Episode 69

Episode details · 303 speaker turns · sound cues from context

00:00:12Scott Trickett: Welcome back to another edition of the parkrun Adventurers Podcast. My name is Scotty. Welcome, Mel.

00:00:21Melissa Erbacher: Thank you, Scotty. What episode number is this?

00:00:26Scott Trickett: 69. Just plain old 69. Hey, busy weekend. Massive weekend around the country. Lots of people doing stuff. Running related.

00:00:39Melissa Erbacher: I know, right? I didn't get a run in. Did you get a run in?

00:00:42Scott Trickett: No. Literally, I didn't.

00:00:46Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, no, literally I didn't either. So, yeah.

00:00:51Scott Trickett: What sort of example are we setting? On a weekend where we've got people at the UTA event doing some crazy stuff.

00:01:00Melissa Erbacher: Warwick Pentathlon up this way.

00:01:04Scott Trickett: Down my way we had the Great Ocean Road Marathon. And what did you and I do?

00:01:11Melissa Erbacher: I volunteered with somebody who went to the Great Ocean Road Marathon.

00:01:15Scott Trickett: Oh, did you?

00:01:16Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, he volunteered on Saturday because he was heading down that way.

00:01:20Unidentified speaker: Okay.

00:01:21Scott Trickett: Yeah. I spoke to some people that went and did these events, but personally, no. I had a walk at parkrun with my gorgeous daughter. It was her birthday. And how cool is this? She's happy to go to parkrun on her birthday. We do give her the choice.

00:01:40Melissa Erbacher: That's pretty gorgeous.

00:01:41Scott Trickett: Yeah, we give her the choice of which parkrun she can go to. And she chose Coburg.

00:01:47Melissa Erbacher: Oh, nice.

00:01:48Scott Trickett: Yeah, well, it was their birthday too, so I think she likes the synergy of that. But she does, she also, I know she does enjoy Coburg.

00:01:54Melissa Erbacher: It's like a big party for her.

00:01:56Scott Trickett: Yeah, exactly. There's birthday cake. So it's win-win.

00:01:59Melissa Erbacher: Was it a fancy dress one?

00:02:01Scott Trickett: It was. They did an under-the-sea thing again. Again, when I say again, they've never done it before, but... It's very popular now, under the sea. It is.

00:02:12Melissa Erbacher: Did the jellyfish umbrellas come back out?

00:02:14Scott Trickett: No, we went as pirates. We went as a family of pirates.

00:02:18Melissa Erbacher: Okay. I must admit our... Well, that's not under the sea, you know. That's on top of the sea. Yeah.

00:02:22Jeremy Savage: Well, I think...

00:02:23Melissa Erbacher: Unless you fall out of the boat.

00:02:25Scott Trickett: I think that the specific technical theme was on the sea, above the sea, by the sea, anything to do with the sea.

00:02:34Melissa Erbacher: Because it's sea for Coburg.

00:02:35Scott Trickett: Yeah. Yep. And I've got to admit, our dress-up game was a bit lacking this week. So I might have gone to the $2 shop on Friday night.

00:02:47Melissa Erbacher: Well, that's okay.

00:02:49Unidentified speaker: Yeah.

00:02:50Melissa Erbacher: People don't need to feel pressured to spend a fortune or whatever on their costumes.

00:02:55Scott Trickett: But you know the eye patch from the $2 shop? Not as high quality as you might expect. Really? Yep. Struggled to fit around my head and then dug and scratched my face.

00:03:07Melissa Erbacher: Okay, well, maybe you just have a big head.

00:03:11Scott Trickett: You know, people have said that, but I actually don't. If you actually measure it, I've actually got a small head. I've got a fat round head, but it's actually in size. It's small. It might have more to do with the fact that it was kids' dress-up.

00:03:25Melissa Erbacher: Yes, possibly. Children's size costumes don't tend to fit adults for some reason.

00:03:33Scott Trickett: But this is all irrelevant to parkrun and running, which I did none of on the weekend. But we've got lots on the podcast this week, and some of it revolves around the longest run. We're going to check in with all our organisers, and let's check in with one of them right now. Joining me on the podcast from the Sunshine Coast is Mel Erbacher.

Longest Run national preview (state-by-state wrap-around)

00:03:58Melissa Erbacher: Well, thank you, Scotty, for having me. It's a pleasure to be here.

00:04:02Scott Trickett: Now tell us what you've got in store for the Sunshine Coast on the longest run this year.

00:04:06Melissa Erbacher: Well, we are doing things a little bit exciting this year and we're actually going to flip the longest run on its head. You're not. Traditionally, we are. We are. We're going to do it backwards. It's going to be reverse freedom runs all day, only the courses are going to be run in the right direction. And we're just going to start at the opposite end of where we started the last two years, I should say. So this year we're going to start at the gorgeous Noosa in probably the dark and very cold because it tends to be that way in June since it's winter. And we're going to head from Noosa to town of Seaside, then jump over to Nambour. We are doing what's rumoured to be Australia's toughest parkrun third on longest run day. So anyone who's participating and hoping to do all seven events is going to have to do the last four after they've done Nambour. I'm not sure how many people are going to thank me for that before we move on to Brightwater, then Kawana, then Golden Beach, and we're going to finish at Central Lakes.

00:05:14Scott Trickett: Very exciting. Any new events this year, or is this the same?

00:05:19Melissa Erbacher: It's the same bunch of events, just...

00:05:23Michael Milton: In a different order.

00:05:24Scott Trickett: Yeah, so you're mixing it up a bit.

00:05:26Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, we haven't had a lot of movement in terms of extra launches in our local area of late so there will be a couple of new events to mix things up with next year and we might be able to do what everybody else seems to be able to do this year and have two longest runs in the same general area that overlap for a couple of events that's something to look forward to but this year we're just going to do our old favorites backwards

00:05:57Scott Trickett: And it's happening on the 11th of June?

00:06:01Melissa Erbacher: It is indeed. Yeah, it's a week ahead probably. of the winter solstice, but we kept clashing every year with a whole bunch of other big running events. So there was much chatter amongst the longest run organizers about whether or not we'll just bring it forward a week. And look, let's face it, last week, the majority of the events got rained out. So we ended up postponing till some of us didn't get to run till August. And that made some wonderful opportunities for other runners to be able to do two longest run events in one year, but ideally we want to do it earlier because there just gets to be more and more running events the later you leave it.

00:06:43Scott Trickett: Good day. That's the Sunshine Coast covered off. We're going to check in with the other states later. Just for those new to the game, longest run's not an official parkrun.

00:06:55Melissa Erbacher: That's why it's called longest run.

00:06:57Scott Trickett: They don't count. They're on the parkrun courses, but they don't count.

00:07:01Melissa Erbacher: No, they're all just freedom runs. Everybody self-times. Everybody runs at their own risk and has a good time.

00:07:09Scott Trickett: Yep. Still officially fun, just not officially a parkrun.

00:07:23Melissa Erbacher: We are very excited to introduce our next guest. He is a multi-paralympian. He completed the 50 kilometre event at the UTA over the weekend and he's done all sorts of other crazy adventures. Michael Milton, welcome to the parkrun Adventurers.

00:07:42Michael Milton: Thank you.

00:07:44Melissa Erbacher: Now let's jump right into it and we'll ask you about your most recent endeavours. How was the UTA?

00:07:52Michael Milton: Yeah, so did the 50-kilometre Ultra Trail Australia. It was, you know, I mean, it's such a beautiful place to explore and get to know and had a few training trips up to the Blue Mountains, one amazing adventurous weekend. I think Katoomba had 350-odd millimetres of rain and we got to go and splash around. It was warm enough that there were no issues and it was just fun because, All of these huge waterfalls are just running crazy. And we kept on getting lost because trails are blocked with overflowing creeks and canyons. And, yeah, it was very, very cool. So I really enjoyed exploring the area. And then, of course, I've run the entire 50K course. I think I'm all prepared. And Friday evening they go and change the entire course on us. due to some rain forecast, and it turned into pretty heavy rain Friday night. So I got to go and explore a whole new 50km of trail in the Blue Mountains. It was lots of fun.

00:08:53Scott Trickett: Now, Michael, Mel's forgot to mention that you actually did the 50km on crutches because, for the listeners that don't know, you actually lost your leg when you were nine. So that's another challenge within itself, you know, 50km through... That terrain is tough enough in itself, but you've done it on crutches. What were some of the challenges you faced?

00:09:17Michael Milton: I guess for me running on crutches is something I've done a fair bit of, you know, plenty of running training from everything from, you know, school cross country through to training for Paralympics as a skier, you know, quite often overseas we'd go for runs and bits and pieces right up to other things, run the Gold Coast Marathon, et cetera, et cetera. Running with crutches offers a bit of a physical challenge that's different. I think the science says, and there's not much science on moving with crutches, but what I've been able to find and read says that if you're on a nice, smooth, grippy floor and you're walking along in a hospital, you'll use about 1.7 times the energy per kilometre than you will on two legs. So it's a less efficient way to travel. Um, it's a bit of an ultimate full body workout cause everything gets hammered leg, abdominals, lower back, um, shoulders, et cetera. You know, there's not much that's not working. And, um, and then over the longer distances like this, you start to have issues with wrists, hands, blistering, um, all of those sorts of things that they're just not designed quite as well as feet are in terms of dealing with that sort of impact and, and all that sort of stuff. So, um, they're some of the challenges I guess that I come to when I'm running with crutches.

00:10:42Melissa Erbacher: Do you have standard hospital issue crutches or do you have ones with like shock absorbers and special grippy grips on the hands or something for like all-terrain crutches?

00:10:53Michael Milton: So I do adapt my crutches quite a bit. Obviously there's two, basically two types of crutches. You've got your underarm crutches and You know, for anybody who's broken their leg or something, they're not a bad option, but they do come with a fair bit of friction under arms, et cetera. I use a forearm based or Canadian crutch. And the ones that I use have a really nice kind of contoured handle. And then for trail stuff, I put on some custom carbon shafts. to pull out the weight. I like to keep things pretty simple, so I don't go for any fancy shock absorbers or anything like that, although they are commercially available for everyday use. I find they're not great for trail and for running, so I try and keep everything pretty lightweight, and the rubber tips that I use are pretty tough, and they work well on trail. For road stuff, parkrun, Gold Coast Marathon, I've done a few triathlons and stuff, I've got a pretty fancy pair of full custom carbon crutches with prosthetic running blades on the bottom as springs. So they absorb the shock when landing on them and then return some of that energy as you kind of step off them. So they're beautiful to run with on the road, but unfortunately they're a bit too unpredictable in terms of grip and it can be pretty hard to control that rebound properly. on steeper terrain downstairs and things like that. So I can't use them on, on trails on, you know, dirt trails, but, um, on the road, they're beautiful to run with.

00:12:32Melissa Erbacher: And what kind of elevation are we talking about for, for the 50 kilometer event? Like you, you mentioned that they changed the course, so you wouldn't have known exactly what to expect either. How much do they make you go up and down?

00:12:44Michael Milton: The course was about 2,400 meters was on the schedule. Um, My Strava file told me it was like 2100. And I had a look at all the people running around me at their Strava files and, and everybody, you know, depending on the device, it's not a great way to measure elevation, but they're all between about 1800 and 2400 meters of elevation. So I think somewhere around 2000 meters of elevation is, I know I was posting on one of the social media groups and kind of asked the question for people who run the normal course that they use, which one was harder and stuff. And I think the actual the time this year was about 15 minutes faster than last year's. So I think for the elites, it was a little bit faster, but there are a fair few longer climbs than the other course. And then we finished with the Nellie's Glen stairs as opposed to the Furber Steps. And I think consensus was that Nellie's Glen's a big step harder than Ferber. um furb is like 951 steps uphill so um yeah nelly's glens it was a big tough climb in the dark and the other issue that we had with the the course change uh was that we started uh over two hours later because there's a ladder on the course they wanted to try and get as many 100k runners through who start at 6 a.m through the ladder section before the 50k runners arrived and so um Yeah, the latter section. So we started at 10 a.m., which for me meant a 12-hour run finished at 10 p.m., so a bit more time in the dark.

00:14:22Scott Trickett: Michael, we've had some accomplished guests on the podcast before, but I'm looking at your list and it's kind of ridiculous. Yeah. The Olympics, the Kokoda Treks, the triathlons.

00:14:32Jeremy Savage: That's very kind of you to say, Scott. Ridiculous is a compliment.

00:14:36Scott Trickett: How did you turn your focus to doing the trail running? How did that come about?

00:14:43Michael Milton: Oh, you know, I love the outdoors. I love challenging myself and, you know, have managed throughout my sporting career, whether it be, you know, Paralympic Games or, you know, other pursuits that, you know, I like to Keep fit and healthy. I like to challenge myself. I love the outdoors and I love a bit of variety. So, you know, setting myself a new challenge and then going and achieving it is pretty motivating for me. And particularly after my second bout of cancer in my life, post-cancer fatigues there and I need to kind of manage that. No, I think fitness is a really important part of managing it. And, uh, that's a pretty big motivator for me to maintain the energy to play with my kids and to have fun with my life. So, um, yeah, that's, this is kind of where I'm at and what I really enjoy doing.

00:15:33Scott Trickett: How did you enjoy the trail running community?

00:15:36Michael Milton: The event and the atmosphere around the event and the support that I've had is, um, it's, it's been great. You know, the UTA family is, is amazing. Um, tom and alina who run have started the event i've just done 10 years ago now so this was the 10th event um i've known since we were kids because they're uh they come from the skiing side of things down at perisher and um so i know them well and um you know the atmosphere and everything the support out on course um you know it's it's been really fun actually i've really enjoyed uh my little dipping my toe into trail running and uh Yeah. I have to admit, I've, I've been having a look at a couple of websites and start to think about, um, you know, where to now we've got a 50 K ultra under the belt. Um, I promised my wife that I won't do the hundred, um, just because of the chance of permanent damage to hands and wrists and stuff like that. I think it's, um, you know, being out there for that distance is really asking for trouble for the rest of my life. But, um, you know, what can I do and where can I go? So, um, You know, I think I've really enjoyed this experience and would love to do something along these lines again.

00:16:48Scott Trickett: Look, be careful. The trails can be addictive. So don't write off the hundreds just yet.

00:16:54Michael Milton: No, no. You know, I've made the deal with my wife and, yeah, that's a pretty solid deal. I think I'm happy to rule that one out.

00:17:02Scott Trickett: Okay. I can't argue with that. You also had a camera crew with you through this journey. Is that right?

00:17:09Michael Milton: Yeah. So part of, um, our relationship with UTA, um, is to produce a documentary and try and submit it to the trails in motion, um, international film running festival for next year. So, um, we've got, uh, had a film crew following us around and doing everything. And, um, you know, uh, the crews in Canberra where I live. So we've been doing some, um, some shoots here on early morning runs and, um, up in the blue mountains and doing a whole pile of variety of stuff. So, um, It's been a pretty interesting process and pretty helpful and you know I'm very much looking forward to seeing more footage because I haven't actually seen that much of what they've shot so hopefully I'll get the chance to do that at some stage.

00:17:52Melissa Erbacher: That sounds awesome Michael. So you mentioned earlier that you love variety and obviously you're a big fan of the great outdoors. You're Paralympic career has not all been in one sport you've crossed between skiing cycling and triathlon could you tell us a little bit about that?

00:18:11Michael Milton: Yeah I guess as a kid my passion was skiing I came from a skiing family my dad used to be a ski patroller at Thredbo they started a retail ski business in Canberra the year I was born so skiing was very much a part of my childhood and You know, particularly after going through bone cancer at age nine, having my leg amputated, skiing was a great way for me to get back into the outdoors and doing something that I loved. And, you know, right through into my early 30s, it was a huge motivator to take skiing as far as I could and to really test my limits. So I skied for a long time, went to five Winter Paralympic Games, won a few gold medals. explored a different avenue of skiing by going speed skiing in France and then skiing down a mountain at over 213 kilometers an hour. But at the same time, I kind of knew when my career was over and was still young enough to look for a challenge. I had a baby on the way. I had a mortgage to pay for. And so I started off track cycling and went through another bout of cancer and then qualified to go to the Beijing Paralympic Games as a track cyclist. And then I've kind of evolved from that into going to a couple of world triathlon championships in sprint distance. And then, yeah, kind of continued to turn my pursuits, I guess, to more, you know, weekend warrior level athlete and just doing stuff for fun rather than trying to be too serious about it.

00:19:44Melissa Erbacher: Now, I'm one of those people who has to do things for fun instead of being serious because I'm not very fast. But you just let slip there that you skied at 213 kilometers an hour. I understand you did that in 2006 and that is the fastest ever time on skis. Is that correct?

00:20:05Michael Milton: No, no. I'm the fastest ever Australian skier, which makes me a big fish in a small pond. And I'm also the fastest skier in the world with a disability. So I think the able-bodied world speed record at the moment is up 254. Okay. So, yeah, 213, you know, not anything super amazing on the world stage, but, you know, from my point of view, it was a great accomplishment and something that was a really interesting process to go through learning about aerodynamics, learning about my own, I guess, mental preparation under pressure like that. And, yeah, you know, at the end, I guess, a huge adrenaline rush of skiing in extreme high speed. Yeah.

00:20:50Melissa Erbacher: Okay, yes, so 213 is certainly nothing to sniff at. What does your body even do when you're going that fast? Like I freak out if the car is going too fast and I'm enclosed in a vehicle that is, you know, there's no wind and things like that. And I'm going to double barrel this question. What kind of device can clock that sort of speed? Does a normal GPS watch do that?

00:21:18Michael Milton: So, yeah, I guess the first part of that answer is, you know, your body's really just standing still. In many ways, you're just holding a crouch position. And in some ways, the faster you go, the easier it gets from a physical point of view because your body starts to produce lift. And so the weight kind of comes off your leg and you've always kind of got to relax to hold that crouch as you go up past 180, 200 kilometers an hour. So, yeah, you know, that's the way it kind of works. And in many ways, speed skiing is very much a mental game. It's about dealing with your own demons and fear, et cetera. The actual timing of the event, it's done over 100 metres and there's simply two timing beams exactly 100 metres apart. They're triangulated, checked by a lawyer, et cetera, because it's an official world record. So, yeah, they simply time your speed over 100 metres and therefore your average speed is easier to calculate over that 100. So, yeah, if you're doing 200 kilometres an hour, you'll do 100 metres in 1.8 seconds. So that's kind of how it works. I guess, you know, the GPS option is there, but it's not accurate enough for an official world record or anything. I think at that speed it's kind of plus or minus 10 or 12 kilometres an hour.

00:22:35Scott Trickett: What happens if you fall over? Did you find out what happens if you fall over that speed?

00:22:41Michael Milton: Yeah, you know, falling over, it's not a good option. You know, when you're skiing recreationally, you know, quite often do things that give you a pretty high chance of falling over and you're prepared to take that risk. But the consequences of falling over at high speed like this are a little bit different. You know, you simply, you've got to absolutely minimise that risk and try and be, you know, reliable and solid. So... What happens if you do, you know, there's potential for lots of things to happen, and none of them are very good. Everything from broken bones to burns because the friction between your suit and the snow can actually develop enough heat to melt it. And, yeah, a whole pile of not pretty things.

00:23:29Scott Trickett: Okay. Let's move on from that. I hope you didn't fall over at UTA on the weekend.

00:23:35Michael Milton: No, no, I didn't. Over that sort of distance, I would kind of normally expect to have one or two little slips or something going on. And especially, you know, we had, what, 20, 25 mil of rain overnight on Friday night. So trails were muddy and slippery. But, no, I was wearing my favourite Hoka trail shoe, which is super lugged and grippy. And, you know, my crutch tips are actually pretty good in that condition. When I've done other things like walk Kokoda and, stuff like that, generally, you know, the crutches actually grip surprisingly well in muddier and softer conditions.

00:24:11Scott Trickett: Now, I always like to bring it back to parkrun, Michael. We are the parkrun adventurers. And it's good to know that you've done a few parkruns down in Canberra.

00:24:20Michael Milton: I've done a few, not as many as I'd like to do. My son and I, he's eight. We have a little bit of a parkrun challenge going. And I do a few more than him, but he keeps on coming along about once a month when I throw a parkrun challenge at him and coming along and whipping my backside, actually. He's quite proud that I haven't beaten him yet over 5Ks. I keep on trying to stretch him out to a longer event, but he hasn't agreed to that yet.

00:24:50Scott Trickett: So 5K is the sweet spot for your son?

00:24:54Michael Milton: For an eight-year-old versus me? Absolutely. I think my parkrun PB is 32-odd. So, you know, he's down at 30, but probably has the potential to go a bit lower than that if you really want to push it.

00:25:07Scott Trickett: And which ones have you tried in the Canberra region?

00:25:10Michael Milton: Went out and did Ginninderra a few years ago now, 2013, with the Indigenous Marathon Project guys and met and had a chat with them and Deek. And so that was fun. And more recently, I've been going to my local down at Lake Burley Griffin.

00:25:25Melissa Erbacher: You're a bit of a junkie for crazy, wonderful, amazing things to do. You make me feel like an underachiever. But what's the next adventure you've got planned?

00:25:35Michael Milton: I got a call about three weeks ago that involved coming and guest speaking at a charity event for the charity partner for the Cairns Ironman triathlon. And, um, while I was having a chat to them about coming up to Cairns and, um, you know, it's a charity event, so they didn't have budget or anything. I kind of said, well, you know, could you, could you score me an entry or something? And, um, they went, yeah, of course that's super easy for us. So, um, So I've got an entry in for the Cairns Half Ironman Triathlon. I don't have long, though, because after UTA on Saturday and the 50K, I need a little bit of time to recover from that. So I've got less than three weeks now until that event. So I guess it's not ideal from a recovery and training point of view. At some stage very soon I'm going to have to start my swimming training. But, you know, I guess... my training recently is, and, and it always has, you know, I have passion for riding bikes. And so, um, you know, I think if I did all my training for 50 K trail run by running, my body would break down. It just, running with crutches is pretty intense on, on parts of your body. And so mixing that up with some longer bike rides and maintaining that aerobic base, I think has been really good for me. So I should be good on the bike and the run. And as long as I can pull the swim together, I haven't trained specifically for it, but I might be kind of racing it too much. I'm just there to do my first long distance triathlon to finish and to really enjoy myself. So, uh, you know, I'm realistic about where I'm at with that. And, uh, we'll be happy just to go out and plug away. And, uh, you know, as long as I keep moving forward, I'll eventually get to the end of it.

00:27:15Melissa Erbacher: Do you have a rough time in mind that you think you might finish?

00:27:20Michael Milton: You know, I'd like to, I'd like to think that I could make it around six and a half hours. Um, I've traditionally not done well in the heat, uh, I guess 20 years of, uh, living winter to winter as a full-time skier and, and things like that. You know, I used to, start sweating and swearing and hating the weather as soon as it got over 25 degrees um and as soon as it did i'd try and leave the country and go somewhere colder um these days i'm better than i used to be but coming out of a canberra winter up to cairns um that's a bit scary for me so we will um we'll wait and see but you know i think six and a half hours for me should be relatively realistic i hope

00:27:59Scott Trickett: You'll be fine, Michael. I've done a few triathlons in my time, and the swim leg is a waste of time. You make up all the time on the bike and the run, so you've got that covered.

00:28:08Michael Milton: Well, what do they say on the swim? You can't win a triathlon in the swim, but you can lose it.

00:28:12Scott Trickett: Yeah, maybe, maybe. But I'm confident in you. Looking at your achievements, I think you'll go all right.

00:28:20Michael Milton: Thanks, Scotty.

00:28:22Scott Trickett: Thanks heaps for coming on the parkrun Adventurers and having a chat to us this week. Very inspirational what you did on the weekend.

00:28:28Michael Milton: You're very welcome. Thank you very much for the call. It was great to get a message the other day from you guys after UTA and, you know, love so many things about parkrun, not only doing it myself, but the idea and the sense of community that you get when you go there. So, yeah, very happy to help out.

00:29:01Scott Trickett: We heard from Mel in the intro about what's happening on the Sunshine Coast for the longest run. It's only fair we visit the rest of the country. So we're going to do a quick wraparound and we're going to start in Queensland and welcome back to the podcast Liv Coop and welcome for the first time Fiona Edmonds. Liv, why don't you start telling us what's happening in your neck of the woods in Brisbane this year for the longest run.

00:29:28Liv Coop: Okay, so we're starting at Mansfield, which is a brand spanking new parkrun. It hasn't even launched yet. So that one will be the actual trial date for that parkrun. So that's a bit exciting. We start at 7 o'clock at Mansfield. Then we move on to Wishart, then Minnippi, Wynnum, Capalaba, Cleveland, and then Redland Bay. So we join up with the Logan guys at Cleveland, which is our sixth run.

00:29:55Scott Trickett: And Fiona, what have you got in store?

00:29:57Fiona Edmonds: Okay, we're starting a little bit earlier because of distance. We're starting out at Yarrabilba, which is a smaller parkrun. It would be awesome to get quite a few people out to that event and check it out. And then we're going on to Berenbah, Underwood Park, Meadowbrook, Logan River. Meeting up at Cleveland and on to Redland Bay and hopefully to meet up with all the other guys there and have a bit of a wind up and a gathering with everybody.

00:30:27Melissa Erbacher: Nothing like meeting in the middle to make sure you have a really great, big, flashy ending to all. What is always an amazing day. Now, ladies, of the events, I mean, obviously Mansfield, it's a trial run. Redland Bay, that's going to be a very, very new event as well, only launching the day before that. But how many of the events in total do you know have actually been involved in a longest run before?

00:30:57Liv Coop: Well, see, last year we did two legs as well and Alan coordinated the other legs and we met up. at Capalaba last year. So I'm pretty sure Wishart and Munipi have been on longest runs. So all bar Mansfield and Redland Bay, there are two newbies this year on our leg.

00:31:15Fiona Edmonds: And I've got two, well, the newbie with Underwood Park because they only launched just prior to Christmas last year and then, of course, following into Redland Bay at the end as well.

00:31:27Melissa Erbacher: Fantastic. So you're starting a little bit earlier so that you could meet in the middle on the right time. How have you ladies found the actual scheduling of, you know, obviously there's a lot of events to do in a row and you need to factor in run time slash walk time and then travel distance and things like that. How have you each found the scheduling aspect? Has it been difficult or challenging?

00:31:57Fiona Edmonds: We have to tell you the truth.

00:32:00Melissa Erbacher: Well, you don't have to.

00:32:03Fiona Edmonds: Well, yes, it was really, really, really difficult. We spent hours deliberating over it and there was numerous messages going backwards and forwards. There was paper all over the office. But in reality, there was this awesome little spreadsheet. set up by an awesome man called The Prof in previous years who emailed it to us and we just plugged in some areas in Google and did some distances and kabang, out she came.

00:32:31Liv Coop: I pretty much said to Alan, these are the runs I want to do and he just made it happen, to be honest. He's a champion.

00:32:41Scott Trickett: Now, I'm interested in the Mansfield event that's going to kick off your leg lift. So it's going to be the trial for Mansfield parkrun. So they're actually going to get timed for the very first one, but then that's it. No more timing.

00:32:55Liv Coop: That's right. Well, they can time themselves. So I'm planning on having a clipboard there. So it would be good if people could time themselves and then just write their name and time down, and then I'll collate it all at the end. I think that would be cool to do.

00:33:09Melissa Erbacher: In terms of the encouraging more walkers to be involved, Liv, so what difference is there from the times last year to this year that you're allowing?

00:33:22Liv Coop: Well, we're allowing it for 10 minutes. So last year it was 45 minutes per event, but we did have a lot of travel time. That's what makes it hard because we're doing it in the winter. Our days aren't as long, obviously, so we run out of light. So that's why we wanted to, yeah, shorten the distance a little bit. But, yeah, just allow for people to be able to not be so rushed, you know, and they could actually come and walk because you can generally walk a parkrun within, you know, 50 minutes to an hour tops. So I think that's, you know, it allows for those people or even the slower joggers like myself who just spot along, you know, to be able to do them in plenty of time.

00:34:00Scott Trickett: Great stuff. So it's June the 11th. You're all ready to go in Brisbane. Thanks for coming on and sharing all the details for the longest run Brisbane this year.

00:34:09Liv Coop: Thank you.

00:34:10Melissa Erbacher: Absolutely. Thank you, guys. We're heading over to the west now to hear about longest run for Western Australia. There's going to be a couple this year. And to tell us all about it, we have Jeremy Savage. Jez, welcome back to the parkrun Adventures. It's been a while.

00:34:27Jeremy Savage: It has been a while. It's been too long.

00:34:30Melissa Erbacher: Tell us all about Longest Run WA.

00:34:33Jeremy Savage: So this year in Western Australia, we're having two Longest Runs. We're doing a northern suburbs and we're doing a southern suburbs. And we decided that it would be appropriate for the two different events to meet in the middle and cover Claisebrook Cove and then, of course, the all-important rehydration event will occur at the closest pub to the Royal Hotel.

00:35:02Scott Trickett: Can you go through the list of events for us, Jez?

00:35:05Jeremy Savage: So the southern suburbs, we're starting at Applecross and going from Applecross to Bibra Lake, from Bibra Lake across to Kalia.

00:35:17Melissa Erbacher: ABC.

00:35:18Jeremy Savage: Completely coincidental. So from Kalia then to Champion Lake, so keeping with the alphabet. There will be lunch provided at Champion Lakes by the awesome event team from the Champion Lakes parkrun. The event director and her wonderful event team are putting on some lunch for us. And then from Champion Lakes, we'll head north to Pioneer, then over to Canning River parkrun, and then we'll complete the seven events at Claysbrook Cove.

00:35:54Scott Trickett: Let's jump in there. What was that sixth one? Canning River. Oh, Canning River. I thought you said Kangaroo parkrun.

00:36:00Melissa Erbacher: I thought you said Kangaroo as well, but I wasn't going to dispute it.

00:36:07Scott Trickett: I thought this was another mystery WA parkrun that we didn't know about. But no, Canning River.

00:36:13Jeremy Savage: And in the north? So the northern suburbs will start at Cottersloh. So Cottesloe up to Corrine Glades, and then from Corrine Glades to Quinns Rocks, heading back south from Quinns to Lake Joondalup, across to Aveley, and then finishing at... Oh, I forgot Maylands Peninsula. So Averley, Maylands Peninsula, then to Glasgow Coast.

00:36:37Scott Trickett: Sorry, Maylands. Whoops. Yeah, we're not sure how many people we're expecting.

00:36:42Jeremy Savage: We're not sure how things are going to go with the two different schedules. But we do expect a group of people to be doing the southern loop, not by car, but by bicycle. So the plan is that we'll meet at Applecross parkrun, and then we'll cycle between each of the events, just for added pain and suffering.

00:37:04Scott Trickett: Yeah, just for an added challenge. So have you roughly calculated how far you're going to be cycling? Because you know you're going to be running 35km. We haven't worked that...

00:37:16Jeremy Savage: We haven't worked that out, but we've factored in there will be enough time to do them all on bicycle as well as run. We may start a little bit late, but we'll certainly make up the time at lunch.

00:37:31Scott Trickett: Now, last year, everyone should be fresh because last year WA skipped the longest run.

00:37:40Melissa Erbacher: Not sure that's quite how it works.

00:37:43Jeremy Savage: Unfortunately, it just didn't work with the timing. So different people were at different stages of what we're trying to achieve. And we have our Perth marathon in June. So it's – unfortunately, there's so many things on. There's only so many weekends available. And it just simply didn't fit the schedule for us to organise last year.

00:38:10Melissa Erbacher: Now, Jess, I want to come back to the cycling thing. Does this mean everybody's going to be running in triathlon gear? Like, are we going to be seeing a lot of lycra in the pictures from WA?

00:38:24Jeremy Savage: Yes.

00:38:27Melissa Erbacher: So there's not time for transition in terms of changing into running gear. I guess that's what tri is for.

00:38:35Jeremy Savage: Trust me, there will be a concerted effort to make sure that there is time for transitioning. Even if it does involve throwing on a pair of shorts over the top of the triathlon knicks because that's not a good look.

00:38:52Melissa Erbacher: Well, I wouldn't say that is for everyone. But there are plenty of triathletes out there who disagree with you. And are you going to add in like a swim at the end of the day as well as the other watering hole kind of situation just so you can have the three events? Yes.

00:39:11Jeremy Savage: I don't think swimming in Claysbrook Cove would be a smart idea.

00:39:18Melissa Erbacher: They've got dolphins there, no?

00:39:20Jeremy Savage: Yes, they do. However, they also have jellyfish.

00:39:25Melissa Erbacher: Oh, okay. So it's not the sharks that you're scared of. It's the stingers.

00:39:29Jeremy Savage: Well, look, there are bull sharks in there as well. It's kind of the trifecta.

00:39:35Scott Trickett: You got them all. No, I think that's a wise move to skip the swim. And maybe just have a drink at the end of the day. Of course. Jeremy, thanks for coming on and informing us all about what's happening in WA this year and Perth this year. And good luck in a couple of weeks' time.

00:39:55Jeremy Savage: Thank you very much. Thanks for having me.

00:39:58Melissa Erbacher: And we're heading now to Victoria to hear all about longest runs that are being planned by Rowan and Tok. Rowan and Tok, welcome to the podcast.

00:40:08[crosstalk]

00:40:08Tony O'Connell: Thank you, Mel. Hi, Mel. I'm Scotty.

00:40:10Melissa Erbacher: Lovely to have you on the show, Rowan. It's been a while since, well, actually we had a roving adventure from you. Doc seems to be here every week these days.

00:40:20Tony O'Connell: Oh, well, on the payroll.

00:40:24Melissa Erbacher: As you do. Lovely to have you both. Now, please, Rowan, could you start with telling us the events that are going to be included in the longest run that you've organised?

00:40:36Rowan - Longest Run Melbourne north-east organiser: Sure. Our longest run takes in north through to northeast of Melbourne. starting at 7am at Coburg and then heading on to Darebin and a special run, which is Mernda, which is a little special treat. Then on to Westerfolds, Mullum Mullum, Jells and finishing at Frog Hollow.

00:40:55Melissa Erbacher: And Tok, I understand that your events will also finish at Frog Hollow, but can you introduce us to how you're going to start and play out the day?

00:41:03Tony O'Connell: Yep, yes, certainly, Mel. We've actually got an early start doing the Gippsland parkruns. We've got a fair bit more travel time between our parkruns. So we've got a 6.30 kick-off, so it'll be probably headlamps to start with at Traralgon. And then we're going to go out to Churchill, across to Newborough, to Warragul, Pakenham, Berwick Springs, and then finish with the Melbourne crew at Frog.

00:41:26Scott Trickett: Now, last year we only had one longest run in Melbourne, And so, Toc, you loved it so much you wanted to bring it to Gippsland and a little bit of Melbourne, I guess.

00:41:37Tony O'Connell: Yeah, look, last year there was quite a few Gippslanders that made the trip up for the This year we thought we'd get one going and try to get a bigger crew in and meet up with the Melbourne crew for the last run, which I think will be a heap of fun and make it a bit of a fun day running into a bigger number rather than having the numbers taper off towards the end.

00:42:00Scott Trickett: And you're finishing at Frog, both of you. Frog's got a reputation for being fast. Do you think this is going to be the fastest leg of the longest run?

00:42:11Rowan - Longest Run Melbourne north-east organiser: It certainly could be. We've got a little bit of elevation with some of the runs in the northeast, particularly with the gels. There's always a bit of a surprise with nearly about 70 metres of elevation. So I think it's going to be quite nice for everyone to finish on a nice, flat, comfortable Frog Hollow course. Quite scenic too.

00:42:29Tony O'Connell: Yeah, I think I've got the lucky end of the stick of looking at some of Rowan's with Westerfold's Mullum Mullum and gels in a row and thinking we've got some nice flat courses at Gippsland so we might start off a bit quicker, but towards the end of the day, I think everyone will be tapering off a little bit.

00:42:45Melissa Erbacher: We're very lucky this year. You mentioned before, Rowan, that you're going to have a Sneaky Peak preview at Mernda. They're doing a similar thing in Queensland and I love the fact that adventurers can test out a new course that hasn't even come yet and have that sort of preview. Something else that is a little bit different this year is we're not actually running the first longest runs on the winter solstice. So what was the reasoning behind doing it on Sunday, the 11th of June in Victoria?

00:43:22Tony O'Connell: A big part of our reasoning, Mel, was the long weekends on that weekend. It gives everyone the Monday to recover and catch up a little bit. It's good that the country's all going to be running on the one day again.

00:43:34Scott Trickett: I want to go back to Mernda. Tell us a bit about this, Rowan. What have we got in plan for Moondah?

00:43:41Rowan - Longest Run Melbourne north-east organiser: Yeah, so it's a lovely course on a Stocklands property. So I've been working with the lovely Amanda, a runner out in the north-east of Melbourne who currently works or goes between Ley Law and a few other courses out there. But she's very excited and I think, yeah, giving a test on the longest run will be a great little sampler and get a good bit of feedback for Amanda and her family and her crew out there. Can you give us a preview of what to expect?

00:44:10Scott Trickett: Have we got hills at Mernda?

00:44:13Rowan - Longest Run Melbourne north-east organiser: Yes. There's a couple of slight elevations, but it's a really nice mix of a course. It's a lovely little adventure park, so somewhere for the kids to play before they go for their run. Going across multiple surfaces, concrete, boardwalks and gravel. There's a little wetland that we run around first, then head down Plenty Road, sort of south towards Melbourne. back up through the wetlands and then through a nature reserve, which is just a bushland sort of park. So, yeah, a bit of something for everyone, hopefully.

00:44:42Scott Trickett: And, Toc, you alluded to yours. I think I've run all your events, either Freedom Runs or Real Runs. They're all very flat. I haven't run Churchill. Tell me Churchill's got lots of hills in it.

00:44:55Tony O'Connell: Yeah, out of the ones that we're running, Churchill probably has got the most elevation. It's shaped probably a little bit like a skate bowl where it's a double lap, At each end of the extremities, I guess, you go up a bit of a rise. So you're up and down quite often on the same bit of track. Churchill probably is one of the hillier ones that we've actually got down in Gippsland.

00:45:18Scott Trickett: I tell you what, I'm gutted. I'm going to miss it this year. I will just mention again, not official parkruns in case there's any confusion. These are just all freedom runs on the one day. And I hope you guys can have fun without me this year. Best of luck.

00:45:36Rowan - Longest Run Melbourne north-east organiser: We'll miss you, Scotty. Thanks, Rowan.

00:45:38Scott Trickett: Thanks for joining us on the podcast and telling us all about the Victorian versions of the longest run this year.

00:45:44Rowan - Longest Run Melbourne north-east organiser: No worries. Hope to see many people out and about.

00:45:46Scott Trickett: To wrap up, we're going to visit Paul Rainbow in Sydney. Now, all the other states are lucky enough to have two longest runs, but in Sydney we're just having the one. So we're just having an update from Paul on... What have you got planned this year, Paul? Do you know? Do you know which events you're going to run this year?

00:46:05Paul Rainbow: Well, we're deciding to mix it up. Last year we did the starting from Cronulla and finishing in Curl Curl, starting with the sea and ending with the sea. But this year we're thinking that we'll want to try to make sure we try to do seven different parkruns since we've got so many in Sydney to choose from. So we're trying to organise from at this stage, from west to east. So starting Penrith Way, there's a couple out there, and heading back towards the city. So trying to do seven parkruns there. But some are a bit harder than others to organise because of councils and that sort of thing. But, you know, that's what we're trying to organise. That's why it's taking a bit longer to suss out the route.

00:46:54Scott Trickett: So have you got a rough idea? Do you know, can you fire off some names of events that you're thinking about? hitting up this year?

00:47:00Paul Rainbow: Yeah, we basically, well, we'd like to do, the course we'd like to do is Penrith Lakes, then Nepean River, Rouse Hill, The Ponds, Parramatta, and hopefully if it's going to be started by then is a new one that's going to start at Kerrita, I think is the name. It's basically another one near Rose. that we did a test run a few weeks ago. And then finishing up at another new one at Willoughby. So that would be our seventh one. That was one of the things I didn't know whether people would be interested in doing one that's actually not started yet. But I was thinking, well, it's quite a good course. It's right on the harbour there. So it'd be a nice one to do. Oh, I've done it before it even started, but

00:47:54Melissa Erbacher: hey, there are no rules with longest run because you can do whatever you like. It's not official. I say go for it.

00:48:02Paul Rainbow: Yeah, that sounds good. I probably will go for it if that's the case. I just thought people would be feeling like it was not a real parkrun yet. But I suppose, you know, it is a 5K course still. And I did it as a test run there a few weeks ago. It was great. It was a really nice course. but it's just got a few issues with the number of people that want to use the same path.

00:48:29Melissa Erbacher: It's a popular area, is it?

00:48:31Paul Rainbow: Yes, it's a very nice location.

00:48:34Melissa Erbacher: Well, I'm sure it's going to be an exciting event this year. because it's all across the country planned for the 11th of June, I think the weather is just going to be spectacular countrywide. So good luck with it, Paul. Congratulations on being one of the eight longest runs that are happening nationally this year. Hopefully next year we can get South Australia on board and maybe even Tassie if they've managed to get enough events up by then.

00:49:03Paul Rainbow: Yeah, I guess it's pretty hard to have seven runs that are, you can do within one single day so you know if you they're a bit widespread it might be a bit hard to travel that distance in the day absolutely we're very lucky to live in the spots that we live and hopefully there's a lot of adventurers out there that will go and visit and check out a whole bunch of new events they've never been to that's the main reason I like to do the ones that well you know Different each year, so people are experiencing these other ones that they've probably never been to.

00:49:39Melissa Erbacher: Exactly. Thanks very much for joining us.

00:49:42Paul Rainbow: No worries. Have a good one.

Roving Adventurers (roving reporter crossovers)

00:49:44Unidentified speaker: I am not the only Scott in parkrun Circles.

00:50:01Scott Trickett: There is a Scott Watkins who visited Washington, D.C. on the weekend, and he sent us a roving report. We've never had one from the States, have we, Mel?

00:50:11Melissa Erbacher: I don't, and I don't think so, but also I love the fact that Parker and Australia's president has gone to Washington, D.C. Yes.

00:50:21Scott Trickett: So this is President Scott, not Scotty, at Roosevelt Island parkrun.

00:50:26Scott Watkins: So I've just completed my first international parkrun, and I did it at Roosevelt Island parkrun in Washington, D.C. It's a great event, really nice course. So the course is pretty much an out-and-back course with an extended loop at the end where you go around a big monument. But it's all on an island, which is in the middle of the river between Virginia and Washington, D.C., And the course, the start of it, you're on a trail running through some trees, but then a large part of you are on these really nice boardwalks that go through the sort of swampy area at the side of the river. They're short as there's no alligators there. And then there's a very slight little incline where you come up, you go back down to the other end of the island around Monument on trail and then back around and then back along the boardwalks again and back up to the start. It's a pretty undulating course at the start and the end, but the middle section is really flat and really, really great event. About half the participants today were tourists, so there was quite a few other Australians there, a few people from the UK, but a growing number of locals here. For those who don't know, Washington DC is a bit of a growth area for parkrun in the US. It's been a bit of a strategic decision to focus on growing it, and so there's three events around the city now and another few starting up. There really is some momentum starting to build here. And after the run, I was able to speak with a couple of the participants and volunteers here. Some of them are local, some of them are living here for a little while from the UK. And also Darrell Stanaford, who is the country manager for parkrun in the US and has been responsible for the establishment of that event and a number of the other ones around the USA. So here's what they had to say. I'm here with Joyce. Joyce, how did you find out about parkrun?

00:51:57Joyce - Roosevelt Island parkrunner: Honestly, I have friends in the UK who were doing it for years and making me super jealous. So when we finally started one in the US, I was super, super excited to get my parkruns.

00:52:05Scott Watkins: And do you live close by?

00:52:06Joyce - Roosevelt Island parkrunner: I do. I live just up the hill, so it's about a mile from my house to Roosevelt Island.

00:52:11Scott Watkins: And how many have you done now?

00:52:12Joyce - Roosevelt Island parkrunner: This, I think, is 27.

00:52:16Scott Watkins: Excellent, excellent. And what's your favorite thing about parkruns?

00:52:19Joyce - Roosevelt Island parkrunner: I actually really love the community, so I love going for coffee afterwards, and I love that it gets my bottom out of bed to go for a run on Saturday mornings.

00:52:28Scott Watkins: Excellent. Great. Well, thanks for everything you do for parkrun USA.

00:52:31Joyce - Roosevelt Island parkrunner: Thank you.

00:52:32Scott Watkins: Paul is the Roosevelt Island male model. Can you tell us about your modelling experience, Paul?

00:52:39Paul - Roosevelt Island parkrunner: Yeah, it's been quite bizarre over the last couple of weeks. Surprisingly, we got some pictures taken a couple of weeks ago, and unbeknown to me, they've appeared in a couple of magazines here, the Washingtonian Running Magazine and a local Connections magazine.

00:52:53Scott Watkins: Great. And you're not from D.C. originally, but what brought you here?

00:52:59Paul - Roosevelt Island parkrunner: I'm in the military so we're here on a three-year posting and when we arrived there were no parkruns in the DC area and now we've got at least three and expanding all the time so it was a bit disappointing when we first arrived but we were very happy to see them develop over the last couple of years.

00:53:13Scott Watkins: And you've done parkrun in the UK?

00:53:16Paul - Roosevelt Island parkrunner: Yes, yeah. In fact our first parkrun was out in the Gold Coast in Australia and then we got back to the UK and South Sea in Portsmouth on the south coast of England is my home run. Great.

00:53:27Scott Watkins: And what's your favorite thing about parkrun here?

00:53:30Paul - Roosevelt Island parkrunner: I think it's the fact that it gets you out on a Saturday morning and starts the day off in the right way and just enjoying meeting people in the community side. Do you think it's got a future here in the U.S.? Oh, yeah, I think it will explode. I mean, parkrun's almost weekly and generating all over the state. So I think once the Americans get the idea of parkrun and what it stands for, it's going to take off big style.

00:53:51Scott Watkins: Great. Thanks, Paul. So now I'm here with Darryl, the man who is responsible for parkrun USA now. And so Darryl, can you tell us a little bit about your role here in the US?

00:54:02Darrell Stanaford: My role is to help all the enthusiastic volunteers get their parkruns going and to do them and to help them navigate the permit process and the funding process.

00:54:13Scott Watkins: And so how many events do you have in the US now?

00:54:16Darrell Stanaford: We have nine events now with three more opening within the next five weeks.

00:54:21Scott Watkins: So it's summer, there's sort of new events blossoming. What's your sort of trajectory for the rest of the year for new events?

00:54:30Darrell Stanaford: Unknown at this point. The permits are a challenge in the U.S. So it seems to be wherever we find the most enthusiastic volunteers, we also find the most challenging situation with the permits. So we will have more parkruns up and down both coasts and some in the center of the country, but it's always hard to predict exactly how many and how fast.

00:54:50Scott Watkins: And if someone's out there listening, what could they do to help parkrun USA?

00:54:55Darrell Stanaford: Spread the word about parkrun so that more people hear about it and stick up their hands and say I want a parkrun in my community.

00:55:03Scott Watkins: About five weeks ago I was in North Korea. I went to Pyongyang and ran the marathon there. So now here I am in DC. So I was wondering what's it like living under a crazy president?

00:55:16Darrell Stanaford: I don't know. You'd have to ask the North Koreans. The U.S. is a great country with great institutions, and no one individual can topple the system, I think. Sometimes that's a disadvantage, but generally speaking, it's an advantage.

00:55:31Scott Watkins: That's good. That's a positive attitude to take. Well, thanks for everything you do for parkrun in the USA.

00:55:37Darrell Stanaford: Glad you were able to make it over, Scott. Great to meet you.

00:55:42Melissa Erbacher: Thanks for the roving report there, President Scott. We look forward to hearing more. I understand you're on some adventures overseas for a little while, so hopefully we can get some more from Mr. Scott Watkins.

00:55:56Scott Trickett: Good to hear an American accent in amongst some British accents there, as usual.

Launches and anniversaries ("Where is the cake?")

00:56:04Melissa Erbacher: So, Scotty, where's the cake this week?

00:56:07Scott Trickett: Dunno. Do you? Do you?

00:56:10Melissa Erbacher: It's a little bit confusing, I have to say. I don't know if you've noticed, but the parkrun Australia newsletter doesn't have anniversaries anymore.

00:56:17Scott Trickett: It's outrageous.

00:56:19Melissa Erbacher: What's going on there? I don't know.

00:56:22Scott Trickett: There must be another source of information. We could ring around all our events and ask them, is it their anniversary this week?

00:56:31Melissa Erbacher: That seems a little bit labour intensive.

00:56:33Scott Trickett: It does. I don't have that much time on my hands.

00:56:36Jeremy Savage: What are we going to do?

00:56:38Melissa Erbacher: Surely there's somebody who works for parkrun Australia who could point us in the right direction.

00:56:42Scott Trickett: Maybe. I'll tell you what, let's change it. Let's just start celebrating. Let's find out where the cake is at first anniversaries. Because the list was getting very long. Do you not agree?

00:56:54Melissa Erbacher: I'm happy that there's getting a long list. But yeah, no, that makes sense to me. We can help everybody celebrate their first anniversary.

00:57:02Scott Trickett: Yes, because that's the exciting one. That's when there's always cake. I've been to second anniversaries, third anniversaries, and there's not always cake.

00:57:11Jeremy Savage: So let's just celebrate events that have made it to one year.

00:57:15Scott Trickett: And this week, there are none.

00:57:18Melissa Erbacher: Nobody. However, next year... There's going to be three celebrating their first anniversary this weekend.

00:57:28Scott Trickett: So we've got three launches. Where are they? We're going to Mawson Lakes in South Australia.

00:57:34Melissa Erbacher: Yay, South Australia. We love it when you guys launch a new event down there.

00:57:39Scott Trickett: The Ballina Coast in New South Wales are launching. And Mount Beauty in Victoria.

00:57:48Melissa Erbacher: That's awesome. That's three different states getting some new parkrun events going. Queensland, not representing this week. We're going to have to do some work, I think.

00:58:00Scott Trickett: I'm heading along to Mount Beauty, which will be exciting. We launched Timboon a couple of weeks ago in Victoria. I think I've mentioned it, one of the smallest towns per capita to have a parkrun. I reckon Mount Beauty's got to be giving that a bit of a nudge too because Mount Beauty is a really small town. So it's very impressive they're going to have a parkrun.

00:58:22Melissa Erbacher: And more importantly, no, it's probably not more important, but does this mean you're going to come equal with me on the most events list? Well, it does. If I don't go somewhere new?

00:58:32Scott Trickett: Go somewhere new.

00:58:34Melissa Erbacher: Go somewhere new. Am I run directing this week? I'm going to have to look at the roster. This can't happen.

00:58:41Scott Trickett: I'll tell you what. I'll give you... We're going to throw to Club Corner. So you've got, I don't know, about five, six minutes to have a think about it. Make some plans.

00:58:52Melissa Erbacher: Sounds like a plan.

00:58:53Scott Trickett: Yeah, make some plans. But now, Club Corner! Club Corner is back. And we're coming back with the third largest parkrun club in the country in training. And we're welcoming... Steve and Margot, welcome to the podcast, guys. Thank you very much.

Club Corner

00:59:16Unidentified speaker: Yeah, thanks for having us.

00:59:18Scott Trickett: Now, you guys have been around running for a long time. Tell us how in training the club got started.

00:59:25Unidentified speaker: Well, we had some very successful training groups. I'd been coaching since I've been 18, so a long time ago. And I guess the training groups got to a size that we really needed to have some structure and that uh you know could take them to the next level because we're getting like 80 people along to a training group and it's like with one coach it was just not possible um so that was 1994 that uh that the club was formed yeah i guess so we registered with athletics australia and with um Triathlon Australia so that people in our club could then go and compete in the cross-country season and the triathlon season.

01:00:08Unidentified speaker: It's really been all about recreational, mainly recreational runners, isn't it?

01:00:11Unidentified speaker: That's right. So I think our focus right at the beginning when we were looking at our training groups was on social and recreational athletes, not on elite. And back then that was an unusual thing. There weren't really any groups back then at all that were catering for that type of person. It was just elite squads.

01:00:29Melissa Erbacher: I remember before parkrun came to the Sunshine Coast, seeing in training runners out and about running around and doing obviously club runs and with your signature singlets going on. And so obviously, and you've just mentioned you were around before parkrun, were you guys being recreationally focused early adopters of getting your runners to participate at parkrun?

01:00:59Unidentified speaker: Yeah. When parkrun first, uh, started in Australia, you know, it was, uh, down at the Gold Coast, but then, uh, there was a move to get it happening in Brisbane as well, which was at New Farm Park. And, uh, we really helped, I guess, get it off the ground a bit at the time because nobody knew what a parkrun was back at that time. Um, but we had a big club, like we've got 700 members in our club and it was probably pretty similar back then. And, um, So we try to encourage all of our club members to go and we promoted it through our business as well, the intraining Running Centre. And yeah, I think it's been a great thing for the community, parkruns. We love them.

01:01:42Unidentified speaker: Yeah, I think it's a running phenomenon, really.

01:01:44Unidentified speaker: Yeah. So yeah, we're quite happy to have been there at the beginning to help support them. The fact that you get a time each week and you can compare it to your previous weeks and you go along and it's it's sort of not really a race and you're going along to just sort of run hard or run easy if you want and, uh, you know, whatever you want, but it's, it's mixing with your friends and it's such a, an easily easy distance to run. Uh, you know, you can run 5k every week and you can still back up the next week and run 5k again, whereas you run a marathon, you're out of action for quite a long time. But, you know, I think the main thing that it's really done for the running community is just, offered a gateway to people to become runners and then to sort of go on to do marathons or half marathons afterwards as well. So it's really been a wonderful thing for the community. So I'd like to just thank everybody who's involved as either a volunteer or as a participant.

01:02:50Melissa Erbacher: And you mentioned that the club got to a size where you couldn't facilitate – You know, you needed more structure to it. Has parkrun become part of a structured sort of weekly cycle? What kind of things do you, like program-wise, encourage your runners to do?

01:03:07Unidentified speaker: Well, we have what's called a minimalist marathon program that we do, and that's for marathoner and half marathoners. And then we have a couch to 10K program that we do for more beginners. And we've got like, I don't know, 15 to 20 coaches that are active doing sessions and We have beginner sessions, kids sessions, long run speed sessions, all sorts of things. But a component of our actual program is doing a tempo run on a Saturday. So mostly we're encouraging people to do parkruns. There's also the cross-country season where the kids mostly will do the cross-countries during that time. But, you know, it is a core component of one of the major programs sessions that we do in each week so we have long run uh a tempo session which is the parkrun we do a threshold session which is sort of longer reps and then we have a speed session so those are the four sessions that we have as as a component of of what we do the other the other um part of it that we've introduced in the last year is a once a month predictor race so we once a month encourage our runners to um

01:04:23Unidentified speaker: log on a time onto our, um, club Facebook page, and then they predict their time. They then have to either run with no watch or with their watch covered up. And then we give them a prize to our club members who have got, who's got closer to the predicted race. And that's a really important skill for all runners to learn no matter what level they're at.

01:04:41Unidentified speaker: And we actually, uh, each week we do a newsletter out to our club members and, uh, we list everybody who's run a parkrun and what their place was in time. And, uh, Yeah, so it's something that we sort of have as a, I guess, a focus in the promotion of what we do as a club.

01:05:03Scott Trickett: That all sounds awesome. You sound very active with parkrun. Now, in training is based in Brisbane and it's mainly Queensland based. Have you stretched out to the rest of the country?

01:05:14Unidentified speaker: Well, you know, I guess that's an interesting thing. That's something we'd like to do, but it's, you know, what we do is very hands-on with our coaches and, uh, it's about finding coaches in other areas who are willing to, to do what we do and follow our program. Um, you know, if you look at all of the parkrun clubs, uh, you know, we're the only one that's probably what you would call a true club where everybody's sort of in one geographical area. Um, compared to, say, Running Mums Australia, which I guess is still the number one club. And it's more of an online club, so it's a very different type of club to ours where it's more hands-on, I suppose.

01:05:56Unidentified speaker: Yeah, it's just getting manpower, really. And we always have coaches who are approaching us. And a lot of the coaches actually are from our own running community that have come through it from the beginning stage as well.

01:06:09Unidentified speaker: Yeah, so we actually – nurture our coaches through from being a beginner in the club to actually being one of the coaches down the track.

01:06:17Melissa Erbacher: If people want to take their recreational running to the next level, how do they get involved within training? What do you have to do to join?

01:06:25Unidentified speaker: Well, to join, it's just a matter of going online and going through the joining motions. There is a fee to join and you get one of our singlets, which you mentioned before, it's very distinctive. When you go to races, if you wear that singlet, you just go in training. all the way through the race.

01:06:41Unidentified speaker: It's a guaranteed cheer.

01:06:44Unidentified speaker: Um, so, you know, it's, it's a, uh, because it's just a red stripe down the front, it's just so easy to see from a long way off. And, um, you know, at all the parkruns, you'll see heaps of people in in training singles. I think, I guess our profile as a club is, is a bit different from other clubs, which people might be members of, but they don't have uniforms and they, They're not as structured as what we are. Maybe they don't even offer the same amount of training sessions. And even, like, we have a coaching director who manages all the communication with the coaches and with the participants in the club.

01:07:24Unidentified speaker: I think the thing with our club, though, and it's the same with any club that people really do join, it's making those connections as a community. Just like parkruns are, you know, it's the parkrun community that nationally and internationally, as well as at each of the different groups. We have the same structure in training groups. So within each training group, there's a little community, and everybody, though, will connect outside of that when they go to races, and they see that in-training singlet. They just make that connection, and it's as if it's a long-lost friend almost.

01:07:55Scott Trickett: It sounds like it's working. I agree with you. It is very different to some of the other clubs running around parkrun, but there's no doubt. Your impact and reach is far and wide. Thanks for coming on the parkrun Adventures this week and telling us all about in training.

01:08:11Unidentified speaker: Thanks for having us.

01:08:18Scott Trickett: It was good to have the guys on, Steve and Margot, from InTraining, because we have talked to some clubs that are like my club and your club that aren't serious, that are just very social, recreational running clubs. Whereas InTraining definitely do offer something a bit more. You know, I'm actually in another club that is a bit more serious. They offer training. So, you know, parkrun's great. You can have the best of every world.

01:08:47Melissa Erbacher: You can. You can be in more than one club at once and it's not cheating.

01:08:50Scott Trickett: Yes, definitely not cheating. I might join a few more clubs by the end of the year.

01:08:57Melissa Erbacher: One for each state.

01:08:58Scott Trickett: I'm on the edges of a few clubs, but I haven't, you know, I've just dipped my toe in.

01:09:04Melissa Erbacher: No commitment yet?

01:09:05Scott Trickett: No, no. My heart's always with the Westerfoldians. That's never going to change. There's nothing wrong with having a little dalliance with some other clubs here and there. I encourage it.

01:09:21Melissa Erbacher: Okay.

01:09:22Scott Trickett: Just not too many of those Westerfodians. Don't you go out finding other clubs. Not coming back.

01:09:27Melissa Erbacher: It's good for the goose. It's good for the gander.

01:09:30Scott Trickett: That's it. That's it for Episode 69. We're in the 70s next week, Mel. I hope you're going to bring your 70s A-game.

01:09:38Melissa Erbacher: Oh, my 70s A-game. I may wear a costume next week. No, I'm not going to fit into it. Let's be realistic. I can't do zips up on things that I used to be able to wear at the moment. But my 70s A-game will be here, costumeless, next week.

Post-show ramble (unnamed off-air chat)

01:09:55Scott Trickett: Hey, this is the part of the program where we can go a bit off. So if you've had enough, people, thanks for tuning in. We'll see you all again next week. But this is the bit where we just ramble. I'll play the music.

01:10:06[music]

01:10:07Unidentified speaker: I'll play the music. Everyone can...

01:10:09Scott Trickett: Come back. So how are you going? You've only got a few more weeks to go. I know you've only got a few more days of work to go.

01:10:17Melissa Erbacher: Eight days.

01:10:18Scott Trickett: Yeah. Are we still on track to be doing a podcast every week or are we rethinking that idea?

01:10:25Melissa Erbacher: No, we're still on track to be doing a podcast every week. I'm going to be one of those unrealistic mothers who completely denies anything's going to change until it changes and I can't do everything all at once. Okay.

01:10:41Scott Trickett: I look forward to it. You know, it's going to be a real challenging couple of weeks. I'm going to be out of the country. You're going to be deprived of sleep.

01:10:51Melissa Erbacher: So out of my mind.

01:10:52Scott Trickett: Out of your mind. So it's going to make for great listening or no listening at all. But we're not going to make any commitment either to not have a podcast or to continue doing the podcast. We're just going to see what happens.

01:11:07Melissa Erbacher: Yes. It could get interesting. Or not. It could get boring.

01:11:14Scott Trickett: Yeah. I'm jet lagged. You're tired. What did you do? Not much. Who do you want to talk to? I don't care.

01:11:22Melissa Erbacher: See you all next week. Let's interview my infant newborn. See what he or she has to say. Yeah. It could get messy.

01:11:34Scott Trickett: Sometimes. Yeah, something for us to look forward to. But that's not going to happen next week. Episode 70, next week's going to be fun. See you then.

01:11:42Melissa Erbacher: Baby could arrive early.

01:11:44Scott Trickett: So we're not committing to Episode 70 being a good one?

01:11:49Melissa Erbacher: Oh, I think Episode 70's probably a safe bet.

01:11:51Unidentified speaker: Okay.

01:11:53Scott Trickett: G'day.

01:11:53Melissa Erbacher: I'll chat to you then. See ya.