parkrun, 17th December 2022
The weather once again decimated the local parkruns, but a few survived. Durham was on, so Niki Szlovak ventured there and came home as first female (again). Myself, Maria Duenas and Alex Harding decided to try Windy Nook, where none of us had run before.
Alex and Maria dutifully got there nice and early, found the car park at the Community Centre and followed other runners to the start. I thought that I had allowed plenty of time, but stupidly decided to let the sat nav take me to the post code specified on the Windy Nook parkrun page. At 8:45 the sat nav declared “You have arrived at your destination” but I was next to some open fields. The car in front turned up what looked like a farm track, so I thought that might be it – which was mistake number two. I decided to head back to Heworth Interchange and try from there. Eventually, after a couple of dead ends, I knew that I must be in roughly the right area, so I stopped and called up the parkrun page on my phone. It suggests parking at Whitehills Community Centre, which I found but the car park was full with no sign of any runners. As it was now 9am, I pulled up on the grass, and headed to the open fields next to the centre – still no sign of runners. After a circuit of the field, I returned to the car and read a bit more of the course details and realised that the start was through the estate opposite the centre. I was now too late to start! The moral of the story is … when going to a new parkrun, research thoroughly the night before.
Maria, Alex and Jack Shawcross kindly took me on a lap of the snow-covered course when they had finished. It seems like a really nice route, so I will return!
Meanwhile, the duo down under were running in the heat of Perth. I have put a photo of each event below to make them jealous – I am sure that they are pining for the North East already!
| Durham | |
| 22:05 | Nikoletta Szlovak (1st female) |
| Windy Nook | |
| 23:49 | Maria Duenas (2nd female) |
| 28:40 | Alex Harding |
| Cottesloe, Perth, Australia | |
| 22:16 | Lucas de Rosa |
| 23:54 | Fred Besse |
