After the havoc of Storm Amy last week, which saw a fair few parkruns cancelled, things were much less blustery this weekend.
parkrun head office encourage people to not spread word of new events too widely before they start, to give the volunteers a chance to bed in and get to grips with everything without being overwhelmed on their first go.
In this instance, it doesn’t sound like it was too well-kept a secret, as 639 turned out at Ushaw Historic House, east of Durham, for their inaugural event, though the numbers may have been affected due to last week’s intended opening becoming widely known as a result of the storm-cancellation. Aoífe Mongahan and Lucy Ward were on hand to witness the birth of yet another North-East parkrun. Perhaps kept slightly better under wraps, ‘The Demesnes’ at Barnard Castle also held their debut event, with 153 finishers.
Carlisle Park in Morpeth put out a call to try and swell their numbers to what would have been a record 200, to celebrate their 200th event. Encountering the opposite problem to Ushaw, they fell a little short at 147, but Peter Noble went along to contribute to the throng, earning a course PB. Another challenge was being attempted over at Blyth Links, Anton Mirafsari pacing a friend to try and dip under 21 minutes for the first time in a few years, falling short by just a couple of seconds!
Closer to home, Antony Darne set a course PB at his regular, Riverside, 32 runs on from the previous one. Harry Mawdsley finished in 2nd at Leazes Park, not a PB despite being over 2 minutes quicker than any other Claremonter this weekend!
The Smiths were our representatives in Scotland this week, going up and down the hills of the scenic Queens in Glasgow. Travelling diagonally across the UK, Julie Cross was down on the north coast of Wales at the increasingly familiar Conwy, recording a course PB on her 5th run there, while Claire Taylor was somewhere slightly more in the middle, at Millfield in Yorkshire. A hop across the water, Alex Taylor celebrated the first parkrun of his thirties at Poolbeg, one of the seemingly innumerable events around Dublin.
A shout-out to Nikki Szlovák, who has been doing some impressive travelling since she left us and the UK behind in June. Who can say what parkrun-culture-shock she may have experienced, going from her last run-out at Saltwell Park in Gateshead, to Shingashigawa Ukima in north Tokyo. Nikki finished as 1st lady, presumably unfazed by an 840 metre long course, that requires the runners to go out and back in a more-or-less straight line along the riverbank three times.
Cate and I ventured down the coast to Easington Colliery, for a not-quite-so-new parkrun, now on event #16. On arrival at the slickly named ‘Heritage Coastal Path, Easington’, it was immediately apparent we were in for a treat, as from the start area you could see right out across the sea, bathed in hazy autumnal sunlight. As advertised online, this week they had someone translating the briefing into sign language, in the inclusive parkrun spirit, so the run director made sure he threw in plenty of ‘hilarious’ jokes to keep her on her toes.
Deceptively starting off on a small field facing the urbanity of nearby houses, a quick trot through a small tunnel (filled with ‘surprise’ bubbles) took us onto a narrow hedgerow-lined path, from which we emerged onto the cliff-top, with beautiful views of the attendant cliffs and ocean (reminiscent of South Shields and Cotsford Fields, for those familiar with those parkruns). A small loop of about a mile through some scenic greenery and woodland took us back to the start of the hedgerow, where this time we turned left as we reached the end of it, to follow a winding path north along the cliffs edge, the beauty of the setting certainly rivalling the Pier to Pier in my eyes!
There was some mild undulation, but nothing to write home about. After a bit, there was a switchback, running alongside the railway line, still with gorgeous wide open views to our left, before eventually hitting the original path, and turning back up through the tunnel to the finish. We had a nice coffee and scone at the very homely nearby cafe (the entrance looks incongruously like someone’s front door), staffed by some very jolly ladies dancing to classic pop tunes. Perfect parkrun for a cool autumn morning.
