Happy Birthday parkrun!
It is a groundbreaking event that has helped Mo Farah prepare for international competition as well as inspire dozens of beginners. Spikesmag.com hails the Bushy parkrun 5km, which celebrates its fifth birthday on Saturday morning…
Look closely at any race fixture schedule in the UK and the familiar name of the Bushy parkrun will be a weekly feature.
Yet
this is a 5km run with a difference. No entrance fee is required and runners do not need a race number affixed to the chest with safety pins. It is officially a ‘timed run’ rather than a ‘race’ and all entrants need to do is register online.
If you think this sounds a slightly novel approach to organising an event then you would be right. But don’t confuse novel with unsuccessful.
What began as a low-key event is now a thriving international franchise. Parkrun is now operated out of more than 20 venues and boasts more than 42,000 registered runners.
On Saturday morning the run celebrates its fifth birthday with more than 600 runners – from international athletes to novices expected to turn out for the 5km multi-terrain test.
Its current standing is all a far cry from
the inaugural run, which attracted just 13 enthusiasts, and event founder Paul Sinton-Hewitt has been staggered at its growth.
“It was never an aspiration for it to become what it is,” explains the South African raised Sinton-Hewitt. “When I started – I thought it was something that would be put on every Saturday and attract between 10 and 20 club athletes.”
Sinton-Hewitt, a former 2:36 marathoner, decided to launch the event with the modest aim of putting something back into the sport after a spell on the sidelines through serious injury.
He liked the idea of organising a free event for club runners, which would act as a useful measurement tool for how their training was progressing, although he recalls the inaugural parkrun was a very low-tech event.
“I remember during the first one I had a clip board in my left hand and stopwatch in my right,” he says.
For the first couple of years the Bushy Park event attracted a cult following of between 40-50 people, largely from the serious local running community in the area. But now elite performers such as Australia’s two-time 3000m World Cup winner Craig Mottram, Mo Farah and former Olympic 5000m silver medallist Sonia O’Sullivan regularly used the run as part of their training.
However, Sinton-Hewitt, who put in an estimated £40,000-£50,000 of his own money to keep the event afloat during the first three years, was being increasingly pressured to charge an entrance fee. A point he stubbornly railed against.
“I would never pay to run a 5km, so we took a moral viewpoint on this and resisted,” says Sinton-Hewitt, who has a full-time job as an IT project and programme manager.
“Eventually (being free) became part of our ethos and mission statement.
The aim is to get people out running, involve them in the local community and leave a lasting impression.”
Sticking to his guns and believing in the concept proved to be the right option. In January 2007 the parkrun concept was expanded to a second venue in South London – Wimbledon Common.
And now,
Nike, Lucozade and Sweatshop are on board as parkrun’s sponsors to help cover organisational costs.
“If I presented this on Dragons’ Den they would throw it out,” says Sinton-Hewitt. “But the bottom line is if you are Nike it helps validate your brand for very little money.
What Nike spend on me, they probably spend twice as much on a single athlete and what they get with this are the hearts and minds of 40,000 people (a number that is constantly growing).”
The fun run now operates out of 20-plus venues, with Manchester, Glasgow and Cardiff all staging events. The concept has even stepped out of the UK into Denmark and the long-term vision is for parkrun, which has attracted interest from as far-a-field as the USA, Canada and New Zealand, to hit more than 100 venues.
Parkrun devotee and committee member Danny Norman is a serious club runner and for him the weekly run is of great value. “I use it for marathon and race training to see if I’m moving in the right direction,” says Norman, who has ran the event more than 130 times. “It is important for me to attain or beat the time.”
However, the parkrun has become of huge importance to Norman on another level, too. “It has become a communal thing,” he adds. “I love to see the familiar faces and the social aspect.”
Sinton-Hewitt, though, is adamant the run should not be seen as the preserve of the club runner and insists it is important for athletes of any standard to come on board. “We take people who are 18 stone and we get them to walk the course and welcome them in. They’ll set a PB and before they know it, it is like a drug, they’re hooked.”
Perhaps, though, the final word should go to European Indoor 3000m champion Mo Farah, Britain’s most high profile male endurance runner.
Farah, who lives locally, has regularly stretched his long legs over the 5km multi-terrain course at Bushy Park.
“It’s my home and the parkrun in Bushy Park has been home to some of my training runs in preparation for European and world cross-country, as well as the European track circuit,” he says
.
However, he makes one more plea. “Can we make it 700 (runners) for the birthday?”
*Photography: Sharon Rowe*
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