Episode 413 - Transport & Tryouts

00:00:00[intro theme playing]

Welcome

00:00:23Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III: What lovely introductory music that is. Welcome to episode 413 of the parkrun adventurers podcast, a podcast about life if your life is all about parkrun. My name is Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III, and I am coming to you from Arrernte Country. Surprise!

00:00:42Melissa Ellis: And my name is Melissa Ellis, and I'm coming to you from Wurundjeri Country. Surprise indeed. I'm not sure you were who I was expecting, Reginald, but seeing as you're here, how was your week?

00:00:54Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III: Thank you for asking, Mel. My parkrun week has been about trawling parkrun data and looking at new graphical representations of parkrun event stats. Did I invent any? No. But I do have a few things I would like to extemporise on regarding, hey, wait, what are you doing with the volume slider?

00:01:10[intro theme playing]

00:01:13Melissa Ellis: How about we get a real person to join me this week? Let's just dial somebody up quickly.

00:01:18Peter Pohlman: Hi, Mel. Thanks for having me. Hi, folks. This is Peter here, and I'm coming to you from the lands of the Pamelong Country on Awabakal Country in Newcastle, which is in the second greatest state of Australia.

00:01:37Melissa Ellis: Oh, thank you for joining me, Peter Pohlman. Welcome to the parkrun adventurers podcast host chair.

00:01:44Peter Pohlman: Yes. I hope the boys are sufficiently surprised.

00:01:48Melissa Ellis: I hope we didn't boost it up too high.

00:01:50Peter Pohlman: Or just made.

00:01:53Melissa Ellis: Yes, so you've appeared on the podcast before, I would imagine?

00:01:58Peter Pohlman: Yes, there was something, I think Sonja and I were interviewed like in the tens.

00:02:06Melissa Ellis: Wow, you go way back.

00:02:10Peter Pohlman: Yes. Long time back.

00:02:12Melissa Ellis: Thank you for joining me and filling in today. It is typical for us to first address how our parkrun weekend was. So would you like to tell us all about your last parkrun day?

00:02:24Peter Pohlman: Yes, our guests first. This week, Sonja and I adventured to the lands of the Dharug people and we went to Galston parkrun. It's a lovely course for a walk with loads to see. And I'd like to go back and run it one day. There's a hill. And you get to do it three times, but you get to make plans and you get to get better because, you know, the first time sucked, but the second time you know what's coming. It's a very satisfying event because it's a multi-lap course. I got 11 medals on Strava, so that's very exciting. The parkrun itself is in Fagan Park and it features gardens of the world. And they are spread throughout the park and you pass several gardens on course. So excluding repeats because you go around lots. You pass the African, Mediterranean, Japanese, Australian, English, Dutch, South American, North American and Chinese gardens. A tip... for attending is there is paid parking $6.50 if you park in the car parks it's an all-day pass so you can stay all day if you wish you collect it from the ticket booth and then pop it on your windscreen we got to be a good ticket fairy and pass it along to someone who arrived just as we were pulling out if you'd like to see what the course itself looks like you could head over to the uh what's it called the Aussie parkrun tourism bracket unofficial Facebook group uh and you'll uh you'll see the start finish area where we took our video and you'll see Catherine broader waving in the background she was tail walking

00:03:58Melissa Ellis: So that's a video you've done recently.

00:04:01Peter Pohlman: Yeah, when we were there, we did a little video recap. We've done about 90 videos now, Sonja and I, in the tourism group. 90? Yeah, I had a check. We started way back in 2015, and our first video was when we toured to Kirra.

00:04:17Melissa Ellis: That's massive. 90. I actually know Galston. I did Galston and I reference this all the time. But when I came up for the longest.

00:04:26Peter Pohlman: The longest run.

00:04:26Melissa Ellis: The longest run. Yeah. Galston was one of the events and I fell in love with it. Although it's got a really annoying hill that you have to do three times. Yeah. It's beautiful. Like manicured ornamental gardens. Just divine.

00:04:40Peter Pohlman: Yes. And three toilet blocks. Oh. What's not to like about toilet blocks? Yeah. Very good.

00:04:48Melissa Ellis: Yes.

00:04:48Peter Pohlman: How was your parkrun day? Where did you go?

00:04:51Melissa Ellis: Well, I was at event 320 at Brimbank parkrun on the lands of the Wurundjeri people on what was my 11th parkrun anniversary to the day. I did check my records and I had, in fact, only run Brimbank officially once before, which was the launch day as discussed last week with TOC. The Brimbank course is one loop which in reality winds and zigzags the park with a very steep incline of about 40 metres in the second kilometre. We're amongst a crowd of 105 on the morning in the park which contains over 10 kilometres of tracks featuring open plains and rocky outcrops, majestic river red gums and the Maribyrnong River. The park itself, approximately 22 kilometres northwest of Melbourne's CBD, is located along Old Calder Highway with an entrance off Keilor Park Drive. The history of the park claims possible human habitation along the Maribyrnong about 40,000 years ago, with Europeans first settling there in the area in the late 1830s. They used the fertile river valley as stock runs, often driving the stock around the brim of the bank, thus the name of the park, Brimbank. Interestingly, in 2016, the park implemented a pilot project to help children on the autism spectrum play more freely, creating a digital script, showing items and sights they would encounter at the park this was designed to alleviate anxiety particularly when moving from one place to another and was designed alongside autism advocacy organisation amaze now this was only my Saturday parkrun day Peter and we will hear more about my Sunday parkrun day a little bit later showing off aren't you two parkruns a weekend

Launches and anniversaries"Where is the cake?"

00:06:38Peter Pohlman: So having a browse about the place, notice my smooth segue there. It doesn't appear that there are any local or international launches this past parkrun day. Perhaps one launch, but their results are still pending. So we shall keep shtum about that. I know that there's a US event coming up soon, but it doesn't start until March. So we'll leave that for when Simon comes back from Japan.

00:07:03Melissa Ellis: Interesting. And probably still that Christmas hangover delay with the launches there, I am guessing. But where there isn't a hangover is in the Antipodes, because there were 10 Antipodes. Australian events that broke their attendance records this week, and assuming that all the data has been loaded. In New South Wales, we have Armidale three weeks in a row, breaking their course record. Rouse Hill and Menai, both in their fourth week in a row of records, plus Galston.

00:07:37Michael Blain: Double woo-hoo.

00:07:38Melissa Ellis: Galston, where are you? Where are your good self? Lawson and Maury. Over in South Australia, we had Gawler and Kate Reed from Tassie. In Queensland, Charleys Creek cracked a record. Is that a joke? No.

00:07:52Peter Pohlman: No. Charleys Creek cracked a record.

00:07:56Melissa Ellis: Okay. I thought cheek and crack. I'm just kidding.

00:08:02Peter Pohlman: Oh, you've got to leave that in.

00:08:04Melissa Ellis: I thought you were trying to trick me up there. Anyway, coinciding with Melon Fest. I saw a video of Melon Fest. People walking along throwing watermelons on big plastic sheets, Peter.

00:08:17Peter Pohlman: They have giant tarps and they pull ropes and you smash melons and these are all the dud melons that don't go anywhere. They're all too small, too large, too old, too fat, too whatever. But why... They're all the leftover melons. Chinchilla's a huge melon growing area.

00:08:35Melissa Ellis: So it's just fun. Is it a competition?

00:08:38Peter Pohlman: They have competitions within it.

00:08:40Melissa Ellis: Yeah, okay.

00:08:40Peter Pohlman: So it's about three days and it's all about watermelons.

00:08:45Melissa Ellis: Okay. And this draws a crowd, obviously, because they're...

00:08:48Unidentified speaker: Huge.

00:08:49Melissa Ellis: Huge in Chinchilla. Okay. Well, every day's a school day.

00:08:53Peter Pohlman: And then we had Victoria with one event.

00:08:56Melissa Ellis: Oh, yes, Cascades on Clyde.

00:08:58Peter Pohlman: Good on them.

00:08:59Melissa Ellis: Good on them.

00:08:59Peter Pohlman: I should stop mugging for the camera because they can't see this.

00:09:03Melissa Ellis: You're very animated. There's lots of arm waving and things. Anyway, no, good job. Anyway, what have we got next, Peter?

Emails

00:09:13Peter Pohlman: I think we've got email. You've got mail. So this week we have an email from Michael Blain. Thank you very much, Michael. And I'll take a deep breath. Here we go. Good morning, Mel, TOC, Simon and Sarah and the mystery host. That's moi. Thanks, as always, for another interesting event. Today, Sunday, I was driving over to Des Connor Park Junior parkrun, listening to episode 412. And lo and behold, after Sir Reginald's segment about Funnel Managers and Number Checkers, you started talking about our little juniors event on the suburbs of Ashgrove in Brisbane. Des Connor Junior parkrun is one of the ovals of Marist College Ashgrove in the inner west of Brisbane. Des Connor was an old boy of the college who was a talented rugby player and ended up representing both Australian Wallabies and New Zealand All Blacks in rugby. We are thankful for the college for providing a beautiful grassed oval for us to run the 2K event on. But back to your comments. Yes, you are correct. We had over 400 juniors on the 9th of Feb. Add to that about 150 parents who like to run and are supposed to go around, that's in all caps, around the funnel. There is quite a challenge for our Funnel Managers to keep things orderly before and inside the funnel. We have more than one Funnel Manager. We now roster five Funnel Managers. I did not know we were such rule breakers. Separately, we have at least 10 marshals rostered each week for supervision purposes out on the course. So keeping marshals separate from the Funnel Managers is important. We usually have a lead Funnel Manager that organises everyone else around the funnel. We have recently increased our ranks of FMs. I assume that's Funnel Managers. Could be something else. To cope with our New Year's surge in participants, which has come early this year. Each year, our numbers usually peak in late March or April as school cross-country season gets underway. Not sure where we will end up this season. The core team of volunteers are experienced and well-organised, and we have a large contingent of RDs, that's Run Directors, and dedicated volunteers that come to volunteer regularly. Through this group, we spread the load so volunteer experience is positive and not overwhelming or stressful. You do need to have your wits about you though, herding the young ones through. From our group of about 10 RDs, we usually have allocated One RD plus three others in attendance each week, and this provides a great layer of support for the actual RD on the day. The funnel can be a pinch point, but it's great to see ideas flow to solve any problems we experience. So much so, we have introduced our version of a double funnel recently. It's working very smoothly. We also have a Number Checker to do the role exactly as Sir Reginald quickly alluded. They end up busy walking up and down outside the funnel as the finished token and finished token support person end up about 25 metres away from the Timekeeper. However, it keeps everything orderly and any discrepancies are easily able to be fixed. But back to today, I have arrived at the event a little bit early, finished the pod, and I've even had time to write this email. The sun is shining and no doubt we will bet another bumper crowd of happy young participants and their parents and carers. All the best, Michael Blain, bracket ED.

00:12:55Melissa Ellis: I like how Reginald has been knighted, Peter.

00:13:01Peter Pohlman: I'm like, Sir Reginald? How does a guest get that? You start off as a serf, then maybe move up through like a landholder to a lord. Hmm.

00:13:14Melissa Ellis: But, yes, and Michael is a very good adventurer himself or a prolific adventurer, I should say, as well as being the ED of Des Connor Junior parkrun. And they are, in fact, getting massive numbers. Good to have some insight in how they're coping. They've had to grow and they need a lot more volunteers than the other Junior parkruns to cope with those numbers. They're getting crazy.

Roving reports & the Channel 5 News crew

00:13:40Peter Pohlman: Well, and isn't this timely? Because we have a roving report from Des Connor Juniors this week. So shall we hear what Tracey has to say?

00:13:49Melissa Ellis: We shall. We've got two roving reports, Peter. Two Junior parkrun reports. So let's listen to them both.

00:13:50[background music]

Roving report Tracey Wood — Des Connor Park junior parkrun, Ashgrove (Brisbane)

00:14:03Tracey Wood: Good morning, parkrunners. It's Tracey in a Tutu, and I'm here at Des Connor Park Junior parkrun in Ashgrove. I was Funnel Manager today. It seemed a bit chaotic, so I've got the Event Director here, Michael Blain, and I've got the Run Director of the day, Emily Delve, here, just to tell me what went on today. Good morning, Emily. How are you?

00:14:25Emily Delve: I'm good. How are you? It was a very busy morning, 437, 8. people in total for today so record breaker record breaker in what is that the highest number we've had here at juniors that is the highest number we've had globally at juniors the highest was 432 now we've broken that

00:14:46Tracey Wood: Oh my God, that's pretty awesome. Michael, you're in the funnel, what did you see?

00:14:51Michael Blain: Oh yeah, no, it was pretty good fun. We've spent plenty of time getting organised. Seems to happen this time each year we get a bit of a peak, so we know what's coming. We might get a bit busier the next few weeks as the cross-country season heads on. But yeah, so we did a double funnel properly today with extra ropes rather than informal. And that gets you there. And we've got a great team, had some really experienced people in the funnel and worked pretty well. Someone took a video so we can help explain how it works to others.

00:15:19Tracey Wood: Yeah, I've never seen a double funnel work before. How does that work? What happens there?

00:15:25Michael Blain: So basically, instead of a single funnel of people, we put a rope down the centre to create a dual lane one. And then you put groups of 20, 30, 40 down one side. The finished token person tries and hands out the tokens as quickly as they can. And then they swap to the other side when the second queue of people. So we have some extra people at either end. And given it's juniors, we haven't gone with the card system that I've heard about in the UK. We've just got people at the one end of the queue and the other keeping them in check. We call them gatekeepers.

00:15:57Tracey Wood: Am I right in thinking that junior parkrun here, the numbers have just been broken week after week after week in the last month? Would that be right, Emily?

00:16:06Emily Delve: I think they have been. We seem to be getting more and more up here every week with obviously the 438 this week. So, yeah, it seems to be getting more and more popular as day goes by.

00:16:17Tracey Wood: And what do you attribute to the growth in this junior parkrun? I mean, it's obviously a great parkrun to come to for a kid, but what do you think?

00:16:27Emily Delve: I think it's the fact that we've got it on the school. So there's the school boys coming down. Everyone driving by will see it. And then obviously the social media presence as well on Facebook. So I think that's attributed to a lot of it.

00:16:40Tracey Wood: Excellent. Any other thoughts on this, Michael?

00:16:42Michael Blain: Well, look, Brisbane's got a good saturation of 5K events in this area. And so I think we've got a lot of people from that helping out on the volunteers, but also getting kids and grandkids to come along. The oval here is spectacular. So thanks to Marist College here, we've got a nice, beautifully turfed oval. And on a sunny day like this, what better to do than to come out? Eight o'clock, your kids are up at six anyway. So come on down, do some exercise. And I just think that whole theme of as a population, we're all... you know trying to get healthier better Olympics are coming to Brisbane in um seven years time and uh so I think that's all just coming together so made this event grow grow really well hopefully we'll get some more junior parkruns at some stage in the future and we can ease off here and share the love with others

00:17:31Tracey Wood: Beautiful. All right. Well, thank you both for talking with me. I'll leave you to it because you now have 438 tokens to sort. So good luck.

00:17:42Michael Blain: And I'd just like to add, Mel, thanks for the podcast. And I look forward to hearing who your mystery guest is this week.

00:17:50Tracey Wood: Okay. You heard it here first. We'll record in juniors. Okay. This is Tracey in a Tutu signing off from Des Connor Park junior parkrun in Ashgrove. Bye.

Roving report Daryl Smith — Eynesbury Heritage Trail Junior parkrun (as spoken; Victoria)

00:18:00Daryl Smith: Okay, I'm out at Eynesbury Heritage Trail Junior parkrun this morning, and I'm lucky enough to speak to today's Run Director, who I think might be familiar to the podcast listeners. Can you please introduce yourself?

00:18:11Melissa Ellis: Hello, Daryl. It's Mel. Thank you for volunteering today. It was really lovely to have you out there.

00:18:17Daryl Smith: Oh, thanks, Mel. It's good to be out here. It's a beautiful course, and I know the kids have a lot of fun out here, so thanks for setting it up.

00:18:24Melissa Ellis: Oh, you're welcome.

00:18:25Daryl Smith: Now, today's event was number 175, and as I understand it, you've been the Event Director since the start. Can you please tell me how it first started and why you decided to launch out at Eynesbury?

00:18:38Melissa Ellis: Okay, well, it started with the launch of Junior parkrun in Australia, I guess. Now, that was back in 2018 when parkrun Australia launched three pilot events to trial the concept in Australia, and that was Westerfolds out in Templestowe in Victoria. They also launched at Ashgrove and Cannonvale in Queensland. So I was at the launch of Westerfolds junior parkrun. I was already a pod listener. I was very excited. Scotty was the Event Director out there. And so I took my daughter out and we were a part of it on the day. And I continued to volunteer regularly out at Westerfolds over that first year. So I looked up the stats because I knew that I was going to talk to you. I volunteered 38 times in that first year out at Westerfolds Juniors. And of course, Ezra was junior parkrunning as well and enjoying her 2Ks. She was a slow adopter to the concept of 2Ks. She had the 5K concept so ingrained that it took a while for her to accept that junior parkrun was on a different day and that You didn't have to do 5Ks to get a token. But anyway, that's another story. But it was deemed a success, which was fabulous after the 12 months. And then parkrun put out an offer that they were willing to launch six more events and they invited people to put submissions, and now I had not made any secret to Scotty that I was keen to bring the junior parkrun concept to the Western suburbs of Victoria or Melbourne really out of Melbourne so I had been scouting for a course and I'm not sure if many people are aware of the fact that junior parkrun has some more restrictions with courses than a 5k parkrun would junior parkruns can't be alongside water and they can't be alongside busy main roads and that's safeguarding measures that parkrun puts in place so where I might have initially hoped or found a good course it it cut a lot of the options away

00:20:48Daryl Smith: Right, yep.

00:20:48Melissa Ellis: So we had to keep looking. Toolern Creek would have been a fabulous location and I still maintain Toolern Creek would be a fabulous location for a junior parkrun. But on a Sunday at Toolern Creek in that same location is Little Aths. So that ruled that out for us. And I had to keep looking.

00:21:07Daryl Smith: Yeah, that makes sense.

00:21:08Melissa Ellis: So then I came upon Eynesbury and the beautiful forest and I fell in love with it. Eynesbury is very close to where I live. And yeah, so I submitted to Junior parkrun and I started to reach out and find my Run Directors and build a team.

00:21:25Daryl Smith: It's a great story, Mel. And so I've been out there a few times and volunteered and had my daughter, all my kids out there actually. And it's a beautiful course and I know that they love it. So thank you for putting on this course. Now, is there anything else you want to tell me about Eynesbury Heritage Trail Junior parkrun as well?

00:21:42Melissa Ellis: Look, we've got a fabulous team of volunteers out there. And I think, like with 5K parkrun, a community's very important. And I think that gets forgotten a bit with juniors because the focus is so much just on the kids. But what I came to realise was, and especially being a tourist, I didn't really have that home parkrun community feeling. But I created that down at juniors. And we're very fortunate that... pretty much on site, only a short walk from where we run the event that we have a cafe that we can go to afterwards for coffee. And we started to build that community. We have a lot of, actually most of our volunteers, our regular volunteers don't actually even have kids. And that's a message I would love to get out to the wider community. You don't have to have a child to come along and volunteer regularly and be a part of a team at a junior parkrun. Obviously, you have to have your working with children check in the relevant authority in the States. They're all different all around Australia. We have different rules. state rules and work with children checks but as long as you've got that you can 100 come on board and be a part of a team and you'll be really welcomed and we have a lot of older volunteers as well like your parents as well nana and pa yes yeah and then and junior parkrun is Well, parkrun in general, it's just multi-generational, you know. I think that is just one of the most brilliant things about it, that interaction with children. Children can learn to speak to all different ages and everybody's just there and everybody's equal. And I think it's just undervalued in the community that it gives so much.

00:23:30Daryl Smith: And I do know that, so I know my parents love to come out there and volunteer and they always sort of fight over who's going to be at checkpoint number four, which is something unique to Eynesbury. Do you want to explain what happens at checkpoint four, Mel?

00:23:41Melissa Ellis: Yeah, so when we first set the course up, we realised that right close to where Marshall 4 stands, we have a regular puddle over winter. It is right in the middle of the path. And so I thought instead of it being You know, really being a problem, let's hero it. And I purchased a giant rubber duck and we named her Jemima because she's Jemima the puddle duck. And we floated her in the puddle and as well as highlighting the puddle. So it was more of a bit of a... I guess we tried to make it unique to us that we had the puddle and it became the puddle marshal. So yeah, and the little ones, they would love to run out and- They do enjoy it, yeah. Yeah, and check on Jemima. And I don't know who it was, if it was one of your parents, actually. We had a Marshal that would always turn Jemima around once the kid had gone past so that when they ran back, Jemima was facing them. And then if other marshals would come during the week, they'd get told off because Jemima had been turned around. So, yeah, it was just a bit of fun.

00:24:48Daryl Smith: That was definitely dad. He tells me that story that he got told off by one of the regular juniors that he hadn't turned the duck around one day.

00:24:54Melissa Ellis: Yeah.

00:24:55Daryl Smith: Oh, no, so he turned it around and then the next time he got told off because he didn't turn it around. Yeah. So I think it started that way.

00:25:01Melissa Ellis: And look, we've got a beautiful forest trail and, you know, the kids are out there enjoying nature and I just love that they can start the day and they're out in the fresh air, off their devices. You know, they play. Afterwards, Daryl, you would have seen this. When they're all finished, they all mill around. They gravitate together and they climb trees because we've got this giant log, this giant dead tree on its side right next to where we start and finish. And the kids are climbing it and playing and I just love seeing them in that natural environment.

00:25:30Daryl Smith: And you often see kangaroos out on the course as well, which is great as well.

00:25:34Melissa Ellis: You do. We've got kangaroos. We've seen foxes. There's plenty of birds. We have a swooping magpie. So magpie season for six weeks can be a little treacherous. Our turnaround marshal needs to take a bicycle helmet.

00:25:49Daryl Smith: Do you remember that?

00:25:50Melissa Ellis: Yeah.

00:25:51Daryl Smith: But no, that's good.

00:25:52Melissa Ellis: And I should say there's five junior parkruns now in Australia for our UK or overseas listeners that are maybe not aware. Of those original three, Westerfolds is the only one still going. So Cannonvale never came back. That was up in Airlie Beach. That never came back after COVID. And Ashgrove came back after COVID in a different location and was renamed as Bellevue.

00:26:17Daryl Smith: Yep.

00:26:18Melissa Ellis: So then we started and Thornton Juniors in South Australia and then a bit later Des Connor came on board.

00:26:26Daryl Smith: Perfect. It's good to have those events around the country as well, which is nice.

00:26:29Melissa Ellis: Yeah.

00:26:30Daryl Smith: Now, as I understand it, Mel, we probably haven't spoken about this yet, but I understand you're a bit of an adventurer yourself. So can you share how many parkruns you have done and how many different courses?

00:26:42Melissa Ellis: Oh, Daryl, I haven't got that ready.

00:26:44Daryl Smith: Oh, we talked about it this morning. Shh. There's 25 to go. So 475. Oh, yes. Roughly.

00:26:50Melissa Ellis: Yes, yes, yes. You're right. I've done 475. So I'm counting down this year to do my 500 and get my shirt. And I've got 235 different events. So I'm contemplating if I can manage in the next 25 events to get 15 new ones and tee up the 500 and the 250th and be a super Norman. Yeah.

00:27:13Daryl Smith: That would be amazing. I hope you get that, and I'm looking forward to coming out to see that as well. That would be great.

00:27:18Melissa Ellis: Yeah.

00:27:19Daryl Smith: Thank you. I heard it on some of the other reporters. They ask about the favourite three parkruns that you've done. Now, we don't want to talk too much about it, but what's your favourite three parkruns that you've done, Mel?

00:27:31Melissa Ellis: Are we talking 5Ks?

00:27:32Daryl Smith: You can talk anyone you like.

00:27:34Melissa Ellis: So bear in mind, guys, that I'm not a world tourist and I haven't travelled overseas. So I've done two parkruns overseas. But generally speaking, all my parkruns are within Australia. So my very favourite one is McLean Beach. That's in rural New South Wales in the town of Deniliquin. The reason I absolutely love that is because I'm a big fan of running alongside water and it runs well, along a waterway a river beautiful river with majestic river gums and it's got some boardwalk and I just fell in love with it when I was out there prior to that my favourite had been Wimmera River parkrun that is a country Victorian one in the town of Horsham much the same reason it runs along the Wimmera River and out and back course it crosses a bridge beautiful bridge the anzac bridge it is a nice bridge yep so there's a little military connection there and and again it's got the majestic gums alongside the river and I just love I'm just a very big fan of of that kind of an outlook oh a third one I don't know if I can choose a third one there's so many beautiful parkruns in the world

00:28:05[background music]

00:28:44Daryl Smith: What we can do then is we can say that you can be a little bit biased and you can choose Eynesbury as your third one and we'll run with that. So Wyndham Vale will be your fourth and that's okay.

00:28:54Melissa Ellis: Right, yes, absolutely. But I might even throw Puckett in there.

00:28:58Daryl Smith: Equal fourth then.

00:28:59Melissa Ellis: Yep.

00:29:00Daryl Smith: All right, Mel. So we were talking about Junior parkrun this morning out at Eynesbury and it was a great day today but it's also a bit of a sad day. Do you want to share what's happening today or what happened today?

00:29:10Melissa Ellis: I do. I stood down and I did my final Run Director at Eynesbury. I have obviously been there from the start. I stood down as ED at the end of the year, but I said that I would see out the roster and I was rostered today for my last stint. So I said farewell today. I said farewell as a Run Director and I got a bit emotional, as you would know, Daryl. And I appreciate that a few people that came out to be there on my last Run Director. I was emotional when I said goodbye to the volleys, less so the kids. But I guess it's the volleys that have been my family and they've come along on the journey with me. So that kind of stung the most, saying goodbye. But I'll be back. I'll be back volunteering. I only live down the road and I'll help out when they need Ross to field and I'll come back to say hi and... See, my kids grow up because, you know, I've gone on the journey with them and I want to see them continue to grow and enjoy their running like your daughter, Charlotte.

00:30:17Daryl Smith: Thank you. We might be able to get you out on checkpoint four now as opposed to being a Run Director. Yeah. All right, Mel, well, I might wrap it up here. I just wanted to say on behalf of every junior who's been out there and all the volunteers, thank you for setting up this beautiful course. I love Eynesbury and so I just want to say thank you for all you've done for Junior parkrun and for us as well. So thank you.

00:30:30[background music]

00:30:37Melissa Ellis: Thanks, Daryl.

00:30:41Unidentified speaker: Music

00:30:46Melissa Ellis: And thank you very much to Tracey in a Tutu bringing us the news live from where it was all happening out at Des Connor. World record, Peter. 438 kids. Oh, my Lord. I can't imagine.

00:31:02Peter Pohlman: No, I even saw it on Channel 7 News.

00:31:05Melissa Ellis: It was. The video of that has been going around. We were a bit unsure if it was going to be official. We did some Googling to see.

00:31:16[crosstalk]

00:31:16Peter Pohlman: Must be official.

00:31:17Melissa Ellis: I saw it on the news. It was on the news. Is it on Wikipedia yet? I don't know. We believe that Bushy Jr.'s was the previous world record holder. And that was the news coming out from Des Connor that they broke Bushy's previous record of 432. So I'm guessing we'll find out if it's incorrect.

00:31:39Peter Pohlman: If anyone would know, they would know.

00:31:40Melissa Ellis: Yeah. Anyway, so thank you very much, Tracey. And, yeah, Michael, wow, you got your record. I hope it doesn't get too much bigger. I really do feel for those volunteers trying to herd all those cats. I mean, it's fabulous. But it's a very big job and a very big responsibility for all those volunteers there at Juniors.

00:32:03Peter Pohlman: I've done funnel management at beaches on a day of 644, but they were 99% were adults. And that was hard enough. Doing 400 kids plus parents who, the parents are the ones who don't listen. Yes. Juniors listen. Parents don't listen. Anyway.

00:32:22Melissa Ellis: Moving on. Trying to keep all those parents out the funnel. That'd be fun. Anyway, yes, we also had Daryl interviewing me. And that, I would like to say, was Daryl Smith. He is the ED out at Wyndham Vale parkrun. It was his request to do a little interview with me as it was my final RD down at Juniors. I got sad. I got very emotional when I did my volley brief. Absolutely.

00:32:48Peter Pohlman: You can always go back. I'm sure they'll have you back one day for a guest appearance.

00:32:52Melissa Ellis: Absolutely. I'll be back to volunteer regularly.

Dazza's

00:32:55Melissa Ellis: Anyway, it's time to move on to Dazza's. And this week, Dazza was all about Valentine's Day and telling us who or where your love was this past parkrun day. And first in the door this week was Stephen Cox and his arse. Did you write that, Peter?

00:33:16Peter Pohlman: Bad luck, Stephen.

00:33:17Unidentified speaker: Oh.

00:33:18Melissa Ellis: I'm kidding. I'm kidding. I'm not. Australian Standing Stones parkrun. And he said, hi, Dazza, kicked some ass this morning at parkrun. And he's got in brackets, Australian Standing Stones parkrun. Turned out it was their second birthday and their 98th event, it is a tough little two lapper I've done 71 different locations now and it's definitely in my top three toughest 128 metres of elevation gain plus it's one of the highest altitude events but great morning now for the five hour road trip home and there was a picture of Stephen holding the event core flute in front of the standing stones Now, someone else has done Dazza's this week, and I noticed that we're not saying selfie frame. We're saying event core flute. Peter, are you making a statement? It's what it is. It's the event core flute. Do we not colloquially call it our selfie frame?

00:34:16Peter Pohlman: Perhaps we also colloquially call it the event core flute.

00:34:19Unidentified speaker: Yeah.

00:34:21Melissa Ellis: Must be a New South Wales thing.

00:34:23Peter Pohlman: It must be someone who hates putting it in his car. They're so awkward to carry around because they're so fragile and flimsy. And if you put a frame on them so they're sturdy, then they take up so much space in your car. They're a complete pain in the bot bot. Just to say you don't have to use the little buzzer.

00:34:41Melissa Ellis: What?

00:34:42Peter Pohlman: The censoring thing.

00:34:42[crosstalk]

00:34:43Melissa Ellis: Oh, but thank you. I appreciate that.

00:34:46Peter Pohlman: As opposed to Stephen Cox, who just had to say arse. But anyway.

00:34:50Melissa Ellis: I did notice an event recently. I picked up their selfie frame slash event core flute, and it was really sturdy. And what they'd done is they'd glued the previous version, because every time we get a new presenting partner, we have to, everybody gets a new event core flute. But they glued them together to make them more stable. I thought that was very clever. Yeah.

00:35:12Peter Pohlman: Speaking also of clever, we have the lovely M. Nico at Kirra. Hers was very simple. It said 250 volleys and cake. And it was a picture of M in her witch's outfit celebrating Kirra's 13th birthday.

00:35:26Melissa Ellis: So they had a dress-up theme out there, I'm guessing.

00:35:29Peter Pohlman: I imagine it would have been like Friday the 13th, you know, insert witch's cackle here kind of thing.

00:35:35Melissa Ellis: Fabulous. Right, next in the door, we had Ingrid Paris. Ingrid wrote that she was RD at Dolls Point after some time away, was presented with their new Token Sorting board organised by Queen of Innovation, Anna, and the legendary woodworker, Andrew. There was a picture of a laser-etched sorting board with hooks under groupings of token numbers for helping to sort the finished tokens. That'll come in very handy, I'm sure.

00:36:02Peter Pohlman: I hope they enjoy it. Margie Lewis was at Port Macquarie. You'll never know who you'll meet at parkrun. And pictured was a parrot sitting on a perch inside a puppy walking pram.

00:36:14Melissa Ellis: Gosh, chickens, parrots. You never know what you'll find in a pram. Now we had next Mark Hibbard. We've been hearing a bit from Mark Hibbard lately, and he was at Grahamstown Aquatic Centre parkrun, Medowie. He said, parkrun away for my 28th wedding anniversary on Valentine's Day at Port Stephens Koala Sanctuary, parkrun at Grahamstown Aquatic Centre parkrun, Medowie, as I already said. And there was a picture of Mark in his adventurers shirt in the event core flute with Heather Hunter also posting in Dazza's that she was... Now, who do we talk to about using a capital P for parkrun, please?

00:36:56Unidentified speaker: Mark?

00:36:57Melissa Ellis: Are you picking on our adventurers? Peter Pohlman, stand down.

00:37:00Peter Pohlman: I'm picking on Mark only at this particular juncture. I'm not picking a fight with everyone. Just Mark, mark next lowercase p please thank you one one word uh Sue Davies was at George Town, which is in the lovely Tasmania hashtag love parkrun a beautiful course along the tamar river short and sweet next we heard from Andrea Booth coming to us from bateman's bay parkrun I'm noticing very New South Wales centric events here I picked things that had love in them.

00:37:31Melissa Ellis: Right.

00:37:32Peter Pohlman: It was all about the love. So I picked all the suckholes who used love and followed the theme. They got rewarded.

00:37:40Melissa Ellis: Andrea said, hi, Dazza. I've had a lovely week exploring the south coast of New South Wales. And this parkrun day, I visited Batemans Bay parkrun. I had the pleasure of meeting Brendan and Em from Shellharbour, who were very encouraging out on course. Thank you. And there was a photo of Andrea in her adventurers shirt with Brendan and Em.

00:37:58Peter Pohlman: in the event core flute and speaking of love Brendan replied and said Andrea we had a lovely morning and we both loved sharing some zoomies with you out on course I love parkrunning with em and she loved running a new PB bateman's bay parkrun oh good job em

00:38:19Melissa Ellis: Okay, we also heard from Gareth Arnold and he is in the Netherlands. He said, let's go with hashtag love parkrun and the love heart emoji with a visit to Zegerplas parkrun in the Netherlands this morning. Or Zagaplas or Zukaplas or I don't know, Plas. Quite a bit colder than Perth. And there was a photo of Gareth jumping above the pop-up with the water in the background. But Peter, no sign of Budgie. Hmm. Mysterious.

00:38:53Peter Pohlman: That's a problem.

00:38:53Melissa Ellis: It is a problem. Now, can I just ask, Peter? Yes. Is there another word for the event pop-up that I'm unaware of?

00:39:00Peter Pohlman: No, no, that's an event pop-up.

00:39:02Melissa Ellis: Okay, thank you.

00:39:02Peter Pohlman: Because it's made of pop-up. That's an official material. I have one more from Dazza's, if I may. Yes. Rodney Glossop from Eden. Oh, you stitched me here. I don't know how to say that.

00:39:19Melissa Ellis: They say Edinburgh. Edinburgh Oval. That's not Edinburgh. Oh, we've had this conversation on the pod before. They say Edinburgh Oval.

00:39:28Peter Pohlman: All right, welcome Rodney. G'day Dazza, long time listener and first time stopping in for a chat after finally joining the club. Your last podcast inspired me to sign up, bringing back memories of the time I dressed up as Freddie Mercury for a Kings and Queens themed event. Yesterday, I was joined by parkrun adventurers' newest member, Hadley and family, at, insert name, Oval parkrun, for a Friends 250th event. Plenty of, I assume there was an emoji there, that might have been love. I'm not sure. Photo evidence of Rodney dressed as Freddie Mercury.

00:40:05Melissa Ellis: Yes. And Rodney was, he was the Run Director, I believe, on the day we had Palm over at the University of WA. So it's nice to hear from Rodney. We haven't heard from him before, as he stated, first time stopping in for a chat.

00:40:21Peter Pohlman: So welcome. Well done, Rodney.

the Obi Award — Brendan Scholarly

00:40:24Peter Pohlman: We reward the love. And insert drum roll for the Obi.

00:40:33Melissa Ellis: Yes. Do you have an Obi-lob?

00:40:36Peter Pohlman: Ah, hang on. Just destroying everyone's EQ filters. Moving on. It's Brendan for sharing the love back. Well done.

00:40:54Melissa Ellis: Applause. Hooray. Yay. And that's Brendan Scholarly, of course, coming to us from, where was he? Batemans Bay with the lovely Em and Andrea Booth. And I love it when our adventurers meet. It's really nice. Now, what is coming up next?

Club Corner

00:41:11Peter Pohlman: Well, we don't have any more emails for me to read, thank goodness, but we do have Reginald, like clockwork. Our clockwork-powered friend is seeking to start a conversation.

00:41:15[background music]

00:41:28Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III: This is Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III, with Club Corner, where we talk about the what and why of parkrun clubs, and I am coming to you from Arrernte Country. This week we are having a conversation starter topic, and that topic is transport. How do you get to parkrun? Let's start with the basics as covered by every course description page, getting there by public transport, getting there on foot, and getting there by road. When adventuring, I am a big proponent of public transport, but sometimes it can be tricksome, especially in Queensland with 7am starts. On foot is awesome if you like a warm-up before parkrun, or if you snag one of those great camping spots a stones throw away from the event start. I would anticipate that travelling by road is the most frequent mode of travel for most, even when staying local at your home event. And here comes the conversation part. What is the most envious way you have heard about for getting to parkrun? Would you like to arrive by water? By kayak, canoe or boat? Are you in the Northern Hemisphere? Can you arrive by skate or ski? Or snowmobile? Does anyone have desires of soaring like a bird and heading to parkrun by plane, balloon or parachute? Maybe parkrun South Africa could partner with the Department of Transport for Transport Month 2025 this coming October. It is the 20th anniversary of the 2005 declaration from the Transport Lekotla. Well, my work here is done. I have derailed whatever it was that Mel and co thought that this segment was going to be about, so stay tuned for our future Club Corners. If you have more ways to derail the pod, drop them a line at parkrunadventurers, one word, at gmail.com.

00:43:22Melissa Ellis: And thank you to Sir Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III. Trying really hard to get some engagement there, Peter. Trying hard to engage our listeners with some stories and create some content for us. Appreciate that, Reginald. Thank you very much. But what about yourself, Peter? Have you got a transport story for us?

00:43:44Peter Pohlman: I'll be good and I'll obey Reginald. And I actually do have some transport stories. In fact, just this very week, I experienced something new. We caught a vehicular ferry on our way to Galston. So we've never done that before. And apart from that, our two best transport adventures, we've caught an overnight train from Newcastle to Melbourne. We did that as a family. There were $1 fares for the kids. And we went down for the launch of Gardiners Creek to support a friend.

00:44:19Melissa Ellis: Gardiners Creek? I remember that one.

00:44:21Peter Pohlman: Yes. Yeah, yeah, you were at that.

00:44:23Melissa Ellis: Yeah, I was.

00:44:24Peter Pohlman: And, you know, it was like 16 hours. There was a heat wave condition. So the train was limited to like 90k an hour instead of 160k an hour. And the clock just kept ticking and ticking. And eventually we got there and we were 30 minutes early. So it was good. And the other best adventure we had was we did an overnight drive from Warwick in the greatest state, aka Queensland, from Warwick in Queensland down to Lakeview parkrun in Newcastle. That was to celebrate my 50th parkrun with some other friends who were also celebrating their 50th, so um Sonja and I we bundled the kids in the back of the station wagon it was about uh half 10 11 o'clock and headed south for an eight hour drive overnight and we got there about 45 minutes before the event so I had a little kip in the back of the car and then jogged down to the start finish line and stood on the picnic table and we all had our cheers and applause and Then we did parkrun. Then we stayed overnight and went back to Queensland in daylight hours on Sunday.

00:45:33Melissa Ellis: Wow. There's some good stories there. I do hear of people getting on the Spirit of Tasmania on an overnight voyage across from Victoria. That'd be great. And then trying to get to Devonport parkrun. I don't know that I would be willing to risk that because you can never know if there would be a delay on the voyage and you might miss the start. Or it can be tricky, can't it, when things are out of your control. So my story, I suppose, one time in Singapore, my only event in Singapore was We tried to get an Uber from the hotel to take us out to West Coast Park parkrun. The concierge was very blasé in saying, oh, yes, I'll just call you an Uber. And none of the Uber drivers wanted to accept a fare that went in the opposite direction to the airport. So I was getting very stressed and panicky. But we did get one eventually and we did make it in time.

00:46:38Peter Pohlman: Excellent.

00:46:38Melissa Ellis: Can be tricky.

00:46:39Peter Pohlman: Get that flag for your world tourist badge.

00:46:42Melissa Ellis: Yeah, the one and only. Well, I have a New Zealand one now, I guess.

00:46:48Peter Pohlman: That's three countries. It is. I think you need four to join the special little club, don't you? So I'm told. La-di-da.

00:46:56Melissa Ellis: Anyway.

Consolidated Club Report

00:46:58Melissa Ellis: It's time for my favourite part of the pod, Peter. It's the adventurers Consolidated Club Report for Saturday, the 15th of February, 2025. Now, we've got to get the drum roll ready again. Of a total of... 752 members... 547 took part on this day in 10 countries across 287 locations. In the UK, there were adventurers at 54 events. We had seven in South Africa. We had three in Japan and the USA, two in Italy and one each in Ireland, Netherlands and Sweden. Locally, we had adventurers at... 55 events in New South Wales they got the gold they pipped the UK this week Queensland came in third with 47 then the greatest state on 43 22 in Western Australia don't laugh 18 in South Australia, 13 in Tassie, the ACT and the North Island had seven. The South Island had three and there were none in the Northern Territory.

00:48:00Peter Pohlman: So I will confess every week when you read this out and I hear the greatest state, I always go in my head, that's the wrong state. That's not Queensland. You've already said Queensland. Anyway, moving on.

the Frond — Grahamstown Aquatic Centre, Medowie (nine adventurers, largest Australian frond); Valentine's Park, UK and Treviso, Italy (four each, largest international)

00:48:16Peter Pohlman: Internationally, we had Biggest Fronds. We had four people each at Valentine's Park in the UK and Treviso in Italy. Italy. And they were, just to name names, we had Colleen, Rhiannon, Kat and Nigel. They were at Valentine's. And we had Debbie, Andy, Andy and Linda at Treviso or Treviso Park. I'm embarrassing myself now.

00:48:45Melissa Ellis: So hang on, hang on, hang on. Back up. I just wanted to say I would assume that people went to Valentine's Park in the UK because it was Valentine's Day the previous day. Oh, well done. So, yes. But I googled Treviso, if that's how you say it. Yes. In case it had some sort of loving significance.

00:49:07Peter Pohlman: And?

00:49:08Melissa Ellis: Unless you love tiramisu, it does not.

00:49:11Peter Pohlman: Ah. Ah.

00:49:13Melissa Ellis: It is the home birthplace of Tiramisu.

00:49:16Peter Pohlman: Well, that's disappointing from our Italian people. They should have tried harder for something romantic. Unless, of course, they love Tiramisu.

00:49:25Melissa Ellis: I don't think there's a Trevi Fountain parkrun.

00:49:28Peter Pohlman: No, that'd be a very smaller one, fountain that's that's not very big now and now they've got platforms and scoops and and glass and it'd be cool if you ran past it oh I think if you run in there the uh giardia really give you a stick like that's not what you want for valentine's day

00:49:48Melissa Ellis: Okay. All right. Moving on to the pilgrimage. Again, no one at Bushy.

Dad joke

00:49:54Melissa Ellis: But, Peter.

00:49:55Peter Pohlman: Well, I was going to say, what do you call a deer with no eyes?

00:49:59Melissa Ellis: I don't know, Peter. What do you call a deer with no eyes?

00:50:02Peter Pohlman: Bamb. Because it's got no eyes at the end of Bambi. See? Just Bamb. Anyway.

00:50:06Melissa Ellis: Oh, that's a dad joke.

00:50:09Peter Pohlman: That's bad. It's a dud. It's a dud joke. Change the vowel.

00:50:11Melissa Ellis: Dud.

00:50:12Peter Pohlman: How about domestically? What did we do there, Mel?

00:50:14Melissa Ellis: Oh, well, our largest frond in Australia was nine at Grahamstown Aquatic Centre parkrun, Medowie. They are getting a lot of mentions today. We had the aforementioned Mark Hibbard, Greg Stark, Adam Stone, Heather and Kevin Hunter, Abigail Hamish, Georgia and Rosalie Lukins. And we also had seven at Galston. who's also getting a few mentions today. You must have been one of them, Peter.

00:50:43Peter Pohlman: I was, as was Sonja, Catherine. Sorry, keep going.

00:50:49Melissa Ellis: There was also seven at Gainsborough Greens.

00:50:52Peter Pohlman: So I noticed that it was all about the Gs because you had Grahamstown, Galston and Gainsborough Greens. So it was like all the Gs. So now we need the Bs to finish off the BGs. Anyway, moving on. Remember, you can add the Adventurers Club as one of your five affiliations on your parkrun profile. In fact, pause the pod right now, go to your club affiliation and change it now. Do it.

Watching the Numbers

00:51:19Melissa Ellis: Now, in our new segment, which we might start calling Watching the Numbers at Birtinya Island, they had their lowest attendance to date, 246 at event six. But is it the lowest to date?

00:51:35Peter Pohlman: It's tied for their lowest.

00:51:36Melissa Ellis: Yeah, because their sequence is 461, 359, 364, 246 and 277 with 246 again.

00:51:46[crosstalk]

00:51:46Peter Pohlman: Yes, a little hiccup there.

00:51:48Melissa Ellis: But they're levelling, aren't they? They're levelling. We're taking a keen interest. We're following along. We'll just see, you know, have an affinity with them. But you know what we forgot to say?

parkrun adventure challengelistener challenge

00:52:01Melissa Ellis: I think we were going to mention another listeners' challenge, weren't we? Oh. It was above in the notes. It was a listener challenge transport. Or is that not a Dazza's challenge?

00:52:11Peter Pohlman: Maybe it could be a Dazza's challenge. A listless challenge. Honestly, people, we need content. Come on. Help us out here. We're dying. Come on. I'm dying.

00:52:21Melissa Ellis: So thinking about Dazza's.

00:52:25Peter Pohlman: I've done pod notes for one week, people. God, this is hard. Help the lady out.

00:52:32Melissa Ellis: Now, in your Dazza's post, I propose that you let us know how you got to parkrun.

00:52:38Peter Pohlman: Yes. Not like the whole turn left, turn right, turn left, turn right. But, you know, what adventure did you have?

00:52:45Melissa Ellis: Potentially something interesting.

00:52:48Peter Pohlman: Did you go on Shanks' Pony? Did you catch a bus?

00:52:50Melissa Ellis: We should challenge the listeners to get public transport to parkrun, Peter.

00:52:55Peter Pohlman: Oh, yeah. I'd be in for that.

00:52:57Melissa Ellis: Do something different. Safely, though. Yes. Please.

00:53:00Peter Pohlman: How about you safely go to parkrun the way you don't normally go to parkrun? Or even if you carpool, get a friend to pick you up. Who knows?

Sign-off

00:53:08Melissa Ellis: Anyway. Yeah. Anyway, what's next? What are we looking forward to? What have you got to look forward to, Peter?

00:53:15Peter Pohlman: Next week, this coming parkrun week, I'm going to be up in southeast Queensland visiting family. But I'm actually not sure where I'm going. I'm actually in the middle of my longest tourism streak ever. I'm at 15 question mark. I've got quite a few. It's my longest ever. I'm stunned. Anyway, so maybe I'm going to go to the new iteration of Gainsborough Greens parkrun, which will now be known as Gainsborough Parklands parkrun. I'm waiting to see if it's going to restart at one or if it's just going to roll on and they're just going to change the map.

00:53:55Melissa Ellis: It'd have to start at one. My understanding of how these things work is that if it is roughly in the same location, it will...

00:54:04Peter Pohlman: I'm betting it stays the same and they've just changed the name and changed the location. That's what they've done in the UK. HQ is consistently inconsistent. Let's be polite.

00:54:15Melissa Ellis: Really? Because when, was it Murray Bridge that closed down? It was, wasn't it? In South Australia.

00:54:20Peter Pohlman: Oh yeah, Jindabyne. Went Jindabyne, Jindabyne, Jindabyne. And they started again, but then they went back to the other ones when they went back to Jindabyne.

00:54:28Melissa Ellis: Yeah, but when they went back, they were pretty much on the original course. So that's understandable to pick up that. But the other Jindabyne, the second one, that was quite a different, completely different location.

00:54:40Peter Pohlman: Absolutely. And so is this. But anyway, moving on.

00:54:45Melissa Ellis: We wait with anticipation.

00:54:47Peter Pohlman: How about you?

00:54:48Melissa Ellis: Where am I going to be? I don't know. How exciting and engaging is that? But what I do know is I'm going to head over to the southeast. And I am going to run an event over there. Have not decided where yet. Potentially somewhere very close to where my daughter lives. So out in the Casey region.

00:55:08Peter Pohlman: Excellent idea.

00:55:08Melissa Ellis: Maybe Pakenham. If I'm going to pick up my grand doggy, I might go to Pakenham. Or if I'm going to not do that, I'll decide if I want to give Dave some hills or not. It's still under consideration.

00:55:21Peter Pohlman: Somewhere over there on the map.

00:55:23Melissa Ellis: Yeah, I've got a lot of faves out there and got a lot of friends who I could catch up with. So that's still all to be worked out.

00:55:29Peter Pohlman: Well, next week we'll return to some regular hosts. We've got Mel and TOC back on the roster. Thank you, folks. It's been fun to step in, albeit briefly.

00:55:41Melissa Ellis: You're pre-empting me to say thank you for joining me, Peter.

00:55:45Unidentified speaker: You're welcome.

00:55:46Melissa Ellis: You've done a stellar job. You're a natural. I'd like to thank myself. You got me giggling and that's the most important thing. But yes, thank you very much. I appreciate you standing in as our mystery guest. We had a bit of fun with that. Hopefully we'll hear from you again in the future.

00:56:01Peter Pohlman: My pleasure.

00:56:01Melissa Ellis: But everybody, as always, you can contact us via parkrun adventurers on Facebook or our email, which is parkrunadventurers at gmail.com. That's it for another week and we'll see you all next week for more adventures.

00:56:05[outro theme playing]

00:56:27Alice: It's free, it's free, it's free.