Episode 18 - Rodney Turner

Episode details · 186 speaker turns · sound cues from context

00:00:06Scott Trickett: Welcome back. My name is Scott. As usual, I'm joined by Mel.

00:00:11Melissa Erbacher: Yes, you are. As usual, joined by Mel.

00:00:14Scott Trickett: And this week, Mel, it's your turn to sound a bit different.

00:00:17Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, just a little bit. I may have contracted some kind of podcast lurgy over the internet waves last week. But I'm feeling better, so it's just the voice altering that's happening this week, and I apologise in advance if it makes me a little bit difficult to understand or if I'm a little bit quiet.

00:00:40Scott Trickett: Now, you're back on the sunny coast, but you have been finishing off your Tasmanian adventure last week.

00:00:48Melissa Erbacher: We did. I had a lot of fun. Actually, this is where the sickness obviously started. I wasn't helped by a couple of wet days in Tassie last week and some grim determination to do a freedom run of Devonport despite... hammering rain on friday afternoon so um completely saturated by the end of that even though well it was just a walk if we'd run possibly it would have um ended in less wetness uh however i was already not feeling well enough to run by that stage but freedom run done beautiful beautiful course even with the rain coming in sideways and the wind which is a tail wind in both directions somehow on an out and back course um i want to go back on a parkrun day so i'm going to have to head back to tasmania just to do devonport parkrun it was gorgeous yeah i want to head to devonport so i think that we can add that to our parkrun adventurers tour

00:01:50Scott Trickett: Yeah, that's another idea I haven't told you about.

00:01:52Melissa Erbacher: Awesome. I love the idea.

00:01:54Scott Trickett: Yeah, we're going to get a whole tour bus together and invite all our adventurers. Maybe we can start in Tasmania.

00:02:00Melissa Erbacher: Sounds great. Well, another one to head to on the tour, I would love to go back to Launceston because that was another gorgeous run as well, and we did that one on Saturday morning. Christine, who's been on the show, showed me around. She showed up also in her red shirt. according to the Red Shirt Challenge last week, which was very cool to see. And that was a great run too.

Red Shirt Challenge (listener challenge)

00:02:26Scott Trickett: I did see a photo of the two of you. One thing that was standing out, and you mentioned it on last week's pod, you were dressed a bit differently than Christine.

00:02:34Melissa Erbacher: I was. We were mostly twins, except for the fact that I had long sleeves on underneath my red shirt and I was wearing fingerless gloves. But once again, this was due to the fact that I was trying to fight off this lurgy that wanted to take me down. And obviously, I was unsuccessful. However, yeah, I was trying to keep warm. And it worked for the morning at the very least.

00:03:02Scott Trickett: Were the Tasmanians, did they think it was a cold morning?

00:03:05Melissa Erbacher: No, they were all out in shorts and singlets.

00:03:08Scott Trickett: It wasn't tops off, was it?

00:03:09Melissa Erbacher: No, I didn't see any tops off at this particular parkrun. I may have surprised a few people by rushing up to them and asking if I could please be in a photo with them. One lady actually was so surprised. She stood aside and got ready to take the camera off me to take a photo of me with my husband. And I was like, no, no, no. I want to be in the photo with you. And she's like, oh, oh, really? It was very lovely. Great way to meet some people. I love these challenges we've been setting. I took photos literally of myself with every single person who was wearing red. I almost got a little whippet that was in a red coat, but he ran too fast for me and they left before I finished. So I didn't grab him, unfortunately.

00:03:56Scott Trickett: And were all these people listeners of ours who were doing the challenge or just randoms who happened to rock up in red?

00:04:02Melissa Erbacher: Randoms who happened to rock up in red, which is what makes it so much more fun because I got to tell them about the podcast and they, got to experience, you know, five minutes with this crazy lady from Queensland who was overdressed for a parkrun and wanted to take her photo with them. So, yeah, no, it was good fun. How about you? Did you get out in your red this weekend?

00:04:25Scott Trickett: Well, I did, but let's just go back. So, this makes you a Stateswoman?

Statesmen / Stateswoman

00:04:30Melissa Erbacher: No, it does not.

00:04:31Scott Trickett: Oh, what have I missed? Oh, because you didn't officially do Devonport.

00:04:36Melissa Erbacher: No, I didn't. No, you have to do it on a I'm paying attention, am I? No. You could classify me as an unofficial stateswoman because I have done an unofficial parkrun. Yeah, no, but I don't go on any lists for this one. Okay. But that's all right. I've done all the courses, so I'm happy.

00:04:58Scott Trickett: And my weekend, my Saturday, we launched another parkrun. We finally launched a parkrun in Princess Park in Melbourne. So if you know Melbourne, I reckon there are two iconic running spots. One of them is – actually, there's three. Take that back. There's three. One of them is Albert Park. We've already got a – We've already got a parkrun there. Probably the key one that everyone would know is the Tan. Many parkruns have been suggested there, but it is very close to Albert Park. But we might get one there one day. And the other one is Princess Park, which is just at the north of the city. And we finally launched there on Saturday after a lot of planning over a number of years. We finally got it off the ground. And it was a good turnout. We purposely haven't advertised this one. We've taken some advice from our Western Australian friends. Just because Council's a bit nervous about the numbers that we can get there. And we launched with 199 on Saturday. Surprise, surprise. Massive success. We didn't destroy the park. And we've now got a parkrun at Princess Park, which is actually called Princess Park, which I've mentioned three times now. For years, my entire growing up, I always thought it was called Princess Park. And when we were going to launch it, I was really excited that we were going to be able to call it Princess parkrun. However. However, it's actually not Princess. I think the association between Princess came from there's a football club that had their home ground right in the middle of this park called the Carlton Football Club. Not sure if you've heard of them. They haven't won many games in the past three decades, so you might not have. So I think that's where I made the connection between Princess and the football club. And there is already a Princess parkrun.

00:06:48Melissa Erbacher: However, this park is Prince's Park, is it not?

00:06:52Scott Trickett: Yes.

00:06:53Melissa Erbacher: And is there also a Prince's parkrun?

00:06:55Scott Trickett: Isn't that what I just said?

00:06:56Melissa Erbacher: No, you said Princess.

00:06:58Scott Trickett: However, there is already a Prince's parkrun, so we couldn't call it Prince's parkrun. So it's called Parkville parkrun. And I got to see lots of red shirts. I had some photos taken with some people, which was good. And with a launch, you know, there's a lot of people who do follow parkrun. So there were a few of our listeners there, which was great. And I had a chance to catch up with them.

00:07:25Melissa Erbacher: Were you given any tips how we can improve the show?

00:07:29Scott Trickett: No, I wasn't. Unless I have and I've blocked them out.

00:07:35Melissa Erbacher: Don't take constructive criticism very well.

00:07:38Scott Trickett: Yeah, there was something about less of me, more of you, but that wasn't criticism.

00:07:47Melissa Erbacher: That's not a tip for improving the show. That might just be personal preference. And I don't believe you actually got that at all. Well, I think you need to slow down on the launching of your event, Scotty. I'm pretty sure you're only doing it in Victoria, so you can stay ahead of me on the most events list. I'm catching up to you though, I'm only one behind. But let's go to a launch in a different state for a change and let's have a chat to Gavin Mackay from Batemans Bay.

Meet the ED / launch ED interview (Gavin Mackay, Batemans Bay parkrun)

00:08:18Scott Trickett: Good idea, Mel. Welcome to the podcast, Gavin Mackay from Batemans Bay.

00:08:24Gavin Mackay: Hello, thanks. Thanks for having me.

00:08:26Scott Trickett: Exciting times for you, Gavin. You're ready to launch this week. Are you ready?

00:08:31Gavin Mackay: Yes, I think we are ready. So probably a few more sleepless nights up until the 7th. But yeah, we're ready to go. And yeah, the excitement's building. I think lots of people have been talking about it in the local town. So we've got plenty of volunteers on board as well, which is really pleasing. Only having had two trials, you know. So yeah, we're ready to go.

00:08:58Scott Trickett: That's a good start. Now, Batemans Bay is a beautiful part of the world, but for those who don't know, just explain where it is in the location of Australia.

00:09:08Gavin Mackay: Yeah, okay, so it's probably about four hours south of Sydney. two hours away from Canberra, right on the coast. So probably too far I would imagine for Sydney kind of holiday makers, but certainly accessible to people from Canberra. So we tend to get an influx of people during the holiday period. So Batemans Bay becomes a bit of a busier place than its usual quiet, sleepy self. But it brings a bit of a buzz to the area and it's just a little bit different around holiday time.

00:09:45Scott Trickett: But you're launching almost in the start of winter.

00:09:50Gavin Mackay: That's right, absolutely. So we've been thinking about this for some time and we've had a few issues, mainly finding a course, I suppose. In Batemans Bay, there's not one large enough park that you could call a public park that would maybe accommodate a 5k run. so we've been playing about with different routes to avoid public roads and so on and we've actually had funnily enough a route nailed for some time and it's only really just changed in the last few weeks because we've had an exciting little development happening in our marina area over the last few months and we've actually been able to make use of that development as part of our route now so it just brings a bit of extra excitement it's going to be part of the route will be on the marina break wall so there's water views for 100% of the course it's like a double kind of loop that we have yeah so looking forward to the reaction from everybody and obviously all our visitors that will hopefully come down for the 7th So you're right on the water there Gavin I have

00:11:08Melissa Erbacher: Is there much elevation?

00:11:11Gavin Mackay: It's generally quite a flat course. Yeah, it should... be quite quick i would imagine the thing is because it's a it's like a double loop now it's probably the narrowest loop you'll ever see seeing as there's there's basically two turnaround points um so you can call it a double loop i suppose but um generally there's uh not too many corners obviously there's two turns that are performed twice but i would imagine it'd be quite a quick course as well

00:11:42Melissa Erbacher: So when you say it's a double loop, it's not a twice out and back, but can your runners see each other as they're coming back? Yes.

00:11:54Gavin Mackay: Yeah, absolutely. So we start in a park and we basically head into town for about 800 metres to a turnaround point. And then you basically head back in the direction of the start line. You run through the start line and then on along the side of the water to the break wall where you turn around again to run back to the start line at the park once more. for your two and a half Ks, and then you complete the loop, I suppose you would call it, again. So it's quite an interesting one. In all honesty, like I say, there is very little choice in terms of getting a route down, which made it interesting when I was recording with the GoPro. But yeah, I've certainly learned a lot about measuring wheels over the last couple of months. So, so, so, so.

00:12:46Scott Trickett: You said you've had a couple of trials already, Gavin. Is there a bit of excitement in town about parkrun starting?

00:12:51Gavin Mackay: There is, there is. Funnily enough, for an area with 16,000 to 17,000 people, I suppose the greater Batemans Bay area, with all the local communities to the north and south, There wasn't one running club. Well, there still isn't, actually. When I came here, I found that quite strange for a decent-sized population. There is a running club further south, about maybe 25 minutes further south. They run on a Wednesday. It's very much a parkrun type idea. It's not really like a proper running club. It encourages people from all walks of life, different age groups, very much like parkrun. So, yeah, I was quite surprised when I found out that there wasn't a running club in the area. So I suppose the good thing is when you do see a lot of individuals out and about walking, running, we'd like to kind of bring all of those people together. Whenever I've been driving along the road into town and I see people running along the running and cycle path, I feel like kind of winding the window down to tell them about parkrun just to try and get everybody together, you know. So, yeah, I would hope and I would certainly think that all of these individuals we have been seeing out and about in town will probably come along on the Saturday morning, which is quite a nice thing, I think.

00:14:21Scott Trickett: Look, don't hesitate for shouting out your car window. I do it every Saturday. If I'm driving to parkrun on a Saturday morning and I see someone near parkrun running, I'll just shout out parkrun.

00:14:32Gavin Mackay: That's absolutely, the only thing is I'm a terrible driver, so if I did that I'd probably end up in an accident.

00:14:40Scott Trickett: Okay, have you got, get your wife to do it or a passenger, but this is a good recruiting method I've found.

00:14:47Gavin Mackay: Yeah, absolutely, yeah, the dog could bark at the back window or something, yeah. We could maybe have a parkrun flag attached to the back of the car. There's an idea.

00:14:56Scott Trickett: Yeah, all you need is a conversation starting point because once people hear about it and you get them there, they're hooked.

00:15:03Gavin Mackay: Yeah, that's right. I mean, the amount of, I suppose, the amount of time over the last, year trying to explain what parkrun is to people. I feel like I can kind of do it in my sleep now. But yeah, it's certainly something that once you tell people the concept, it's really difficult to find anything wrong with it. So I think that's why it's been such a positive thing, you know.

00:15:36Melissa Erbacher: Gavin, you mentioned there was another running group that's very similar in terms of the type of people that they attract and what they're trying to do. Have you actually approached them and given them the parkrun concept and invited them along?

00:15:52Gavin Mackay: Yeah, I sure have. I sure have. I went to see them about three weeks ago, actually. And I spoke to them probably about maybe about eight months ago prior to that. They're an older couple who decided to just, I suppose, get the local Broulee community, which is further south from Batemans Bay. just together to to do a choice of two three five k um and again it's very much like um parkrun where people will do it just to get active to walk people will do it for a time run and so on they use a very similar method to what parkrun does they have a little kind of printout machine as the finishers cross the finish line when they stop they stop watch each time there's a little printout that comes out that then corresponds with the finishing token and someone just basically jots down all the results and then they've got a Facebook page that somebody updates every week. So when I found out about the Broulee Runners and I spoke to the relatively elderly founders, it kind of sounded very much like parkrun and I thought it's definitely something I need to maybe get involved with and certainly over the last... several months I've kind of become quite close friends with the elderly couple who have who started that running group Wonderful so hopefully you'll get to see some of them at your launch and every week afterwards Yeah, absolutely. Some of them were at the trials as well, and we've been on their Facebook page for the last few weeks. So actually some of them are some volunteers for us as well. So I would imagine now that they run on a Wednesday evening, they also have a choice now to come on the Saturday morning as well.

00:17:58Scott Trickett: Now, we're about eight minutes into this interview so far, Gavin, and I've understood every word you've said. despite the thick Scottish accent.

00:18:06Gavin Mackay: Yeah, so you're doing better than most then, Scott.

00:18:11Scott Trickett: So you're not from Australia, you're not Aussie Gavin. How did you end up in Batemans Bay?

00:18:16Gavin Mackay: Yeah, I suppose, long story short, myself and my wife thought we would like a little change from living and working in Glasgow in Scotland, and... The opportunity came up to work in Batemans Bay and get sponsored by one of the local pharmacies. So, yeah, that kind of brought us out here within two months. My wife had a job closely related to her career. And so we were up and running after a couple of months. That was about nearly four years ago. So, they say in Batemans Bay you don't become a local until you've been here 20 years, but we do feel like we are locals now. So, that's how you've got a Scottish guy starting Batemans Bay parkrun, yeah.

00:19:10Scott Trickett: You must have pinched yourself when they sent you overseas to Batemans Bay from Scotland. Yeah.

00:19:15Gavin Mackay: Well, that's it. I mean, because it's classed as a remote area, so it's way easier to get a visa than it is for somewhere like Melbourne or Sydney. It's a great spot. I absolutely love it. It's nice and quiet, beautiful beaches, and they're quiet most of the year, so it's great.

00:19:33Melissa Erbacher: And the winter would be a little bit different than what you're used to.

00:19:37Gavin Mackay: Yes, absolutely. I think I counted on one hand the amount of times I had frost on the car windscreen last year in winter. And in Scotland, it's literally, you know, you count on one hand the mornings you don't have frost. Yeah, exactly.

00:19:56Scott Trickett: Did you parkrun in Scotland?

00:19:59Gavin Mackay: I didn't actually. I didn't parkrun in Scotland. I... The very first parkrun I did was... Well, actually, the truth is I've never actually ran a parkrun, which is a bit odd. But I've had knee surgery fairly recently and I've had a long-standing injury that kind of held me out. And that's one of the reasons I decided to invest a lot of time in this because I knew I would be able to be a volunteer every week. But the first parkrun I visited was... The Kingscliff one up in Queensland because our good friends who introduced us to parkrun live in the Gold Coast and when we were up visiting them they got us up in the morning to take us along and she had, our friend Laura had done several parkrun volunteering roles and I think she's got our 100 t-shirt and everything so And that's really where we learned about it a few years ago. Yeah, so I suppose it was her who initially grabbed my interest for parkrun, but I hadn't actually heard of it when I was in Scotland, you know, four to five years ago.

00:21:15Melissa Erbacher: So you were on an adventure when you first came into contact with parkrun then?

00:21:20Gavin Mackay: Yeah, absolutely. I thought... As soon as I kind of learnt about parkrun, I immediately thought how good that would be for Batemans Bay. And then when I learnt that... parkrun would like every single community who would like a parkrun to have one that just kind of captured my interest regardless of how big or how small you know if you have a parkrun with 30 people 20 people coming every week I think it's every bit as important for the community as one that can draw say 300 a week you know

00:22:00Scott Trickett: One of the problems of doing this podcast every week is we get to learn about all these great new events popping up. And our list of parkruns to visit is getting longer and longer every week. But I suspect Batemans Bay might jump to the head of that queue. I'm a bit excited to visit you. Can't wait to get there. One question. Have you got any bridges on your course?

00:22:23Gavin Mackay: Do we have any bridges? We have a Batemans Bay bridge, but fortunately it's not in the course.

00:22:30Scott Trickett: Oh, no, no, no, not fortunately.

00:22:33Gavin Mackay: Scott's partial to a bridge. You are, you are. No, we don't have any major bridges, Scott.

00:22:40Scott Trickett: Okay. Well, I still want to run there.

00:22:43Gavin Mackay: Yeah, absolutely. You're more than welcome.

00:22:46Scott Trickett: Great. Look forward to it. Thanks for coming on the podcast and telling us all about it. Good luck with your launch.

00:22:52Gavin Mackay: No worries. Okay, thank you very much for having me.

Guest interview — Rodney Turner (Heart Week)

00:23:01Melissa Erbacher: Joining us next on the podcast, we have Tuggeranong parkrunner, Rodney Turner. Rodney is a heart attack survivor and he's involved with Heart Week. Welcome to the podcast, Rodney.

00:23:14Rodney Turner: Hi. Good to be part of this.

00:23:17Melissa Erbacher: So, Rodney, tell us, how did you get involved with Heart Week?

00:23:22Rodney Turner: I got involved with Heart Week in 2014. I suffered a heart event. I had some open heart surgery. And then after that surgery, I returned to heart crime.

00:23:39Melissa Erbacher: Okay, so what is the difference between a heart event and a heart attack exactly?

00:23:45Rodney Turner: Okay, so for myself, back in 2014... I did suffer some chest pain, but mine was associated with a ruptured heart valve. So that meant that I had to have open-heart surgery, which was done in Sydney. And luckily for me, they were able to repair my valve. So it's part artificial. With a heart attack, normally there is a... closing of the arteries and that usually requires someone to have a stent to open the artery and in some cases there might be some people may have some of their heart muscle may die during that process so that's really the difference. So a heart event could be any number of things whereas a heart attack is It's normally something quite specific.

00:24:49Scott Trickett: Were you scared about coming back to exercise after you had your heart event?

00:24:53Rodney Turner: Yeah, I was. Yeah, definitely. I'd been, when I did the rehabilitation program, they'd have me on their treadmill and run through my heart and, you know, the nurse was standing with me. So, yeah, that first run that I did back, Well, the first few, I was really nervous because, you know, I've cut open your chest, they've stopped your heart, they've done a repair job. And plus, I actually got ill after my surgery and I was in the 5% of patients that have a reaction. So I've got... I've built up a fluid around the heart. So I've got pericarditis. So I'd actually... I was in heart failure twice and... I was rushed from home to hospital. So I ended up going back three times, and that was to get the heart back in normal rhythm and to drain the fluid around my heart. So because of all of that, I really lost confidence. And so it took me a while to build it up. So by the time I got back to parkrun, all of that was pretty much running through my mind. And it's interesting because I remember Gary... then put out a message to all the parkrunners to find out who was able to do first aid. And it was interesting. I thought, oh, that's funny. This sort of coincides with my return. I think he must be worried about me returning to jogging and how he might deal with a medical emergency if I was to... have an event on the run.

00:26:39Scott Trickett: Yeah, absolutely.

00:26:40Rodney Turner: Yeah, the timing of that was interesting. But yeah, to answer your question, yeah, it was. But it's interesting, after I did a few and, you know, it was coping well, it really sort of helped me move on. I was thinking, okay, I can run five k's now, can't do too much wrong with me. And I'm at the point now where, you know, many days can go along, I don't even think about it. It's really... The time when I think about it, when I'm shaving, I can see the scar on my chest, and that sort of brings it all back.

00:27:12Scott Trickett: Before you had your heart event, were you overweight? Were you an unhealthy lifestyle?

00:27:20Rodney Turner: No, no. I wasn't overweight, and I didn't have an unhealthy lifestyle. I probably... There were a number of things in my diet that I've since removed, since the heart event. But I actually had... I was diagnosed with a slightly leaking valve probably 15 years ago. And so I saw a cardiologist and she said that the majority of people, like there's... you know, percentage of the population that were like me that must go on to 99 now dramas, but, you know, 5% of the population would go on and deteriorate. I was in that 5%. It was just my body didn't like the operation.

00:28:18Scott Trickett: Yeah. That's all good.

00:28:21Rodney Turner: It's all good now. It's all good now. Yeah. Well, until my next checkup anyway. Okay.

00:28:29Melissa Erbacher: Just keep parkrunning. You'll be fine.

00:28:31Rodney Turner: Yeah, that's exactly right. But hey guys, look, it really is an awesome event. And what I find about it is, for people like me that have been part of it for a while now, it doesn't matter what the conditions are. Rain, hail, frost in Canberra, you feel compelled to get up and go. And I think it is because it is that community event. And, you know, you are seeing familiar faces and friends. So that's what I get out of it. And, of course, like a lot of people do, you know, you catch up with friends and people. I've met friends through parkrun. So that's what I like about it. I think it's an awesome community as well.

00:29:18Melissa Erbacher: And having the Heart Foundation there as part of the event at the start of Heart Week, that was all to raise awareness of what they do and the facilities and, They offer to help patients like yourself recover.

00:29:34Rodney Turner: Yeah, look, that's exactly right. That's one of the important messages that I think that has come out of this week. It's about rehabilitation and the importance of people participating in rehabilitation following a heart event or a heart attack. and the statistics show that people actually do a lot better if they go through a heart rehabilitation program. So for me, when I went through that, I learned about the importance of diet, what we can do to keep a healthy heart. We shouldn't be smoking. We should be out there exercising. So all of those things are important, and that's been one of the... the key messages this week. And I think that parkrun can play a really important role in that. You know, we had some walkers there from the Heart Foundation. So some people will walk the five Ks, others will do parkrun, parkwalk.

00:30:38Scott Trickett: That's all great. Great to hear. Rodney, it's just great that you can be involved and take part in parkrun no matter what your fitness level or whether you're coming back from something like you've been through. So we're happy you're back parkrunning. We hope this will inspire others who have been hesitant about joining in because they've been worried about their lack of fitness or they're returning from injury or whatever it is. So thanks for joining us on the podcast this week. Thank you. And Heart Week's going to continue on, so there'll be more opportunities at parkrun this weekend. Another opportunity to get dressed in red, so we can continue our red challenge, Mel. for another week.

00:31:19Rodney Turner: Awesome. That sounds great. I'd better go out and find a red T-shirt with a zipper on the front.

00:31:25Scott Trickett: Great.

00:31:26Rodney Turner: Just to show everyone that I've had my open heart surgery and I'm still out there running.

Roving Adventurers — international roving report (Nicole at Crissy Field parkrun, San Francisco)

00:31:40Scott Trickett: I'm a bit excited this week because we've got some more international roving adventuring coming your way. Nicole visited Crissy Field in San Francisco and we have our first sample of some American parkrunners. Shall we throw it over to Nicole? Let's do it.

00:32:00Nicole: Hi, this is Nicole at Crissy Fields parkrun doing some adventuring in San Francisco. I'm here at the finish line of our parkrun that I've just finished, which was amazing. I can see the bridge and the amazing water views here. And I'm here with Dale, our run director for today. Say hi, Dale. Hello. Dale's been organising our run for us today. How did you get into parkrun, Dale?

00:32:29Dale: Well, we have a group that runs every week, and this formed the core of the people that did parkrun. So when Max started it up, he brought five or six of us from this other run to parkrun, and we are mostly the volunteers that keep things going.

00:32:47Nicole: Well, you've done a great job. It's a beautiful trail. It's amazing views here, especially coming from such a long way away. Do you run much?

00:32:55Dale: I do, but I don't run very many parkruns. I'm usually doing the timing and directing.

00:33:00Nicole: I can see you've got your volunteer T-shirt there. How many times have you volunteered?

00:33:04Dale: About close to 50.

00:33:06Nicole: Amazing. Well done. Well, I must say thank you very much. I've had a lovely time here. Thanks, Dale.

00:33:11Dale: Well, good. This was our 66th run, and we had 51 runners today, just like last week, which is our... Total, which is our record number, 51.

00:33:22Nicole: Really, everyone was super friendly here, I'd say.

00:33:25Dale: Well, we try to be.

00:33:26Nicole: Yeah, thanks so much. Thank you. I've got Peter from Barking in Essex here with me. How'd you go, Peter?

00:33:35Peter: That's in England, by the way.

00:33:36Nicole: Yeah, that's in England. How'd you go?

00:33:38Peter: I did very well. The usual time.

00:33:43Nicole: Did you enjoy it? What did you think of the course?

00:33:45Peter: The course, I didn't like the loose ground. I normally run on like a tarmac, firm ground. Really? And that may have hindered my time today.

00:33:59Nicole: Nothing to do with jet lag?

00:34:01Peter: No, no, I think I'm over that. Just lack of training, maybe.

00:34:05Nicole: Did you enjoy it?

00:34:06Peter: Yeah, I'm 60 as well. I just turned 60. Happy birthday. You know, and I'm not getting any younger. Neither are you.

00:34:16Nicole: Yeah, no, thanks for that.

00:34:18Peter: Yeah, great course. A bit too hot for me, for my life, for being a Brit, you know. It's all right for you. I don't live in the tropics. I know Melbourne is pretty chilly there at times, isn't it? But, yes, lovely crowd, lovely turnout, lovely scenery, and I'm so pleased that I did it. And, you know, it'll be a lasting memory for me now.

00:34:38Nicole: Awesome, awesome. Thanks for being on, Peter. Thanks as well. I'm here with Catherine, who's come all the way from Seattle, another parkrun adventurer. How'd you go, Catherine? Doing well.

00:34:50Catherine: I went well, yeah. It went great. It was my very first parkrun ever, and I'm really excited to be here.

00:34:56Nicole: Your very first parkrun ever?

00:34:57Catherine: Ever. Yeah, completely.

00:34:59Nicole: That's amazing. Okay, so you're hoping to start up a parkrun, I hear?

00:35:03Catherine: Yes, we're hoping to start a parkrun in Seattle. I'm working with two other women, Jack and Courtney, and we're trying to get one going at Myrtle Edwards Park in Seattle on the Puget Sound waterfront.

00:35:13Nicole: Amazing. So that would be the sixth parkrun in the States. Yes, it would be. Considering Australia, we have 170 parkruns. That's a great start.

00:35:25Catherine: It is a great start. Yeah. And we came all the way down to San Francisco. It's our closest parkrun so that we could check it out. That's amazing.

00:35:30Nicole: How far is that?

00:35:32Catherine: Oh man, I would guess 500 miles, but yeah, I'm not quite sure.

00:35:38Nicole: Good on you. It's great to meet you. Thanks for being on the podcast. Yeah, thank you so much.

00:35:44Scott Trickett: Well, that's very exciting. parkrun is going to grow in the US.

00:35:48Melissa Erbacher: I am chomping at the bit to get overseas and do my first international parkrun. Which country will it be? I don't know.

00:35:57Scott Trickett: It needs to grow in the US. We really need to send someone over there who's a guru, a parkrun guru, to really kick it along. Just, you know, someone. Someone. What's happening on the social scene this week, Mel?

Social Adventurers / social scene round-up

00:36:10Melissa Erbacher: Well, we had heaps of adventurers take up the Red Challenge this week, which was awesome to see. On Instagram, we had Barefoot underscore Mike 77, who got a selfie with another gentleman in red. Presumably, he also entered. you know, introduced himself and had a bit of a chatter about the podcast.

00:36:29Scott Trickett: Over on Facebook, a couple of my people, Gary Murphy was at Highlands parkrun with his red dog Flynn.

00:36:36Melissa Erbacher: Wendy Glenn had her red parkrunners all in a row wearing their 50 Club Milestone tees and said, 1500 kilometres of parkrunning right here in our red.

00:36:46Scott Trickett: And Tim McKinley snaffled a sneaky pic with some stranger in red. Now, he did mention which parkrun he was at. He was at Parkville parkrun.

00:36:58Melissa Erbacher: Oh, was he? Do you think you may know who that is?

00:37:05Scott Trickett: I recognize my head. So thanks, Tim. Thanks for coming up and saying hi, which he didn't.

00:37:13Melissa Erbacher: Did he? So he didn't say hi. He obviously didn't ask you whether or not you knew about the parkrun Adventurers podcast.

00:37:20Scott Trickett: No.

00:37:21Melissa Erbacher: Disappointing, Tim. We want better from you next time, okay?

00:37:25Scott Trickett: On Instagram, Macalicious21, he was also at Parkville, and he rocked up wearing his brand new GoPro and filmed the whole event. I must search for that because he walked up to me and introduced, or had said hello, and the first question I asked is, are you recording? And he was. Tells on my best behavior.

00:37:46Melissa Erbacher: You behave and I find that hard to believe.

00:37:48Scott Trickett: I do. Particularly at parkrun. We should try and find that footage because it'll be a good video of the Parkville course.

00:37:57Melissa Erbacher: Awesome. Running Guy Ryan was on an adventure up to Tamborine Mountain for parkrun this morning for a fun trail run. First finisher too. Good job Running Guy Ryan.

00:38:10Scott Trickett: AK Selba was at Jells Park and it was eerily beautiful there on Saturday.

00:38:16Melissa Erbacher: It was a gorgeous picture that one actually.

00:38:21Scott Trickett: She is a fantastic photographer. And if you want to follow her good Instagram account, check out AK Selba.

00:38:28Melissa Erbacher: On Instagram this week, we also heard from our regulars, Runjo Run, Recreating Mel, Finding My Balance, and Will B1981, aka the artist formerly known as Positivism1. And he claims he's been meaning to do this for a while, but I'm pretty confident Will B1981 changed his Instagram handle Because I had some trouble with it repeatedly last week and in previous weeks. I think Scotty could feel quite the interesting blooper reel of me trying to say that. So thank you, Will B1981. You're awesome. Ironically enough, you nailed it. You've got to go out with a bang.

00:39:11Scott Trickett: Ross Pentland was on Twitter and he was talking about stats. He went mad for stats.

00:39:19Melissa Erbacher: How we are mad for stats or he's mad for stats?

00:39:22Scott Trickett: He's mad for stats at the moment, Ross. He's breaking down the elevation and a whole lot of other stuff.

00:39:30Melissa Erbacher: Oh, well, that might explain why earlier in the week he tweeted, Hashtag parkrun stats. Hobart parkrun has the lowest average time per runner in Tassie and it's the only Tassie parkrun with less than zero metres. No, that can't be right. It must be greater than zero metres elevation. And he must also love stats in a haystack with Ian Hay, which fortunately we're going to have again next week.

Facts in a Haystack (with Ian Hay)

00:39:58Scott Trickett: Looking forward to that. My favourite segment. And wrapping up on Facebook, Bronwyn Bell shared some enticing pics of the meetings slash finish area at Nambour parkrun. I understand she got a taste of course B, so she'll have to head back for a second attempt to try course A.

00:40:18Melissa Erbacher: She will. There's a slight difference in the elevation between course A and course B. And it changes due to weather when the creek goes underwater.

00:40:27Scott Trickett: Which is harder, A or B?

00:40:29Melissa Erbacher: Yeah. Ask the runners who've done both and you'll find them split 50-50. So course B will send you down the twins and back up them. And the twins are very, very steep in whichever direction you take them. So... they equal one larger hill on the way back, whereas Course A, I think, technically takes you up three or four more moderate hills. So it really depends on if you like quantity versus quality of hills.

00:41:04Scott Trickett: Can't wait. Just building my anticipation for that.

00:41:08Melissa Erbacher: Liv Coop shared some gorgeous sunrise pics taken by herself and run director Melanie overlooking the Sirame parkrun course. You should check those out. They're gorgeous. And of course they're gorgeous because I already said gorgeous. So you're going to have to get rid of one or several of those gorgeouses.

00:41:24Scott Trickett: We'll leave them all in because they're that gorgeous. And finally, Paul Curtin got in touch with some feedback on the podcasts for us. He said, Hi Scott and Melissa. Finally got around to listening to the podcasts. Three down. I think they are great. Just the right balance of fun and information. Keep them coming. Well, we will, Paul. Thank you very much.

Listener feedback / listener email

00:41:46Melissa Erbacher: Let's hope he didn't stop at episode three.

00:41:49Scott Trickett: Well, with such a glowing review, I'm sure he'll keep listening to four, five, six. We're up to 18 now. Okay, where's the cake this week, Mel?

Where is the cake? (weekly anniversary/launch calendar)

00:42:02Melissa Erbacher: This week there are anniversaries in three different states. So you can go to Queensland, New South Wales or Victoria and you'll get some cake. The first one is at Cleveland in Queensland. They're turning three and they're going full-blown crazy with crazy socks.

00:42:20Scott Trickett: Down in my neck of the woods, Altona Beach, they're celebrating their first anniversary. They're not having any theme as such but they're embracing the cake vibe.

00:42:31Melissa Erbacher: Well, that's awesome. It's always good to go someplace for cake.

00:42:35Scott Trickett: There will be cake.

00:42:37Melissa Erbacher: In New South Wales, Rhodes are also celebrating their first birthday and they are having an R theme, an R for Rhodes. So I do like a letter theme because it means people can be as creative or as lacking in imagination as they like. Have you got any suggestions for an R costume, Scotty?

00:43:00Scott Trickett: Well, you could go as a runner. So you've sort of covered the field. You've covered the people that don't even bother to dress up.

00:43:08Melissa Erbacher: That's possibly one of the least imaginative costumes, but good point.

00:43:15Scott Trickett: That's what I bring to the podcast. What would you go as?

00:43:21Melissa Erbacher: I would probably go a little bit off the wall and go dressed as a pirate, um, And this is my interpretation of R. I would just walk around saying R the whole time. That's what I would do. That or a rascal. Or a rebel rouser.

00:43:39Scott Trickett: Or a rogue squadron leader.

00:43:43Melissa Erbacher: Well, that one I could probably just show up dressed as myself. But I don't know. You've got to use your imagination.

00:43:53Scott Trickett: You do. I did and came up with runner.

00:43:58Melissa Erbacher: That's all right. Kiwana parkrun, for our second birthday, we had a pea theme for parkrun. And that way, anyone who didn't get dressed up could go as a parkrunner. So we had 100% compliance in the dressed up category that year. And I do like what Rhodes have done. And you're right, the ones that don't get dressed up in the literal sense will still be there as runners. So they're also going to have 100% participation.

00:44:23Scott Trickett: And that takes us out for episode 18. Thanks for joining us. We're going to do it all again next week. Hope you will join me, Mel.

00:44:33Melissa Erbacher: I'll join you, and hopefully my voice will return to the normal Mel-sounding voice.

00:44:39Scott Trickett: 18 episodes in, and we still haven't figured out how to sign off the show.

00:44:44Melissa Erbacher: If anyone has any suggestions for really witty sign-off lines, like Stay Classy San Diego or something similar... Message us. Let us know. We need some help.

00:44:56Scott Trickett: We do. Until next week, I'm Scott Trickett.

00:45:05Melissa Erbacher: I'm hoping you'll still be Scott Trickett after next week.

00:45:10Scott Trickett: And that's Mel Erbacher. We are the parkrun Adventurers. Goodbye.

00:45:27Unidentified speaker: Thank you.