be getting more like 160 runners at our parkrun every week. Could be right. In which case I am delighted that we attracting so many more runners to our parkrun than a race will.

In reply to Rampikino:



It seems that club runners may be a little softer than the rest of us

In reply to Rampikino:





How do you identify a club runner, I'm not sure that all runners declare as a member of a club at our local parkrun.

In reply to Rampikino:

Don’t know that you can compare them. People will run different events for different reasons.

I’ll run a Parkrun on the Saturday and then a proper race like a cross country or a half marathon on the Sunday.

In reply to timjones:

Look in the right hand column. If they’ve registered themselves as with a club, it’s shown there.

In reply to Rampikino:
As mentioned, one of my local park runs attracts 700-800 every Saturday, 15-20% are club runners. A local 5k weeknight summer 5k, which are held most weeks, might attract a maximum of 200 runners*,70-80% will be club runners. This time of year there are likely to be less club runners as XC has started and most people won't do both**. I would say the majority of parkrunners have started running because of parkrun and whilst some will enter races and some will join clubs from that starting point, they are not people who have previously drawn to races or clubs.

We always used to have a rule at our club that you didn't wear a club vest at parkrun, as we didn't really feel it was in the spirit of the event. I've spoken to Tom Williams about it and parkrun are totally cool about people wearing club vests, but it is a rule I stick to myself and so do most club mates, club vest racing, parkrun isn't a race. We do however often wear club branded training kit, especially when volunteering.

* There are one or two exceptions to this, but as a general rule.
** Our local XC leagues are on a Saturday afternoon.

In reply to DancingOnRock:

One of the events I go to a lot, as a runner and volunteer, participants are reminded that sheep have right of way.

In reply to DancingOnRock:


I get that bit, but I'm pretty sure that not all club members declare the fact

In reply to timjones:


The vast majority will.

In reply to DancingOnRock:


As Rampkino, not heard that from a parkrun spiel, thought you might be referring to comments between runners. Not sure who these unfriendly/different types that might turn up if there was no such friendly reminder !

In reply to Rampikino:


I 'm not intending to knock parkrun - I just didn't agree with the suggestion that they are more friendly than other running races/events

In reply to Jim Hamilton:

It's far less intimidating to beginners than other events. As such it's a really good intro to the sport.

In reply to The New NickB:

That's very fair. One of our core team members won't run parkrun over winter as he has XC league.

He prefers to race rather than to just run.

In reply to Jim Hamilton:


Our Parkrun is very friendly - Newark. It had 271 runners on Saturday with a real mixed bag of oldies, young guns, runners with dogs and kids and some really fast racer types with plenty of enthusiastic club runners like me. There are two main running clubs in Newark which are well represented with many wearing the colours. I arrive at about 8:30am, socialise for about 15 mins, warm up for another ten and get in my position with 5 to spare, just behind the leaders so that I dont get trampled. There is a cafe on site where you can finish with a cuppa and breakfast roll.

Some treat it very seriously and some are there for the fun. For me its a great yardstick and its great training for other stuff. It also has a few very awkward steps and a short incline through some woods which on the third lap are really tough and great for the legs.

In reply to Jim Hamilton:

I think they are different as they don't have all the registration stuff beforehand - turn up and run.

There are definitely different feels to all parkruns - I've done a variety and they have a lot of similarities but some feel more relaxed than others. I've not found one that I wouldn't happily go back to.

In reply to TheDrunkenBakers:
I used to live (and run) in Newark. Where is the parkrun route?

Edit - just looked it up...

In reply to Phil1919:
Dear heavens above, we're fighting about whether it's a race or not?? Race it if you want, let Parkrun call it what they want. As soon as you start picking things like this to pieces, it generates bad feeling and it tarnishes what is a fantastic event, whatever the f*** it is.


EDIT - This is not aimed at Clint86 specifically but rather at those fighting about it.

In reply to Ava Adore:

No.

We are discussing running psychology within the area of parkrun and club runnning, and what particularly motivates or de-motivates people from taking part in different types of events.

In reply to DancingOnRock:

Stop all this disagreeing on forums!

In reply to Rampikino:

I agree. You should agree with me.

In reply to Dave B:

I agree.

In reply to Dave B:


I disagree.

In reply to bouldery bits:

I Agree with that, you should.