— open the full-size coverEpisode 353 - Mel’s a dot
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Episode 353 - Mel’s a dot · 2023-10-04
Enhanced transcript — Produced by an automated editing pass — speakers named, sound described, segments marked. NOT yet checked by a person.
Speaker names appear only where they could be established with confidence; others are shown as “Unidentified speaker”. Non-speech sound is in [square brackets].
Source: https://log.5kadventures.net/transcripts/ep353.html · The Adventurers Log · An independent project, not affiliated with or endorsed by parkrun.
[intro theme playing]
Welcome
Unidentified speaker: Side by side they stick together to uphold the Magpie's name. See the barricades are shouting.
Melissa Ellis: Welcome to episode 353 of the parkrun adventurers podcast. A podcast about life, if your life is all about parkrun. I am Melissa Ellis and I'm coming to you from Wurundjeri Country.
Tony O'Connell: And Guten Abend, Fräulein. I am TOC, and I'm coming to you from Bunurong Country.
Melissa Ellis: In Germany.
Tony O'Connell: In Germany.
Melissa Ellis: Oh, you caught me off guard there.
Tony O'Connell: That's funny.
Melissa Ellis: That's funny. How are you, Mel? I'm good. Do you like our new theme music? I thought, don't tell Ollie.
Tony O'Connell: Mel, Mel, Mel, you know I subscribe to the ABC theory. Anyone but Collingwood. And look what happened on the weekend. You got up. We did. Oh, so good.
Melissa Ellis: So proud of the boys.
Tony O'Connell: I can tell you my mother and my sister and half my family are on your side of the bandwagon there. Oh. Aren't they? A lot of the family happy with the Collingwood win.
Melissa Ellis: Oh, look, the boys did us proud. I think they've behaved extremely well and they played. It was a very good match, but... Anyway, I thought, there's no copyright on the theme song, so there's nothing stopping me using it. Far as I know, but we'll get a letter in the mail, I guess, if that's incorrect information.
Tony O'Connell: And Mel, I heard a whisper that given it's episode 353 and we had the song at the episode 99, are you actually singing the Collingwood theme song today?
Melissa Ellis: How is 353 relevant?
Tony O'Connell: I just thought I'd get you to sing the Collingwood theme song. Okay.
Melissa Ellis: If it had been on Saturday, I probably would have. Maybe I should have recorded it after the match. I did think that that might have been a good idea, but no.
Tony O'Connell: Not right now.
Melissa Ellis: I can give you a little recap if you like.
Tony O'Connell: Yeah, I think we heard enough of it Saturday, Mel.
Melissa Ellis: I meant of my day, my weekend, not the game.
[crosstalk]
Tony O'Connell: I thought you meant the Collingwood theme song.
Melissa Ellis: No.
Tony O'Connell: Mel, where did you get to this parkrun day just gone?
Melissa Ellis: Well, Toc, as you well know, on Friday I journeyed north, northeast for a weekend of sunshine, big things, black and white glory and a whole lot of sweary surprises. Bearing in mind, we have some audio coming up and I'll do my best to give a recap of all the excitement. Originally, I had wanted to head north, on the Victorian AFL Grand Final weekend to pair the trip with a visit to Floriade. What is Floriade, Melissa? I'm glad you asked, Toc. Floriade is a flower entertainment festival held annually in Canberra's Commonwealth Park on the shores of Lake Burley Griffin. It features extensive displays of flowering bulbs with integrated sculptures and other artistic features. Floriade comes from the Latin word floriate, which means to design with flowers. The festival attracts tourists from around Australia and overseas in spring from mid-September to mid-October each year and is considered the most important regular event for tourism in the Australian Capital Territory. Floriade started in 1988 as a one-off celebration of Canberra's 75th birthday and was based on the world-famous Keukenhof Garden in the Netherlands. According to Wikipedia, it is the largest flower festival in the Southern Hemisphere with over 300,000 visitors each year. And although I have visited Canberra many times in September previously, I had never actually attended. Fun fact is my connection with the horticultural industry. I didn't know about that, did you? Back in 2019, on a trip with Irene and Parth, I encountered a giant pink garden gnome called Floyd, which was being used as a promotion for the annual event. And I was motivated to return and locate Floyd again, as he seemed a perfect fit for our adventurers Big Thing theme. On the drive up with Andrew Martine, we stopped along the way to visit some more iconic big things. The big magpie in Euroa installed just this last August was the first, then the big Ned Kelly in Glenrowan and the big swoop in Canberra. The two magpies were definitely on theme for the weekend and the gorgeous weather gave us some fabulous shots. We also visited the Mint where we saw Titan in action, picked up a Bathurst coin for Martine and snapped the big coins out the front. Then we hurried off to the Commonwealth Park in search of Floyd before the gates closed in preparation for the ticketed night festival. And, well, the festival didn't disappoint. The displays of colour were a joy to be seen. But as we entered the gardens, Martine's shriek, I see Floyd! And there he was, my giant pink gnome, sounding proud and posing for photos with all the visitors. So I got my fangirl photos, enjoyed a streak around the gardens, but sadly came away with no Floyd merch. Floriade, you seriously need me on your marketing team, but we were there for a parkrun and I had a date with a dot. So it was an early night to be fresh for the one and three quarter hour drive to Batemans Bay early Saturday morning. Batemans Bay is situated on the New South Wales south coast where the Clyde River meets the Southern Pacific Ocean and the traditional custodians of the land surrounding Batemans Bay are the Walbanga people of the Yuin Nation. It is the closest seaside town to Canberra, making Batemans Bay a popular holiday destination for residents from Australia's national capital. It was event 322 for Batemans Bay and we were amongst a crowd of 174, which is well above the average of 67 participants, again likely due to good weather and school holidays. Someone must have phoned ahead as I was greeted by a welcome message on the event whiteboard and received a shout out in the event briefing from the RD, although I was less impressed with the Collingwood Wisecracks. I roll. I'm kidding. This is a double-loop course with surfaces including grass, concrete and bitumen and starts from Rotary Park near the Batemans Bay Marina. We had warm conditions, as you know, Toc, and although I had a crack at my first post-pandemic sub-30 and was generously paced by Andrew Johnston, again I fell short, only improving on last week's time by one second. I'm going to blame the weather. Much thanks to the wonderful community who were very welcoming and kind to afford me platitudes for my arbitrary milestones and also to my wonderful parkrun buddies for making me feel very loved. I've made quiet references a couple of times to the difficult year I've had and I seriously don't know where I would be without the support I've received from my parkrun family. After the run, we zoomed up to JJ's at the marina where I indulged in balsamic mushrooms with extra avo and fried halloumi, a decaf flat white and Bec's delicious chocolate keto cupcakes. The staff was so accommodating to a frond of 10 with no booking, allowing us to sit outside at picnic tables and order from the takeaway menu. Highly recommended. This is such a hard recap because we then returned to our motel in Queanbeyan so I could watch Collingwood play Brisbane in the grand final and see my beloved Magpies win their 16th premiership. Apologies to my very accommodating non-football travel companions who graciously endured three hours of football anxiety and some spicy words they may not have heard me utter prior to that day. Also apologies for me wearing my footy jumper home the next day after having also ran a parkrun in it the day before. It's been through the wash now and it's ready for next season. It did surprisingly, or not surprisingly, draw attention wherever we stopped on the drive home. A few heckles, but mostly happy smiles and calls of go pies. Oh, and Tony, I am reliably informed that Ollie received his early birthday package and was spotted RDing at Shellharbour sporting his brand new Collingwood socks. You're welcome, Ollie.
Roving reports & the Channel 5 News crew
Melissa Ellis: But anyway, we do have some audio from the lovely Bec Bailey who captured some of the excitement from the morning and the lovely guests that were in attendance and did surprise me. So why don't we have a little listen to Bec?
[background music]
Roving report Bec Bailey — Batemans Bay parkrun
Bec Bailey: Good morning adventurers, it's Bec here. I'm in the car, it's 5am. I'm about ready to drive a couple of hours south of my home in Shellharbour to a little event for a tourist. It'll be my first time to this event. There's someone down there getting a special milestone today and I know it's her first time to this event so I will report back in once I get there. We've arrived at Batemans Bay. found a couple other people who have come here for a tour.
Talking to Tony O'Connell — Co-host of the podcast, interviewed in the field as one of the parkrunners who…
Bec Bailey: So who have I got? Hey Bec, it's Toc. And Jacqui. Oh guys, what are you guys doing at Batemans?
Tony O'Connell: I don't know, we just thought we'd rock along and see if there's any milestones or anything to celebrate it today.
Bec Bailey: Oh, so you guys happened to come surprise Mel without her knowing as well?
Tony O'Connell: Yeah, yeah, it might have been a bit of that. It looks like there's a bit of a crowd have done exactly the same thing.
Bec Bailey: Yeah, definitely a bit of a frond today for sure. Yeah, apparently she was saying she thought you were going to Germany.
Tony O'Connell: Yeah, look, on the way up here, it's about a nine or ten hour drive, we put our Strava onto silent and she thought, Toc hasn't done a run for a whole day, so it was a little bit unusual. She thought we might have been on a plane heading off to Unity Day. All part of the big plan to keep her in the disguise.
Bec Bailey: Yeah, that's it. Well, she seemed to enjoy the surprise anyway.
Tony O'Connell: Yeah, no, look, it was great. It's just one of those days where, you know, we've had people rock up from, you know, WA, from Shellharbour, from Inverloch, from Picton. It's just a great surprise and she was shocked. She was so shocked. It's always good to see her shocked.
Bec Bailey: Yeah, that's it. I'm going to catch up with a few of those other people soon as well.
Tony O'Connell: Yeah, no, look, it's really great to catch up, Bec. And you've done the trick with the cakes. Thank you. Top effort on the keto cakes. But it's just been a great day. And as I said, the look on Mel's face when you guys jumped out from behind that caravan was just priceless.
Bec Bailey: Anything for Mel. She's an amazing person. She does an amazing job. We all love her to bits.
Tony O'Connell: And I think we're all quite happy to drive to catch up and celebrate. Anything for her, yeah.
Bec Bailey: All good. Well done, Mel. Your 200 locations and your 400th run, you got there. Arbitrary, but you got there.
[crosstalk]
Tony O'Connell: You're a dot. And she's a dot on the Charlie Pearce map now.
Bec Bailey: Yeah.
Tony O'Connell: Well done.
Bec Bailey: Well, have a good drive back, guys, and we'll see you when you see her. Cheers, babe. Thank you.
Talking to Sam Schroder — The Office Lady (podcast administrative support), interviewed with her husband Luke…
Bec Bailey: Oh, stumbled into a couple more people who have travelled to Batemans Bay today. How are you guys?
Sarah Jefferson: Good, thanks. Very good, thanks.
Sam Schroder: What are you doing down here? Oh, well, it's a long weekend and we thought, why not head to the coast? And look, that's a lie. I've been planning this trip for months. We are here... I'm Sam, this is Luke, also known as The Office Lady, and we are here to celebrate Mel's 400th parkrun at her 200th event location. And I've been planning this weekend since July when Mel and I went to... Covertly planning. Yeah, very much covertly. Since we went to Kangaroo Island in July and Mel revealed the maths of it all and so I've been keeping a sharp eye on how things might play out and might have invited a friend or two along actually as well. Yeah, thank you for the heads up.
Bec Bailey: No problem. And plans to go to the Shlava this weekend. But, you know, happy to drive two hours for Mel.
Sam Schroder: Absolutely. Yep, yeah we we decided no matter where Mel decided she would do this run that we would be there so we were ready to buy plane tickets or drive to Queanbeyan and drive a bit further yeah do whatever needed to be done to be where Mel would be and we are absolutely stoked to have run a spectacular parkrun in a magical location on a beautiful day today absolutely stunning yeah thanks for asking no worries thanks for coming out and checking the course of course oh yeah yeah new tick new volunteer role I did the course check this morning which is my first time ever doing that hot tip for everyone choose a two-lap course so all you have to do is a k 1.25 k's and your course check's done I'm a smart fantastic well done good planning good to see you guys again as always
[crosstalk]
Talking to Sarah Jefferson — Roving reporter / co-host, interviewed in the field as one of the surprise party, with…
Bec Bailey: Alright, I've stumbled across another couple big adventurers here, and also our partners in crime for hiding behind the car earlier in the big surprise.
Sarah Jefferson: Who do we have? What are you doing here? Hi everyone, it's Sarah from the West Side on the east side.
Matt: That's it, and Matt with Sarah.
Sarah Jefferson: Yeah, we've come over to Batemans Bay parkrun. We had a little bit of a change in plan, but I'm very excited to join a frond, so we drove an extra... A few hours, a couple of hours, two and a half hours, because what's that when you've crossed the Nullarbor, I guess.
Matt: That's right.
Sarah Jefferson: So I'm very excited to be here this morning.
Matt: Yeah, it was nice to come down and celebrate Mel's, yeah, pretty big achievement.
Sarah Jefferson: Yeah.
Matt: 400 parkruns and 200th location. Beautiful spot. We've had amazing weather. Stunning.
[crosstalk]
Sarah Jefferson: So beautiful. And some keto cupcakes made by the amazing baker Bec. Thanks guys. Very, very nice at the end of our run. So thanks for that. But congrats Mel on your achievement. Lovely to be here and celebrating you.
[crosstalk]
Matt: It's exciting to sneak up and duck behind the cars. Oh, did she see us? Did she not?
Sarah Jefferson: Yes, I think that was the adrenaline hit this morning. Oh my gosh. Literally running out and then Bec had, like, she's walking and then ducking behind the car and sneaking up.
Bec Bailey: And I was meant to record the whole thing and I just got caught up in the moment and completely forgot. But there's a lot of screaming. I think we made her cry a little bit. We love you lots, Mel. Yeah, we love you, Mel.
[crosstalk]
Sarah Jefferson: Yeah, it was lots of fun. So I'm very happy to be here. And yeah, we've seen some whales breaching at Mollymook last night. It was beautiful. Full moon rising over the beach. It was stunning. So beautiful on the south coast. Very excited to be on the south coast of New South Wales, checking it out.
Bec Bailey: The course is a bit flatter than Shellharbour, as originally planned. It's quite a lot flatter. I haven't checked the shava, but I'm pretty sure it's dead flat. Yeah, it would be pretty flat. It's dead flat.
[crosstalk]
Matt: Yeah, it was good. I got to run with TOC and... He spoke the most, but it was good fun. I had to speed up at the end and have a breather.
Bec Bailey: Yeah, I went out too hard and I could hear you guys coming up behind me and I was like, oh, I've got to slow down.
[crosstalk]
Matt: No, it was great to catch up with everyone. Yeah, everyone's well, so it's fantastic.
Sarah Jefferson: Yeah, it was great. What are you guys' plans next? Staying over for another week, I hear. Well, because we thought we were going to be in Shellharbour, we're going to head back to North Wollongong tonight. But we have our engagement party next weekend, which is very exciting. Well done. Congratulations. Thanks. So, yeah, that will be on the northern beaches. So we'll head to Rhodes parkrun next week and check that out. Yeah, do some holidaying in between and... Yeah, that's what we're up to. Enjoy that. Thanks for coming down. Yeah, thanks for having us and joining in on the surprise. No worries. Congrats, Mel.
[crosstalk]
Bec Bailey: Love you.
Talking to Andrew Johnston — Melissa Ellis's travel companion and driver for the weekend, interviewed with Martine
Bec Bailey: All right, I found a couple more people joining us at Batemans today. The drivers of Mel to this special occasion today. Who do we have here?
Andrew Johnston: I've got Andrew.
Bec Bailey: And Martine. Welcome, guys. Welcome to Batemans.
Andrew Johnston: Yep, fantastic place here. Sunny morning, really, really nice course out here in front of the water. Now, speaking of drivers, we've been driving Mel in two different senses. Quite literally, we drove her to Canberra last night and we drove her down to Bateman Bay this morning. But secondly, we also drove her to keep her numbers aligned to get her 200 and 400 on the same day, which is a really special thing. And it was great reason to get some of her really, really close parkrun friends to come down and meet and have this special occasion with her.
Bec Bailey: Nice, and you guys were in on the whole surprise, but you managed to keep it nice and quiet, so Mel had no idea that the rest of us were all joining her today.
Martine: It was a little bit hard. Mel was coming up with all these theories about, with TOC especially, and so trying to keep a straight face was quite difficult. You're supposed to be in Germany right now.
Andrew Johnston: Yeah, that was one of the theories. Quite an absolutely astounding theory, that one, but...
Martine: I think she had a list of three. It was either Germany, WA, or I can't remember what the third one was.
Andrew Johnston: Victor Harbor.
Martine: Victor Harbor, yeah.
Andrew Johnston: And, yep, managed to keep it secret until we turned up here at the car park and got a great surprise. It was really good for everyone to come here today.
[crosstalk]
Bec Bailey: It was so good to see your face this morning.
Andrew Johnston: Yes, yeah. Really excited, making it a real special day for her.
Bec Bailey: Yeah. What are you guys' plans after this? You got more adventuring on the lines, or...?
Andrew Johnston: We've got about six months worth of adventuring already lined up. I think in about the next six or eight months, we've got about three or four weekends that we don't have something planned. So we've well and truly caught the adventuring bug.
Bec Bailey: Well, thanks for joining us at Batemans and bringing Mel and obviously driving her for the special milestone. No problem.
Andrew Johnston: It's been great to be here.
Talking to Melissa Ellis — Co-host of the podcast, interviewed at her own milestone parkrun
Bec Bailey: Alright, I'm here with the whole reason that we've all come to Batemans today. It's Mel. How are you Mel? I'm very good. I've had a brilliant morning.
Melissa Ellis: It was a lovely surprise and I nearly cried. I thought you did cry. Well, I kind of did, yeah. I was overcome.
Bec Bailey: Oh, well, I'm so happy that we surprised you. Yes. It didn't get spoiled.
Melissa Ellis: Well, it did. I was getting suspicious, so that might have already been revealed. I don't know.
Bec Bailey: It has been revealed, yeah.
Melissa Ellis: I was getting suspicious of TOC and Jacqui. But then I had decided in my head that he'd gone to Germany. But he didn't. They were here. They were here. Yes. And then I thought that was it. I thought that was the big surprise. And then you and Sarah and Matt popped out.
Bec Bailey: Yeah. Nowhere. Behind in the cars. Yes. We thought you'd seen us when we were running down the field and we ducked behind a car real quick. I didn't. Sam was doing a great job of blocking your view. Try to surprise you. But here we are, we've all come because it's you and we love you so much.
Unidentified speaker: Thank you, Bec.
Bec Bailey: And we came to celebrate your, although it's arbitrary. I know. But you're a dot.
[crosstalk]
Melissa Ellis: You're a dot. You're a dot. So, and it was a big thing. Martine convinced me to skip a run a couple of weeks ago so I could maintain the synergy of the two milestones coinciding on the same day. So, yeah, I'm kind of glad I did now and become a dot. And so, yeah, Charlie Pearce, please don't redo the... If we don't redo the graph yet, then I'm not a dot anymore.
Bec Bailey: Big achievement to be a dot. I'm still a black square, so I've got a ways to go before I'm ever a dot.
[crosstalk]
Melissa Ellis: How magic is the weather? It's just been a perfect day. We're standing on the grass by a bay, and the sky's blue. Not even a cloud. It's just been an absolutely fantastic, beautiful morning.
Bec Bailey: It's a dead flat course. Michael Gentle, if you're listening, dead flat. Come to Batemans Bay.
Melissa Ellis: I got so close so Andrew ran with me and I I kind of figured out within the first 500 metres he was sticking with me and so I thought okay I'll give it a crack I'll give it a crack I tried really hard for the sub 30 but I didn't quite get it so that's okay it's it's still there for another day close yeah I'm getting yeah I'm sitting around Just over 30 minutes back, but anyway, we'll change it. Beautiful brunch and your cupcakes, Bec. Bec made me keto cupcakes and they were delicious. She can have baking. Yay, I could eat brunch. That was really nice. And it's just the fact that it's thoughtful. And so I really do appreciate that.
Bec Bailey: Oh, thanks, Mel. Anything for you. We've all decided this, that we would drive anywhere. We've all talked about no matter where your 200th location was going to be, where we're going to go. Really?
Melissa Ellis: Well, I'm glad it was here.
Bec Bailey: I'm glad it was here too. I've never been here. It's pretty close to Shalaba.
Melissa Ellis: Yeah.
Bec Bailey: It's nice. Ollie, you're right. This course is very lovely. It is. Yes. Yep, yep, yep. Sad you couldn't come, but happy birthday party to Ava. I'll see you next week. For your birthday. You can't keep that one quiet. No, no. We'll make sure we tell the world. We kind of already have. We kind of have, yes. There will be cake at Shellharbour next week, everyone. Fabulous. Well, congratulations. Thank you. Good to see you again. You too. Yeah, we'll see you at Bathurst. Bathurst. Yes, that's right. Two weeks away. Yeah, well, safe drive back. Thank you. Go Pies!
[background music]
Tony O'Connell: It was a good recap there. Yeah, it was a lovely day up at Batemans Bay. We really enjoyed our day up. We enjoyed the road trip up and back. It was a fairly quick hightail home after, but how good was it to catch up with all the friends there and just sit around after parkrun? And I just love those Saturday morning feels.
Melissa Ellis: I know. They're pretty special, aren't they? So I also wanted to say, some people might think it's a stretch that I thought you could have been going to Germany, but in my mind, it was totally a realistic option.
Tony O'Connell: I've got to say, Mel, we deliberately did turn our Strava and Garmin off so that we'd throw you with that, hoping you'd think that we'd just gone to South Australia and we're doing the long road trip. Germany, I don't know where that came into the equation, but when we got a message from your travelling companion saying, she's sinking Germany, we just all burst out laughing. That was a great little thing.
Melissa Ellis: Unity Day. I thought you were going to go over for Unity Day.
Tony O'Connell: Go and do the extra parkrun?
Melissa Ellis: Yeah.
Tony O'Connell: Yeah, no, look, would have been great, but I think we're done with travel overseas for a while. Yeah.
Melissa Ellis: That's fair enough. Oh, and I really also want to thank Bec again for the keto cupcakes. It is such a treat for me to be able to eat something at brunch. I mean, obviously I also had my balsamic mushrooms, but yeah, so lovely to have her go to all the effort of making something to my dietary requirements. So thank you so much, Bec. And also she'll give a shout out to the Office Lady for all her work behind the scenes.
Tony O'Connell: Mel, I thought when Bec brought out keto cupcakes, not being a dietary type person, I thought, oh, God, what are these going to be like? They were actually really good.
Unidentified speaker: Yeah.
Tony O'Connell: I was sort of eyeing off a second one there for a fair while. I thought, oh, there's not enough to go around, but someone might have to miss out so I can have two. I got one to take home on the road. Oh, cool.
Melissa Ellis: I got two. So, yeah, they were pretty good. Yeah, it's not all bad.
Tony O'Connell: Mel, during your recap there, you mentioned the dot. I know. It's a big thing to become a DOT.
Melissa Ellis: I'm very proud of my new DOT status. Do you want to explain to the listeners about the DOT?
Tony O'Connell: For our listeners that don't know about the DOTs, there's two different parkrun stats groups out there that a lot of us follow. There's the parkrun stats group and the parkrun stats chat group. And one of the members, Charlie Pierce, puts up this graph generally about once a month and it tracks... everyone by the number of parkruns they've done in blocks of 50. So one to 50, 50 to 100 and so on. And then how many different events you've run in blocks of 50. And so obviously right at the start of the graph, for example, if you've done between one and 25 parkruns and you've done under 50 different events, you'll want a four and a half million people in a block, right? You don't go to a dot until you're less than 50 in a block. And in your case, Mel, because you've done 400 parkruns at 200 different events, you're one of 39 people that fit into a block. And so you get your own dot.
Melissa Ellis: I know.
Tony O'Connell: That's really cool, the graph. And I'd encourage people to jump onto those two Facebook groups and have a look at them. And Charlie does a great job with them.
Melissa Ellis: Thank you, Charlie.
Tony O'Connell: And it was really good that Charlie was able to confirm and produce that report on the Sunday night so that we could confirm that you are in fact a DOT. For those that are following the DOTs, they have a habit when you're in the area, if there's more than 50 people in a box, It's a shaded box. If there's less than 50, you get your individual dot. And as more people travel and more people do more parkruns, the shading's slowly going across the graph. So it's harder and harder to get to become a dot because there's a lot more people in those boxes progressing as well. So to achieve that is really good.
Melissa Ellis: Yes, I'm pretty proud. I'm a bit chuffed. I'm not sure how long I can maintain it. It's been a crazy year. I think we just looked up prior to recording, Tony, I have done a streak of 44 this year. I'm on a streak of 44. But of course, they're not all brand new events, but there's only, oh, there'd be less than five out of that 44 that are repeats.
Tony O'Connell: And Mel, as Australians and I guess our Kiwi friends and people from America would understand, once you start to do all the events around you, travelling starts to become a major issue. For our friends in the UK, where you have such a plethora of parkruns within, you know, 100 kilometres.
Melissa Ellis: Plethora.
Tony O'Connell: Plethora. Yeah, where you have such a range of parkruns so close, it's easy to travel. Although I did notice while I was over in the UK, there was a bit of a reluctance. When you said you were going to drive six hours, they'd look at you as if to say, who drives six hours? Not sure where your NENDY is, Mel, but if I don't count the ones across the water in Tasmania, I think we've probably got an eight-hour drive as a minimum to get to our NENDY. Yeah.
Melissa Ellis: Yeah, well, now that Braidwood Showground is back top, that's my NENDY.
Tony O'Connell: Yeah, I think ours might be Jerrabomberra or somewhere.
Melissa Ellis: But yeah, it's over seven hours. I've got nothing under seven hours. Till the next launch.
Tony O'Connell: So distance becomes an issue and obviously to try and keep yourself as a dot, you have to get up to either the next block of 450 runs, which is obviously a bit over a year away for most people, or you have to do another 50 events and obviously getting to 50 different events is... is a lot more challenging.
Melissa Ellis: You are correct, my friend. Challenging also on the bank balance.
Tony O'Connell: And I really do feel for the likes of our Kiwi friends that I'm not sure how many events there are now in New Zealand, but I know they get to the – I think it's somewhere near 50 now and then have to cross the ditch to get to a new event. So that's a big swim to get to each new event.
Melissa Ellis: But, you know, there's future growth coming, so that's good. Now, the next thing I've got on our agenda is to talk about Collingwood. Yes.
Tony O'Connell: Oh, Mel, Mel, Mel. I had a fear of being one of the guest hosts on the week after Collingwood have won a grand final. I still live in massive trauma of 2010 where Collingwood- Won the premiership. Ran over the top of St Kilda. But Mel, it was certainly, listening to it on the radio on our trip home from Batemans Bay, the commentators were all saying it's probably one of the best games that's been on for many, many years. It's unusual for a grand final to be so close right to the end of the game. Normally by halftime, there's a fair bit of a break. So this year was actually a really good game to listen to, even if Collingwood won.
Melissa Ellis: And what about the pre-match entertainment? How was Kiss?
Tony O'Connell: We were actually out of the car for a quick walk at Pambula. We had a quick walk around Pambula, towards the Panboola Wetlands parkrun course for the pre-game. Lovely, yeah. Just to make sure we could get out and get back in the car to listen to the footy on the way home.
Melissa Ellis: Oh, yeah, they did a good job. I did wonder what today's generation, like what perhaps my 13-year-old would think, sitting there witnessing these 70-year-old men with their make-up and their, what would you call their costumes?
Tony O'Connell: Interesting. Bless them. And having been someone that was at the grand final the year that Meat Loaf sang, I'm sure Kiss did a fantastic job.
Melissa Ellis: No, they were good. They were very entertaining and they had heaps of little kids, so there would have been I don't know how many dance groups out there doing formations to the music, so it was really entertaining. And fun fact, Kiss toured in about, oh, I'm going to say 1977, right? played at VFL Park in Waverley and I could hear it and I could see VFL Park from my front lounge room window and you could hear them playing. So there you go.
Tony O'Connell: Cool. That's how long they've been going for. Yeah.
Melissa Ellis: Mind you, I was seven. Anyway, we should move on. Happy Birthday parkrun.
Tony O'Connell: Yay. It's today. It is. We're recording this on the 2nd.
[background music]
Melissa Ellis: We are. So 19 years old today.
[13 seconds of audio that could not be transcribed]
Tony O'Connell: Who would have thought that group of people that got together and ran around Bushy 19 years ago would have led to this?
Melissa Ellis: Thank you again, PSH.
Tony O'Connell: And we've got a little bit of that growth coming up a little bit later, Mel.
Melissa Ellis: We do, yeah. That's exciting.
parkrun news bulletin
Melissa Ellis: But there's more news now. There is some records, is there not, that were broken this weekend?
Tony O'Connell: There is. Mel, this week across Australia, and I've just gone to the Australian ones, I'm sure there's many across the world, but we had eight events break their attendance records. And I think what's significant about that is most weeks there's one or two break it. To get eight, and we start to look at the growth of numbers, we're getting back towards our pre-COVID levels, which is fantastic. But this week, I know Warragul, Rooty Hill, Launceston, Jakes Point, Dorset Recreation Reserve, Dolls Point, which is, as we all know, the pretty one. Mm-hmm. Christies Beach and Carine Glades all broke their attendance records. And probably just when I had a look there and I had a little bit of help from one of the EAs, Leanne from Tassie, Launceston are up to event 526 and they've broken their attendance record. Yeah, generally you see events early in their time break records, but to be breaking it after 526 events... And that was largely boosted by a big group that came from a – there's a really big heart health promotion across northern Tassie by the Clifford Craig Foundation. So, yeah, really good to see those sort of numbers on the increase again.
Melissa Ellis: Good pickup, Tony. That's excellent. And Launceston being the founding event in Tasmania too, I believe. Yep.
Tony O'Connell: And that's what I said, being an event 526, it's actually really good to see some older events. You always get your newer events kicking over some records. Dolls Point, I didn't have a look at their attendance numbers, but yeah, to see events like that up there kicking off attendance records, obviously they're doing a lot of things very right.
Melissa Ellis: And we should give a shout-out to adventurer Ingrid Botha, who hails from said pretty parkrun.
Tony O'Connell: Yes, one of their Run Directors at the event. So, yeah, there we go. I was sort of looking at that attendance records, and look, it was flagged to me by Warragul parkrun, one of their groups. I saw that they had their attendance record, and they've been going since 2014. So, you know, once again, an event nine years old, breaking attendance records, and And looking at those events like Warragul, the numbers have just steadily been increasing, obviously doing so many things right within the community. It sort of got me to have a look at my time in parkrun now and the growth that there's been in Australia across that time. I like keeping a few different numbers and stats and the odd spreadsheet and And just sort of reflecting on a few things, I looked at Inverloch's original application that we put in to the local shire when we proposed Inverloch parkrun. And we had some of the numbers that were on that compared to where we're at now. And so looking at it, parkrun, as we know, in Australia launched at Main Beach. There was exactly 100 participants in April in 2011 and six volunteers. It took till 2014 before Australia had 100 events run concurrently on the day and And that was with one or two closures. So interestingly, Calamvale in Brisbane was our 100th event. The 200 events running concurrently on a day was reached in 2017 in November. So it took about six years for us to get to 250 events concurrently. And then just a couple of numbers. Once again, I was pulling some figures out for Inverloch when we proposed it. Ten years ago on this weekend just gone, there was 42 events across Australia with 5,611 finishers and 361 volunteers across the whole of Australia. This weekend, we ran 464 events, had 60,000 finishers and 5,216 volunteers. That's over a tenfold increase in the number of people. I sort of started to think, where's the future of parkrun with that sort of growth? When do we hit event 500, for example? So this year, across Australia, we've had an extra 36 events, I think, We've got another 36 before we hit 500. When's that point going to be? Is it going to be February, March next year? And where are those new events coming from? I look at the map a lot and there's just little holes everywhere. And I think it could be a good place for a parkrun in there. I don't know about you, Mel, do you often look and sort of think, or as you're touring, like driving home from Batemans Bay, you drive through a town and you think, oh, wouldn't this be a fantastic place for a parkrun?
Melissa Ellis: Absolutely, yeah, I do that all the time. all the time thinking of potential everywhere you look. And wouldn't it be good if they hit the 500 on Palm weekend?
Tony O'Connell: Oh, I wonder if we could get an event up towards Toowoomba to be the 500th.
Melissa Ellis: No, because we can't go to the launch.
Tony O'Connell: No. Oh, well, good point. And we don't want to hit them up on week two or week three either.
Melissa Ellis: No, no.
Tony O'Connell: No, good point. Yeah, no, we often, as we're driving around, we get out and have a leg stretch in a town and you'll be walking, you'll be walking along the park and you think, oh, look, you know, there's toilets, there's a cafe, there's a big car park, there's this beautiful track. Why haven't they got a parkrun here? Yeah. But anyway, that's just me reflecting a little bit, you know, from I was looking at Inverloch's application for our new permit for the next year and I just happened to go to my permits folder and I had a lot of that information still in there from when we first proposed parkrun nine or ten years ago.
Melissa Ellis: And I do believe you have recently, I don't know if we announced it on the pod, I can't remember, that you have recently come back into being an event ambassador after a small break.
Tony O'Connell: I have, Mel. I took a little bit of time off. I was a regional ambassador before I stepped back. And to be honest with you, Mel, I've really missed helping events and talking to events and having that involvement with events. problem-solving and just being that ear and being that support person. I've really missed that since I stepped down, and I've put a new application in, and I was actually really happy to say I was accepted. One of my referees I used on that was the lovely Janet from Lochiel. Aw.
Melissa Ellis: Hi, Janet.
Tony O'Connell: I don't know whether she said good words or – But back into the event ambassador role again. So I'm really looking forward to that.
Melissa Ellis: Well, congratulations to that. Thank you.
Tony O'Connell: And we've hit October, so we're talking about parkrun's birthday, the 2nd of October, but we've just finished off a really big month. For a lot of us that are involved through the podcast, Streaky September is over for another year. I don't know about you, Mel, but I've had my streak running for a few years now and obviously I've managed to streak every day over September. How about you?
Melissa Ellis: Yes, I completed September with my own little personal challenge of 10,000 steps a day and a minimum 3K activity. So proud to say that I completed it and I will maintain it, although I haven't done the 3K today. So guess what I'm doing when the recording finishes?
Tony O'Connell: I think you did this last time we recorded, Mel. I think you went out and did a little blocky after we recorded then as well.
Melissa Ellis: Yeah, I think I did. It's not unusual for me to have to do a couple of blockies before I hop in the bed. Never mind. Yeah.
Tony O'Connell: Look, Mel, I think the interaction on the Facebook page has been fantastic. We've had a lot of new names this year popping up there, which I think is really encouraging. It's great to see new names, new activities, new ideas coming up as well. And some of the challenges that people have been completing for the Bingoe card are I tend to look at things very, oh, it says this, you've got to do this. Some people have come up with some fantastic interpretations and ideas, and I love seeing the creativity in the group. There's been some really great people completing the magpies and the friends and all sorts of challenges in there.
Melissa Ellis: Actually, we were very excited walking to get my 10,000 steps after dinner on Saturday night, just going up and down the street. And I glanced up at an apartment block and there was one light on in the apartment block and there was a cat sitting in the window. And I was like, oh, oh, there's a cat. There's a cat in the window. Quick. And there was an abandoned trolley. And I'm like, quick, get the trolley in the photo.
Unidentified speaker: Yeah.
Melissa Ellis: Of course, that's a leftover from last year's Bingoe card, but I can't not see abandoned trolleys.
Streaky September
Tony O'Connell: Mel, I think with Streaky September coming to a close, I think we should encourage everyone to keep going. Hopefully, you've formed that habit, but I reckon it's time to throw over to Pippa and listen to Pippa's closing comments on the month.
Pippa White: And that's it. September is over. Today is the 1st of October and I'm sat in my house and it's nearly midday and I haven't yet been out. How terrifying is that? That's for me, who's a proper obsessive streaker. If you've decided that the 30th of September was your last day and you stopped, that's brilliant. Fantastic. We'll see you next year. How has my September been? Well, quite frustratingly, it's the second September I've had an injury. Back in 2019, my very first September, I fell and I cracked my back and that's been an ongoing problem, I suppose, ever since. But exercise keeps me healthier and keeps my back healthier. So I'm going to be walking probably for the next few days, maybe a couple of weeks as everything heals. However, I'm out there, I'm getting the exercise in, I'm getting the mental health time. I've actually got three people streaking this year who've never streaked before. And ironically, one of them is not even a parkrunner. One is my, it's a tame volunteer, my daughter, and she's been doing two kilometres a day, which I'm really excited about. Another is a parkrunner who hasn't yet to find the pod. So my next challenge in October is to get them completing maybe a parkrun and listening to the pod. And we'll see how we get on with that. September has been a blast. I've loved it. I've got out. I've done some different things. I haven't quite completed my Bingoe card, but thank you to everybody who's joined me on my journey this month because it's been fantastic. See you next year.
Melissa Ellis: And we would like to thank Pippa very, very much for sending us the recordings and supporting everybody through Streaky September.
Dazza's — Holly Pleasance
Melissa Ellis: But now... It is time to hear from Dazza's. And this week at Dazza's, he said, it's grand final day in the greater state. Dazza has picked a side, have you? Before the footy, there's parkrun. How was your morning?
Tony O'Connell: Our first one that we've got from Dazza's is Errol Poole. Errol said, go the Lions. But yeah, Saturday morning, that probably sounded a lot better. And he had a little emoji of a lion and a smiley face. And then he had a comment, NRL, who cares? And our photo was Errol in the White Rock selfie frame.
Melissa Ellis: He's getting around. I haven't bumped into Errol for ages. He might be at Bathurst. He could be. Who knows? And we also heard from Holly Pleasance, who said a wee bit of Celtic theme here at Warwick parkrun. And there was a photo of Holly, well, not just Holly, but seven ladies in their tartan skirts.
Tony O'Connell: Next, we heard from Renata Koch. All shades of blue were represented at Parramatta parkrun's 500th, but Christianos took the cake. Go Panthers! And she got that one right. The Panthers came over the Broncos in the end for a win. So she was on the money with one of them. And she put a collage of photos in to celebrate Parramatta's 500th event.
Melissa Ellis: Fantastic. I did notice all that blue in the social media. We also heard from Margie Lewis. Tail walking with Katie at home to re-parkrun.com. We may have misplaced the tail when the person we were following dropped out after one lap. Some jogging to find the next person and a pic there of Margie and Katie Young in the Tail Walker's fluro.
Tony O'Connell: Next up, we heard from Carmel Rowe, Mitchelton parkrun. Great to meet Samantha Roberts and Wayne. Ticked off me NENDY. Now to get to the next one. They keep getting further away, just like we were discussing before, Mel. Hope the Queensland teams do well in their grand finals. And it was a pic of Carmel in her adventurers top in the Mitchelton selfie frame. And those adventurers tops, Mel, they get around.
Melissa Ellis: They do, and they're becoming very recognisable. We also heard from Cheryl Loves Raymond. Four weeks after total hip replacement and I'm back enjoying a newly launched course today at Port Macquarie parkrun, my home club, doing my 150th parkrun with 312 participants for event number 347. And Cheryl sent us a photo, with a cool Eat, Sleep, parkrun, Repeat t-shirt.
Tony O'Connell: The t-shirts seem to have been all the flavours in them this week, Mel. Our next one was from Chris Gore. Well, Dazza, there weren't too many football colours at Shipwreck parkrun this morning. It was a sea of green as everyone was wearing their Team Gore world record t-shirts to send off Phil and Gemma Gore as they head across to Tennessee in the USA to compete in the World Championship of Backyard Ultras. It was also time to hand over the Shipwreck ED role to Martin as they stepped down from the role after getting Shipwreck up and running five years ago. Well done, Phil and Gem. We had a guest RD for the event, Sam Grant from Carine Glades parkrun, came down and brought some of the Carine parkrunners along. It was also run number 300 for Carine. It was a great morning and the cafe was packed out afterwards and the Carine crew also brought along a fantastic spread to help celebrate. And the picture there, Mel, had about 30 people in Team Gore 102 T-shirts. And, yeah, I'd just like to say good luck to Phil in the Backyard Ultra Championships in Tennessee.
Melissa Ellis: We'd like to also – well, I'd like to also say well done to Phil and Gem because there's a lot of effort that goes in to supporting somebody to do something like that. We should probably point out that the 102 – I guess that relates to his goal to eclipse his previous best.
Tony O'Connell: 102 was actually his world record where he ran 102 hours. I beg your pardon. It was about 688 kilometres he ran. Yes, crazy. I think as well as that, I think we should be saying well done to the two of them for getting a parkrun up and going for five years. Absolutely, five years. Because that takes a significant amount of effort as we both know.
Bec Bailey: It does.
Melissa Ellis: Yeah, so good luck, Phil. The parkrun adventurer is very own Phil Gore.
Tony O'Connell: We'll claim him.
Melissa Ellis: We'll claim him. Now, we also heard from Joanne Blackbird. Hey, Dazza, headed up the bush on the public holiday to do another Vic location. Oh, I got caught out. Tallangatta Station parkrun was so scenic with the massive Lake Hume and beautiful Green Hills beside us the whole way. Chatted to a Pies fan, yay, and his son from Wyndham Vale parkrun. Oh, was that Daryl? Oh, never mind. Listened to the game on the radio in the car on the way home, but was so exciting, stopped at a convenient pub. Thank you, Tara Wingy, to watch the last 10 minutes on the telly. Great to see the pies. Hold on. And Joanne shared a photo of herself at the Tallangatta Station event in the selfie frame with the train station sign in the background, becoming very iconic, that train station sign, TOC.
Tony O'Connell: It is. It's appeared in quite a few posts now on Dazza's on the Saturday as well as on other spots.
Melissa Ellis: Very handy to have one of those at your parkrun.
Tony O'Connell: It is nice big letters. Easy to see. And finally, we heard from Calum Burrell. And Calum said, as well as recruiting two new members to the adventurers, we recruited two new members for Team Burrelly whilst at Lister Park, parkrun, Bradford. A friend of Burrell's is Lindsay and I were very pleased to join up with Ellen and Rosin Burrell whilst they were on their visit to the UK. And for those that don't know, Ellen's the prof from up in Queensland. Going on, it was a pleasure to join up with like-minded parkrun tourists from the other side of the world who just happened to share our surname. Rosin and Lindsay were convinced Alan and myself might be distantly related. And they had a photo with the Bradford pop-up because over in the UK they have the little pop-up signs and it had Calum, Lindsay, Alan and Rosin all behind the pop-up.
Melissa Ellis: Do they have selfie frames as well over there?
Tony O'Connell: No, they just have the pop-up frames with the event name.
Melissa Ellis: Oh. Okay, cool, cool, cool. Very good. So that completes Dazza's for this week. Thank you for selecting those, Tony.
Tony O'Connell: My pleasure. I actually enjoyed going through them like I do every Saturday, but it's good fun going through them, looking and picking up different events and different ideas.
Melissa Ellis: So would you like to also announce this week's winner?
Tony O'Connell: Yes, and look, following on from Ollie's lead last week, I don't actually have a whiteboard at all. I do have the post-it note still. And my post-it note, because I love my post-it note stuck to the computer screen so you can't see the screen. My post-it note says the winner is Holly Pleasance. for the photo with the seven ladies in the tartan skirts.
[background music]
Melissa Ellis: Hooray. Well done, Holly. Thank you for showing off the Celtics over there at Warwick parkrun. We must get there one day. Have you been to Warwick?
Tony O'Connell: I haven't been to Warwick yet, but I've seen quite a few comments from the likes of the Pohlmans about Warwick, so obviously it's one that we need to get to. Add it to the list.
Melissa Ellis: I think so.
Emails
Melissa Ellis: But now it is time to have a look at our inbox. I'll call you Ollie. And Simon, no, it's TOC.
Tony O'Connell: You've got mail.
Melissa Ellis: And we didn't align or assign these ones, so I'll go first with Cathy Crispin we heard from. Oh, yes, I did have to read Cathy's. Now I remember. It says, hi, Mel, Ollie. and crew. Just wanted to drop you a quick message about Rocky, our black and white. See what I did there? Mascot from Panania parkrun. Rocky is no lightweight and has been a feature of our event right from the beginning. At this, our second location. While this course does occasionally flood, it floods less than our original site at Deepwater Park. I think the clue is in the name. I've added a couple of pics for you to see Rocky in the wild. I was actually out on a run while listening to episode 352, so took a quick check-in to take a pic. The video shows his parkrun tattoo too. I've also added a photo of Rocky at his spa day earlier this year with fellow adventurers Sherry and Abby Brantman and the Viking Paul Whelan. Hope this helps explain the significance of our mascot, Rocky. No Passionista pics with him this week as I was touristing at Inverell, lovely course, with hubby, the boy child and the pooch, Zeppelin. And Cathy included some photos, which I will describe once I move my cursor across so that I can see them. And we had a photo of the aforementioned people with Rocky, which is a big rock, painted white, Now, assuming the spa day was a refresh of paint for Rocky, who's had a smiley face painted on the front in black and has a parkrun logo painted on his butt.
Tony O'Connell: Moving along, we had another email from Scott Earl. Not sure if I can put this message here, but on the 7th of October, a group of us are doing the Great Auckland 7 parkrun Challenge, doing all the parkruns in one day. Anyone's welcome to join in and do some or all with us. PM me and I can add you to the Facebook group. Cheers, Scott.
Melissa Ellis: Now, Scott is also known as Scott Aeroplanes over in New Zealand, which obviously is where the great Auckland Seven parkrun Challenge is, so much like our longest run day, I would assume, Toc?
Tony O'Connell: Very similar to it. And naturally enough, the seven parkruns, although they're on a Saturday, I assume one of them is going to be at an official parkrun and the rest will be freedom runs.
Melissa Ellis: Yes. So that should be a good day. Now, this won't quite give you much time if you are listening from New Zealand, bearing that this pod will only be out days beforehand. But, yep, drop Scott a line if you're interested in going. Now, we've also heard from Renata Koch about a new Polish parkrun launch. And I shall do my best. Actually, no, I won't. I'll cheat. It says, hello, Mel and Ollie. To begin with, I would like to apologise for parkrun Poland's recent launches. I hope they didn't deliberately choose places with exceptionally difficult names for new parkruns. But, Ollie, I was really impressed by your attempts to pronounce the two new Polish parkruns in the last podcast great effort. And for clarity, she did name the two parkruns that I can't say. She goes on. Well, guess what? Another Polish parkrun with a difficult name launched today. Oh, yay. Attached to this email is a little voice file with a beautifully pronounced event name. I recorded it for you so you can listen, practice and impress the listeners or just play it when recording the podcast. But that would be boring. Thank you for the weekly dose of parkrun Goss, Renata. Thank you so much, Renata. I'm sorry Ollie wasn't here to pronounce all those wonderful names, but we do appreciate the recording that I will insert.
Tony O'Connell: And Mel, I looked at those couple of names there and I just was not even going to have an attempt at them. I think Wally did... Wally.
Melissa Ellis: We could call him Wally.
Tony O'Connell: I think Ollie did a fantastic job of it. I can't even pronounce Ollie, let alone those Polish names.
Melissa Ellis: I can't even remember who I'm recording with anymore.
Club Corner
Tony O'Connell: And on that note, Mel, I think we should throw across to Rachel and listen to Rachel this week.
[background music]
Rachel: 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 headlining. No, I'm not on tour with Tom Jones or Taylor Swift, and not that they would be supporting me. I'm going to stop this musical analogy. I am talking about what we used to know as takeover days, you know, where a group or club comes to parkrun and does all of the volunteer roles for the day. Sometimes it's an ad hoc group, think the classic junior takeover days, or more organised, think scouts or an office group or the local footy club. In recent years the expression takeover has been replaced by headlining. It's the same thing, just a subtle clarification that parkrun still owns the event being taken over, and the takeoverers can't unilaterally change things just because they are in charge for the day. It also gives a little more emphasis to the organisation doing the taking over. The act of a group coming together to run parkrun for the week is a great community interaction, and parkrun HQ have got ambassadors working with corporate entities to engage with them and their altruistic endeavours. That's it. That's all I have. There's not much to say about headlining apart from it's great. And if you and your team want to take over slash headline an event, you should contact your local team and ask about it. And remember, in parkrun life, all non-milestone clubs are unofficial and unsupported by parkrun. So stay tuned for our future club corners.
Melissa Ellis: Thank you, Rachel, for bringing us more interesting news about takeover days. They are a popular thing to have at your parkrun, Tony.
Tony O'Connell: Yeah, they are, Mel. Have you ever actually been involved with a takeover day?
Melissa Ellis: I feel like I have, and it must have been way, way back in the days of my first running club, Raring to Run. I'm pretty sure I was involved in a club takeover day.
Tony O'Connell: Yeah, I think we've done the same, the one Thaggy Roadrunners have taken over Inverloch. And interestingly, probably similar sort of vein, but all the Inverloch RDs and event team took over Phillip Island one day. So sort of similar but different.
Melissa Ellis: Oh, and then there was the Festival of Mel. Yes. That was like a takeover of Mel's.
Tony O'Connell: Males rule the world.
Melissa Ellis: And at Junior's one time, I think it was Mother's Day, one of our RDs, Andrew, what's his last name? Andrew Reynolds.
Tony O'Connell: The tall bloke.
Melissa Ellis: He decided that because it was Mother's Day that the dads would do a takeover.
Tony O'Connell: Okay. So there's many different formats for the takeover. So it doesn't just need to be a company or a group or a charity takeover. It could be all sorts of things.
Melissa Ellis: That's what we like, using your imagination.
Tony O'Connell: And that's what events love.
Melissa Ellis: We need to have an Ugly Christmas Singlet takeover.
Tony O'Connell: We could do that at multiple events on the same day.
Melissa Ellis: We could. We could take over the world. Anyway, perhaps I move on. Yes.
Consolidated Club Report
Melissa Ellis: The adventurers Consolidated Club Report for Saturday, the 30th of September, 2023, of a total of 473 members, 375 took part on this date in 13 countries across 194 locations. Yes. In the UK, there were adventurers at 27 events. There were six in Germany, three in South Africa and the USA, and one event each in Canada, Austria, Finland, Ireland, Italy, Singapore, and Sweden. Locally, we had adventurers at 43 events in New South Wales, 36 events in the greater state, 33 events in Queensland, 14 in South Australia, seven in WA, and six in the ACT, Tassie and the North Island had four, and there was one in the Northern Territory. Now, I do believe our South Islanders in New Zealand were off doing other things, so there's no bowling strike, but never mind.
Tony O'Connell: I think, Mel, that might have been a combination of, I saw lots of reports of, I think, wet weather, and I think New Zealand might have been playing in the rugby at parkrun times. Ooh.
Melissa Ellis: Okay.
Tony O'Connell: So that might have explained part of it. Well, there you go.
Melissa Ellis: I just thought the Baileys went off to a party and had too much to drink and didn't get up for parkrun.
Tony O'Connell: No, I'm kidding.
Rachel: I'm kidding.
Tony O'Connell: And now, internationally, our largest frond was at Riemer in Germany, where Mark, Nicole, Elise and James Scarborough ran. And a special congratulations to James for equalling his PB.
Melissa Ellis: And locally, our largest fronds, there was two events with 10 participants. One was Schlaba and the other one was our very own Batemans Bay Frond with Matthew Stevens.
Adventurers PBs
Melissa Ellis: And we've got a new little bit of information this week, Adventurers PBs.
Tony O'Connell: And this is for our parkrun adventurers out there that have got the parkrun adventurers listed down as one of their five clubs. And this is for our parkrun adventurers out there that have got the parkrun adventurers listed down as one of their five clubs. And it's for the adventurers that have run an all-time PB. So this is just not a course PB. This is an all-time. And this week, two adventurers got to ring the bell. We had Gavin Porter run a PB at Cleethorpes. He ran in 2004. That was pretty quick. And Manish Bindaroo ran a PB at the Ponds in 2118. Well done to those adventurers.
Launches and anniversaries"Where is the cake?"
Melissa Ellis: Now, we had five launches around the world that we know of. Disclaimer, this week, well, this last week, TOC and the first one, Bahnstadt Promenade in Germany. I hope that's close. This event is in Heidelberg. It's an out-and-back course on asphalt. They had 131 finishers and 14 volunteers and 30 first-timers at that event. So nice. Numbers there for new parkrunners.
Tony O'Connell: Nice little number to launch, Mel. We had one in Japan. We had Sunset Hills Shitasanbashi, which is near Sakura. They had 45 finishers with 19 volunteers and 20 first-timers. So that's 20 people running their first parkrun ever out of 45. So it's nearly half... the people and I love this I've actually copied part of the course description and it is pass through the cherry blossom tree-lined road then become a paved road with a view to the countryside then go around the gravel road on the embankment twice return to the start finish as you go up the slope the view of the ibuana and the feeling of openness are very pleasant
Melissa Ellis: Well, I think the combination of that course description and the name will mean that it's a popular event.
Tony O'Connell: It will be.
Melissa Ellis: Now, we also had one in the Netherlands, Groene Ster. Groene Ster? And it is in Leeuwarden. They had 33 finishers, four volunteers, 18 first-timers on their three-lapper on asphalt and shell paths through the forest and beach. Wow.
Tony O'Connell: And Mel, I'm looking at this run list and I think you've stitched me up here. I got the Japanese one and I've got the Polish one.
Melissa Ellis: Lucky we've got help from Renata.
Tony O'Connell: Oh, beautiful. I'm going to say it's Monalka Kraluska. Młynówka Królewska. And we can't give you any stats or anything yet because it doesn't appear on the website as of yet. And I tried my best. I tried stalking grade level one and I could not find anything about it.
Melissa Ellis: We also had over in the UK, Baysgarth Park. Now, this is Barton-upon-Humber near Hull, apparently. They had 80 finishers, 14 volunteers, two first-timers, and it's a small one lap and two large laps on park paths and trails. So welcome to all those events just in time to celebrate the 19th birthday.
Tony O'Connell: Yay, cake all round.
Melissa Ellis: Now, looking forward, we haven't got anything noted. Have you got anything that you can think of, Tony?
Tony O'Connell: No, look, I'd just like to give a bit of a plug to the Palm next year. The Palm Facebook group has the date and the location on it, just encouraging people to start thinking about booking accommodation and transport, noting that it is difficult to get there from Melbourne via flights. You have to go in and out of somewhere, and a lot of the flights arrive too late for the Friday night dinner. So get onto that one and have a look early. It is very doable if you have a good search. Yeah.
Melissa Ellis: What about Bonza? I thought Bonza flew straight from Melbourne to Toowoomba.
Tony O'Connell: I'm struggling to work Bonza out. You've got to get on their app to work anything out on it. And I can't get their app to work.
Melissa Ellis: Oh, okay. Yeah. I have actually had the same problem, but I have been reliably informed.
Tony O'Connell: I am a dinosaur.
Sign-off
Melissa Ellis: They fly in. I think they don't fly every day, but I think you can get a fly in on like a Thursday and maybe out on a Monday or a Tuesday or something like that. But anyway, it's worth looking into as well. Bonseroo is another option. Mel, where are you this parkrun day? I believe. So I've got another flight. Woohoo. I am travelling again. I'm going to head to New South Wales and I think I might go to Parramatta. I think I might go and check out Parramatta. It's on the top 100 list of events and it's a Ray Farah event. So, yeah. What about you? What about you? Back at the stump?
Tony O'Connell: Well, we're going to travel a long, long way and probably go just up the road to Inverloch, I think. Our weather in Victoria for the next couple of days is looking a little bit damp. You might have heard we have a lot of bushfires burning down here at the moment. There's a couple of towns have actually been evacuated and the same towns also have a flood alert issued for Wednesday. So they're going to go from bushfires to floods in a week. So I think we might stay a little bit close to home.
Melissa Ellis: Sounds like a good idea, Tony. Stay off the roads and stay safe. Now, we also want to wish a very happy birthday to our host with the most, Mr Oliver Spake, who is celebrating a big milestone this coming Saturday. He's got a parkrun birthday. And all the best, Ollie. We hope you have a great day after parkrun with your lovely family.
Tony O'Connell: Yes, and enjoy all the celebrations. Happy birthday, Ollie, and enjoy the cake. And as always, you can contact us via parkrun adventurers on Facebook or on our email, which is parkrunadventurers at gmail.com. That's it for another week. We'll see you all next week for more adventures.
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