Cyclopark parkrun - event 100

On the 15th October 2022 I walked the Cyclopark parkrun which was the 100th event held at the venue and my 99th parkrun event overall.

I had planned to run the Royal Tunbridge Wells parkrun and keep up my chain of tourist events going, but a request to Stephanie from the Cyclopark run director changed my mind and my schedule has now been rewritten. I hadn't planned on walking either, but a combination of circumstances dictated otherwise.

Being my local event I knew that the centenary milestone was fast approaching for the Cyclopark and I should have drawn my schedule up around it. But I had wanted to attend Royal Tonbridge Wells on account of theirs being a prime number event as well as the R that I am still missing as part of the alphabeteer challenge. These challenges are easily addictive and interfere with rational thought, hence my decision to skip Cycloparks centennial celebrations.

However, Hayden and Phoebe have swimming lessons on Tuesday at the same place as Sarahs children (the run director at Cyclopark). Talking to Stephanie in the week Sarah had told Steph to inform me in no uncertain terms that I should forget about Royal Tonbridge Wells for the week and attend Cyclopark instead. Whatever guilt I had suppressed came creeping back and ultimately I had to make the right decision.

I've run the Cyclopark event over 50 times and without the event my passion for parkrun simply wouldn't exist. It was only right that I attended and I feel bad that I hadn't realised that myself in the first place.

As I was now going to be running locally I contacted my friend Bartek to see if he was interested in joining me. Since his first parkrun at Squerreys Winery he has started his own parkrun journey with follow up runs at Shorne Country Park and Malling, the latter being his preferred route on account of its gentle terrain and wider paths. Living up the road at Ebbsfleet the Cyclopark is perfectly placed for him and an ideal home venue if he wanted.

On the Friday before parkrun I had to go into the office to take part in a workshop. I had already been to the office once earlier on in the week and so made a late call before leaving in the morning to wear a different pair of shoes. I had only walked into town before I realised I'd made a major mistake. The shoes hadn't quite been broken into properly and as a result my heels had been worn away by the friction. After suffering the whole day from discomfort it wasn't until later that evening I was able to discover the true damage my new blisters had done, and it wasn't good (or pretty).

I wasn't going to be able to run at parkrun in the morning, but with my 100th planned for next week there was no way I could miss it. I could put back my 100th, but we've planned to go to Bushy, the venue of the very first parkrun and we've made arrangements for the children to miss their clubs and other subtle changes to our normal schedule. My parkrun plan has been designed to be adaptable, but evidently not quite adaptable enough. In order to get to my 100th as planned I needed to complete number 99!

Friday night was also a bad night for me sleepwise. Stephanie has been suffering for a week or so with a bad cough and it seemed she'd finally passed it onto me. So not only could I not walk I could barely breathe without sounding like Darth Vader. No way could I run, so a new plan which involved walking was hastly formed.

I asked Bartek if Gosia would be joining us to watch and support Bartek participate in the event and whether she'd like to walk with me instead. Fortunately she agrees and that is exactly what we ended up doing.

During the race briefing, Sarah embarrassed me somewhat by calling me out and thanking me for putting my parkrun tourism ambitions on hold and helping spread the word of the event on social media. It was the first of many little touches that reminded me of the importance of your home event. Tourism is great and fun, but there is nowhere like home, especially when home is such a friendly, motivating place.

I also had the opportunity to meet up with Auntie Melinda who had returned from a trip to the US. She got a chance to tell me a little about her trip and I was able to high five her multiple times as we passed one another on the course.

Walking parkrun is absolutely fine, in fact it is actively encouraged now what with the parkwalk movement and introduction of the parkwalk volunteer role on event days. It has always been a case of walk, run or jog, but that's being emphasised much more strongly now to encourage further participation after listening to people who still hadn't returned after the COVID enforced break. A high number of people had cited overall loss of fitness and concerns about not being able to register competitive times as being a main contributory factor. With encouraging people to focus on the activity, rather than the time it will hopefully bring those people back.

It was the first time that I had elected to chose to walk. I had to walk half the course at Lullingstone through injury but it was nice to walk and take the event at a more leisurely pace. Gosia and I was able to cheer people on as we walked, including Bartek and Auntie Melinda. We were also able to talk with the tail walker about her own parkrun journey which was a unique to her as mine is to me.

I finished in 154th place out of a field of 157 people in a time of 55.47. it may well have been my slowest ever recorded time, but it was certainly one of my most memorable and enjoyable events for sure.