Panshanger parkrun - event 536

On the 7th February 2026 I ran the Panshanger parkrun which was the 536th event held at the venue, my 275th parkrun and 189th different course I'd attended.

Running during the winter months can be a precarious pastime. Ice, snow, rain and mud are all potential obstacles that can get in the way of a good morning out.

Luckily for me I like and enjoy those conditions and find it all rather fun. 

There is the cautionary parkrun tourist who plans their winter based itinerary around venues and course that are tarmac based and save the grass based courses for the summer.

I take it on a week by week basis and a luck of the draw.

If a course is a trail based event and had a possibility of mud, then so be it. If it's hilly and on tarmac, so be that one too. If an event is cancelled due to weather conditions then that is also fine, I'll just rearrange my calendar and visit the next one on the list.

Which is why, when I arrived at Panshanger Country park on Saturday morning I arrived with a bit of a smile on my fast.

Because it had rained cats and dogs all week, the ground was muddy and getting to the start line was a danger in itself. We were out in the wilds of Hertfordshire about to undertake a one lap course with absolutely no idea of what we were about to face.

When you arrive at some venues, the walk from the carpark to the start tells you everything you need to know. You might walk around some or most of the course. Or you might, in the example of an out and back along the coast see or know enough of the area to know what the full course entails.

But the layout of Panshanger Country Park, none of the course secrets were revealed. The carpark was next to the start and the course head away downhill into the distance through a treeline where it was all left to the imagination.

So we started, very gingerly on the downhill. Grass had turned to a film of muddy slime underfoot and traction was difficult. Some chap on my right hand side did a classic cartoon style slip, where his whole body went airborne and he landed with a crash/splash on his back.

I do hope he wasn't injured, but I am slightly perverse in that slapstick style calamities such as that simple appeal to my sense of humour and I laugh first, show concern and worry second.

The course, as it started to reveal itself was a single lap, primarily on rough trail.paths, either rough gravel based, or on grass ruts where paths had been formed over years of usage.

As it wound it's way around Panshanger Country park, firstly along it's lowest part alongside a lake, before going uphill into the woods before going further uphill once more alongside fields of wild meadows.

Each stretch brought mud, and some epically deep puddles. Participants, particularly at the beginning were trying to tread carefully and make their way around the edges. Those with looser abandon or in a hurry hurtled straight through them instead.

I put myself in the latter category, ploughing through puddles and making an absolute mess of my trainers and socks. They were going to get soaked whichever route I took, so I might as well take the quickest one. 

After two and half kilometres, all the uphill segments had been completed. The rest of the course was much like the first, navigating an anti-clockwise route through the country park via a rotating canvas of trees, field and the marvellous outdoors. 

The last kilometre or so was rather thrilling as after the uphill climbs came the downward descent. Before arriving once again at the foot of the muddy field where the start/finish area was located.

If the start was precarious, the end was even more so. With over 100 people traipsing through before me, all the whole heavy rain coming down it was virtually impossible to run. Instead I Bambi Walked my way across the last 100 meters trying to keep to the far extremities of the path where the grass was at its longest and thickest.

Eventually I made my way across the finish line, where I came home in 141st place out of a field of 214 participants in a time of 33:44.

Overall the course, despite the weather conditions which Foordy described as being the hardest parkrun he'd taken part in. Despite that, we both agreed would be a course to revisit again over the seasons. Undoubtedly the venue would look completely different in Spring, Summer and Autumn with the countryside changing it's various colours and scenes.

But that's parkrun tourism isn't it? Random. adventures on a Saturday morning, whatever the weather, whatever the season. It's always fun!