Parkrun Tourism - Horton Park

Horton Park in Bradford is a 19th Century municipal park to the Southwest of Bradford city centre and last Saturday became first Parkrun Tourism destination since I started my blog. The parkrun is relatively new and was started to take some of the pressure of the main Bradford event at Lister park whose numbers are getting quite strong.

Setting up on the Park's central avenue.

By contrast to the Bradford and Huddersfield editions the run at Horton is very small usually around 50. This leads to a very different atmosphere when running. At Huddersfield there is always someone within a metre or so but here at Horton it can get very stretched out fortunately, though, there was quite a bunch of us that finished within about 15 seconds of each other which meant we didn't back off at the end when we were tired.

The day itself was cold with a brisk and as the race started we got a few flakes of snow which held off for the 3 and half laps of the park. In the small field I found myself very near the front as I went down the hill for the first of four times (Four downs and three ups we were told at the briefing although they forgot to mention how steep it was). A quick count up revealed I was in seventh position and I set my sights on taking the next couple of guys in front of me.

New years day and 50th Parkrun.

A Bit About Parkrun

At the moment I am making Parkrun my weekly tempo session. It works well for keeping your speed up for linger runs, but more than that, Parkrun is a fantastic community project. For those that don't know Parkrun it's a free timed run in a park near you run at 9:00am every Saturday. Everyone is welcome and you get everyone from Olympic medalists (occasionally), elite club runners, people pushing prams and really unfit people who are trying to make a difference and everyone in between. 

What makes it special is the camaraderie. Because the run is weekly you get to know the people finishing around you. The events are entirely staffed by volunteers and you are sort of expected to volunteer every now and again, although like most organisations some people give a lot back and others not so much, pesonally though I get a big kick out of volunteering. 

50 runs done, with Harry, Robert (and Mark)

All you have to do is find an event here http://parkrun.com, register only once for all the runs worldwide, print off your personal bar code and then turn up at the venue on Saturday morning.

Huddersfield Parkrun, New Years Day 2016

Any way, enough rambling, today was my 50th parkrun at Greenhead Park in Huddersfield. It's a really nice, well kept park with a lot of features typical of Victorian Parks. My brother Robert and his son Harry turned up to run and Sam (my son) came along to watch. Sam normally runs and at 5k and 10k is much faster than me but has been injured for a while now.

The route was changed this morning due to the normal route being icy so after the briefing and the shout outs for 50 and 00 runs, we were off.

The run went slowly due to an excess of Saltaire Blonde, Champagne, and Port along with Chili, Meat and Potato pie and Cheesecake. The usual suspects were around cheering me along, so thanks to Dave, John, Martin and all the rest too numerous to mention.

Anyway I plugged my way round in 24 minutes, the Garmin trace is attached as usual as well as a trace from a previous run showing the normal route. As I went round the top corner I passed Harry before finishing and getting my barcode scanned for my time.

It took a while before Harry appeared with his mouth full of cake, he was running without Robert and was losing interest so I ran an extra lap with him so that he finished his first complete Parkrun as I did my 50th, but there are stories like that every week and that's why Parkrunners turn up week in week out in all weathers.

Garmin trace from Christmas Day 

Garmin trace from today

Parkrun UK page