parkrun

[Rosscow]

RizzoTheRat said:

I'm not convinced, I wouldn't even see which way they went That's impressively fast.

[markh1973]

Rosscow said:

RizzoTheRat said:

I'm not convinced, I wouldn't even see which way they went That's impressively fast.

What's frightening is that you watch some of the BMC (or similar) races and the guys at the front are running easily sub-15 and you think the guys getting lapped are running slowly until you check their times and they're running 17/18 minutes.

[MesoForm]

Last Saturday I took a drive to one me and a couple of ex-workmates hadn't done and randomly bumped into three other ex-workmates of ours who also meet up for parkruns! It's great that people pick parkruns as a way of meeting up with old friends. I thought I got a PB of 24:03 but I'd forgotten I'd also got 24:03 a couple of weeks prior... I've got a 'real' 5k race booked in August so between now and then I'm going to be putting in some quicker training so hopefully that PB will get down a lot before the end of the year.

CardinalBlue said:

A very Saturday off Daddy Taxi duty meant I was able to do my first ParkRun in about three years… since then ive moved house and my new local one is A) significantly hillier than the one I used to do regularly and B) a lot less busy - about 70 there today which I found surprising as my previous ones was over 300 each week.

Very enjoyable… hope I don’t leave it another three years to go get another go!

I prefer the quieter parkruns, I have a choice of about 5 within 20 minutes of me near Norwich and normally opt for a quieter, off-road run rather than one of the busy flat ones. I just find it a more pleasant experience (plus the queue for the coffee is shorter!).

markh1973 said:

What's frightening is that you watch some of the BMC (or similar) races and the guys at the front are running easily sub-15 and you think the guys getting lapped are running slowly until you check their times and they're running 17/18 minutes.

20 minutes is a big achievement for the vast majority of parkrunners, even the ones who train to go quickly but one of our local 5k races had a field of 900, the top 300 were all under 20 minutes! https://totalracetiming.co.uk/raceresults/393

[elvismiggell]

MesoForm said:

markh1973 said:

What's frightening is that you watch some of the BMC (or similar) races and the guys at the front are running easily sub-15 and you think the guys getting lapped are running slowly until you check their times and they're running 17/18 minutes.

20 minutes is a big achievement for the vast majority of parkrunners, even the ones who train to go quickly but one of our local 5k races had a field of 900, the top 300 were all under 20 minutes! https://totalracetiming.co.uk/raceresults/393

Sub 20 would be absolutely huge for the average Parkrun attendee;

Parkrun said:

In 2005, the average finish time for completing a parkrun was 22:17. In 2020, it was 32:30.

Obviously that will be skewed to some extent by people that only do it very occasionally and that's their only running or walking activity. Many of the folks in this thread can reassure themselves that they are considerably faster than average. (The rest of us can congratulate ourselves for getting out there at all, regardless of time.)

[john2443]

elvismiggell said:

parkrun said:

In 2005, the average finish time for completing a parkrun was 22:17. In 2020, it was 32:30.

Obviously that will be skewed to some extent by people that only do it very occasionally and that's their only running or walking activity. Many of the folks in this thread can reassure themselves that they are considerably faster than average. (The rest of us can congratulate ourselves for getting out there at all, regardless of time.)

Week 1, in 2007, the event I started at had 17 finishers, last place was 26:24.

This week P17 was 20:28 and 153 finished in under 26:24 (plus 200 people behind them), the slower average makes it sound like we're getting worse, but in fact, overall we're getting better, sort of! (I'm not, I'm just getting older and slower )

[Rosscow]

Agreed - my 9th place in 18:12 last week certainly beats 9th place from 9 years ago which was a 21:09!

[cslwannabe]

Rosscow said:

Thanks, wall really pleased with my time!

P5 is great, well done!

Thanks! Luckily my local parkrun is pretty small in terms of number of runners - especially during the winter months when it’s windy, boggy and generally a pretty slow course so I’ve managed a couple of P1s there (over 20 mins!). I need something like P38 and P42 to complete 1 to 50 as a finishing position.

I was 48 when I managed my parkrun PB. 3 years later I’m about 40s adrift of it but think I can get closer than that, fingers crossed, even if I never quite get back there.

[Master Bean]

My most recent time was 39:24.

[RizzoTheRat]

john2443 said:

Week 1, in 2007, the event I started at had 17 finishers, last place was 26:24.

This week P17 was 20:28 and 153 finished in under 26:24 (plus 200 people behind them), the slower average makes it sound like we're getting worse, but in fact, overall we're getting better, sort of! (I'm not, I'm just getting older and slower )

I think first finishers are gradually getting faster, and we're getting more newcomers joining at the back, so overall we're just getting wider...I certainly am at any rate, but I'm blaming the post parkrun cafe for that

[redback911]

RizzoTheRat said:

I think first finishers are gradually getting faster, and we're getting more newcomers joining at the back, so overall we're just getting wider...I certainly am at any rate, but I'm blaming the post parkrun cafe for that

Heh, my main motivation for Parkrun is the social at the cafe afterwards. I tend to avoid shorter distances, mainly because I'm not built for speed (186cm & 90kg), and it takes effort to run fast. But as I increase the distance in my ultra events and spend more time doing Zone 2 training, its helped me with my 5K times.



I'd still rather run 20km slowly than 5km fast though.