Episode 158 - v-index

Episode 158 — open the full-size artworkShow artwork, 20 February 2019

HostsMelissa Erbacher Scott Trickett

Roving reporterJoanne Watkins

Show notes

The parkrun adventurers are exploring new volunteering challenges! And we have a roving report from Joanne Watkins at Albert Melbourne (opens in a new tab) parkrun!

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Roving reports

In this episode

• Welcome starts at 0:23

  Mel Erbacher and Scott Trickett. Scott was in Adelaide for the zoo course at Torrens parkrun, meeting RD Robbie and his team, the celebrity Barcode Scanner Marilyn and the plaque for founding ED Brian Wild, and eyeing the par 3 golf course next door; Mel recalls her own Torrens visit at an event-director powwow around the McLaren Vale Half Marathon, where she first met Paul and Emily Wilcock. Mel timekept at Kawana, where the token handers-out spilled the first half of the tokens minutes before the first finisher, and her 25th timekeeping stint prompts her idea of a V-index for volunteer roles.

• Roving reports & the Channel 5 News crew starts at 18:47

  Self-contained roving report from Joanne Watkins at Albert parkrun, Melbourne, recorded during National Volunteer Week. She interviews Katie on reaching her 100th parkrun in five years, having started at age four after coming along in a pram with her mum. Katie describes the Albert Park Lake course ("around like a big lake", "heaps of swans"), running with her mum and grandma, seeing her teacher and classmates there, and her 35 volunteer occasions, marshalling and scanning, with scanning her favourite. She closes with advice for anyone nervous about volunteering: try a role once, and if you don't like it, try another. Hosts return praising "the power of our junior parkrunners".

• Launches and anniversaries starts at 23:52"Where is the cake?"

  No launches at all this week ("Zero, zero launches"). Anniversaries at Ballarat (Victoria), one further Queensland event, Bowen (Queensland), Burnie (Tasmania), Canning River (WA), Narrabri (NSW), Sandon Point (NSW) and West Beach (South Australia). Scott notes the run of B-names lets listeners combine the anniversaries with the Bee Gees Club, and says he is heading to Ballarat himself to revisit the "Ballarat Double", a warm-up lap of Lake Wendouree before parkrun in the park across the road, an idea he and Tim tried at the Ballarat launch and which never caught on.

• Sign-off starts at 30:22

  Mel said it sounded like Scott needed a holiday, he agreed and asked whether it sounded like they should wrap up 158, and she suggested they head off. Mel thanked him for joining her this week and Scott called it a treat and a pleasure as always, saying he hoped to see her in person next week on the Sunshine Coast - a meeting listeners would not get to hear - and Mel said they would chat again soon.