Episode 101
2018-02-27
— open the full-size artworkShow artwork, January 2018HostsMelissa Erbacher Scott Trickett
Roving reporterMark Connolly
GuestRowan Ardill
Show notes
The parkrun adventurers go West and rock out! We speak to parkrun UK Engagement Officer Rowan Ardill who tells us all about ‘running the date’. And we have a roving report from the Northern Territory with our man on the ground Mark Connolly reporting in from the launch of Nightcliff (opens in a new tab) parkrun.
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Enhanced transcript
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Read the transcriptGuest
Rowan Ardill
His self-set "Run the Date" challenge through February (1 km on the 1st, 2 km on the 2nd, up to 28 km), which he failed in 2016 and went public with this time via Facebook live videos and a Tumblr blog, always running alongside company; his parkrun UK role developing junior parkrun and recruiting "outreach ambassadors" to stimulate demand in under-served communities; founding Bolton parkrun in Feb 2011 while working in NHS public health, becoming an early parkrun ambassador via Tom Williams, and launching a junior parkrun in Ramsbottom on 11 March; his Berlin Marathon 2017 (collapse at 35 km, ambulance, 45-minute lie-down, finished in 4:18); and Ramsbottom Running Club's twinning with Kembla Joggers in Wollongong via colleague Glenn Turner, and the clubtwin.com idea behind it.
Roving reports
In this episode
Welcome starts at 0:17
Scott Trickett and Melissa Erbacher. Mel's birthday present from her husband, revealed by a riddle card, was four nights in Margaret River: a gorgeous trail parkrun with Wes in a carrier on her back for the first time, volunteers Maddy Trent and Cassie Hughes travelling down to meet them, a famous tree formation called the undies, and a place straight into her top three. Scott went to Studley's second anniversary as an 80s rocker with eyeliner applied by Yvonne, high-fived RD Adam hard enough to nearly break his arm, and found himself enjoying trail running again on a Sunday detour.
Roving reports & the Channel 5 News crew starts at 41:46
Mark Connolly's self-contained roving report from the launch of Nightcliff parkrun in Darwin, NT - announced on air with the spoken ident "Tales from the Top End." He interviews Event Director Tina Sanderson twice, once before the run ("we're just waiting for people to arrive... people are sort of arriving in hordes") and once after ("it couldn't have gone any better"), covering the cool cloudy morning, the Nightcliff foreshore course over the Rapid Creek Bridge, how easy she found the parkrun start-up process via Darwin City Council funding and parkrun Australia's tools, and a Knight Rider / David Hasselhoff gag on the way out. Scott hands back at 00:44:58 with the attendance figure of 254.
Launches and anniversaries starts at 46:20"Where is the cake?"
One new event launching this week: Largs Bay parkrun in northern Adelaide, near Port Adelaide, beachside and expected to be flat. Two first anniversaries: one event in WA and White Rock parkrun in Queensland, which Mel notes is a trail event on her list. Mel adds that Queensland has "a whole bunch more launches lined up for March".
Sign-off starts at 58:09
Scott thanked Mel for sharing part of her trip, her four nights in Margaret River, and said it had been great catching up with Rowan Ardill and learning about his challenge. They then talked up Mel's alternative to running the date - a minute per date, so 31 minutes by the 31st - which Scott said a lot of their adventurers would step up to in March, while both ruled themselves out of the kilometre version.