Episode 136 - Kelly Hodges

Episode details · 316 speaker turns · sound cues from context

00:00:07Unidentified speaker: Thank you.

00:00:22Melissa Erbacher: Welcome to episode 136 of the parkrun Adventurers podcast. You were wondering whether or not it would happen. Did my new co-host last week, Tim, eclipse Scotty to the point where he threw his tools down and stormed out of the workshop? I don't know. Scotty, are you here? Did you join me?

00:00:43Scott Trickett: I'm back. Did you miss me, Mel?

00:00:47Melissa Erbacher: That's a very strong word.

00:00:51Scott Trickett: I love the indifference. Thank you. It's great to be back.

00:00:55Melissa Erbacher: Of course, I missed you. It was a very different experience recording with the different co-hosts last week, especially on our podcast. You know, yeah, it was a little bit weird not having you around and not to mention the fact that I had to drive the ship and wow, didn't I do a stellar job with that?

00:01:14Scott Trickett: Well, everything worked. So, I mean, the podcast went out. I mean, I'm glad the rest of our listeners got to share the echo chamber that I'm subjected to every day of Tim's office. Yeah. The acoustics in the Airlie Beach parkrun HQ office is not ideal, and we brought that to last week's episode, and I'm great. He did fix it up for the outro.

00:01:43Melissa Erbacher: He did. He recorded at home for the outro. Okay. He changed location. Okay. But yeah, you know, parkrun is a not-for-profit organisation. There is not budget for plush couches and, you know, soundproofing and lovely shag pile carpets to absorb the noise. You know, it's a Spartan office because, you know, we don't need to spend money where it's not necessary.

00:02:09Scott Trickett: Exactly. So I like to peel back the curtain every now and then. So let's describe the parkrun headquarters to our listeners. Because it sounds fancy. It sounds luxurious to have an office in the Whitsundays. But the reality is it's – how big is it? I'm not good with measurements. Mel, it's maybe five metres?

00:02:31Melissa Erbacher: One of those 20-foot containers. Like if you can imagine the size of being inside one of those 20-foot containers. And it's kind of long and rectangular too, isn't it?

00:02:41Scott Trickett: And it's got a desk. That's it.

00:02:43Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, he hasn't even got a chair. It's a stand-up desk.

00:02:46Unidentified speaker: Right.

00:02:47Scott Trickett: No chair, no rug, no lamp. Like I remember back in my old job at SBS, it was a really cold corporate office. Everything was beige and they went to open plan and it was just horrific. I hated it. So I asked, can we get some lamps and some rugs? Because we were a creative team. So I wanted sort of to create sort of a nicer sort of mood for So I wanted rugs and a lamp and just something to decorate it. And I got a very firm no. Don't be ridiculous. But I think at parkrun, I think we can just expand the budget a little to buy Tim maybe a lamp. Maybe a rug's probably going too far in the Whitsundays, but I think it needs something.

00:03:33Melissa Erbacher: Well, maybe just for Christmas, the rest of the staff could pool our resources and purchase a lamp for him.

00:03:40Scott Trickett: Yeah, yeah. But it was good. It was good to have a different voice. Hopefully, you enjoyed it and hopefully the listeners enjoyed it. I enjoyed it. I enjoyed having a week off.

00:03:54Melissa Erbacher: Did you? And what did you do with all the extra spare time that you had from not recording a podcast for the first week in two and a half years?

00:04:01Scott Trickett: I didn't worry about the podcast, which was... What I enjoyed most about it. I didn't have to worry about anything. I didn't have to organize the guests. I didn't have to organize the edit. We didn't have to coordinate our schedules. I just said, you guys do it. So that was what I did. I did not worry about the podcast.

00:04:23Melissa Erbacher: Is it a big worry for you every week, Scotty?

00:04:25Scott Trickett: It's not a big worry. Definitely not a big worry. I love it, Mel. Okay. But one less thing to worry about. Helps from time to time.

00:04:33Unidentified speaker: Yeah.

00:04:34Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, well, you know, we're coming up to the festive season and I feel there's going to be a Christmas slash New Year break coming on, as we always do. So that'll be nice to get a little bit of R&R in. Something to look forward to, holidays.

The Perlustration (annual listener survey)

00:04:50Scott Trickett: What I have done in my spare time is I just quickly glanced at the perlustration results. I'm not going to give away too much yet because we've had a good response, good early response so far.

00:05:02Melissa Erbacher: Awesome. Can I just ask how's the ego going? Because I haven't looked. I'm not sure. I've had a bit of an up and down week. I'm not sure if my ego can handle the results just yet. So I've kind of not looked.

00:05:17Scott Trickett: Well, there's one question in there. We weren't going to put it in there, but through Tim's prompting, it needed to go in there. And luckily, Mel, your ego is big enough and strong enough to handle it. Mine is as well. But I'm in a good mood. I'm happy at the moment.

00:05:38Melissa Erbacher: Okay. Good.

00:05:39Scott Trickett: Yeah.

00:05:40Melissa Erbacher: Good, but we still are going to leave it open for a couple more weeks, aren't we? So we won't go into the results. We'll give everybody a full breakdown toward the end and then we will also tell people what will or will not change. Maybe we'll start actually implementing some of the changes from the early results this week. What do you reckon? Yes.

00:05:58Scott Trickett: Yeah, and this is it, people. Like we said it last week, we do take notice of these results. Like if you tell us something sucks, it's gone. If you tell us you want something back, it's coming back. So I've got some good news and some bad news on that front, Mel, but I'm not going to tell anything. I'm not going to share anything just yet. But I can say something's going and something's definitely coming back just from early responses.

00:06:23Melissa Erbacher: Oh.

00:06:24Scott Trickett: Something to look forward to. And don't forget, we're giving away a watch. It's sitting right in front of me, as I see. It's in its box. It's brand new. It's a TomTom Runner 3. It's a great watch.

00:06:33Melissa Erbacher: It comes with free Scotty syncing it to your phone and computer support. It doesn't. It doesn't. But it's still a free watch. It's brand new.

00:06:41Scott Trickett: Thanks to TomTom. We'll send it to our friends in the UK as well. Yeah, yeah.

00:06:46Melissa Erbacher: We don't mind where it gets sent. I mean, the recharge plug is probably a USB one, yeah? So you should be able to plug it in anywhere.

00:06:53Scott Trickett: Yeah. Yeah. So don't forget that. It's perlustration. We'll share the link again this week. I want to go back though, Mel. Massive weekend last weekend for both of us. It was our anniversary. It's probably the most important weekend on the parkrun Australia calendar.

00:07:07Melissa Erbacher: For everyone.

00:07:08Scott Trickett: For the year.

00:07:09Melissa Erbacher: Not just us, for everyone.

00:07:10Scott Trickett: I think most people are focused on what happens at Kawana and Westerfolds on the weekend. Pretty sure. But for those that aren't, let's share. What did you get up to?

00:07:22Melissa Erbacher: Well, we had our sixth anniversary at Kiwana parkrun on the weekend. We had a spooky theme because it's not an anniversary at Kawana unless there's some kind of fancy dress theme. Or it won't be as long as I'm around on the event team anyway. Even if none of the runners want to get dressed up, I'm still doing it. So...

00:07:44Scott Trickett: So how are you finding that? So six years in, is the interest waning a little bit in dressers?

00:07:49Melissa Erbacher: It is definitely – it has evolved. It depends on the people that are coming. So, you know, we've got some new runners that are sort of still excited about those sorts of things and so they tend to participate a bit more. Some of the runners and walkers who've been there since right from the start have just kind of toned down their costumes to an extent, whereas in previous years they might have gone all out. Yeah, we've got the full gamut going on. It's interesting to see. Certainly in terms of the actual celebration, you know, it was nowhere near the level of crazy that it was in the early years. And that's just, you know, a reflection on us as an event team keeping it simple, understanding that, you know, we already do the best thing that you can possibly do every week and we give uh our parkrunners an event free 5k timed run so there's it's not much more you can do to make that amazing um and yeah it's nice to celebrate it with a bit of a costume and a bit of a hoo-ha but we don't we don't do like the whole prizes in the pre-event brief anymore we don't um spend like 20 minutes just highlighting all the different stats or anything like that. It's all very low key and we just give everybody the run that they love and show up for all the time. We did this week, this year I should say, instead of I've actually made the cake, the anniversary cake every year since we started and this is the first year that I did it and we instead invited parkrunners to contribute and cupcakes, if they felt so inclined to bake and whatnot. And so we got some awesome, very yummy cupcakes that were brought along. Not too many though, which was interesting. Probably also a bit our fault for not, what's the word, publicizing it very much or very long beforehand. But you know, that was fine too. Yeah, but it was a good morning. How was yours, Scotty? Because we share our anniversaries.

00:10:06Scott Trickett: It is. It's pretty cool, isn't it, how we synchronise that? It's interesting you say that six years in, yeah, things are evolving. I think we're seeing that at Westerfolds too. I think the parkrunners, the Westerfoldians, they're into it. They're dressed up every week. But I remember back to the first few years and there was a lot of excitement about getting dressed up and that probably does... wear off a little bit. But we had a W theme this year, so I went as a wish list. Thanks to Maddy Trent for the heads up on that.

00:10:40Melissa Erbacher: Maddy Trent for the heads up on that? I thought Maddy Trent had a different suggestion for you, which I strongly encouraged you to think about very carefully.

00:10:51Scott Trickett: So he did. I think he did. My memory's fading as I'm getting older. So I wanted to go as a worm. I thought that would be a great costume. You, along with my wife, pointed out that I could end up looking like a massive penis. Well, it depends. Well, the potential to look something resembling more of that than a worm, which made me, you know, I was more excited to explore the worm costume. But my beautiful wife put her foot down.

00:11:21Melissa Erbacher: Thank you, Vonnie. I think the whole population of parkrun also thanks you.

00:11:26Scott Trickett: No, to the worms. So I went as a wish list and that was good. That was good for me.

00:11:31Melissa Erbacher: I found that very interesting because I actually had to zoom in on the photo. I couldn't just leave it little. I had to open it up and go, all right, what is on the list? Because it wasn't just any ordinary wish list. It was a wish list of parkruns. It was. And you wrote up their names, Scotty.

00:11:49Scott Trickett: I did. Hey, let's get to that in the outro. Let's give a tease. Okay. Let's explore that in the outro because perhaps I should have given that a bit more thought than I did have at the time.

00:12:01Melissa Erbacher: Who you might be offending.

00:12:02Scott Trickett: Well, maybe, maybe not. But yeah, there's lots of parkruns that I want to get to and they were on my wish list or maybe not. But we had a good old time. We do do. So Bree, the event director at Westerfolds, she does do the certificates and reads out a few stats. So it's still got that element to our anniversaries. I'm still waiting for my very first parkrun certificate, Mel. I thought this year could be the year. I know I'm not around Westerfolds much, but... But, you know, if Bree was just going through the list and they're a bit ambiguous, like they're not just for most runs and most PBs or that. So I thought it was a chance, but lucked out again.

00:12:42Melissa Erbacher: I'm a little bit offended that you're still waiting for your inverted commas first parkrun certificate because I recall making a certificate for you for parkrun several years ago. And you've obviously blanked it out of your mind or it doesn't count. It's not important because I didn't print it out and send it to you. I only sent it to you electronically.

00:13:04Scott Trickett: I want it to be a public thing.

00:13:05Melissa Erbacher: Oh, okay.

00:13:07Scott Trickett: You know, hand it to me in front of hordes of people. Who are clapping and cheering. You know, I designed the goddamn things. I want one after all these years.

00:13:15Melissa Erbacher: Okay. Well, hopefully somebody listening in Victoria has access to the certificates and can get one to you.

00:13:24Scott Trickett: But it was a double barrel weekend with anniversaries, but it was a triple barrel weekend. because I did PAX that I'm not going to go into because I think we did that last year, but I had an awesome weekend at PAX where we… Geeked out. Yeah, so we geeked out massively. But we also had our annual run for the Fieries event, so I just want to quickly touch on that and mention that the Westerfoldians won for not the first year, second year, third year, but actually the fourth year in a row. Just a brief mention, it's a complete domination. Other running clubs came at us this year. The field was stronger. The competition was more intense, but it didn't faze us.

00:14:04Melissa Erbacher: Just quietly. Scotty bought all the trophies to work on Monday and at the staff meeting had them all lined up in front of the computer so that we could see how much shiny bling the Westerfoldians had.

00:14:18Scott Trickett: That was an accident. That wasn't meant to happen.

00:14:19Melissa Erbacher: Oh, really? That was awkward. Who put those there in the way of the camera?

00:14:23Scott Trickett: There's so many. There's so many. They get in the way.

00:14:27Melissa Erbacher: You know what's really ironic is the fact that all the trophies have these like little firemen with their firemen hoses on it. And to me, those look like the statues of the models that died in a freak gasoline fight accident in Zoolander.

00:14:43Scott Trickett: That's what I've said too. And nobody else sort of goes along with me when I bring it up.

00:14:46Melissa Erbacher: See, no, I think next year the Zoolanders need to represent and run for the fireys, try to get ourselves one of those trophies.

00:14:54Scott Trickett: Well, this is the maybe not ironic part, but this year there was no trophy. Oh. So we're going to make our own. Okay. It was great winning, but the prize was just a bunch of gift vouchers to a local pub.

00:15:10Melissa Erbacher: So where were all those trophies? Where were they from, the ones that you had lined up on your desk?

00:15:16Scott Trickett: Might have just been from previous years.

00:15:17Melissa Erbacher: Okay. Oh, dear. Yeah.

00:15:21Scott Trickett: But I'll tell you, it's been a long intro, but that's the way we go these days. I mean, with me now, what is it, two-hour episodes? So we can go for a 20-minute intro.

00:15:30Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, we don't need to compete with me now in terms of length and all that sort of stuff.

00:15:35Scott Trickett: You don't want to do a two-hour intro?

00:15:36Melissa Erbacher: Well, I don't think their intro goes for two hours.

00:15:39Scott Trickett: No.

00:15:40Melissa Erbacher: Preamble, yes.

00:15:42Scott Trickett: So there's the difference. So here's where I am at with my running, just to link it back to Run for the Fireys and how we won for the fourth year in a row. So I was entered in the 10K and I woke up in the morning and I just didn't want to run 10K. How bad am I going at the moment? So I downgraded. It was actually in the sake of being a good parent because she was in the 6K and she was going to run by herself. So I downgraded to the 4K event because Kasia didn't actually want us to run with her. She was also defending her title. But I was a bit worried about sending my daughter out for 6K. It's a long way. She really hasn't been training as much to get 6K.

00:16:22Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, but she does juniors as well as regular parkrun every week.

00:16:26Scott Trickett: I've got to say, she did really well. She did really well. So five-minute, five-and-a-minute Ks over 6K was a great effort.

00:16:31Unidentified speaker: Yeah.

00:16:32Scott Trickett: But I got to the 2K point of the 4K event, stood around and waited for 20 minutes for Kasia to come back, then ran with her the last 2K. And my time still counted towards the average time for the team event. So I potentially – You ruined it. My 20 minutes could have blown it for the team. But it didn't. That's our dominant thing.

00:16:55Melissa Erbacher: So what you're saying is you were the weakest link and the rest of your team stepped up and carried you. Carried me. It's about time.

00:17:08Scott Trickett: There we go.

00:17:09Melissa Erbacher: Well, I'm glad to hear that. That's an intro.

Nutrition Q&A with Kelly Hodges

00:17:18Scott Trickett: In my absence last week, Mel and Tim started talking about nuts, and it made me hungry for one thing, but it also made me want to talk to Kelly again, our nutritionalist. So welcome back to the parkrun Adventurers.

00:17:33Kelly Hodges: Thank you. Glad to be back.

00:17:35Scott Trickett: It's great to have you back. Now- Last week, Tim was more talking about stealing nuts and not eating them as such, but he said they were his favourite snack. I'm a bit partial to nut from time to time, but I've got to balance it with a few allergies in our house. This shouldn't be held against the nut, should it? But nuts are really good for us.

00:17:55Kelly Hodges: Yes, 100%. Nuts are so, so good for us. And yeah, with the allergies, it does make it tricky, especially in all the different schools and everything going nut free. It does make it trickier because they do make such a good, healthy snack, which are absolutely loaded with protein and fats and fiber. And all of that is really going to help to fill you up and it's going to keep you full a longer term. So if you were to have a bit of a snack of nuts, kind of say in the afternoon at about like 2 o'clock before that 3 o'clock energy slump kind of happens, that if you're having something like nuts, which is high in the fats and the protein, it's actually going to help to fill you up. So then come 3 o'clock, you're not having your energy crash and reaching for the sugar and all of that sort of stuff. So nuts are amazing.

00:18:49Melissa Erbacher: With the nuts, the ones that Tim was actually referring to, Well, he was talking about, let's say, supplementing the normal sort of nut mix with some of the more expensive nuts, which were in the nut mix already, but just adding some extra for the proportions. Is there any difference? I'm assuming that the nuts that are more expensive are more expensive because they're more expensive to produce, not necessarily because they're better for you. Have you seen any correlations between the really expensive nuts are actually better for you or no? No.

00:19:24Kelly Hodges: Oh, you know, that's not really. I think you're right on the money with saying that it comes down to the production and how much they can produce and therefore how much they need to charge in order to cover their costs. It doesn't really go with the nutritional value against the pricing because it's Yeah, like if you look at like macadamias, for example, they are one of your most expensive nuts. They're generally between $50, $60 a kilo, depending where you buy them from. But macadamias are absolutely amazing. They're high in your unsaturated fats. They've got lots of thiamine in there. The thiamine will help with the breakdown of fat and protein. It will improve cardiovascular function, maintains a healthy nervous system and it's also really high in manganese the other thing is it's really low in sugar but the fact it's got those qualities i don't think really stipulates the price i think the price and the nutritional benefits of nuts are quite independent of each other

00:20:31Scott Trickett: Kelly, what are some of the better nuts? Because I like a cashew nut, but it also gives me a throbbing headache. Oh. I know. Oh, that's not good. No, no. So obviously some nuts are better than others. I know that the cashew is delicious, but it does have a high fat content. But it's good fat, right?

00:20:51Kelly Hodges: Yes, yes, that's exactly it. So as soon as you said that word, the high fat content, all your nuts and seeds have quite a high fat content. Some have a higher fat content than others. But when it comes to the fat that's actually found in nuts, it's a natural dietary fat. It's a healthy fat. It's one that's occurring in nature. It's not one that's man-made, such as like your vegetable oil. So it's 100% amazing for you to be eating it. When it comes to what's the best type of nut, it is, I think almonds have always had the, I guess, the rap for being the best nut because they're high in protein, they're high in the good fats, they've got lots of fiber because you eat it with the husks still on them. Also, they're relatively more affordable than something like a macadamia. But when it comes to the nuts, all the different nuts have different fatty acid profiles, different vitamins, different minerals. And because of that, it's really important to get a good variety of different nuts. So for example, cashews, it's got your non-heme iron, which means your plant-based iron. which will help to increase energy levels for someone who's iron deficient. It's also got a very low GI rating, which means it won't spike your blood sugars. But then you look at something in comparison, like a Brazil nut, it's got lots of fiber. And so that's a prebiotic, meaning it's going to keep your gut health nice and healthy in there. it will help with your bowel motions to regulate bowel motions it will help to keep you fuller for longer so eating a brazil nut will keep you fuller than eating like a cashew nut the brazil nuts also have lots of selenium which is great for your cognitive function your immunity for fertility as well and just two brazil nuts a day provides a hundred percent of the recommendations for selenium for an adult so If you're eating nuts, it's amazing and we do advocate about 30 grams of nuts a day. But what we also advocate is a really, really good variety so that you're not just only having the benefits of cashews because we want you to have the benefits of cashews, the benefits of Brazil nuts, the benefits of pecans and pine nuts and getting a really good variety so you get all the different benefits and all the different fatty acid profiles in there.

00:23:18Melissa Erbacher: Now, I'm no nutritionist and I'm not privy either to Scotty's nut eating habits, but I would warrant a guess that if he's getting headaches from cashews, he may be eating more than 30 grams because that's not really a lot, is it, Kelly? Like if you look at it as a portion size, what is that? Is that a handful like of all the nuts all together or is it like a handful of each of them?

00:23:43Kelly Hodges: 30 grams ends up being like a small handful. So kind of if you cup your hand, it's just like a little level handful in there of the nuts. So yeah, if Scotty is getting headaches from cashews, I would highly recommend not eating cashews and probably choose lots of other different nuts. Also, the headache, it may or may not be caused by the cashews. Like if you're having cashews but every time you're having cashews, you may be having it with something else, for example, like with a glass of wine or something, then it may be something else that's giving you the headache. But, yeah, if something's kind of giving you a bit of a negative effect, I generally try and reduce that out of the diet because if it's giving you a headache, You don't quite know what it's doing to the rest of your body, just if it's causing like inflammation or other sorts of issues, like whether it's with your bowel motions or bloating or other sorts of things going on. So if you've got a headache, one, maybe you're eating too much. Two, maybe it's something else that you're eating it with. And three, maybe you should have a look at reducing and enjoying other types of nuts and seeds.

00:24:54Scott Trickett: This is all great advice, Kelly. I've deduced this over a number of years. It does cause inflammation in me and it is linked to my daughter is anaphylactic to nuts as well. So I think there's some sort of link there. I'm no doctor or nutritionalist, but that's what I've come up with.

00:25:11Kelly Hodges: I feel that's a nice educated opinion. I like that.

00:25:15Scott Trickett: Now, Mel's favourite snack was chocolate. Oh. And I know that you're going to say chocolate's no good for us, but I do know you've got a killer recipe for some healthy chocolate.

00:25:25Kelly Hodges: Yes, I do. So when it comes to chocolate, one, who does not love chocolate? It is amazing. But with the chocolate, I guess there's different types of chocolate that you can be eating. And so when it comes to like your dairy milk chocolate and your white chocolate, They've got a bit of a combination of the trans fats and the sugars and when you combine the fat and the sugar like those sorts of chocolates do, they're extremely morish and you just want to keep eating and eating because it satisfies your body so, so much and it just releases kind of all your happy hormones and it just makes you feel really, really great. The thing is, with those chocolates, they are very high, unfortunately, in your man-made fats and in your refined sugars, and they don't have much benefit. So the next best option is to move towards a darker chocolate. The darker chocolates have far less sugar, they're less refined, and because of having less sugar, They don't stimulate the body as much, so therefore they aren't as moorish as what a white or dairy milk chocolate would be. So moving towards a dark chocolate. But then moving towards a homemade chocolate is amazing. So I've got a recipe which I – Well, yeah, I tend to recommend this one quite a bit for all of the chocolate fans just because it's really easy to make. It takes, honestly, about five minutes. And what you do is it's raw chocolate, so you don't have to cook anything. It's got three ingredients. So you need coconut oil. cacao powder, so cacao powder is a less refined version of cocoa powder. So if you've only got cocoa powder, you can use cocoa powder. So you've got your coconut oil, cacao powder, and maple syrup. And with that, what you do Pretty much you get equal quantities of your coconut oil and cacao powder. You mix them together. So in summertime, the coconut oil is already liquid, so it will mix nicely with your cacao powder. In wintertime, you may just need to heat your coconut oil slightly to make it into a liquid. But so you mix your coconut oil and cacao powder and then you add just a little bit of maple syrup to flavor if you want to. Mix it all together. You get a baking tray and you line your baking tray and you literally just pour your chocolate onto the baking tray. From there, you can get a little bit fancy. You can put like some cracked salt or you can put blueberries or you could put coconut shards or you could put slivered almonds. You can put whatever you want on there. Just sprinkle it on top of the chocolate, pop that into the fridge, and that's all you do. And then when you come out, you go to the fridge and you just break off a little piece at a time. But the beauty of this recipe is it is mostly coconut oil, which is fat, and then your cacao powder, which is your antioxidants. And so we've pretty much removed – about 90% of the sugar and so therefore when you're eating it, it tastes amazing but you're not being tempted with more because it's not the sugar that's in there, the fat's in there and the fat's filling you up and making you feel satisfied but it's not making you crave it so that you have to keep eating and eating and eating.

00:29:01Melissa Erbacher: I want to know a little bit more about the antioxidants because I did hear that the darker the chocolate, the more there are antioxidants. And I'm guessing because they're anti-something that they're good, as in we don't want the oxidants for some reason. And I don't really understand oxidants, but I do know that, you know, red wine's got antioxidants. It's good for you. Dark chocolate's got antioxidants. Can you give us a little bit more of a breakdown on exactly why we don't want oxidants, Kelly? Okay.

00:29:32Kelly Hodges: So with oxidants, well, I guess antioxidants, they fight, they don't actually fight oxidants, they fight free radicals. Free radicals are essentially these bad guys in the body which cruise around causing inflammation in your body. If you've got, for example, quite a processed diet, if you've got quite high levels of stress at home or in the workplace, if you're exposed to environmental toxins, so things such as like if you work, I don't know, at a fuel station, if you're working at a mining site, if you're... working in the roofs of homes or a painter when you're constantly exposed to chemicals, all of those sorts of things will raise your free radicals. Those free radicals will cause inflammation and longer term they can cause ongoing issues in the body depending on what sort of exposure you've had and for how long. And so what antioxidants do is they pretty much buddy up with these free radicals and help the body to eliminate the free radicals. So With the antioxidants, chocolate is high in free radicals. Chocolate is high in antioxidants. Wine has a good source of antioxidants. But also just your standard fruit and veggies has an amazing source of antioxidants as well. So unfortunately, you don't need chocolate or wine, but it's fun because they do have antioxidants. So you can use that as an excuse as well.

00:31:03Melissa Erbacher: And will do.

00:31:04Kelly Hodges: Yeah, yeah. Why not?

00:31:08Scott Trickett: Great question, Mel. Great answer, Kelly, because I think we always hear this term, but I didn't understand it at all. But now I do.

00:31:14Kelly Hodges: So thank you. Yeah, no worries at all. It gets a little bit scientific. So hopefully that was explained in a not too scientific-y way.

00:31:23Scott Trickett: I want to move on to another fun topic. My wife is from Eastern European origin. She's Polish. She likes to ferment stuff. Yes. And it doesn't really sit with me well, but she'll drink like pickle juice, which is disgusting.

00:31:40Kelly Hodges: Does she make it or does she buy that? Yes, yes.

00:31:44Scott Trickett: No, sometimes she buys it, sometimes she makes it.

00:31:47Kelly Hodges: Oh, good on her.

00:31:48Scott Trickett: Tells me it's good for me. Tells my daughter it's good for her. We can't do it. But I think you're going to tell me that we should be doing it as well.

00:31:56Kelly Hodges: Yes, absolutely. And so with fermentation, what that does is it pretty much encourages all the bugs, which doesn't really sound that nice. So there's the bugs in your gut. They're called probiotics. And then there's bugs that essentially feed the probiotics, and they're called prebiotics. So prebiotic bugs... feed probiotics and probiotics are in your gut. The more probiotics in your gut lining, essentially the healthier you are, the better able you are to digest your food. Not only to digest it, but to absorb it. And so some people who don't have enough of these healthy bugs in their gut, they can eat like a perfect diet but they can just land up malnourished time and time again when they're checking their bloods as a result of not actually absorbing the nutrition that they're giving themselves which obviously is quite annoying because they're going to all this effort to eat really, really well, but then they're not actually absorbing what they're eating. The other thing that all the healthy bugs do is it improves your immunity, which is a really, really big one. So someone who tends to get sick quite a lot, we often will have a look at their gut health and just make sure that they do have all the healthy gut bugs in there, that they do have enough of the foods that feed those gut bugs. And so with those bugs, when it comes to fermentation, the fermentation process actually increases all of those prebiotic and probiotic properties in the fermented food. So then when you eat it, you're essentially just absolutely flowering your gut health. You're feeding it, you're putting more healthy gut bugs into there and you're just making that absolutely amazing. And so with the fermented foods, definitely including them in the diet is a great, great option.

00:34:05Melissa Erbacher: I've got to admit, I'm still not quite convinced. You might be flowering your gut health, but I'm not sure you're flowering your taste buds in your mouth.

00:34:13Kelly Hodges: I feel like you maybe haven't tasted the right fermented foods then, Mel. Which ones have you had? Well, you know, it's – yeah.

00:34:24Melissa Erbacher: It's all the pickle-y kinds of things. But also, my sister-in-law has started fermenting, I don't know if it's the same thing, but her own kombucha. And I know that's all the rage. And Adam loves to buy a kombucha if we're out to breakfast. You know, can you give us a bit of insight into kombucha? Yeah.

00:34:46Kelly Hodges: Yes, so kombucha. Kombucha is a little bit of a trend at the moment and so it's just like the nuts and seeds when it comes to fermented foods you still need a good variety because if you're only getting kombucha you're only getting that kind of one strain of those healthy gut bugs and so you're wanting a good variety of say kombucha and sauerkraut and kimchi and yogurt and all the different things. But when it comes to just talking about kombucha, kombucha is amazing because it's pretty much, it doesn't sound very good, but you've got a, you're essentially fermenting tea. and so it's just like an iced tea, and it goes nice and fizzy because of the way how it's fermented, and you've just got tea bags, and you've got something called scoby, and the scoby is all the bugs in there, like all of the things that you're going to be fermenting, and those bugs will eat the sugar that you put into the kombucha, and you just ferment it. It's the Easiest recipe in the world like it's absolutely amazing and then at the end you can flavor it so you can flavor it with like mango or you can flavor it with Pineapple or you can make it like an apple flavor and lots of people will use kombucha as a healthier alternative to soft drinks because it's far, far lower in sugar. And the other thing is a nice alternative for people who aren't drinking alcohol. So when they go out, well, not lots, but a few bars now are serving kombucha on tap or just in their fridges. And it's just nice to be able to have like a drink, which is good for you, but then also it's non-alcoholic as well. So kombucha, I would encourage you to try it, Mel. It's life-changing. It's so delicious.

00:36:42Scott Trickett: Well, I tried it recently. It's like a fancy fizzy drink. Yeah, yeah.

00:36:47Kelly Hodges: It's so good. Which flavor did you get, Scotty?

00:36:51Scott Trickett: It was a raspberry and something. I don't know. It was sweet enough and fizzy enough that I enjoyed it.

00:36:57Kelly Hodges: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, everyone really tends to enjoy it. And it's really good for children as well. Like if you're trying to kind of get them away from the soft drinks and everything, just to have a kombucha there and not tell them that, oh, this is a fermented iced tea, but just say, hey, try this fizzy drink. And children absolutely love it as well.

00:37:19Scott Trickett: Hey, you'll like this segue. Speaking of children, I hear you're pregnant, Kelly. Very pregnant.

00:37:24Kelly Hodges: I am. I am. I'm now 34 weeks pregnant. So I've got six weeks to go until I've got my own little one.

00:37:31Scott Trickett: Okay. So my next question, we are the parkrun adventurers. Are you still parkrunning at

00:37:37Kelly Hodges: I am. I am. I love it. I did stop for a little while because my belly was feeling a bit heavy. But then I think like most runners, you just miss it and you're like, oh, you get so jealous of everyone else running. And so then, yeah, for a little while now. I've started coming back and I'm like, yeah, I'll just walk and I'll walk for a few weeks and then I've just been slowly like, oh, maybe I'll just run for a little. Maybe I'll just run a little bit faster. And so now I'm back to just doing my regular runs, which is great. I'm loving it.

00:38:13Melissa Erbacher: I last time I was pregnant well last time I was pregnant when I was pregnant I should say I stopped very early on and used it absolutely as an excuse not to run and I don't know I understand with the heavy belly but there are also other things going on which makes it uncomfortable and you're not experiencing that at 34 weeks that's amazing.

00:38:38Kelly Hodges: Well, yeah, like I said, I did stop and I was very happy to stop because I was like, you know what, I'm listening to my body, like I've got so much going on, I don't want to put extra pressure on my body and I was cycling and swimming and doing other bits and pieces. But then because I'd come to parkrun and I'd either, I don't know, like I'd direct parkrun or I'd do a volunteer or I'd just literally sit there having a cup of tea with my nan whilst all the runners went past and And it's just really, really hard because you just want to be involved.

00:39:09Scott Trickett: No, it's great. It's great that you're still running. I think Mel looks for an excuse.

00:39:14Unidentified speaker: Yeah.

00:39:14Scott Trickett: stop writing so don't don't read any too much into that uh kelly awesome as always i think i said last time i think you're our favorite uh guest i always learn so much so thanks for coming on the parkrun adventurers and uh sharing all your wisdom with us you are so welcome thank you so much for having me and i look forward to chatting to you guys again soon

Channel 5 News Crew

00:39:40Kelly Hodges: Good morning, parkrun Adventurers. It's Melissa here coming to you from Chelsea Bicentennial parkrun. And I've got with me Dawn. Hi, Dawn. Hi, Melissa.

00:39:49Dawn: How are you? Oh, good, thanks. This is your home parkrun, isn't it? It certainly is, but I haven't been here for a while. And why is that? Because I spend most of my time touristing around Victoria. You've done quite a few, Dawn. I have, yes. And where did you go recently? Because that was pretty special. I went to the two in Paris and Hanover in Germany and Singapore. Now, that is a big adventure. That was a big adventure, yes. Did you plan that for any particular reason? Well, I wanted to go to Paris, but mostly I just did it for parkrun. You know, you have to go and do these parkruns overseas. And how did you find them? It was very interesting actually. The two in Paris, most of the parkrunners were tourists from the UK or Australia and in fact they only did the briefings in English. But when I got to Germany they were all locals and I did not understand a word. But that's good. It's good that they're actually getting some locals doing the parkrun there. In Singapore, again, it was great. But wherever they were, it was fun. It's the same format, so I guess you can sort of figure it out by... You just wait until they say go, and off you go. Follow the pack. And how long have you been coming to Chelsea Bicentennial? I found, it's nearly two years now, I stumbled across it when I was running in the park and I thought, oh look, somebody's having a fun run and I've missed it. And I googled and that's how I discovered parkrun. And since then I think I've only not run or volunteered about three weeks in the last two years.

00:41:16Kelly Hodges: Oh, that's really good.

00:41:18Dawn: Yeah. Do you know much about Chelsea Bicentennial? Describe the course for us. Oh, it's very, very, very, very flat.

00:41:24[laughter]

00:41:24Unidentified speaker: LAUGHTER

00:41:26Dawn: I think it's probably one of the flattest courses it's possible to have. It's a gravel path so it's quite easy on the legs. And you go past the Pony Club. If you've got kids, it's got a beautiful playground. It does, with toilets. With toilets, yes, absolutely, there's toilets here. And, yes, it's a straight out-of-the-back course. Good, very good. Well, thank you for having a chat with me, Dawn. It's a pleasure, Melissa. Happy adventuring. Thank you.

00:41:57Lyndell Murray: Good morning, Scotty. G'day, Mel, and hello to all of the parkrun Adventurers. It is Lyndell, and I'm reporting in this week for the Channel 5 News crew from Ocean View parkrun. Now, I came out to Ocean View last week to get my O on the original course, knowing that they're changing the course this week and they're launching their brand new E today. So I don't know at this point whether that was a good decision or a bad decision to come back for the new course. When they were pointing it out to us last week when I was here, they pointed to yet another hill that we're going to have to run up. and look ocean view was already a pretty hilly course so let's let's see how this uh pans out i'll report in after the run if i can still talk alrighty everybody good news i'm still alive that was awesome i think now i've caught up with aurelia how are you going today oh very well very well how are you Lyndell oh let's not talk about me i don't know how i am you've got some really nice headwear here Halloween-ish. Halloween-ish, yes.

00:43:03Aurelia: There's a few of us who've got our little Halloween... Oh, I think I managed to get the orange T-shirt by mistake today.

00:43:11Lyndell Murray: It all counts. Now, I met you last week, Aurelia. You did your first parkrun here last week.

00:43:15Aurelia: I have, yes. That was fantastic, yes. And you came back. Even better this time, yeah. My feet didn't get muddy, but I really enjoyed it. It's wonderful, this ocean view. um property is magnificent isn't it it's really beautiful and how did you compare this week's course to last week's definitely better definitely better much improved my feet didn't get wet and it was harder but i suppose that's what it's supposed to be i loved it yeah hills are your friend i live not far from here so i figured i should be fit in case of fire to escape

00:43:58Lyndell Murray: I've never heard that reason for coming to parkrun before. I need to get fit in case I have a bushfire.

00:44:04Aurelia: Oh, yeah. All of us, you know, each one of us is unique. So I now have to get my family involved so they can escape as well.

00:44:14Lyndell Murray: You don't want to have to leave them behind. So you live close by here in Ocean View? Yes, I do. I walked here. Wonderful. And so... The community here at Oceanview parkrun is really friendly. Is that how the community here is generally?

00:44:29Aurelia: Oh, absolutely. It's a really, really great suburb. And you'll find that's probably, you know, tops in terms of friendship and helping each other. And, yeah, it's excellent, yes.

00:44:42Lyndell Murray: Excellent. And you'll be continuing to come to parkrun then?

00:44:46Aurelia: I am planning to do so. I usually work on Saturdays, but I'm going to take Saturday morning off and make it my Saturday morning where I run and meet with friends and basically, you know, have a good time.

00:45:01Lyndell Murray: Aurelia Saturdays.

00:45:03Aurelia: Yes, absolutely. It's a new thing on my map.

00:45:08Lyndell Murray: Well, that sounds wonderful and great to have parkrun as part of it. Thank you very much.

00:45:12Aurelia: Much appreciated for your time. Thank you.

00:45:15Lyndell Murray: Alrighty, I've tracked down a few of the regulars here at Oceanview parkrun. I've got Dean and Anne-Marie and their furry friend Harry. How are you guys going today?

00:45:26Unidentified speaker: Yeah, exhausted, but happy to be at the end of it. So yeah, great.

00:45:30Unidentified speaker: I don't know why you're exhausted after running at Ocean View. No, it's really good. Nice long hills and lots of downs, so lots of up and downs. And it's off-road too, which is nice. Yeah, definitely. The track's really good. Nicely mown and very well marked.

00:45:48Lyndell Murray: Absolutely. I came here last week for the first time and I thought for sure I would get lost and I didn't. So I'm two for two. No getting lost at Ocean View parkrun.

00:45:58Unidentified speaker: That's definitely a bonus here because you don't want to do any extra Ks if you don't have to.

00:46:03Lyndell Murray: Too many hills. There is. Never too many hills. And now how did you guys get into parkrun?

00:46:09Unidentified speaker: I was getting ready for a motorcycle desert race, and I needed to get fit, and I went to the first one at Petrie, and from there, this one opened up later right next to my house, so can't go wrong now. No, so there's no excuse. No, no, and we're here every Saturday.

00:46:28Unidentified speaker: Yep. And how about you? I just run it home, just around a track, and saw on Facebook that this was going to be a parkrun and came the very first time and have been coming ever since. Excellent.

00:46:42Lyndell Murray: So that's about six months now, is that right?

00:46:46Unidentified speaker: Yeah, it's a bit different winter. It's a bit cooler.

00:46:49Lyndell Murray: Yes.

00:46:50Unidentified speaker: Definitely PB weather, but as it's getting a bit warmer, it's nice, but we still get that easterly breeze here, so it's really nice.

00:46:57Lyndell Murray: There is a bit of a breeze.

00:46:58Unidentified speaker: I was thinking if I come in summer, I'll definitely carry some water. Definitely. And it is always three to five degrees cooler up here compared to down Brisbane way. So always nicer.

00:47:10Lyndell Murray: Well, that's nice to keep in mind over summer too, isn't it? Yeah. All right. How about you, Harry? Have you got anything to add? He's just having a good old scratch there, so maybe I'll leave him to it. All righty, guys. Well, thank you very much for talking to me on the podcast today. Thanks for having me at Ocean View, and hopefully I'll be back sometime.

00:47:28Unidentified speaker: Good luck, and we'll see you next time.

00:47:30Lyndell Murray: Yep, see you then. Okay, parkrun adventurers, milestone alert. I've got Andrea here. Hello. She's doing her 100th parkrun.

00:47:38Andrea: Yes, I am. Hi.

00:47:41Lyndell Murray: And her friend, Micheline.

00:47:42Andrea: Hi. Hi.

00:47:43Lyndell Murray: And you've done your 100 not too long ago, I understand. Yes, my 106. Excellent. Now, most milestone-ers do their milestone at home. You're not at home. I'm not at home.

00:47:55Andrea: I'm close to home, but I wanted to do something different, something unique, something, yeah.

00:48:01Lyndell Murray: An ocean view is pretty unique.

00:48:02Andrea: It definitely is. Lineries and hills, and I heard it's one of the toughest ones in Australia, and I thought I'd give it a go. Excellent.

00:48:11Lyndell Murray: And you've done a few different parkruns in your time.

00:48:14Andrea: Sure I have. More than a few. I've done 40 different ones. Wow. Yeah. 40 all over Australia and I've done three overseas and I've done 60 at my home run in North Lakes. Wow, that's pretty good stats.

00:48:30Lyndell Murray: Of the ones that you've done elsewhere, what would you say are your favourites, either because of the course or because of a memory that you have there?

00:48:39Andrea: Well, I think my first one overseas was in Paris and that was probably one of my favourite ones, only because I had to get up by myself. This was the day after Bastille Day. And so after a huge night out, they decided to sleep in. But not me. I woke up at 6 o'clock, had to catch a train by myself, 40 minutes away from where we were staying, by myself in the Paris metro. Had to catch like three different trains to get there. Finally found my way there. There was only about 10 of us runners who did it. 500 meters in, I fell over, actually injured my wrist. And when everyone should have thought I'd give up, I just kept on going and did it and completed my five kilometers. It was the best time ever. It sounds like quite the parkrun adventure. And then on the way back, though, I bought myself a baguette and a typical French croissant, and I just enjoyed it. I just smiled the whole way back.

00:49:35Lyndell Murray: It's nothing like a visit to a Parisian boulangerie. Nothing like it. All right, well, congratulations, both of you, on your 100 parkruns. It's quite a milestone.

00:49:51Andrea: What's next? Next, more tourist parkruns. Sunshine Coast, the greater Brisbane region, just everywhere, wherever we can go. Checking out new places.

00:50:05Lyndell Murray: And how about you, Micheline? Oh, I'm not sure. I'll just keep going at North Lakes probably. You had your anniversary there last week. Yes, a couple of weeks ago. Was there a theme?

00:50:16Kelly Hodges: No, not this time. We had a theme for my 50th, but not my 100th.

00:50:19Andrea: We wore tutus. Tutus?

00:50:22Kelly Hodges: For my 50th we did.

00:50:23Andrea: My 100th I was like, no.

00:50:26Kelly Hodges: No.

00:50:26Lyndell Murray: A bit more low key.

00:50:27Kelly Hodges: Yep.

00:50:29Lyndell Murray: All right. Well, thank you both of you for talking to me today. Well done on your 100th. Thanks so much. And maybe I'll see you at Northlake sometime.

00:50:36Andrea: Yes, you're welcome. Let us know when you come over. Yes, thank you.

00:50:39Lyndell Murray: All right. Now we've settled down for coffee at the Ocean View Estate Winery and I've found the event directors. What's your name? How's your day been today? Good.

00:50:48Adrian: I'm Adrian. It's been very good. It's exciting to have a new course today.

00:50:53Kelly: I'm Kelly. It should always be about me first anyway. And I've been awake all night because I worked last night, but I'm Marshall today for the new course.

00:51:00Lyndell Murray: All right. And how did the new course go and how did that come about?

00:51:04Adrian: So from all reports, it's gone very well. It came about in collaboration with our landowners from the winery. They've very invested in making it a successful run and having people be able to do a freedom run through the week. So they've put some new infrastructure in to help us make the course more obvious without a lot of pre-setup. We used to do bunting every week and now they've saved us about 40 minutes of setup at least and about half an hour of pack down. So it's fantastic.

00:51:27Kelly: Well, that sounds like a win all round. Oh, look, we did have Walter get lost, but Walter is habitually lost. So no matter how many arrows, no matter which way, but his wife was not far behind and she was like, oh, Walter. And Walter is one of your regulars? Walter's one of our regulars. He always carries his own camera and he puts it in people's faces and takes his own sets of, what do you call them, pictures. Pictures. Pictures. And then, yeah, he's one of our great, fun locals.

00:51:57Lyndell Murray: Excellent. So Walter's gotten lost, but nobody else. So we're saying it's a success.

00:52:01Adrian: Definite success. One of our regular course complainers, sorry, Paul, has passed the course successfully today. I didn't say Paul, Paul Savage. I didn't mention you at all. I'm very sorry, Paul. I won't do it again.

00:52:15Lyndell Murray: Hey, look, I'm a pretty good tester of getting lost on courses. I said just before, I thought I was going to get lost. I didn't get lost last week. Same this week. I think it's a fabulous course. Now, you've been going now for about six months or so. Is that correct?

00:52:29Adrian: Yeah, first run was the 12th of May. So we've been going for just under six months and going pretty successfully. We got about... 25 to 30 people on it on average every week we get probably in that we get 10 tourists every week And we've got a few new locals turn up and try it out and and they've stuck with it. So it's been great. I

00:52:47Lyndell Murray: That's excellent. And the tourists, are they here for the hills or the O?

00:52:52Kelly: Oh, they're here for the big O for sure, I think. But we had, was it last week or the week before, we had the lady that was getting married in the afternoon and so she ran in a wedding dress through the puddles and things with her dog, which was really, really cool. So, yeah, I think the tourists come for the, I think they know that Brekkie's pretty good and you can have champagne if you're allowed to straight after the run.

00:53:16Lyndell Murray: look i always say if you can combine running with wine why wouldn't you yeah why wouldn't you and it's legal exactly um so we've talked about the support that the winery has given you was that part of the impetus in getting the parkland set up here how did how did the parkland actually

00:53:34Kelly: become, you know, here. Well, I always wanted a parkrun in Debra and so that's why I co-event directed Petrie. I started that one off because it was close to Debra. But there just wasn't enough pathways in Debra where you could run without having to cross a driveway. So I was nagging the councillor at every forum I could and finally he goes, come up and meet the Ocean View people with me. And so Kate and Thomas graciously met me and they were just all for it. I think they had a grape fest run here once. So they said...

00:54:01Lyndell Murray: this course will do and what do you think and then from they've just been fantastic and so supportive of us since that's great what a great story um I love to hear how parkruns start because there's always a different driver isn't there and it's and it's you in this case um wanting to find something a bit closer to home um Dayboro obviously there's lots of cyclists out here is the running community also pretty big out this way yeah we got Debra runners and walkers so there's a quite a big running community as well and actually a big triathlete community which is funny so they'll run they'll ride up the hill and then maybe run down the hill and then stop it at the Debra pool and do their laps as well excellent well that that's terrific so thank you very much for having me here today thank you for starting a parkrun and thank you both for the community the community that you've built here and and for the contribution that you've made to all of the cyclists, triathletes and runners in the community. Thanks, guys.

00:54:58Adrian: Thanks, I thought it was great to have you and hopefully we see lots of people up here because it's a great little course and I think it's worth a very big challenge for people.

00:55:06Kelly: We forgot to mention the curse of Adrian. The curse of Adrian, he follows him from parkrun to parkrun with the lowest numbers of any run director on a given day. So he had it at Petrie and now he's got it here at Oceanview.

00:55:16Lyndell Murray: Adrian, has it got anything to do with turning up with a knife through your head?

00:55:19Adrian: Yeah, it's fair to say I'm a unique personality.

00:55:24Lyndell Murray: So just to clarify, it is Halloween and a few of us have got our Halloween headdress on, but I think Adrian took the cake with his contribution to that. I'll take a photo and upload it to the parkrun Adventurers page maybe.

00:55:38Melissa Erbacher: All right, so thanks. I think it's time for breakfast now.

00:55:41Lyndell Murray: Thanks again, guys, and see you next time. Thank you.

00:55:44Kelly: See you. Cheers.

00:55:46Melissa Erbacher: Well, we've had a little bit of a dry spell, Scotty, but the girls are back with a vengeance. And some more roving reports.

00:55:55Scott Trickett: Yeah, I was starting to think if we did something wrong, Mel, or if we said something to offend the crew.

00:56:01Melissa Erbacher: Surely we would never do anything that annoys anybody. Would never say anything out of turn. That doesn't sound like us.

00:56:09Scott Trickett: No, no. And I tell you what, keep it up, crew, because my little glimpse at the perlustration, people love the roving reports.

00:56:17Melissa Erbacher: They do. We do.

00:56:18Scott Trickett: And we love them. We know. We love them. But it's good to know that our people love them as well.

00:56:23Melissa Erbacher: Yeah. Very cool. Melissa Ellis was at Chelsea Bicentennial, as you will have heard. And Lyndell was at Ocean View, which is of particular interest to you, Scotty. She was there back-to-back weeks to check out the new course. Yeah.

00:56:36Scott Trickett: Particular interest. And should we go to, dare I say, for the last time? I'm saying for the last time, Mel.

00:56:47Melissa Erbacher: Because as we mentioned at the start, some things are going to go and some things are going to stay. Yep.

00:56:55Scott Trickett: And this one's taking a beating. But let's go to the hotline.

The hotline

00:57:01[other]

00:57:01Unidentified speaker: Hotline. Hey, Scott and Mel. Jackie from the ACT here.

00:57:12Andrea: My question is, if you could do any three parkruns in the next 12 months that you haven't done yet, what would they be?

00:57:20Melissa Erbacher: I love this question. If we have to retire the hotline and go out on a high, I think this is the perfect adventurous question to ask to do so.

00:57:32Scott Trickett: These are the questions that I was hoping we'd get. And I'm with you, Mel. It's a really great place to finish. And it really ties in nicely to my costume from the weekend. I was a wish list at the Westerfolds anniversary.

00:57:45Melissa Erbacher: You were. And I'm pretty sure that these two things are 100% unrelated to each other. But, yeah, your wish list, Scotty, you actually wrote down. Like how many were on there? Were there 20? Were there more events that you want to head to that you haven't been to yet?

00:58:03Scott Trickett: Let me go through the workings of how that happened. I just had this foam sheet costume and then I used a permanent marker and just started writing down event names that I thought, oh, yeah, I'd like to have them there. That would be cool. As I started going through the list, there were more – on there that I had room for on my wish list. And I'd wished I'd thought about it a bit more before I started writing them out there because my wish list got analysed a little bit more than I expected it to as well. So from the people that were there on the morning and for some other people who saw the photo and zoomed in and wanted to ask me questions about why some events were on there and why some weren't on there. So it's a great timely question, Jackie, and I'm going to let ladies go first, Mel.

00:58:52Melissa Erbacher: This one was super easy for me. I had it down. Like, you know for sure that it's the right answer when it's just like, boom, got it. Okay, so these are my three events. I'm going to go with the assumption that money is no object, time is no object. So Jackie has said in the next 12 months. Were I to win the lotto, none of them are domestic. I'll let you know that, right? Yeah, no, no. I want to do Chesham and I want to head to Cannibal's Cave or if I couldn't do that one in South Africa, Piggly Wiggly parkrun and Bear Island. Boom, done.

00:59:31Scott Trickett: That was easy.

00:59:32Melissa Erbacher: Yes, very easy. And all amazing sounding parkruns overseas, which I would just love to get to. I know there are so many more, but those are the first three that sprung into my mind.

00:59:44Scott Trickett: I get Bear Island and I get Chesham. The South African events, is that just because of the funny names?

00:59:51Melissa Erbacher: Well, Cannibal's Cave specifically sounded like it's in a beautiful spot as well. But yeah, I do love the name. Absolutely. And until we have an opportunity to explore more of the South African landscape and the kinds of events that we have over there, yeah, it's difficult to get informed. You really need to speak to people who can recommend different places and things like that. that will pique your interest because just looking at a list and just scrolling down a list and even looking on a map, you don't necessarily know, like, the more intimate geographical details or, you know, you can guess if something's on a coastline, then, okay, well, that one's probably near a beach or something. That one looks like it's on a river and things like that. But without actual people's recommendations, people who've traveled, the adventurers who've been there and experienced those events and recommended them firsthand. That's actually usually how I pick parkrun events to go to full stop. Like it's not – I'm not an alphabet tourist. I don't go, hmm, that one's an O. Let's head there. I'm not interested in doing things usually just for names. There has to be something else.

01:01:04Scott Trickett: there that entices me and that usually comes from recommendations so yeah how about you did that give you some time to mull over it it did and can i i'm a bit like you so once i actually sat down and thought about it there's a couple that just jump out and i'm gonna i'm gonna keep it in australia i'm gonna keep it on our homeland. And I actually got in trouble from my beautiful wife, who I've mentioned for the third time in this episode, because I didn't include any Polish events on my wish list.

01:01:38Melissa Erbacher: Oh, okay.

01:01:39Scott Trickett: Because I'm an Aussie male, even though I was born overseas myself.

01:01:42Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, but you're an adventurer, Scotty. It's in your blood.

01:01:46Scott Trickett: So I'm an Aussie adventurer. And so I'm taking, I'm also taking the beaches out of the equation.

01:01:51Melissa Erbacher: Because we know we're going there.

01:01:53Scott Trickett: Yes. Yeah, we're going there. We publicly said that that's on our wish list. So there's a couple. So Ocean View is one that I really want to get to. So mine's really based on, in my role, I try and watch a lot of Facebook pages and look at a lot of photos of events and and see what each event is doing. And Ocean View is picturesque. It looks good in the vines. I don't mind a hilly course. You know, if it's two hillies, stop and walk, mate. Don't push hard on the hard courses. That doesn't make any sense to me.

01:02:27Melissa Erbacher: Talking about hills, you know, in South Africa, there's an event called Thousand Hills. I don't know if that's an indication of what the course is like, but...

01:02:37Scott Trickett: I like hills, but I might draw the line at 1,000 over 5K.

01:02:40Melissa Erbacher: 998 is where I cap out.

01:02:42Scott Trickett: Yeah. So Ocean View is on my list. There's an event over in South Australia called Largs Bay. I don't reckon too many people know about Largs Bay. I don't know why I'm so intrigued by Largs Bay. It's a coastal run. They make a lot of references to the wind, so I'm guessing it's really windy there. It's just one that I keep going back to and it's an event that I want to get to. Okay. So Largs Bay is on the agenda and I think our Christmas adventure, our Christmas holiday is heading over that way. So I think I'm going to tick that off. And the other one which looks really awesome and is obtainable in some way is Broken Hill.

01:03:23Melissa Erbacher: Yeah, Broken Hill. Yeah, that one has my interest definitely. Okay.

01:03:28Scott Trickett: Yeah, so I've seen a video of the course, and again, I've seen lots of photos, and I think they're creating a really nice vibe at Broken Hill, so I want to get there. And none of them are linked to the alphabet, which has become an obsession in our house at the moment. Oh, has it? Yep, yep, because I think I've got my B, definitely got my B. I don't know if I've got my L and my O, but it's irrelevant. They're the three that I want to get to in the next 12 months.

01:03:57Melissa Erbacher: Well, that's pretty cool. I mean, there are other ones, obviously, that I know I will be getting to in the next 12 months, which have been top of my list or high on my list for a long time. And I'm, you know, the plans are in the works to get there. But yes, I just sort of, I took this from the different angle that money and time are no object. Because I love to dream, Scotty. And I'll get it one day.

01:04:20Scott Trickett: So let's see, who does it before? I reckon I'll do mine before you do yours.

01:04:24Melissa Erbacher: Really?

01:04:24Scott Trickett: Yeah.

01:04:25Melissa Erbacher: Okay.

01:04:25Unidentified speaker: Yep.

01:04:27Scott Trickett: Hey, where are you going this weekend? Because it's your birthday. It's a very festive time for Mel Erbacher at the moment.

01:04:34Melissa Erbacher: Oh, this time of year, super festive time for me. Yes, it's my parkrun birthday. And I share it with my parkrun birthday twin, Nicola Forward. So happy birthday to Nicola for this coming week. We are each of us going to at least eat two cakes or possibly one cake normal side up and one cake upside down, given we're on different sides of the world. Yeah. Yeah, I'm heading to Tasmania for the second time. Very, very excited. We jet off on Friday, so that will be cool. Get down there in plenty of time. We're actually going to stay in Hobart, but I think everybody kind of probably has an inkling as to where I'm going to go in Tassie. Because you all know, as I just mentioned, I'm not an alphabet tourist, so I'm not chasing a queue, which a lot of people seem to pop down there for. But I've got another goal in mind, and it's one of my New Year's goals. There's a compass club of the Aussie variety. It's not that one with the north in the name or the south in the name or the east or the west, you know. That's – I'm going to go out there and say it. That's not a real compass club.

The Compass Club (new adventurer club)

01:05:48Scott Trickett: Hang on, I've got it. It's a real compass club because I've got it. Oh, really?

01:05:51Melissa Erbacher: Okay. It's legitimate if you're in the club.

01:05:55Scott Trickett: Yeah, but I like yours too.

01:05:58Melissa Erbacher: Mine is a challenge for adventurers. Well, I'm going to Jeeveston parkrun, the southernmost event in our great land.

01:06:10Scott Trickett: And so does this mean you're in? That's it? This will be the final. I've got to finish the event first.

01:06:15Melissa Erbacher: I've got to do the whole thing. I've got to remember my barcode. If I don't remember that, all is lost. So I will be packing oodles and oodles of spares in every single possible piece of luggage, item of clothing. I might just – anything that has a pocket, I'm going to put a barcode in it.

01:06:35Scott Trickett: And the rules of your compass club are once you've attained it, that's it, you're in. You don't have to keep chasing it.

01:06:42Melissa Erbacher: It doesn't matter if the points shift afterwards. Once you're in, you're in.

01:06:46Scott Trickett: Well done, Mel. Well done.

01:06:48Melissa Erbacher: Still working on getting the artwork for a medal. If anyone's a graphic designer out there and wants to do something really cool with like putting the compass points on some kind of – cool metal design let me know um because yeah i've got some graphic design skills but they're not that advanced and i need to send um some artwork off to to whichever lucky metal trophy shop is going to be the creator of the medals because i'm making my own damn medals for this It's been a long time coming. I've been chasing it for years. It's finally come to fruition. I've never worked so hard for a medal or, you know, possibly spent so much money. So I need something to commemorate the event.

01:07:39Lyndell Murray: And, you know, it's my birthday. It's my parkrun birthday. There you go.

01:07:45Melissa Erbacher: Hmm. Where are you going this week, Scotty? I know we don't normally talk about this, but we've started talking about this lately, haven't we?

01:07:51Scott Trickett: Why not? Why not? We're adventurers. We tend to go. Somewhere different every week. Where am I going this week? I'm heading out to Point Cook. So Point Cook are having their 250th event this weekend, and I thought that was a reason enough for celebration and for revisiting and also to complete the conversion of my mother-in-law. So she's – remember we took her a few weeks ago down to Wimbledon Bar?

01:08:15Melissa Erbacher: And your father-in-law stayed in bed, but you mentioned you'd have to sort of encourage and go along to a few more events just to seal the deal for your mother-in-law.

01:08:25Scott Trickett: But she's been asking, when are you coming? When are you coming? And because we've had, you know, anniversaries at Westerfolds or other commitments, we haven't made it. But this week, we're heading back out west to Point Cook parkrun. Nice flat course. Looking forward to catching up with the team there. As I said, haven't been there for years, it seems.

01:08:45Melissa Erbacher: I love that you're going to help encourage mother-in-law back to parkrunning again.

01:08:50Scott Trickett: Yep. So I think we've got her. I think we've got her hooked. So now I'm working... On my sister-in-laws. Is that what they are? Yeah, they're sister. Are they sisters-in-laws? Yeah, they're sister-in-laws. They're not my sisters.

01:09:00Melissa Erbacher: They're your sister-in-laws, yes.

01:09:02Scott Trickett: Yeah, because they're all over in the West as well. And they don't listen to the podcast, but geez, it'd be good if they did and they could come along as well. Be an invasion.

01:09:12Melissa Erbacher: Well, that sounds very cool, Scotty. I hope you have a wonderful weekend.

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

01:09:16Scott Trickett: Now, there are other reasons for celebration. There are no launches this week around the country, but there are still anniversaries happening. Even though the main ones were last week, these events will be celebrating.

01:09:26Melissa Erbacher: And, you know, arguably more exciting for these guys is that it's their anniversary this week than ours.

01:09:35Scott Trickett: So we've got East... One way to look at it.

01:09:37Melissa Erbacher: We've got East Richmond in New South Wales.

01:09:41Scott Trickett: We've got Karkarook and Coonwara in the Great Estate.

01:09:45Melissa Erbacher: Which Scotty knows or Scotty is referring to Victoria. So I need to point that out for those who think that's an ambiguous statement. There's Maitland in New South Wales.

01:09:57Scott Trickett: Port Hedland in Western Australia.

01:09:58Melissa Erbacher: South Bank in Queensland.

01:10:00Scott Trickett: And Willoughby in New South Wales.

01:10:03Melissa Erbacher: So another good bunch of anniversaries going on. We clock them up every year, every event.

01:10:10Scott Trickett: That's how it happens. That's how it works.

01:10:12Melissa Erbacher: Thanks for joining me again, Scotty. I'm glad to hear that you were going to come back and that you did, in fact, come back. You didn't like the time off so much. I mean, you asked if I missed you. Did you miss me? Did you miss the podcast? Worry aside.

01:10:30Scott Trickett: You know what, Mel? I did. I did.

01:10:33Melissa Erbacher: There was a decided pause there.

01:10:36Scott Trickett: They could have gone either way. Yeah, no, no, there was a moment of jealousy at one point.

01:10:42Melissa Erbacher: I was talking to Tim this week, damn it. You wanted to talk to Tim.

01:10:50Scott Trickett: Yeah, well, you know, and also there's a bit of anxiety that people are going to compare Tim and myself and luckily I survived it.

01:11:00Melissa Erbacher: Okay, the ego has come away relatively unscathed. Not sure if we're going to be able to say that with the perlustration as we get the results over the next couple of weeks, but, you know.

01:11:12Scott Trickett: Good reminder to do it, people. Perlustration, perlustration, do it. You know you want to.

01:11:17Melissa Erbacher: And, hey, if anybody's got any roving reports, you do not have to be a member of the Channel 5 News crew. We welcome them from everyone. The Channel 5 News crew didn't exist until we had some people doing some repeated things and contributing a lot, which was awesome. But we still welcome roving reports from those who don't want to contribute every second, third, fourth week. Just want to do a random one every now and again because you've visited someplace interesting or different.

01:11:44Scott Trickett: You know, in last year's perlustration, we asked about merchandise. Would you like to see it? Would you buy it if we had it? It was a positive response, and unfortunately, we haven't acted on it, simply because we, you know, I made the mistake of calling ourselves the parkrun Adventurers, Mel. So it's really hard to create anything using our name. But you're creating medals. I think we should do something for the Channel 5 news crew, you know.

01:12:08Melissa Erbacher: Well, I am still knitting those leg warmers. It's just taken a long time.

01:12:14Scott Trickett: Yeah. What's wrong with your needles?

01:12:15Melissa Erbacher: They're a bit rusty.

01:12:18Scott Trickett: The needles, right? You need the plastic ones or the wooden ones. Bamboo. Bamboo's good for the environment.

01:12:24Melissa Erbacher: Okay.

01:12:25Scott Trickett: I'll look into that. But I want to explore this now. You've planted a seed. If you're doing metals, I really want merchandise for the podcast.

01:12:35Melissa Erbacher: Okay.

01:12:36Scott Trickett: And I'm serious this time. I know you all think I was joking about the leg warmers.

01:12:40Melissa Erbacher: I'm not joking about the leg warmers. But yes, I think we'll work on something for Christmas.

01:12:47Scott Trickett: That's a good idea. That's a good idea.

01:12:48Melissa Erbacher: It gives us a deadline.

01:12:50Scott Trickett: Okay. We'll be back next week. I wonder who's going to be hosting it next week. Should we mix up? Should we have regular guest co-hosts?

01:12:57Melissa Erbacher: I don't know, Scotty. Do you trust me with the technology?

01:13:00Scott Trickett: Well, now we've got this new one. We've got this new one. I think it should be easier.

01:13:05Melissa Erbacher: Well, it should be, but I was the first person to use it last week, and the sound quality, hmm, not quite all there. Yeah. I'm the first to admit it.

01:13:14Scott Trickett: Well, this week I think is better.

01:13:16Melissa Erbacher: Okay.

01:13:17Scott Trickett: I think. We've been recording. We haven't listened. But we think it looks better. So I think there's an opportunity, there's a scope here to explore future guests, co-hosts. What are they called? Guest presenters.

01:13:31Melissa Erbacher: Thank you, Scotty. I will chat to you next week and I will give you all the gory details of my undoubtedly fabulous sixth, it'll be my sixth parkrun birthday.

01:13:45Scott Trickett: Can't wait. Speak to you then.

01:13:53Melissa Erbacher: Can you hear the guys installing solar panels on the house behind mine?

01:13:58Scott Trickett: No. Can you hear Buster snoring? No. He's giving it a go.

01:14:03Melissa Erbacher: I'm pretty sure he's not as loud as the guys with their power drills on the tin roof.

01:14:09Scott Trickett: Can't hear either.

01:14:10Melissa Erbacher: Okay. Okay.