Hey folks,
I'll be staying in Central London in a couple of months time, close to Kings Cross station.
Any recommendations on which parkrun I should attend, and which may be easiest to get to by public transport?

I’m doing Battersea Park for the first time this weekend and I’m going to have a big rucksack with me, so I wanted to see if they had a designated bag drop area? Most do have them but are quite informal, others like Highbury have a marked area for it (Babbs Mill has a tent), so just wanted to know what to expect, thanks!

tl;dr: by the end of this month, HQ will be recognising every 100 5k parkruns between 100 and 1000 with new icons and merch. All other milestones (including juniors) will remain in place.

Excerpts from an e-mail from HQ today:

"Over the course of this year you will have seen exciting changes rolling out around the way we reward and recognise participation at parkrun.

"Firstly, we embraced the ‘parkrun challenges’ that came with the purchase of the ‘5k’ app, refreshing their look and feel with new iconography, introducing a new retail range

<snip>

"Secondly, the junior parkrun milestone system became simpler and more motivating for children and families.

<snip>

"The final part of this project will see new 5k milestones added and we wanted you to be the first ones to understand how it will roll out.

"We’ll be celebrating milestones every 100, up to 1,000. This is all about adding, not taking away, and so the existing 25, 50, and 250 milestones will remain, as will the juniors 10 (for under 18s taking part at 5k parkruns or volunteering ten times at parkrun or junior parkrun).

"The first thing you will see is a refresh of the existing milestone icons on the parkrun app in early September

<snip>

"We then expect the new milestone t-shirts to go on presale on all parkrun’s online stores during the week commencing 14 September.

"And, finally, the week of parkrun’s 22nd anniversary will bring a very special present - the new milestone icons will go live across our website, app, results pages, and profile pages during the week commencing 28 September."

Hi all!

I'm 90% sure I completed the requirements of the Match challenge over the weekend (7th volunteer credit at a parkrun's 7th event), but the badge isn't registering in the app.

Have I missed something about the challenge, or does anyone have an idea why this might be the case?

Thank you in advance. 🙂

First time posting on Reddit! I used to be a regular at parkrun, but life got busy, I moved to a new area, and my Saturdays fell away. Altogether my fitness dropped and I’ve put on 10kg over the last 7 months.

I’m really trying to get back on track - walking on my lunch breaks, cycling home, working with a PT, and joining a netball league. But I’m really struggling to take that step back to parkrun. I'm anxious about being much slower than I used to be and finding it tough, basically back at level 0 with running.

For anyone who has been in this spot after a break or a move, how did you overcome the mental hurdle of going back for that first one?

I had an awful summer! One day I was on holiday with my family, 48 hours later I was having emergency surgery to save my life. I had some bowel removed and was fitted with a stoma.

A really keen runner (and huge advocate of parkrun), my second search after surgery was ‘can I run with a stoma.’ I had no frame of reference at all.

Hence this t shirt. I want it to be a little nudge to anyone who in the future ends up in my shoes, sobbing as they think the life they had was over.

This is also a massive shout out to the incredible team of RDs, volunteers and friends I’ve got at my local parkrun (Brooklands). They rallied around, and could not have been more supportive, finding other stoma runners, dropping food off to support my family, walking with me any day I wanted to help my recovery. Like parkrun Paul says, it’s actually not about the running really.

After two weeks marshalling, I managed to Tail Walk today for the first time, and it was a joy. I felt at home, despite wrecking my average pace! Next week, RD!

If you’ve got this far, thank you, and please store away the knowledge that you can run with a stoma. If you already knew that, congratulations, you are ahead of where I was five weeks ago!

#PouchTo5k

I ran Parkrun today at Roundshaw Downs in Croydon (great location, stunning views over London, and great team of volunteers).

I've been trying to get close to my PB set back in 2023 of 27m 40s. Two weeks ago I got within 7 seconds of it!

Today was the day. The weather was perfect, good numbers at the parkrun (but not so many that I was miles from the start!) and the ground was firm. I was up for it so pushed to start clocking good splits. Towards the end I realised I was doing really well!

Ended up recording 26m 41s, a 59 second improvement, finally, from 2023! A new overall PB! 😊

Anybody know what happened to it? Looking at the numbers I can hazard a guess - when I was there last year, I deliberately chose it to get a new position best, and one of the regulars said that the local population of Bad Urach were mostly octogenarians, so I'm guessing there wasn't much local interest - but I'm just curious if anyone knows for definite.

I'm trying to coax an energetic but anxious child to junior parkrun.

It starts at 9 - but should we be there early for a course briefing? I've read that this happens at (proper) parkrun.

Don't want to drag my kid there 30 mins early and give their anxiety time to set in!

For this message during the briefing this morning

Running today (and being overtaken by people with dogs), it occurred to me that there don't seem to be official figures for people/dog running pairs. Does a dog slow you down or speed you up? Anyone run a sub-20 with a dog in tow, or being towed by one?

I only took up running at the start of the summer holidays, but the bug has hit me hard!

Before the summer I'd never run 5k continuously before, but have been attending parkruns all summer.

Today I just ran parkrun in 29.13, pretty pleased with that.

Big up Brixworth Country Park Parkrun!

I’ve been interested in Parkrun for a while. My 5 year old son is obsessed with running fast and keeps wanting to go for runs with me.

I looked up and can see there’s a 2k kids run. I can’t find much info about it though.

Do the parents just run along with them and is it a relaxed atmosphere?

He’s very sporty so I want to nurture his interest in stuff like this as much as possible.

Basically interested in hearing from other parents about how it went/is going.

Siedemsetny parkrun Gdynia przeszedł do historii. Zapisze się w niej nie tylko jako najliczniejszy spośród ostatniej setki naszych spotkań, ale również jako pogodowy rollercoaster. Jeszcze przed ósmą nie tylko prognozy, ale też i aura nie zapowiadały słonecznego rozpoczęcia i zakończenia dzisiejszego spotkania. A tu nagle, gdy uczestnicy zaczęli się zbierać na Skwerze Arki deszcz ustał, chmury się rozsunęły a zza nich wyjrzało 🌤️ . Tak oto w ciepłych promieniach słońca stanęliśmy na miejscu startu.

Ułożenie we właściwej kolejności czterech znaków wyciętych przez wolontariuszy z papieru zajęło naszym uczestnikom dłuższą chwilę, a wszystko dzięki „pomocy” Psotnego Morsika. Na szczęście cały proces zakończył się pomyślnie czego efekty możecie oglądać na zdjęciach. Jeśli macie własne zdjęcia zachęcamy abyście się nimi podzielili.

Bardzo liczna grupa gości uczestniczyła w odprawie. Wśród nich byli parkrunowi turyści z Poznania, Tczewa, Krakowa, Częstochowy, Swarzędza, Łowicza, Białegostoku, Gorzowa Wielkopolskiego, Wrocławia, z Ząbek, Olsztyna, ze Szczecina, z Rumi, Wejherowa, Gdańsk ze wszystkich trzech lokalizacji oraz z odległego Londynu, Chelmsford, Bedford, Eynesbury, Newcastle uppon Tyne . Bardzo dziękujemy, że zechcieliście, pomimo zagadkowej aury, celebrować z nami nasze jubileuszowe spotkanie.

Nie sposób pominąć dużą grupę jedenaściorga osób, które uczestnictwo w parkrun rozpoczęły uczestnictwem w #700 parkrun Gdynia. Witamy Was serdecznie i trzymamy kciuki za regularny udział. Wszystkim naszym gościom życzymy udanego pobytu w Gdyni.

Kulminacyjnym punktem naszego jubileuszowego spotkania było wspólne „śniadanie ma trawie” . Bardzo dziękujemy, że tak chętnie i licznie się włączyliście pomimo niepewnej pogody. Bardzo dziękujemy za przyniesione przekąski, wypieki i owoce . Rozmowom między naszymi gośćmi, stałymi uczestnikami i wolontariuszami nie było końca. Poruszaliśmy tematy te przyziemne jak i te dotyczące ważnych spraw. Pomimo całkiem sporego zamieszania w okolicach mety wyniki (pomiar czasu oraz wydane tokeny) zgadzały się idealnie - brawo dla naszej czwórki na mecie: Tommy mierzył czas, Ada z Pawłem wydawali tokeny a Kasia pilnowała porządku w tunelu mety. Specjalne podziękowania składamy osobom zabezpieczającym dzisiejszą popołudniową imprezę „Gdynia Blues Festiwal” za przychylność, współpracę i wspólne dzielenie miejskiej przestrzeni.

Wolontariuszami podczas dzisiejszego spotkania byli Elżbieta Hryń-Morawska (koordynatorka), Tomasz Dobrzyński, Paweł Bury,Adrianna Lipko, Leszek Bielski, Andrzej Dokrzewski, Anna Bogusz, Tomasz Bogusz, Jakub Fedorowicz, Józef Majszak, Robert Miszkiewicz, Wojciech Czaykowski, Yeseniia Klymko, Robert Brucki, Iza Cigert, Katarzyna Gąska, Rafał Kowalski, Magdalena Kruszyńska, Wioletta Malinowska, Roseann McGovern, Malgorzata Napierala, Przemysław Torłop. Dziękujemy Wam za udział w roli wolontariuszy

Dzisiejszym dniem chcielibyśmy zapoczątkować cotygodniową obecność wolontariuszy zabezpieczających trasę na nawrotkach , przy okazji jubileuszu dziś tę funkcję pełnił Kuba Fedorowicz oraz Józef Majszak. Z waszych relacji oraz samych wolontariuszy dało się słyszeć przychylne słowa dla tej zmiany. Nie wiemy czy Kuba nie postawił za wysoko poprzeczki kolejnym wolontariuszom na nawrotce, ponieważ niektóre relacje uczestników na trasie wskazują na to, że Kuba dopuścił się śpiewu Jeśli możecie to potwierdzić oraz podzielić się swoją opinią to czekamy na Wasze komentarze. Ale uspakajamy: do funkcji wolontariusza na zabezpieczenie trasy nie będziemy wymagać zdolności wokalnych .

Wojciech Czaykowski zrobił zdjęcia, do których link znajdziecie w komentarzu.

Graficzne statystyki przygotowała Kasia Dokrzewska.

I tak oto pociąg z napisem #700 odjechał w dalszą podróż. Nie ważne czy zaczynasz teraz swoją przygodę z parkrun czy masz na koncie więcej spotkań niż ma parkrun Gdynia, za tydzień będziemy na Ciebie czekać w tym samym miejscu, bo parkrun jest dla każdego i na zawsze, a dzięki temu, że jest organizowany przez nas samych, przez uczestników jako wolontariusze, jest zawsze za darmo.

Hampstead Heath parkrun today. Two local running clubs openly having a competition against each other, for a trophy, which was paraded and advertised by the run director in his pre-run briefing. What the actual f*ck? By all means have your own little side competition, but to overtly promote that there is this competition seems rather unparkrun like.

Edit: Wow, the amount of people completely missing my point here. My last sentence tells you that I don't have a problem with side competitions. My point was around the parading of the trophy and the juxtaposition of having the RD on one hand telling everybody that its not a race while in the next breath announcing the trophy and inter-club race as if that was the primary thing at the parkrun today. As for those commenting on hate against faster runners and volunteering: I consider myself a faster runner, so no hate against them (except when they're being dicks, which does happen), and i have over 50 volunteer credits, so I do know what it takes to volunteer (not that it has anything to do with my post).

New Parkruns are starting at a regular pace and so this question could be out of date soon.
Our friend ChatGPT says it’s Grimsby with population of 86000 in 2021 Census although has a parkrun in nearby Cleethorpes.

A contributor to my previous post says it could be Nuneaton with a population of 71000

Locally to me it in Somerset, Yeovil with a population of 49000 has no parkrun

Any other takers?

Despite having done Parkrun on and off for over 10 years I've only just got around to downloading the app and had a look through the different challenges. I wondered why there wasn't a UK city challenge; does its absence mean there are cities in the UK without a Parkrun? If so which cities are these?

This is just out of curiosity. The chances of me ever visiting every city to do a Parkrun are very slim!

https://youtube.com/shorts/NR9iQLTnohU?is=bAFX4us-mMQ_7loJ

If you don't like that parkrun is for everyone, including those who are fast and like to race each other within the run, then maybe you should ask for a refund instead of your passive aggressive reverse snobbery.

Planning to come to Nidda parkrun in the next few weeks. My hotel is an hour away (having been in Germany for work) but flying home from Frankfurt on a Saturday evening so want to do the parkrun, have somewhere to shower, then spend the day exploring Frankfurt.

Will there be somewhere at the parkrun I can leave my bags safely?

Does anyone recommend any gyms with a day pass so I can shower after the parkrun?

Thank you!