The calm before the storm
Back in July I agreed to meet a woman I'd never met (with my wife, I should add!) about trying to start something that people said wasn't possible: organising a parkrun for the West Oxfordshire town of Witney.
Well, this morning, after months of hard work our organising team of 15 were joined by additional volunteers and 34 runners to test out the course, the equipment and our processes.
The weather was cold but kind - the frost helped firm up some of the muddier sections and the sun was shining.
It was interesting to observe the run to check the course worked and as I walked across our main field I felt quite emotional as I saw the runners commence their 2nd of 3 laps.
To see the months of hard work, planning, negotiations be transformed into reality brought a lump to my throat. We've done it!
And with amazing feedback from the runners we only have a couple of minor tweaks to be ready for our first public run next week.
The only unknown is just how many people will show up; predictions range from 200 to 400 so we'll see!
More information about parkrun in general and our specific parkrun can be found here: http://www.parkrun.org.uk/witney/course/
"When you cross the finish line, your life will change forever."
-Unknown
Resteemed by @runningproject
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Bravo! You must feel very proud and happy and you should! Running rules and helps people to connect.
Thanks, we really are! Got a feeling we're going to build a lovely community around it.
That's awesome! Congrats!
Thank you! It's been hard work but so satisfying and we have a great core team.
Do you plan to make winter edition, or maybe once per year, but with more routes?
Congratulation to you and all people who were involved to contribute the event to be held. It must have been exciting experience.
Now that we have completed our test event we, like every parkrun around the world, will meet every Saturday to allow people to walk, jog or run our 5k route for free.
It's been a very exciting and rewarding experience so far. Think it may be a little more stressful next week when we are open to tge public for the first time!
Find out more about the global parkrun revolution at http://www.parkrun.com
Thanks for the link, I had no idea that such global network as Parkrun exists!
But still, there is no Netherlands, where I live. I'll take a look at the rules about how to become a member or activist. My husband is always saying that he would want to organize a run ( trails 75km...100km..He is successful in such races), but we just don't know actually how would we organize such event, since we probably couldn't find enough volunteers (not even for the shorter routes)
Definitely look into the parkrun website - they continue to expand into new territories. Germany joined the family late 2017. Maybe Netherlands could be next?
I'm surprised it isn't already on the list. But, as you said, could be next, I'll check the website from time to time, to see what is going on. ;)
Well done you must feel so proud, I love parkrun.
It's an amazing feeling! I'm not quite sure what next week will feel like when we do it for real with a few hundred people!