Episode 345 - Level 2 with hygge

00:00:00[intro theme playing]

Welcome

00:00:24Tony O'Connell: Welcome to episode 345 of the parkrun adventurers podcast, a podcast about life, if your life is all about parkrun. I'm TOC and I'm joining you from Bunurong Country.

00:00:35Melissa Ellis: And I am Melissa Ellis and I'm coming to you from Wurundjeri Country. Welcome back TOC.

00:00:41Tony O'Connell: Oh, it's great to be back, Mel. Loving our weather here. We're certainly back into the extremes of every type of weather within two days, and I'm wearing jumpers again, and the days are shorter.

00:00:54Melissa Ellis: Oh, is that a thing, is it? I don't know. I haven't been overseas, so I don't know these things. What happened? Did you have really long days of daylight?

00:01:02Tony O'Connell: In a couple of places, Mel, Oslo, for example, at 11 o'clock at night, it was still bright daylight and you woke up at four in the morning and it was bright daylight. Really? So they have a couple of hours of dark in the middle of summer, but conversely, in the middle of winter, they don't get much daylight at all.

00:01:19Melissa Ellis: Yeah, that would be weird.

00:01:20Tony O'Connell: Yeah. Good to be back in the country, back at Australian parkruns and back with all the friends on a Saturday morning again.

Level 2 with a View

00:01:27Melissa Ellis: But what adventures you did have? Did you have a recap to give us? Did you have highlights? What's your top three highlights from your European vacay?

00:01:37Tony O'Connell: Ah, look, Mel, from a parkrun point of view, I have to say Cinqua parkrun, which is When you look at it, it's spelt Vaxjosjon with lots of little dots above it, but they assure us it's pronounced Sinkwa when we're in Sweden. Amazing parkrun around a lake. We were there on a beautiful sunny day. It's a single lap around a lake, similar to an Albert Park type thing. Just a massive turnout on the day as their special day. Great vibe. We had ABBA warm-up, so we had a Mamma Mia theme warm-up before parkrun. They still do them in Sweden. After parkrun, it's ice cream. It's just what you do over there. And then a group of us, a group of the Aussies, went back down to the lake and had a swim in the lake off the jetty. That was probably my biggest highlight of the trip on a parkrun sense. We did Bushy. Bushy was an amazing experience. I think there was 1,200 people the day we were there. Came in in position 1,038. Don't think I'll ever finish with four figures again on a position number. No. Amazing experience to see, to watch their funnel, to just experience the vibe that is bushy and to really soak it in. And look, there were just so many other ones. Every parkrun was brilliant. The first three Saturdays we had, they turned up with wine and cake to parkrun. Yeah, we've got a lot to learn in Australia. We're not cultured. They've got it nailed over there. When the event teams turned up with a bottle of Prosecco and some homemade cakes, it's just a great experience. Great little local parkruns. And the number three, oh, no. I'd really struggle to pick number three out of all the other ones. We did 10 parkruns were away and two junior parkruns. The junior parkruns were awesome. Loved the juniors. Just such a brilliant trip. You know, cramming them in at one stage with the special days in Europe. We got to do three parkruns in four days. Tired at the end of it because running three parkruns in four days takes a bit out of you. But, yeah. Yeah, just a brilliant experience. We ended up participating in 10 different countries while we were away. So lots of little ticks on our world map. Met up with some great friends while we were over there. Made some new friends. Made some friends from people that I'd met online, never spoken to in real life. Met them and you just click. It's parkrun. You just click. You sit down. You have a coffee or if you're civilized and you're at Caffarella in Rome, you have Prosecco. So just an amazing experience, Mel. I highly recommend it if you ever get the chance. Go over there and just experience, parkruns, as we know, we go around our parkruns locally and they're the same but they're different. Well, it's the same when you go overseas. And I tried to live stream some of the briefings because – They might have been in a different language, but you'd almost tell what they're saying because you knew at this point of a briefing, this is what they'll be talking about. Yeah, so it's, yeah, a lot of same, same, but different, but just a great experience.

00:05:04Melissa Ellis: We were living vicariously through you and enjoying seeing it all through your eyes. Now, I was particularly impressed. You and Jackie quite often run a parkrun at your own paces, so you don't necessarily run together, but I loved seeing...

00:05:18Tony O'Connell: are those results at bushy where there was you both together so you stuck together for that one experienced it together we stuck together Jack finished in front of me which was which was really great but no look it was one of my intentions Mel was to to run bushy with Jack she's been a great partner through all all the little parkrun journey and yeah we we finished finished together at bushy well I was taking furious notes and I hope to emulate you one day in the future It's a great experience, Mel.

Roving reports & the Channel 5 News crew

00:05:49Tony O'Connell: Yeah.

00:05:50Melissa Ellis: But we're glad to have you back, back on Australian soil, back into the Channel 5 News crew. So get to work. It's time to get down to business.

00:05:57Tony O'Connell: Right, yeah, Mel. Let's get to business. Where did you get to on Saturday?

00:06:01Melissa Ellis: Well, as mentioned last week, I returned to Studley parkrun on the traditional lands of the Wurundjeri people to catch up with Bec Bailey. Bec was in Melbourne for the weekend visiting friends before she returns home from her huge South American adventure. Bec covered six countries and three time zones, plus two extra time zones and countries if you include Melbourne and New Zealand. Those countries included Peru, Bolivia, Chile, Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay. And she tells me all had their own currency too. But back to Saturday, it was my fifth visit to Studley parkrun and I was happy to join the crowd of 207 for a mild morning run along the Yarra River. As I stood beside Bec for the event brief, I nudged her to elicit a Shellharbour as the RD called for tourists. Another voice called out from the crowd, Roosevelt Island, D.C., and I quickly scanned the crowd for the tourist in apricot, resolving quickly to look for her after the event, then moving with the crowd for the start line. The lovely Bec declared her intention to run with me, but I waved her off, not wanting to hold her up after so many weeks of missing parkrun, while I pootled around at a leisurely pace, even waving to a man with a camera, who I later realised was not even the official parkrun photographer. After finishing my run, I was disappointed to find that the Studley Park Boathouse is closed for renovations, but we lingered around to wait for the international tourists to finish and approached so that I could introduce myself in the hope of securing some audio. And to my surprise, I discovered said tourist Joyce to be a listener and we enjoyed exchanging stories and recording a report that you will hear a bit later. And afterwards, we headed a short distance to the Studley Grounds for coffee and iced coffee before saying our goodbyes until we next cross paths, which is next weekend at Centennial.

00:08:00Tony O'Connell: Very good timing, Mel.

00:08:01Melissa Ellis: I know. So yes, that was my weekend. But what about you? You were back in the Gippsland region?

00:08:09Tony O'Connell: Yes, back in the greater state and back down to one of the Gippsland events. We went and visited Koonwarra, which is not too far from our home base, about half an hour travelling. So it's almost our, or it is our second closest parkrun. It was my seventh trip to Koonwarra. Koonwarra, or Cooney as it's affectionately known, and Jack's fifth, and it actually got Jack a new p-index. He's up to five on the p-index now, so congrats, Jack. Well done. Yeah, Koonwarra, it's actually been profiled twice now on the podcast, at its launch and a little bit down the track, but it was just one of those great events to go back to. You run through the bush, you run on the trail. It now has a bridge that realigned the highway, and it runs over the course now, so you run through a big tunnel. a couple of bridges to run over. That was great. We caught up with Bernie and Ray Larson from Sale. Bernie was the founding Event Director at Sale when they launched back in 2014, helped Bernie out with getting it through cancer and that. It was great. She came down to have a catch-up and just say g'day. And then afterwards, we went and had breakfast with Jojo and Scott over the road at the little cafe there. It was just a really nice little catch-up and then meandered back home.

00:09:25Melissa Ellis: That's great. Now, what's that word you've written? I can't say it. It's hygge. Hygge.

00:09:32Tony O'Connell: So Koonwarra was launched and Ebony Knox, the founding ED, spoke about a sense of hygge, which is a sense of community and wellness and cosiness. And it's a Danish word. And it just continued everywhere. At the event on Saturday, you know, there are 239 events in, and it's just got that sense of a kickback community, laid-back community. And it was really funny. While we were in, I would say, in Copenhagen, we actually found the hygge shop. And so we got some really great photos. They have lots of wellness and happiness products. But, yeah, the event has just a kickback, laid-back feel. It's really, yeah, just a real cruisy event.

00:10:21Melissa Ellis: I do remember that launch with affection.

00:10:23Tony O'Connell: It was a great one, wasn't it?

00:10:24Melissa Ellis: Yeah. Oh, excellent. Well. I'm glad that you had a good weekend. Now, one other thing that we need to refer to from last week's podcast, I mentioned the gentleman at Newy that was running around with giant orange moustache above his head. A lot of you probably thought that I might have been under the influence when I was discussing such things, but no, turns out I wasn't. And We actually were able to secure a little bit of audio from the gentleman in question, and his name is Carlos. So let's just have a little listen to Carlos.

00:10:55[background music]

Interview Carlos Duque — Movember team runner, New York City Marathon 2023; the parkrunner with the giant orange…

00:11:09Carlos Duque: Hi, my name is Carlos. This year, I'm running the New York City Marathon with the Movember team, representing Australia on the 5th of November. So, my Movember campaign started six months earlier, and I'm running the weekly programs and events around the region to raise awareness for prostate cancer, testicular cancer, mental health, and suicide prevention. Why do I do it? For one simple reason. I want to give back what they gave to me when I most needed it. Back in 2019, when I broke my femur, I went from running 140Ks a week to be sitting in a hospital bed asking why, why this happened. My life turned around 180 degrees and I went from everything to nothing. My mind, my life, everything was a little bit of complicated situation at that time. And I get the support from the people that I love. I'm from Movember, showing me ways to get up, stand up and keep going. Movember, my closest friends and my family were my biggest support. And they were the reason why I'm back running, showing the people and showing the world that we can do it, but we cannot do it alone. So we have to find the right person, the right moment, or simply just open up and talk with someone. Unfortunately, in Australia, nine Australians die every day by suicide, and seven of those are males, which suicide is the leading cause of death for Australians between the age of 15 to 44. So help me to help others. Please visit my page, leave me a message, and if you feel generous, just donate. Why? Because mental health is an unspoken issue. We men think we are tough and rarely talk about our feelings and struggles. But the reality is that we all do. And the more we share the load, the healthier we'll be. So if you know one of those 12 months, give them extra love and a space where they can open up. You can find me as a Carlos Duque in the Movember website or on Instagram at Andres Duque or simply on Facebook as a Carlos Duque. Thank you so much. I'll see you around with my big mouth. Next week, I will be running the Stockton parkrun on Saturday. On Sunday, we'll be having fun at the City to Surf. The following weekend, I will be... Lake McQuire parkrun on Saturday, and then we have a big event, a 24-hour endurance run at the Atomwood, 24-hour endurance run with the Up and Atom crew. Thank you so much. See you around. Keep moving.

00:14:00[background music]

00:14:17Melissa Ellis: So there you go, TOC. That is Carlos. He will be next week at Stockton parkrun on Saturday, this coming Saturday, and he will be at City to Surf. So that is my mission, to get a selfie with Carlos in my Wonder Woman costume.

00:14:31Tony O'Connell: And Mel, just listening to what Carlos had to say, and you're right, he is very inspirational. You listen to that backstory and- you know, where he's come from, what he's trying to achieve now. And it just makes me want to go out and have a run and raise some money for Movember.

00:14:47Melissa Ellis: I know. Isn't he inspirational? We will share the link to his Movember... Fundraising page.

00:14:55Tony O'Connell: Yep.

00:14:55Melissa Ellis: Yeah, fundraising page in our socials. When we put the podcast link up, the Office Lady is already all over that. So, yeah, I encourage everybody to go up and say hi to Carlos if you see him out and about at the parkruns running with his big orange moustache and, yeah, get behind him because great cause.

00:15:13Tony O'Connell: Spot on, Mel. Just referring also back to last week, I've just got a little bit of a clarification to make, if I may.

00:15:21Melissa Ellis: Oh, please do. We do appreciate that you are the man with knowledge.

00:15:26Tony O'Connell: Last week, we spoke about the new parkrun on the Irish Island that runs at 11 o'clock. And one of the reasons given for its late starting was ferry timetable, which is partially the reason that it starts late. The other reason that Inis Meain starts late is there's a group of three islands. And we were very lucky when we were in Galway. We could actually see the island. We didn't get out to it, but we could see it. But We were talking to people about the parkrun there. There's a priest that serves the three islands and their mass is on Saturday morning and he goes from one island to the next. Inis Meain's service is actually nine o'clock on the Saturday morning. And so... Being a fairly faithful island, a lot of the island residents go to church and so they had to make it later to suit the local church services. A bit of a fun fact, when they had the Airey Airlines or Andy Airey's group visit last week, They had 240 of his group go over. That's more than the entire population of the island in visitors for the day. You spoke briefly about Andy Airey last week. Andy organises trips mainly around the UK and the continent, obviously, because that's where they're based. Andy organised a pizza night we went to in Copenhagen on the night before the Denmark special event. He had 150 people turn up to a little restaurant for pizza, and it just went off like clockwork. So he's a great organiser of that sort of thing. And they're a fairly active group with their tourism, the Airey Airlines group. They're travelling around quite a bit, a lot of them following different challenges, like the alphabet challenges and things like that. But they are a fairly active tourist group.

00:17:16Melissa Ellis: That's great. And I did find out that our roving report that did speak to Andy in recent times was actually Alison when she was over in the UK earlier this year. So she interviewed him for one of our episodes. Yep.

00:17:31Tony O'Connell: He's a really nice bloke too.

00:17:33Melissa Ellis: I think he needs to organise a trip to Australia.

00:17:35Tony O'Connell: That'd be a big playing group, I think, Mel, because...

00:17:40Melissa Ellis: They could come to Palm Talk.

00:17:42Unidentified speaker: Yeah.

00:17:43Tony O'Connell: If he had 240 people and he organised the buses from basically Dublin across, he booked out a ferry because the ferries aren't running at the moment to get to parkrun on time because they weren't being patronized enough. So he organised a ferry. They ended up having to get two ferries because they filled both of them. He might need a couple of jumbos to bring a crowd to Australia. Yeah.

00:18:07Melissa Ellis: Sounds like a plan to me.

00:18:08Tony O'Connell: Sounds good.

00:18:09Melissa Ellis: But also, TOC, this week there was excitement surrounding results at the Victorian event in Nathalia, where there were only two finishers, and the first finisher being VM80-84 age category runner Barry Thomas in a time of 41-31. Now, our dear informant has done some investigating for us and believes that Barry is only the fourth 80-84 year old in the world to achieve this feat as being first finisher. The others being Trevor Webster at Hogsback, South Africa, on the 23rd of April in 2022 in a time of 42.21. Raquel Bassi at Ceres, yep, in South Africa on the 16th of June in 2022 in one hour and 34 seconds. And Vito Gaglio at, oh, I can't say that one.

00:19:08Tony O'Connell: Montelepre.

00:19:09Melissa Ellis: Italian parkrun. I'm guessing. Thank you. In 40 minutes and 46 seconds. So this makes Barry the second fastest 80 to 84 age category first finisher in the world. And we think Barry can push harder and take that crown. It's not a race. Incidentally, Barry has completed 64 parkruns all at Nathalia Showgrounds which is up to 85 events. So that is some very good consistency by Barry, whose PB is 39.27. And that was only in April this year. Go Barry!

00:19:09[crosstalk]

00:19:30[background music]

00:19:43Tony O'Connell: Mel, have you done Nathalia? I absolutely have. It's a great little course, isn't it? It's the H. The H course, the double H. And I'm just having a quick look to see that... Barry was, in fact, not there on the week that I did it, so I can't say how I'd go up against Barry, but if he's a first finisher, he's done very well.

00:20:06Melissa Ellis: Yes, so there's some interesting little tidbit there. What else were we going to update on, TOC? So last week Simon and I discussed that graph that is often posted in the Stats Geek group, giving them another shout-out this week, by Charlie Pearce, which shows total parkrunners by number of parkruns and number of events. So this is the graph that has all the little boxes and everybody gets excited about what box number they're in and whether they're or not they're a dot. Charlie updated this graph just this week as at the 6th of August and I looked up my results. So I fall into the box of 75, which is 393 runs for 194.

00:20:52Tony O'Connell: different events and I'm hoping in seven weeks time I am going to hit a box and be a dot you're getting very close to being a dot Mel you you're so close to it with your run total and your different event total so you've you can almost go up diagonally yeah that's the plan I see the diagonal move up for you would put you up into a dot of 33 people I'm sitting in a box of 85 people on 335 and 170 I've got a long way to go before I get to be a dot. And with the way the boxes are creeping across the graph, I think by the time I get into a box that's going to be a dot, it'll be a solid number.

00:21:32Melissa Ellis: It's a little bit like just out of reach, isn't it? The closer you get, it just keeps moving ahead.

00:21:37Tony O'Connell: It just keeps growing and growing. Another quick fun fact there, Mel, if you add the total runs that both you and I have done and the total different events that you and I have done, there's actually only one person in the world who's done more total runs and total different events.

00:21:55Melissa Ellis: And who would that be?

00:21:56Tony O'Connell: That would be our good friend, Danny Norman. A number of the runners that... tend to have done a lot of different events, tend to only go to them once, and they don't have a great number of individual finishes. So when you look at the two of them combined, Danny's the only one that actually has both more events than the two of us together and more individual finishes than the two of us together.

00:22:20Melissa Ellis: He certainly gets around. He is the master of adventuring.

00:22:24Tony O'Connell: He certainly is.

Roving reports & the Channel 5 News crew

00:22:25Melissa Ellis: But now, Tony, it is time to throw to our roving reports. We've got a couple this week and they're not both me. So let's have a listen to those now.

00:22:30[background music]

Roving report Melissa Ellis — Studley parkrun

Talking to Joyce Adams — US parkrun tourist; home parkrun Roosevelt Island DC, Washington D.C.

00:22:45Melissa Ellis: All right. So parkrun's finished and I've bailed up Joyce. Now, Joyce is touristing here at Studley today. Joyce, would you like to tell us where you're from?

00:22:52Joyce Adams: Sure. My home parkrun is Roosevelt Island in Washington, D.C. And you've listened to the podcast before. I have. I listened a lot during COVID, especially like painting my house and stuff. Well, that's good. You guys were the only countries doing parkrun. We were. Well, some of the others. Now, so I've bailed you up because I spotted that you're a tourist here today. So what brings you to Studley parkrun? So my friend and I flew over to New Zealand and Australia for the Women's World Cup. So we've been following the U.S. team around and had planned to be in Melbourne regardless of who was playing, but it worked out that it's the U.S. And Studley looked about the right size and I just really like a really pretty course. So that was why Studley was my pick. Well, this is an added bonus that you're into Kiki-A.

00:23:41Melissa Ellis: So we call the, you call it football, we call it soccer, a.k.a. Kiki-A, because my co-host is a very avid supporter of the Australian team. And we were both at the Matildas game last Monday. So I've been following it as well.

00:23:58Joyce Adams: So you did enjoy the course today? Oh, my gosh, it was gorgeous. Absolutely beautiful. I was doing run-walk intervals and stopped every interval to take pictures when I was walking. I was telling Bec, who I'm here with today.

00:24:09Melissa Ellis: She's over there. Hi, Bec. Hi. I was telling her that, yeah, I do recommend this one to our tourists that are dropping in Melbourne because it's pretty close to the CBD and it's a lovely trail. So it's a little bit of a surprise. So I'm glad that you picked it. And is it your first time to Australia?

00:24:25Joyce Adams: It is, yes. So you've got a flag. Um, yes. This will be my fifth country. I got New Zealand, uh, last two weeks ago for my fourth country. And what event did you run over there? Um, I did Western Springs in Auckland and then, um, Blenheim parkrun in Blenheim on South Island.

00:24:41Melissa Ellis: Lovely.

00:24:42Joyce Adams: So both islands you did? Yes. Ah. Okay, now Roosevelt Island. Tell us about Roosevelt Island. Oh, gosh. We turned seven later this month, actually, and we were the second parkrun in the D.C. area. We call it the DMV, District Maryland, Virginia. We are usually somewhere between about eight. 80 to 110 right now. We are also a trail course, a little more technical than this one, kind of coiled up onto the island. And it is the Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Island. So there's a large statue of Teddy in the middle of it. And we also get a lot of tourists. So we happen to be kind of the tourist parkrun in the DC area.

00:25:19Melissa Ellis: So is that because it's on the island or is there something else that draws the tourists?

00:25:23Joyce Adams: It's partially because we're a really interesting course. We're on the island. All the others in the area, while gorgeous and I love them and I love the people with them, are all out and back. So we're a little more fun. We are also really mass transit accessible. So we're about a 10 minute walk from the metro. Yeah, that's always important, isn't it? It is. Yeah. Excellent.

00:25:39Melissa Ellis: All right. So where do you go from here?

00:25:42Joyce Adams: Are you in Australia for a few more weeks? Are you going home? I've got one more parkrun day. So tomorrow night, the US plays Sweden. We'll see how that goes. In Melbourne? In Melbourne. So we're doing that. And then flying to Sydney Monday and getting to go to the Matildas match that night. And then one more match and parkrun day in Sydney. And then I fly home.

00:26:02Melissa Ellis: Okay, Ollie, did you hear that? You'll have to look out for Joyce. She's going to be there too. Thank you. Oh, yeah.

00:26:08Joyce Adams: We'll be at Centennial next week. Oh, okay. I think I'm probably at St Peters because I've got a friend who used to be in the Seattle area, and it's her last parkrun day before she moves to Western Australia. Okay. So that's her run.

00:26:20Melissa Ellis: St Peters is a lovely choice. It's a big parkrun. It's very busy. It was the first one in New South Wales. Okay, good to know. I'll prepare for hills. All right. Well, you could almost be another US correspondent for us. Keep listening, please, Joyce. It's lovely to meet you today and all the best with the rest of your trip. Oh, thank you so much.

00:26:25[crosstalk]

Roving report Lyndell Murray — Greenbank parkrun

00:26:41Lyndell Murray: G'day, parkrun adventurers. It's Lyndell and today I'm coming to you from the traditional lands of the Yuggera people to the south of Brisbane. I'm in Greenbank. Now, I've got Wayne here. Wayne, what's happened today?

00:26:55Wayne: Well, Lyndell, we celebrated our sixth anniversary of parkrun today at Greenbank. We've come a long way. We started off, obviously, six years ago today. It was an all-grass course with lots of little holes and rolling ankles and frozen grass. And thanks to the council, we now have a lovely two-lap course that's all concrete, all paths, and, yeah, it's a nice flat course. And we get a lot of tourists and visitors here chasing a PB, so... We're pretty proud of it.

00:27:27Lyndell Murray: Now, Wayne, I was going to ask you about that. It's a very perfect two laps of two and a half kilometres, and I was going to ask you that. Was it purpose-built for parkrun?

00:27:36Wayne: Well, the parklands were already here, but yes, the track was definitely designed for two and a half laps to make, obviously, the five kilometres for parkrun.

00:27:42Lyndell Murray: Yep. Excellent. And now you also said in your briefing that you've never had to cancel here at Greenbank due to not having enough volunteers. That must be incredibly satisfying.

00:27:55Wayne: Incredibly satisfying. Funny story, we actually had one event way back when we first started. We actually had more volunteers than we did runners, walkers. So, but yes, we haven't had to cancel due to lack of numbers. I think I was saying in the brief earlier on that this could have been potentially our 318th parkrun today. But due to COVID, it does flood around here quite a lot. So weather events and whatever. So this is our 230th today. Yep. So, quick maths tells you we've missed over 100 that we could have potentially had with the double ups you can get for Christmas and New Year. But yeah, it's been 230 great events and long may it continue.

00:28:25[crosstalk]

00:28:33Lyndell Murray: Indeed. Now, tell us about, we've already brushed on the fact that it's a two-lap course here in Greenbank, all paved pathway. What else about the course is unique here in Greenbank?

00:28:46Wayne: Well, something that I personally love is the wildlife. Like, there's not too many... You could call this suburban Brisbane. I mean, we're not that remote. Where you can see heaps of kangaroos. I mean, you can get 30-plus on the track. In fact, one of the young girls that did it today was telling me that one of them ran across the track in front of her. She wasn't daunted, they'll never hurt you. And we've got like a man-made lake there with loads of ducks and stuff on and you'll occasionally get the odd snake maybe in the warmer days. But no, the kangaroos and the bird life is terrific around here and there's loads of, you know, there's actually playgrounds as well for kids so people can enjoy it and barbecues can enjoy it before and after the event. And it's dead flat. We have one hill at the end which we call Killer Hill and I think the gradient's about half a degree. Like, it's really nothing, but that's our only hill. So, yeah, it's good.

00:29:36Lyndell Murray: Terrific. Now, six years on, you were here at the very first event, Wayne, and you're a Run Director now.

00:29:43Wayne: Yeah.

00:29:44Lyndell Murray: Did you have an official role at the first event?

00:29:46Wayne: No, at the first event I wasn't. I was just a participant, got the bug for it. I think we had 240-odd. I think it's still our record number for the most at any one of our events. And, no, I just got the bug for parkrun then, actually. It was my... I think it was my first parkrun. And now I've been coming back ever since and I just love giving back to the community and I saw the volunteering role that we can do and just work my way up to being an RD and obviously RDing is not that difficult. But, you know, I just personally love to see the joy on people's faces and hear the parkrun bell ring at the end for a PB. And, you know, I'm mad I'm giving everyone their times, whether they're, you know, on lap one, whether it be they've done lap one in nine minutes or they've done it in 29 minutes. I really don't care. You know, they love to hear the positivity and the positive comments. And that puts a smile on my face and starts my weekend off well. So that's pretty much all I care about, to be honest.

00:30:40Lyndell Murray: Excellent. Now, is there anything else that you would like the listeners of this podcast to know about Greenbank parkrun?

00:30:49Wayne: Extremely friendly. I mean, I'm going to sound biased. I'm going to sound biased, but it's one of the friendliest I've ever visited, and I've been to quite a lot. I mean, I was in Toowoomba last weekend, which is a terrific course, by the way. But, yeah, we're just so encouraging. Yeah. I think I put down, it's not, you can go to a few parkruns, and I hate to say it, but they can be a little bit pretentious maybe. And, you know, it's not about the time here. And if you want to punch out, I mean, that record's 15-something. If you want to do that, fantastic, and we encourage those people also. But we love to encourage the ones that... for whatever reason, might be going around an hour. And if they take two hours to finish, we'll gladly stand here and wait for the two hours to finish, as will our Tail Walkers. So that's the thing I love most about Greenbank parkrun, is the social connectivity with the community. And I think that's why a lot of regulars keep coming back, because they just get positive comments all the time, and I personally love that.

00:31:48Lyndell Murray: I did notice that. It's a two-lap course, as we've already talked about. A lot of people went for a third lap today. The faster runners go about for three or four laps. But there was lots of walkers. I walked today and plenty of walkers all smiling and chatting and having a lovely time.

00:32:05[crosstalk]

00:32:06Wayne: Yeah, absolutely. And another thing I love to see, I love the puppies. I absolutely love the dogs. And I know you can only have one dog per lead. And I know most of the dogs' names, funnily enough. And I just love that about, you know, and I'm a dog lover. But, you know, I do love people running around with their dogs. And, yeah, yeah, it's really good.

00:32:29Lyndell Murray: That's brilliant. Wayne, thank you so much for talking to me today. Thank you for run directing today. And thank you for everything that you and the rest of the run directing and event directing team have done for the community in parkrun here in Greenbank.

00:32:42Wayne: Wonderful. Too easy. It should be pointed out that our Event Director, Stuart Steele, who's been here since day one, he's done a fabulous job behind the scenes directing, along with Chrissie, to make this event. And all us Run Directors and all the other volunteers, I mean, I personally can't thank all the volunteers enough because without the volunteers, this doesn't happen. And we've got a particular, just a little funny story, we've got a particular family, the surname of Kuchikau, Colleen and her kids, and almost every single week without fail, her and her kids... they volunteer in many different roles and honestly we'd be lost without them so special mentions got to go to them and um yeah every single volunteer that comes along and you know as I said it wouldn't happen without them wouldn't happen without you either Wayne good on you Lyndell thanks so much my friend yeah no worries have a great weekend

00:33:00[background music]

00:33:37Lyndell Murray: All righty, parkrun adventurers, just a bit of a recap. I'm back at home from parkrun this morning. Something that didn't come up in my interview this morning was the theme that they had for their anniversary at Greenbank this morning. They had a Kikie theme. A few people in different jerseys, Matildas. There was an English jersey, a South African jersey, a couple of those as well. But I don't know. We're talking about it as like World Cup. I don't know. All I saw was Kiki A. And secondly, a bit of homework. I mentioned that I had been at the launch at Greenbank. I did lodge a roving report from that visit, and you can listen to that on Episode 76 of the parkrun adventurers. All righty, that is me, Lyndell, for the Channel 5 News crew reporting in from parkrun.

00:34:25[background music]

00:34:41Tony O'Connell: Well, Mel, that was certainly a brilliant set of roving reports. Have you had a look at Roosevelt Island's parkrun? You have to go over a bridge to actually get to the parkrun. You can't actually park at the parkrun. And it's a bit of a lasso-shaped course. And I sort of throw a bit of a challenge out there. I'm wondering what Peter Pohlman could come up with a name on that one, given the name of his main beach course. So just a bit of a challenge out there, Pete. LAUGHTER Oh, dear.

00:35:11Melissa Ellis: Oh, dear.

00:35:12Tony O'Connell: Oh, dear. The other great roving report, the legendary Lyndell and Wayne. And just wasn't Wayne full of bubble? That was just a great little report. And you can hear the enthusiasm. That must be a great parkrun to go along to. Absolutely. If Wayne's a representative, well done, guys. That sounds great.

00:35:30Melissa Ellis: Yep, the sixth anniversary out there at Greenbank.

Dazza's

00:35:33Tony O'Connell: Right, moving along to Dazza's. And this week, Dazza has said, welcome to Dazza's, our virtual cafe where the coffee is hot and the stories are all about parkrun. Come on in and tell us about your morning. And we're going to kick off with Bec Bailey. If we've heard of Bec already today, Bec said, Dazza, I scanned my barcode today. It felt so nice to be back at parkrun after six weeks away. Found some public transport and a train, a tram, sorry, and a bus to tourist to the beautiful Studley parkrun where I met the just as beautiful Mel and enjoyed a run along the river. We met other tourists from the USA. And Bec put up a great photo of Bec standing in front of the parkrun

00:36:14Melissa Ellis: flag with a bit of bush in the background and the trail I took that sorry photo credit and we also heard from Joe McLean and she said adventure with friends to pretty mount Penang parkrun which meanders through mount Penang gardens with sculptures and all There was cake to celebrate Natalie Wilson's 100th plus two birthday celebrations from yesterday. All in all, a lovely morning. I do believe that Jo's was one of those birthdays. And anyway, she posted a pic of herself and a group of friends with the Mount Penang selfie frame. I actually don't know much about Mount Penang, TOC.

00:36:55Tony O'Connell: Not a course I am familiar with, but one I'm certainly going to have to look up after we've finished recording. Our next one was Susan Rodak. Hi, Dazza. I love Saturday mornings with my boys, San Remo parkrun. Park walking while assisting my VI son, Fred. Dexter was on barcode scanning. There's a picture of Susan with the sun with the flag and the lake in the background.

00:37:20Melissa Ellis: She does get some good photos, Susan. Must have a good camera.

00:37:24Tony O'Connell: And I must admit, Mel, I had to go and have a quick hunt at San Remo parkrun to find out whether it was a lake or the ocean in the background. Yeah. Or it looks like a bit of both.

00:37:34[crosstalk]

00:37:37Melissa Ellis: I just did a freedom run of it and I can't remember.

00:37:41Tony O'Connell: It looks almost like an inlet off the ocean.

00:37:43Melissa Ellis: Yeah, yeah, that sounds about right. Let's go with that. And TOC, we also heard from Joyce Adams. My first ever Australian parkrun didn't disappoint. Picked Studley for the scenery and proximity to the Melbourne CBD, but loved it for the wonderfully warm welcome. Meeting Mel and Bec was an added bonus. Still hoping for on-course kangaroos though. And Joyce had a photo of the very famous Cane Bridge.

00:38:10Tony O'Connell: The famous bridge at Studley, the bouncy bridge.

00:38:13Melissa Ellis: It's a beautiful bridge. Yes, it is very bouncy.

00:38:18Tony O'Connell: Next up, we heard from Andrew Yateman. Kadina Trail parkrun with fellow adventurers Alan Raven and Dave Allmark. And there's a picture of five parkrunners around the selfie frame at Kadina.

00:38:31Melissa Ellis: Now, we heard from our favourite Janet Reid, who said a wonderful morning celebrating their fifth birthday at Pakapakanthi parkrun with fellow EAs Alicia and Kate, as well as our RA Greta. Newbie Bark Runner Mitch actually completed his first full 5K, which included lying down in three puddles. Context, Mitch is Alicia's new puppy. And Janet shared a picture of Janet, Alicia and Kate in tutus walking with their Bark Runners. That was a tongue twister. I should have got her to record that one herself.

00:39:09Tony O'Connell: And I must apologise there, Mel. I actually put that last little note in about the context because I thought you might wonder who Mitch was. I'm very familiar with Mitch. Alicia has been flooding her socials with pictures of the lovely Mitch. And Mitch certainly looks like he's settled in well.

00:39:25Melissa Ellis: Okay. Well, that's all right.

00:39:26Tony O'Connell: Right. Next, we heard from Sherry Brandtman. And there was a pic of the volley crew at Cajula parkruns with Sherry as the RD. And the picture was Sherry and the volunteer team. And there's a few in the crew with the selfie frame.

00:39:42Melissa Ellis: Well, we go from Sherry to Cherie. Cherie Martin, Run Director, debut and loved it. Here with my support crew and TOC added context this week. No, context. This was at Wynnum parkrun. So Cherie wearing the RD vest and L plate. and her volunteer crew. Great to see a group of adventurers giving their support. Our adventurers, they're really good volunteers, TOC.

00:40:09Tony O'Connell: They really are. And, yeah, that was some decent-sized L-plates that Cherie was wearing. And well done. It was great to see her having a go at it.

the Obi Award — Jo McLean

00:40:19Melissa Ellis: Now, I know you're at a very messy desk, TOC, but somewhere in all that rubbish should be an envelope. It might have, I don't know, fingerprints and post-it notes stuck on it. See if you can find it.

00:40:34Tony O'Connell: I'm just going to have a bit of a look around here. Yep, yep, I've got one post-it. There's a lot of post-it notes here. Yeah, I know. I have one here. Our Obi this week, our Obi goes to...

00:40:45[background music]

00:40:50Melissa Ellis: Joe McLean fabulous oh my goodness I think Joe McLean is now a double Obi award winner she has letters after her name and everything so congratulations Joe happy birthday and uh thank you for contributing to Dazza's

00:41:13Tony O'Connell: And it was a great photo too. I really enjoyed that photo as I scrolled through. I enjoyed all the photos that were in there. But yeah, it was really great to see the teams out.

00:41:23Melissa Ellis: Did you get a surprise with how busy Dazza's is these days, Tony?

00:41:26Tony O'Connell: I did, Mel, when you asked me to have a read through Dazza's and I think there's 190 comments this week. Thank you very much for the opportunity. I normally scroll through. I actually went in and actually looked at the comments and I actually really enjoyed reading what people were putting in there.

00:41:43Melissa Ellis: That's good. I encourage everybody to jump in on a Saturday morning and interact with each other. It's a very social place to be after parkrun when you're in the middle of your park faff.

00:41:52Tony O'Connell: Yeah, it was good.

Club Corner

00:41:53Melissa Ellis: But anyway, now it's time for us to head over to Club Corner and see what Rachel's got to say.

00:42:00[13 seconds of audio that could not be transcribed]

00:42:13Rachel: This is Rachel with Club Corner, where we talk about the what and why of parkrun clubs, and I am coming to you from Arrernte Country. Today I'm going to talk about something similar to Club Corner number 9 where we talked about a bingo, or was that bingos, bingos, bingo, bingo, bingo, no, it's date, bingo. What is date bingo? It's another number bingo, but using dates instead of finish time seconds or finish position token numbers. Did I talk about finish position bingo last time? Hmm, well, just in case I didn't. It's where you take the last two digits from your finish position and use them to complete all numbers between 01 and 00. Time bingo has 60 to collect and position bingo has 100 to collect. Date bingo has 366 to collect. Insert cheer. Date bingo is something to really keep you occupied, and looking forward in the calendar to the leap years. The last time Saturday had a 29th of February was in 2020. Hmm, yes, that year. And jeepers, the next one is in 2048. No comment. So, how many bingos are you collecting and how are you going with them? Mel? Ollie, Simon, Sarah, Office Lady, and remember, in parkrun life, all non-milestone clubs are unofficial and unsupported by parkrun, so stay tuned for our future club corners.

00:43:31Melissa Ellis: Thank you very much, Rachel, coming to us with the information about Date Bingo. This caused me to look up my own Date Bingo, Tony. I am at 81% and I do have the 29th of February that I did achieve on the 29th of February in 2020, that infamous year, and I was at Peppertree at And fun fact, I don't have my very own birthday, the 12th of the 7th. So I'll have to do that hopefully in the future. I think that foul parkrun day on my birthday during the pandemic, during lockdown.

00:44:07Tony O'Connell: Happy birthday.

00:44:08Melissa Ellis: I have worked out that by the end of the year, I can get four more date bingos. I can get the 9th of the 9th, the 11th, the 11th, the 18th, the 11th and the 23rd of the 12th.

00:44:19Tony O'Connell: Well done, Mel. I'm currently sitting on 87%. My 29th of February was at Bendigo Botanical Gardens, also in 2020. So must have been a lot of people touristing just before we all know what happened. And as far as improving that, I don't have an opportunity to get another date bingo until the 10th of February next year. So I'm going to be on a bit of a drought on date bingo for about... Six months.

00:44:47Melissa Ellis: Is that something that you actively track each week or look at regularly?

00:44:51Tony O'Connell: Not at all, either but it is interesting until we uh listen to Rachel there I had to go and look up my stats and work out where I was actually at it's not one of the ones I'm not a big number chaser Mel um yeah I I like Mel for bets I like a couple of the other challenges but date bingo is not one that I'll yeah chase actively I can't even get regular bingo

00:45:20Melissa Ellis: Was it? Stopwatch bingo. I haven't even got that. Don't talk to me about that. Let's change the subject.

Consolidated Club Report

00:45:26Melissa Ellis: Would you like to know about the adventurers Consolidated Club Report?

00:45:29Tony O'Connell: I'd love to, Mel. Tell me all about it.

00:45:32Melissa Ellis: The adventurers... Oh, it's a mouthful, isn't it? The adventurers Consolidated Club Report for Saturday, the 5th of August, 2023, of a total of 445 members, 353 took part on this date... in eight countries across 186 locations in the UK we had adventurers at 27 events in South Africa there was three two in the USA and one each in Ireland the Netherlands and Singapore locally we had adventurers at 40 events in Queensland, 37 events in New South Wales, 35 events in Victoria, 14 in South Australia, seven in Western Australia, six on the North Island, the ACT and Tassie each had five. There was one in the Northern Territory and the South Island. So that's another bowling strike. And we now know why we've been getting all these bowling strikes. It's because we've got Dave staying up there in the Northern Territory. Hopefully we might hear from Dave in the coming weeks.

the Frond

00:46:40Melissa Ellis: Now, the largest frond. I'm adding an extra bit this week. TOC. And at least I called you Ollie. TOC.

00:46:48Tony O'Connell: What about his desk, Mel?

00:46:49Unidentified speaker: Yeah.

00:46:50Melissa Ellis: Outside of Australia and New Zealand, the largest frond was three at Fort Ward in the USA. That was Darren, Lucille, Pede and Helen Rubin. And three at Penrose in the UK, which was Stuart, Tamsin and Morglen Smith.

00:47:09Rachel: Now at home, there were seven adventurers at two events.

00:47:14Melissa Ellis: One Shellharbour in New South Wales, which had Julie and Gordon Turner, Louise Aitkin, Sue Keane, David Foster, Kirsten and Delvene McKenzie. And the other one was in the greater state, Woodlands Historic Park, who had Scott Wilson-Smith, Jason and Ollie Andrews, Dawn Branton, Cheryl Smit and Irene and Parth Bommakanti. And those last said adventurers were featured in the photo for the Consolidated Club report that was posted. Yesterday, on Sunday.

00:47:47Tony O'Connell: Very nice. Lots of adventurers getting out and doing adventury-type things.

00:47:51Melissa Ellis: Yes. I don't know what's going on with the local adventure numbers. It's all hit and miss at the moment.

00:47:57Tony O'Connell: I'm finding it really interesting. It's one set of stats that I really do enjoy following, actually. The way the state numbers and number of events bounce around from week to week, it's almost like we empty one state out and they all go to another state somewhere. Yes. It's like a palm every week.

00:48:14Melissa Ellis: I know. I know. It doesn't seem to follow any sort of pattern. But anyway, it's nice for a little bit of interstate rivalry, isn't it? It is. They all try to be as good as us, but we really know they're not.

00:48:26Tony O'Connell: We are the greater state.

00:48:27Rachel: It's good to have an ally.

00:48:30Tony O'Connell: Yeah. Now, moving along now.

Launches and anniversaries"Where is the cake?"

00:48:34Tony O'Connell: We had another launch in Australia this week. Harmony Boulevard parkrun, which is located up on the sunny coast, just inland from Brightwater parkrun and Kawana up in that area. They had a launch this week. 173 attended in the suburb of Palmview. It's a four-lapper on a lovely flat concrete path comprising of two larger laps around the outer edges of the park and two smaller laps through the middle. I'm advised that parking is recommended at the Display Village, which is a short walk away, as street parking is very limited. So another new one up in Queensland, Mel.

00:49:11Melissa Ellis: Yes, they're getting a few just in the last few weeks. So good on them.

00:49:19Tony O'Connell: Progressing, which was good.

00:49:21Melissa Ellis: They do lead the country with the most events in Queensland. Certainly do. I thought we were catching them for a while there. We overtook that other state. Yeah.

00:49:31Tony O'Connell: I think we've got a few to go to catch Queensland. They did have quite a few years head start on us though.

00:49:36Melissa Ellis: Yeah, and they're bigger. Yes, yeah.

Sign-off

00:49:39Melissa Ellis: There's more room.

00:49:40Tony O'Connell: Right, Mel, moving along from our whimsical dreaming of parkrun global domination... Where are you at on Saturday, Mel?

00:49:51Melissa Ellis: I'm going to be at the largest frond, Tony, which is going to be at Centennial Park, be there or be square. We are going to have a catch-up prior to City to Surf. We do hope to see as many adventurers as possible. I haven't been to Centennial, so it will continue my tourism streak. Yay! And I'm very excited to experience this course with its famous horse marshal.

00:50:16Tony O'Connell: That's a mouthful itself.

00:50:18Melissa Ellis: But what about you, TOC? Where will you be?

00:50:20Tony O'Connell: Mel, this week, Jack and I are going to head up to Kilmore Racecourse Walking Track for their event number 12. It's another one of the events in the greater state that was launched while we were traipsing around Europe. And so we're slowly getting back on track. We came back to a deficit of six in the state. This will be our fourth one we've got to. So... Yeah, going up to Kilmore.

00:50:45Melissa Ellis: You're going to love it. It's a good one.

00:50:47Tony O'Connell: Good. I'm looking forward to it. Apart from that, Mel, I'm just – I'm at Ollie's desk. I'm just having a bit of a clean-up. You've got to do something. You've got to get a cleaner in for him. This thing is absolutely covered in post-it notes. They've got all sorts of bits and pieces written on them. I just – oh, Mel, hey, did you know this? What? Ollie's got written here, palm24. It's going to be on the 13th of April, 24 at –

00:51:13Melissa Ellis: As always, you can contact us via Facebook or our email, which is parkrunadventurers at gmail.com. That's it for another week. We'll see you all next week for more adventures.

00:51:20[outro theme playing]