Episode 417 - Baby Brain is Real

00:00:00[intro theme playing]

Welcome

00:00:23Simon Mackley: Welcome to episode 417 of the parkrun adventurers podcast, a podcast about life, if your life is all about parkrun. I'm Simon Mackley, and as always, I'm coming to you from Quandamooka Country.

00:00:37Sarah Jefferson: And I am Sarah Jefferson, coming to you from beautiful Noongar Boodja, which is Noongar Country. [Noongar: "Noongar country"]

00:00:42Simon Mackley: Massive welcome back and congratulations to you and Matthew Stevens on the birth of Hadley.

00:00:50Sarah Jefferson: seven weeks old already um yeah how many parkruns has she done Sarah I love that um we're starting with this question Simon um so out of her seven weeks earthside she has been to and completed six parkruns either on my chest or matt's chest and she has slept through each and every single one of them the first week we took her to parkrun she was only 15 days old I do feel very fortunate that I was well enough to sort of walk the 5Ks 15 days after giving birth. And I do understand that that's not possible for everybody. On this day, though, we did have to wake up at 5 o'clock in the morning to get it fed, dressed as well as ourselves, which is crazy given that we actually went to the closest parkrun to home. And I was thinking to myself, my goodness, how much my life has changed. So, yeah, it's definitely becoming a little bit easier as time goes on. But baby brain is definitely a thing. So please be nice tonight. No curly questions just yet. But you've also, since we've heard from you last, you've also lived through a cyclone and obviously survived through a cyclone. So how's everything going?

00:02:06Simon Mackley: Well, on a personal side of things, we fared pretty well. We had a little bit of minor flooding at the back door and throughout the lawn, which softened the ground around the roots of a big tree that we had at the front of our house, which we've now had cut down. because it started falling forwards into a blank space. So if it had fallen, it would have just landed on nothing anyway, apart from the grass. My brown pool is now crystal clear again, and we swam in it yesterday, so it's all good. But from a Redland Bay and surrounds, there's a lot of parks closed, which leads me into where I was last week and why they were closed. So I'm going to jump into that. So I was at Wynnum parkrun event 601. It was a record breaking day with 561 participants and 19 volunteers. There are a lot of parkruns closed in southeast Queensland and I'm sure northern New South Wales as well. It meant that there was a lot of parkrunners who were not going to let another parkrun day pass without participating. I ran with one of my workmates who was testing out his knee after he's had an injury. So it was an easier run for me and no reason to push. Yeah, where were you, Sarah?

00:03:21Sarah Jefferson: Just firstly, Simon, I'm sure you really appreciated getting back out to parkrun.

00:03:25Simon Mackley: Oh, I did. And missing it. Like after missing two when I went to Japan, like I had one week back and then one week off and yeah, now back again. So yes, it's been a topsy-turvy last couple of months.

00:03:36Sarah Jefferson: Yes, good to be back. So this week I headed to the ninth event of Sir James Mitchell parkrun in South Perth. On this day, I was joined by seven other friends who I hadn't caught up with since having Hadley. So it was really nice. A few of us walked along the river and had a bit of a chat. So the course runs along the south side, the bank of the Durbal Yerrigan, which is a swan river looking across towards the city of Perth skyline. It's a mixture of path and grass, and there's a lot of bird life around, at times even dolphins, although I didn't see any on Saturday. It was possibly because I was too busy talking. There is a lot of parking available in this area. However, there's no bathrooms and they are working with the council to get a water fountain established at the start-finish line. There's a coffee van that they have had set up and the man said that he's going so successful that he's actually there three days a week, which is really great. We didn't stick around, though, to try out the coffee van as we headed to a local bookshop cafe for breakfast afterwards. There is also a bike path around the River Loop. So if you were staying in the city and have a bike handy, you can actually get to this parkrun by riding your bike. And you can also, if you're keen for an adventure, hop on the ferry from Perth, catch it across to South Perth and head on up. Fortunately, Saturday wasn't too hot in Perth. However, there is not a lot of shade on this course. So I could imagine in the peak of summer, it might be a really hot one. I did speak to the RD afterwards, Mike, and he said that the city of Perth actually had reached out, stating that they were keen for a parkrun to launch in this area. So it actually only took five weeks to get this event up and running, he said. So surely that's going to be one of the quickest things [Noongar: "the Swan River (Perth) — the speaker glosses it herself: "the bank of the Durbal Yerrigan, which is a swan river""]

00:05:36Simon Mackley: parkrun setup Simon I don't know what you think five weeks is just yeah ridiculous like I thought that we even had a six week lead time with um when we submit the paperwork so that's um yeah that's phenomenal but if councils are reaching out with the funding and course suggestions yeah that is awesome so that's it's great isn't it now that

00:05:57Sarah Jefferson: you know, rather than teams going to the council and approaching them and waiting for the, you know, going through all of it. It's really great that they actually came out ready. So credit to parkrun that, you know, councils are wanting this in their, you know, areas.

00:06:14Simon Mackley: Definitely. Yeah. So we had some feedback. So two weeks ago when Mel and I were last presenting, Reginald talked about some parkruns with numbers in them. I've had a few questions on that, so I need to clarify what we're actually talking about. So the four parkruns that we discussed have numerals in the name as opposed to being spelt out in numbers. So where I'm talking lake to lake, it has a two in between the lake and lake, as opposed to two rivers, which is... in New South Wales, which is T-W-O, rivers, wines, blah, blah, blah. So, yeah, just pointing out that we're talking about numerals within the name of a parkrun. Also, after the week we recorded a previous event in South Africa, which is called Root 44 parkrun, it came back on board after COVID. So, yeah, it's the fifth parkrun with numerals, with the numerals four and four in its name. I hope that now makes sense.

00:07:25Sarah Jefferson: Thanks for clarifying, Simon. So just an update on the Palm Facebook group. So Simon and I are not going to be giving too much of an update on Palm. We'll leave that to Mel and TOC. However, there is a messenger group called palm25 event posts and queries. It now currently reflects all of the people who have let us know that they will be in attendance for Palm this year. So some people who have been to Palms previously, have actually been removed from that group as it will be the important place on the weekend of where all of the timely information will be posted. So if you are going to Palm in Queenstown next month, please reach out, let us know if you are not in that group so that we can ensure that you know where to be and when to be there. So on that note, we might head to New Zealand with a little bit of information, from our correspondent over there with some stats from the 15th of March. So in New Zealand this week, there were 10,587 finishes across 55 parkruns in New Zealand supported by 902 volunteers, the largest being Hagley with 726 and the coziest was Hamilton Park Gore with 19 finishes. Lower Hutt and Millwater both set new attendance records as well.

00:08:51Simon Mackley: Yeah, it's a big spread between the biggest and the smallest, isn't it? Wow. It certainly is. Yeah. So in Australia on Saturday, the 15th of March, there were 467 events. So that's still down because of closures in southeast Queensland and northern New South Wales. There were 76,934 finishers and 5,913 volunteers. Across Australia, there were 14 events that set new attendance records. Five were in Queensland, two in New South Wales, two in WA, three in Victoria, one in South Australia and one in Tasmania. So of interest, New Farm in Queensland had their record broken after 287 weeks. So that stood since before COVID. And Charleston in SA was standing for 284 weeks. So same sort of period. Gardiners Creek record lasted just one week. So those Queensland events, with so many of them wiped out by the effects of Cyclone Alfred, there would have been a funneling effect into the open events. I can imagine Parkville in Melbourne had a huge increase of 126, which would likely be due to the Formula One Grand Prix being so close to the city. And Bibra Lake in your home state, WA, had not only a birthday, but they also set the new WA state record, which I believe was 596 participants.

00:10:30Sarah Jefferson: We're still getting some really big numbers, Simon, and some records, aren't we? I'm wondering what it is. It's quite impressive.

00:10:40Simon Mackley: It is. I mean, yeah, to have 14 events. When I say you have 14 events with new attendance records, it's just, yeah, crazy. And some of them, like the Queensland ones, I understand. Bibra Lake being a birthday show. But, yeah, there were some in there that I was like, I wonder why they, yeah, had attendance records.

00:10:57Sarah Jefferson: It definitely does seem to be week by week, though. There's just so many records. And they're not new events, right? So they're, you know, well-established events. So maybe everyone's finally catching on to parkrun and just how good it is.

00:11:10Simon Mackley: Exactly.

00:11:11Sarah Jefferson: Let's hope so. So an update on the adventurer's Buff. So if anyone's interested in purchasing one of these buffs or accessorizing for Palm, now's the time. So you might want to grab one as you head to Palm or know that we're coming into the cooler months. as well um they we don't have these in stock all year round we also don't even have a regular time that we actually do an order for these so if you are interested now is a really good time to grab one they are twelve dollars and postage is four dollars for one or for two of them larger orders are subject to the number that are purchased I know that some people who live in the same vicinity are actually pulling together to save on postage. So you can always have a think about that if you've got some friends who might be interested. And I believe that Ali Sheppard is picking up a UK order from Queenstown and then will be posting within the UK. So if you're interested, there will be a Google sheet that's going to be posted for that. So don't wait too long because they may sell out. And then I'm quite certain we are not doing another order for these. All right.

Roving reports & the Channel 5 News crew

00:12:29Sarah Jefferson: So we have one roving report this week all the way from the UK. So we'll throw to that now.

00:12:30[background music]

Roving report Ruth Perkins — Penrith parkrun

00:12:42Ruth Perkins: Good morning, parkrun adventurers. This is Ruth Perkins in the UK. And today I am reporting from a wonderful Penrith parkrun. And I thought I'd be particularly interested to record this one today because there is a Penrith Lakes in Australia. So contrast the two. We've got a beautiful sunny day today. Crisp sunny day though. It was about one degree when I woke up. So there was ice on the car, and well it's a very busy event we've got like hundreds of people around us at the moment with a few minutes till the First Timers Welcome so I'm hoping to catch a chat with somebody on the core team afterwards and tell you a bit more about this lovely parkrun around some playing fields Hello again parkrun adventurers. I have got Andrew Richardson here today and to start off at Penrith parkrun we had a wonderful First Timers Welcome. I take it that wasn't the first time you've done that?

00:13:50Andrew Richardson: No, I would say I've done it maybe for about ten and a half years to be honest.

00:13:56Ruth Perkins: Oh, wow. And I really enjoyed. You had a bit of call and react. I can't remember what the technical term is, but there were some certain phrases you said. And then it seemed like the whole of the parkrun replied to you. What kind of stuff do you get them to say?

00:14:09Andrew Richardson: I just say they know it off by heart now so they just kind of they just give it back to us you know when I'm giving them one sentence they come back to me with the you know the following sentence just like being at a concert really do you know what I mean when they're you know like Elton John gives out to the crowd and he knows what they're going to sing back to him well I'm the same really but just obviously I'm not as good looking and I'm not as famous I'm not as rich neither

00:14:32Ruth Perkins: Well, I don't know about the rich. I'm going to ignore the handsome or not question. And you have got a speaker system worthy of Elton John, it feels like here. It's impressive.

00:14:43Andrew Richardson: Oh yeah, no, no, it's a very good speaker system. It works because obviously we've got a... up to 400 people at a time sometimes, and that's including the volunteers and that. You just need to get your message out there and just keep everybody focused and listening to what you're actually saying, just in case there's any... I'm not trying to be a bit of a jobsworth here, but just in case there's anything wrong with the track, I should try.

00:15:06Ruth Perkins: No, that's really important, the safety stuff. We do appreciate that. Yeah, and it's nice if you can make it a little bit humorous as well, like you do. So I've just introduced you to a term, a passionista, because I found out that's what you are because you've never been to another parkrun, is that right?

00:15:20Andrew Richardson: That's certainly right. I'm a kind of country boy and I live in Penrith and I kind of work here and I kind of, yeah, do my charity stuff here and do my volunteering here. So, yeah, I'm just, you won't see me leave Penrith, I'm afraid.

00:15:35Ruth Perkins: Nothing wrong with that. It's absolutely beautiful today. I was really impressed with the views down the bottom end of the course. So we go past the river. What's the river called?

00:15:44Andrew Richardson: The river's called River Eamont.

00:15:46Ruth Perkins: Lovely. And what are the hills that we can see in the background?

00:15:49Andrew Richardson: You've got to the left, as we're standing now, you've got the Lakes, which is including all sorts of lake district fells. Then to the right, we've got the Pennines, which includes the Pennine Way and such like, and it stretches from... Yorkshire to you know north of Cumbria to Northumbria so yeah no it's a we're we're very lucky I don't realise what I've got here really that's all there's the way isn't it and I saw there's a big like white cloud at the top end of the course is that is it like a steam train or something no I think somebody's just having a fire in the back garden oh

00:16:30Ruth Perkins: Never mind, never mind, because there's plenty here without steam chains to work your fire.

00:16:33Andrew Richardson: There's plenty of people around here full of steam and hot air and puff. But no, definitely that's somebody just having a fire in the back garden.

00:16:44Ruth Perkins: But we have got a castle as well, I can see. Do you know much about the castle over there?

00:16:48Andrew Richardson: Oh yeah, we've got several castles around this area, yeah, we're very steeped in history really just because obviously we were very close to the Scottish borders and they used to pay us a visit every now and again just to liven us up well it wasn't just them it was just everybody to be honest so that's why the Romans decided to build a wall just to try and keep them out but it didn't always work and they're still coming over the border now to this day not that I don't mind the Scottish but we can have a bit of banter with them anyways yeah

00:17:16[crosstalk]

00:17:22Ruth Perkins: So is there anything else you would love people to know about Penrith parkrun?

00:17:27Andrew Richardson: No, it's just a nice place and it's full of friendly people and there's definitely a nice feeling as you've just found out really and there's a good bit of banter goes on, do you know what I mean? That's why I don't really go anywhere else, it kind of works.

00:17:45Ruth Perkins: So you said about doing charity work, and I heard that you mentioned that next week is a special event here at Penrith?

00:17:51Andrew Richardson: Oh, yeah. Yeah, Motor Neuron Disease Association, you know, they've got loads of volunteers, and it's kind of, you know... It means a lot to us, you know, because I was an ex-rugby player and such like, and there's many, many people, unfortunately, you know, that sport, you know, they're suffering, or they have suffered, and, you know, it's funny, Rob Burrow's last ever public event was at Penrith.

00:18:20Ruth Perkins: Oh, gosh, wow.

00:18:21Andrew Richardson: Yeah, and so you know Rob, and, you know, they just said he was such a nice guy, and, you know, so... That's why it means a lot to people around here, do you know what I mean? So, you know, anything like that we can do, we'll do, do you know what I mean? Yeah, because it doesn't cost me anything, it doesn't affect me, so we'll just do it, yeah.

00:18:42Ruth Perkins: It's such a wonderful charity event here and I've just got to say a big thank you to you and all the other volunteers for everything you do to put this on because we've really enjoyed it today, so thank you very much.

00:18:52Andrew Richardson: Yeah, no, no, that's fine. I'm glad you enjoyed it. Not all volunteers are the best, as you can see. Some of them are okay, but some maybe aren't. Look at them, just trying to put us...

00:19:03Ruth Perkins: This will be used in evidence against you. See what I mean?

00:19:06Andrew Richardson: This will be used in evidence against you, apparently. Yeah. There's a lot of banter, as I kind of told you. They like to give us a bit of stick anyways. But I'm sure they'll get it back over time anyways.

00:19:09[crosstalk]

00:19:15[background music]

00:19:15Ruth Perkins: Yeah. Thank you again so much. Thank you.

00:19:19Andrew Richardson: There you go.

00:19:28Simon Mackley: We're back from our roving report from Ruth, who was at Penrith UK parkrun. She was talking to Andrew Richardson, who was the first-time welcome giver. Passionista, my gosh. He's only done 15 parkruns, but he's volunteered 439 times at Penrith parkrun. And I loved, yeah, I love the call and return of a welcome brief or a run brief. But yeah, Penrith in the UK sounds very different to Penrith Lakes in Western Sydney.

00:20:02Sarah Jefferson: It certainly does. And it actually got me thinking, Simon, during Ruth's interview, there I'm sure would be lots of a double up of names in different locations. So I know that parkrun is, Don't name any event exactly the same. So, for example, like that was mentioned on the podcast, I think it was last week, you've got Ipswich in the UK and then you've got Ipswich Queensland in Australia. I know that there's Centennial parkrun in New South Wales and we have Centennial parkrun Dunsborough in Western Australia. So also similarly, we have Newcastle parkrun here in 2J Western Australia. I'm sure there would be a Newcastle parkrun over in the UK. I know it's Newy, for example, in New South Wales here. But I wonder if there is a club or any ideas about a club out there that where you would complete these double kind of events. So would it be like a double club or a double trouble or something like that? I hope I explained that okay as well.

00:21:13Simon Mackley: Yeah, because I know that there's four Mansfields worldwide. So there's one in the UK, there's two in Australia and one in the US. Then from helping set up Brisbane Valley Rail Trail Blackbutt, there's also Blackbutt out of Newcastle. And I'm sure there's Albert's. I saw that there was two Avondales. So there's Avondale in the UK and Avondale University in New South Wales. Yeah, so maybe doppelgangers or twin cities or twins or something like that. Yeah. Listeners, we'd love to know.

00:21:45Sarah Jefferson: It does sound like an adventurer's club. Yes. Lots of travelling and obviously lots of privilege to get to all of these different events, I guess.

00:21:53Simon Mackley: Exactly.

00:21:54Sarah Jefferson: Yeah, food for thought anyway.

00:21:56Simon Mackley: It is.

Dazza's

00:21:57Simon Mackley: All right, shall we jump into Dazza's? So this week, Dazza has said it's World Speech Day. World Speech Day was created to make way for sharing new ideas, educating others and providing inspiration as they spur on the movement towards change in the world. Did you give a speech at parkrun? Did you do the event brief or the First Timers Welcome? Come into Dazza's and give a speech on how your morning went. The kettle is on. And we were looking for wind emojis for our comments this week.

00:22:26Sarah Jefferson: So from New South Wales, we heard from Jo McLean from East Richmond parkrun. Bit steamy to run like the wind at East Richmond parkrun this morning, but still managed to smile for the photographer. No speeches. Would love an iced latte, please. And there was a photo of Jo mid-stride with a big smile on her face, making parkrun look very easy.

00:22:52Simon Mackley: And next we heard from Tim Robbins, who was at Chermside parkrun in Queensland. He said, nah, but park faffed all the way through our park walk at Chermside parkrun. And another comment, and Tracy met Spider Abdul. Now, apparently there's a bit of history between Spider Abdul. It's a soft toy with Abdul, the infamous poo suit wearer from WA, with a photo of his face with a Spider-Man body. It was taken from the University of WA parkrun by Rory Marriott to Queensland, and now it has its own Facebook page, Where's Spider Abdul? I believe the idea is that Spider Abdul will venture around and then finally make his way back to Abdul in person. So there were two photos posted, one with Tracy the troll next to the Chermside sign, as well as one next to Spider Abdul.

00:23:46Sarah Jefferson: And if anyone like me needs to see a picture to understand something, feel free to jump into Dazza's and have a look at this little soft toy. On the West Side, we heard from Gareth Arnold, who checked out Tamworth Wetlands parkrun. He said, Kaya Dazza, we went to Tamworth Wetlands parkrun where the shady trees prevented us from feeling any, I think it's wind. No speech from me, but I did talk to a couple of randoms I hadn't met before. Always good, smiley face. Here's a pic of chutney on the core flute selfie frame, which is impressively reinforced at this particular location. There was a picture of a parkrun selfie frame with Chutney, which is a soft toy covered in leopard print, which was resting on the log. So Kaya is our Noongar word, Simon, for hello. And Gareth is certainly stirring some trouble with his reference, I'm sure, to the core flute selfie frame. [Noongar: "hello — glossed on air by Sarah at [00:24:33]: "So Kaya is our Noongar word, Simon, for hello.""]

00:24:46Simon Mackley: I think he is. As we both know, Gareth, he is definitely the stirrer. So that's good to know about Kaya. Yeah, I was wondering what that actually meant. Next, we heard from Leanne Evans, who is at, I don't know if it's Hobler's or Hobler's Bridge Reserve parkrun. So she said, First Timers Welcome, Hoblers Bridge Reserve parkrun. My voice is still hoarse, so no speech now. Time for a quick long black, then off to work for a few more speeches slash handovers. And there was a photo of the 13 volunteers on the day with the selfie frame.

00:25:22Sarah Jefferson: From South Australia, we heard from Eric Banner, who was at Shiraz Trail parkrun. Spent the morning at Shiraz Trail with a few blow-ins and the wind emoji. There was a picture with Eric Banner, who was there with Andrew Johnston, Martine Barrot and Roberta Winters. So quite a few blow-ins at that.

00:25:45Simon Mackley: Next, we go across to the UK where we heard from Andy Airey. He said 28 of us made the 720-kilometre round trip from Chipping Sodbury to Barmouth in the UK to tick off a Y at Y Promenâd. A couple went for a swim in the Seven Degrees Sea after. It was a photo of the crew all rugged up, beanies and all with the event pop-up. And also very impressive to read that some of the group members took a dip in seven degrees C after the event. Some big kahunas over there in the UK this week.

00:26:20Sarah Jefferson: Agreed. And I do wonder if there's anyone brave enough to... headed to Queenstown after Palm that will be getting into the water there after the event. So I'm setting the challenge and I look forward to seeing who's up for it to go for a dip after the event. All right, back to Dazza's though. In South Africa, that is you, Simon, not me.

00:26:48Simon Mackley: No, I think it is actually your turn. It's got my name against it, but it's your turn.

00:26:53Sarah Jefferson: Sounds good. I'll take it. So we did hear from someone in South Africa this week. Jonathan Morgan from Delta parkrun took a minor 6,000 kilometre detour on my way from Australia to Kenya to visit my ninth parkrun country, eighth country volunteering at Delta parkrun. Off to Kenya tomorrow for a week, but unfortunately no parkruns in East Africa yet for next Saturday. There's a photo of Jonathan donning the blue volunteer vest in the selfie frame. Very impressive, Jonathan.

the Obi Award — Tim Robbins

00:27:26Sarah Jefferson: All right, Simon, do you have the Obilope this week?

00:27:30[background music]

00:27:30Simon Mackley: I do have the Obilope this week. And let me just open it up. The Obi goes to Tim Robbins. We also saw that Tim was volunteering at Juniors with Rory Marriott on Sunday as well. So well done, Tim. Congratulations, Tim.

Emails

00:27:58Sarah Jefferson: Moving on to emails this week. Crickets. Well, we did have one, but we're actually going to be holding that over for Mel and TOC to answer next week as it is referring to Palm. However, something that I did really enjoy, Last week was the Who Am I section that Reginald had shared as sort of a guessing, guessing a different parkrun. I had absolutely no idea coming from, not coming from, sorry, Victoria. And it's not an event that I have done. However, feel free to email in if you liked it, didn't like it, if there's any suggestions that you do have. We like receiving emails and we would love to share them with the listeners.

00:28:45[background music]

Club Corner

00:28:50Simon Mackley: And on that, we might throw across to Reginald.

00:29:00Reginald 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 time on Club Corner we are covering two roles that are very behind the scenes, but the impacts of their tasks are seen by more than those that attended the parkrun, the roles are Results Processor and Report Writer. As you would all know, when attending parkrun you need to bring your barcode, and that your barcode is scanned along with your finished token on the day by the Barcode Scanner, see Club Corner part 65, part 11 of our volunteer series. This creates a file in the virtual volunteer app, which is loaded to the parkrun server and combined with the Timekeeper file . Once all files from the various Timekeepers and Barcode Scanners are uploaded to the parkrun server, the results are ready to be processed. In most cases, the Run Director performs the task of processing the results, but sometimes it is a fresh person. If it is this fresh person, they can be designated as Results Processor in the volunteer roster. I shall not bore you with the specifics, the ticking and unticking, the colours and the rows etc. TOC has mentioned the pleasure of seeing a sea of green previously, and I shall leave his explanations stand. A role that can similarly be a burden or a pleasure is report writing. Harking from the days of ye olde timey club running, a run report was prepared so that it could be published in the local paper, parkrun skipped the local paper and formally published their own reports to the event website of each event, but in a very stylized, academic, running kind of way. This has been ceased and in Australia, most run reports are tabled to Facebook. The tone has turned from fastest and how many interest statement of affairs from the author's parkrun experience of the day. We have two more in this series on volunteer roles. One hopes that you have enjoyed this dive into the minutia of what makes parkrun tick. It really is more than a run, jog or walk in the park. And remember, in parkrun life, all non-milestone clubs are unofficial and unsupported by parkrun. So stay tuned for our future Club Corners.

00:31:12Sarah Jefferson: We are back from Club Corner. Thank you, Reginald. Simon, as a Run Director, I'm not sure that I've ever had anyone complete either of these roles on my watch. I guess, namely, because I actually haven't had anyone ask me. What about you?

00:31:29Simon Mackley: I have done the results processing one before, but that was mainly because in the early days when we had the physical scanner and the physical stopwatch, sometimes whoever was RD on the day maybe wasn't going home straight away to process and that sort of thing. So I know I've done that, I would say, more than 10 times. And at the time we had an ED, sorry, our ED wasn't very technically proficient. So quite often we would just take it and process it on their behalf. But, yeah, I can't say I've ever done the Report Writer as a separate task.

Consolidated Club Report

00:32:09Simon Mackley: All right, let's kick on into the Consolidated Club report. So the adventurers Consolidated Club report for Saturday, the 15th of March, 2025, of a total of 769 members, 572 took part on this date in 10 countries across 287 locations. Internationally, there were adventurers at 61 events in the UK, eight in South Africa, two in the USA, one in Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Japan, and Lithuania, which we don't hear from very often. Locally, we had adventurers at 56 events in New South Wales, 50 events in Victoria, 44 in Queensland. Both South Australia and Western Australia had 19. Tassie had 10. The ACT had 6. North Island, 4. South Island, 3. And none in the Northern Territory, probably because it's the weather that they're not good for running in a sauna.

00:33:13Sarah Jefferson: I'm sure that is the case.

the Frond — Mickey, Leanne, Miles and Jarvis Mansell and Alison King (largest international frond, Puarenga); Brett Crispin (largest frond, Timberlock)

00:33:15Sarah Jefferson: The largest international frond this week was on the North Island of New Zealand at Puarenga. We had the Mansell family. We had Mickey Mansell. Leanne, Miles and Jarvis Mansell and Alison King.

00:33:30Simon Mackley: Okay. And for the pilgrimage, did we have someone at Bushy? Yes, we did. Michael George went there for the very first time. And Michael is not a name that I have heard mentioned on the podcast before. So welcome, Michael.

00:33:47Sarah Jefferson: The largest frond this week is, or was at, Timberlock. We had Brett Crispin. And Simon, I'm not sure about your thinking, but I agree with Mel.

00:34:01[19 seconds of audio that could not be transcribed]

00:34:19Sarah Jefferson: And I'm sure that TOC entered this into the show notes this week, that we should be starting finds when Inverloch is mentioned. It's definitely the new one.

00:34:29Simon Mackley: Yeah.

00:34:29Sarah Jefferson: It is the new Shellharbour for sure. So that's one fine, TOC. And just to remind you that you can add the Adventurers Club as one of your five affiliations on your parkrun profile. We continue to grow. And I am going to put it out there, Simon, that by the start of May, we will be up to 800 members. So we currently have, just to recap, 769. And I guess next time we are recording, we can check in to see if we're up to 800. That's you and I recording at the same time, of course.

00:35:03Simon Mackley: Yep. Fair enough. I won't talk to anyone else about it.

00:35:08Sarah Jefferson: Great.

Launches and anniversaries"Where is the cake?"

00:35:09Simon Mackley: Alrighty. So we will crack on into launches this week. So there were two. And the first one to launch was, before mentioned, Hobblers or Hobblers Bridge Reserve parkrun, which is located in Tasmania, Australia. There were 180 participants with 15 volunteers. And interestingly, there were only seven first-timers out of that 180. It's an out-and-back flat trail alongside the North Esk River, primarily on packed gravel with a short boardwalk section. The start and finish is on grass and is close to Hoblers Bridge Reserve.

00:35:50Sarah Jefferson: We had the next launch coming to us from Berlin in Germany, Mauerweg parkrun. So there were 87 participants and 25 volunteers with 14 being first timers. So this one sounds really exciting, Simon. The run takes place along the Wall Trail south of the Berlin districts of Lichterfeld and Marienfeld. The Wall Trail is located on the former border strip of the Berlin Wall, 1961 to 1989. The start and finish are on the wall trail near Djembatabeg and the briefing will take place directly adjacent to it on a large meadow. The flat asphalt course consists of three sections. Each section departs from the start and finish areas and is run back and forth. [German: "Wall Way / Wall Trail — the route along the former Berlin Wall border strip, as the speaker then explains in English"]

00:36:38Simon Mackley: Well done with those pronunciations. Okay, in the ongoing segment that we should start calling Watching the Numbers at Patina Island, and no, I'm not going to sing it, Mel, there were 237 out of at nine, including the Belinda Fairy and Nicole Sanday. Cracking on to looking forward. So in palm related news. I am reliably informed that the Quizmaster has written all of the questions, has added most of the answers, and will pass those over to Lyndell soon. Now, as for Reginald Yardley-Pompous III, trying to cut the Quizmaster's lawn with a who am I last week, in your language, Reginald, dot, dot, dot.

parkrun adventure challengelistener challenge

00:37:27Simon Mackley: All righty. Do you want to do the listener challenge?

00:37:30Sarah Jefferson: Okay. So the listener challenge this week is that when you are posting in Dazza's, we would like you to add a number in your comments. So I guess coming back to what we mentioned before, not the word two, T-W-O, if I can spell baby brain. Told you it's a thing.

00:37:53Simon Mackley: Yep.

00:37:53Sarah Jefferson: Rather putting the actual numeral into your comments.

Sign-off

00:37:57Sarah Jefferson: Okay.

00:37:58Simon Mackley: Alrighty, Sarah, where are you going to be next parkrun day?

00:38:01Sarah Jefferson: Okay, so I'm heading back to Cottesloe parkrun. I made a conscious effort not to go to Cottesloe parkrun before we recorded the podcast and go to a different event. So I was talking about a new event, but I actually haven't been back here since I've had a baby. So taking Hadley back to meet the team, which will be nice. And it is going to be around 33 degrees. So we will be taking the shelter down to the beach and going for a swim after parkrun and making a bit of a morning of it. Simon, what about you? Where will next Saturday take you?

00:38:37Simon Mackley: I am planning to stay somewhere local because we have something on later in the day. So I'll most likely be at Scribbly Gums. I may go elsewhere depending on what's actually open over the weekend, um so yeah I guess that we won't be having a chat until palm now Sarah so uh as the week that we're due to record will be the weekend of palm and everyone will be over the ditch exploring in New Zealand so next week Mel and TOC will be back all right they will thanks Simon it was nice to catch up and

00:39:14Sarah Jefferson: 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. We'll see you all next week for more adventures. Bye. Bye.