Episode 422 - Potato, Potarto

00:00:00[intro theme playing]

Welcome

00:00:24Melissa Ellis: Welcome to episode 422 of the parkrun adventurers podcast, a podcast about life, if your life is all about parkrun. My name is Melissa Ellis, I'm coming to you from Wurundjeri Country.

00:00:36Danny Norman: And hello, my name is Danny Norman and I'm coming to you from Chessington in southwest London.

00:00:41Melissa Ellis: Surprise, everybody.

Level 2 with a View

Interview Danny Norman — Host of the With Me Now podcast; guest co-host in the comfy chair

00:00:44Melissa Ellis: Welcome to the parkrun adventurers podcast and the comfy chair, Mr. Danny Norman.

00:00:49Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III: Thank you.

00:00:50Melissa Ellis: We must explain to our listeners first off, I did say, well, I tried to say in last week's episode, I would be recording with Simon, but it's Simon's birthday today.

00:00:59[crosstalk]

00:00:59Danny Norman: Happy birthday.

00:01:00Melissa Ellis: Happy birthday, Simon.

00:01:01Danny Norman: Did you beep his name? You beat his name in the last part. I did, yes.

00:01:05Melissa Ellis: Because actually, when I recorded with TOC last week, I hadn't really thought about the fact that it was going to be Simon's birthday this very Monday. And he's turning 50. So it's a big milestone birthday for Simon.

00:01:16Danny Norman: I was going to say, is it allowed to say how old he is? So he's a cow. He's a cow in terms of human years.

00:01:23Melissa Ellis: It's a milestone.

00:01:25Danny Norman: Yeah, it is a milestone. You get a T-shirt for that.

00:01:27Melissa Ellis: And I thought he might prefer to spend it with his lovely wife and his son rather than me. So I gave him the option to have the night off, which he gratefully accepted. So thank you, Danny, for giving up two hours of your Monday morning to sit in the comfy chair.

00:01:43Danny Norman: Choosing to give, not giving up. I choose to spend the time with you. I'm happy to do that for you on this lovely Monday, bank holiday Monday morning in the UK. And do you have somebody special by your side? She's just jumped off. So before we recorded, peek behind the curtains, little Madam Dolly, my blessed Dolly. And thank you for the Dolly mention that I get in, even on this podcast. I've had a rather affectionate and clingy white cat sat right next to me while we were prepping before the recording, but she's now gone to have a bit of a nibble of her dry food. So she might come back in a second.

00:02:13Melissa Ellis: Alrighty, well, we'll jump straight into things. I've got a couple of retractions, apologies, admissions of mistakes.

00:02:22Danny Norman: I have the empathy. I get you. I have to do it every week myself, so I know how it feels.

00:02:25Melissa Ellis: Last week, I mentioned that our potty mouth bravos were in New South Wales at Tamworth Wetlands, because that is incorrect, because Tamworth Wetlands is actually over on the West Side in WA. So I will admit that correction. Now, this one isn't so much of as a correction, but more that I wanted to offer more context about Ingrid's roving report coming from Australian Standing Stones that we like to refer to as Arse parkrun. So a little bit of background.

00:03:01Danny Norman: Oh, Mel, can I just stop? Sorry to interrupt you. I find fascinating. So over in the UK, we would say ass because it's spelled A-S-S. Now, arse is A-R-S-E. But you are saying arse, not ass. And I find that fascinating.

00:03:16Melissa Ellis: Yes, you are correct.

00:03:17Danny Norman: Because the Americanization would be of ass. Are you going to have to bleep a bunch of this? But yeah, they're saying ass instead of ass. I'm surprised that you guys don't do the Americanization of it all. But there you go. Anyway, because you say data. You say data, not data. Hang on a minute. Which one is it? I'm confused. I'm confused.

00:03:38Melissa Ellis: Data. Yeah, we say data. I don't know. I just say ass. Oh, now I'm going to say ass. We like to say ass.

00:03:45[crosstalk]

00:03:45Danny Norman: Sorry to interrupt.

00:03:46Melissa Ellis: I'm confused. Don't overthink it, Danny. Gosh.

00:03:49Danny Norman: Sorry, my bad. I won't say anything more. I'll be quiet now.

00:03:52Melissa Ellis: Now, the Celtic Council. Did I say Celtic correct?

00:03:55Danny Norman: Well, here we go. So, I believe so because it's Celtic and Celt, whereas we have a football club over here in Scotland in Glasgow, or Glasgow, called Celtic. Okay. It's all very confusing. Phonemes for you, phonemes. That's what, they're very confusing. 44 of them, none of them make sense in the English language.

00:04:12Melissa Ellis: Well, basically, I'm trying to give context about these dam standing stones. And they came about because the Celtic Council of Australia chose Glen Innes as the home of the National Celtic Monument to pay tribute to Australia's Celtic pioneers. Their first stone was erected in 1991, followed by an additional 36 stones over the following year, all quarried locally. The monument plays host to many ceremonies throughout the year, including dawn services at the winter and summer solstices, as well as the annual Australia Celtic Festival, which was what was referenced in the roving report. Now, what Ingrid didn't mention was that she was in Glen Innes for the erection of the final rock. The final stone was rigged so that the local tug-of-war team, the Jellybeans, would pull it up. The monument is within the Centennial parklands, which overlook the township and contain the stone circle comprising of 38 megaliths. Megaliths? Is that how you say that?

00:05:12Danny Norman: Megaliths, yeah, absolutely.

00:05:13Melissa Ellis: Yeah, okay, like monolith, but they're a megalith.

00:05:15[crosstalk]

00:05:16Danny Norman: They're so mega.

00:05:17Melissa Ellis: Yeah, standing 35 metres high, which are unique to the southern hemisphere. The parkrun course begins and ends at the Australian Standing Stones near the main car park area, and it is a two-lap trail course with views over the town to the east and the Shannon Vale to the west. So I hope that's given a little bit more of a background. I think we did mention it when the Australian Standing Stones were launched, but I just wanted to refresh the listeners on that point.

00:05:45Danny Norman: I just typed in megaliths into Google, and as I thought, yeah, Stonehenge is a renowned prehistoric megalithic monument. Yes.

00:05:52Melissa Ellis: Basically, we have a mini Stonehenge. Okay. So it is quite an interesting and unique parkrun in that respect.

00:05:59Danny Norman: Okay, cool. I've been past Stonehenge many, many times. I've not been over to it, but you can drive past it. On our tour, on our tourism, we've gone past it many, many times. And yeah, it is fascinating.

00:06:10Melissa Ellis: Does it have a parkrun?

00:06:11Danny Norman: No, no, not for miles around. It is literally in the middle of... I say nowhere, just a vast grass, rolling plain fields of English countryside. There's nothing really much around it. Maybe one day, maybe one day. They've got to keep people's feet away from it in case of general erosion and stuff.

00:06:27Melissa Ellis: Haven't they decided, oh no, I'm thinking of Easter Island. Would they be megaliths too, the Easter Island?

00:06:33Danny Norman: I don't know. The only person that can tell me that, megalith, Easter Island, is Google and see what the AI response is.

00:06:41Melissa Ellis: is massive maori statues megalithic human figures yes they are there you go anyway because they've just discovered that the bits are only the top and they're actually buried really really do are they wow okay the bodies yeah the body you can see is the head but underneath the ground is the bodies unless that's fake news and I got sucked in anyway

00:06:52[crosstalk]

00:07:02[crosstalk]

00:07:02Danny Norman: We'll check it out afterwards.

00:07:03Melissa Ellis: That's quite possible. Yeah. I'm very gullible. But, Danny, did you have something you wanted to mention regarding last week's podcast?

00:07:11Danny Norman: Well, the segue is speaking of fake news to something which I want to bring up. I'm like, okay, I really need to address this. I can't let this go. So, yes, listening to the pods a few days ago, as a matter of fact, I was just driving around and I – Yeah, I can't let it go. So with a lot of confidence in his voice, TOC said that Denmark, because you're talking about Denmark, because Denmark had their first new parkrun in ages. And you're having a conversation about the size of Denmark. And TOC just really confidently said, yeah, Denmark's massive. And you're talking about the state of Victoria, about the total area and how the UK compares. Because you're right. I think a lot of Europe can go into Australia. I think that's what you were trying to say last time.

00:07:56Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III: But TOC went, yeah, Denmark's huge.

00:07:58Danny Norman: I'm like, no, no, no, it isn't, TOC. I'm not going to admit it. You've been over to Europe, but only recently, a couple of years ago. It was actually not very far from it. It was in the Netherlands. And so I thought I'd do a bit of research, and I'll let you know about it. I've informed you. But anyone listening, if you are wondering, because you are primarily Australia and New Zealand listeners, that Denmark's landmass and the Victoria landmass. So landmass of Victoria is 227 hectares, kilometres squared right I think the UK is about 240 000 so it's a little larger the land mass of Denmark is 43 000 so about what's that fifth or sixth smaller so talk if you're listening I'm sorry to have to point it out Denmark is not big. I don't know if he's getting confused with Norway or Sweden, but even then, I know Norway's a lot larger. Again, you've got to take into account the Mercator map, isn't it? The way it projects it is it looks larger than what it is further up toward the North Pole than what it is toward the centre. But, yeah, sorry. TOC, if you want to send us a DM and say thank you very much for proving you wrong, I'm fine with that. Anyway.

00:09:06Melissa Ellis: I think TOC would say he's just a builder. Yeah.

00:09:09Danny Norman: He's not a master of geography, is he? No, that's fine.

00:09:13Melissa Ellis: But he's our favourite builder.

00:09:14Danny Norman: Yeah, absolutely.

00:09:15Melissa Ellis: But what we like to talk about at the start of our podcast, Danny, is what you were up to on your last parkrun day. So would you like to give us an outline on what you got up to on Saturday?

00:09:25Danny Norman: Certainly will do. And I quite like this, being brief on where I went, which is very unusual compared to on my pod with me now. So, yeah, I was at my 901st parkrun and 495th different location, which was the fifth event of Ben's Yard parkrun Ely on the Stuntney Estate. That's stunning. I have to be very careful, extra careful in pronouncing that. It can go horribly wrong. In, unsurprisingly, the cathedral city of Ely in East Cambridgeshire. Now, it's just under a couple of hours' travel from home, which, time-wise of late, is a relative luxury. And I drove up with my partner, Jem, a.k.a. Jemmyfish, and then people are like, why are you calling it Jemmyfish? On my pod with me now. We have particular monikers and nicknames and we picked my mum up on the way too. She was down to Marshall and she absolutely loves these little days out. She marshals regularly at Junior parkrun on a Sunday. She lost a 5k. It didn't come back after the pause. So when she gets to go and do a 5k on a Saturday, she absolutely delights in it. And I also had other friends travelling there, including Tiny Steve, Tiny Bertie the dog, and others whose nicknames and monikers, as mentioned, will only make sense and can't have context if you listen to With Me Now. Now, it was a very sunny morning as we are nearing summer over here, which always adds a gloss to proceedings. So you guys are going into winter, if I'm not mistaken. Is that right?

00:10:39Melissa Ellis: That is correct.

00:10:40Danny Norman: Yeah. So there are a bunch of pod listeners there. The volunteers are super welcoming. I'm a big fan of their Co-Event Director, Nona, for a recent parkrun UK matter in which she decided to teach someone a lesson about social responsibility and parkrun etiquette after their inaugural. You might be aware of what we're talking about. I'm not entirely sure, Mel. I mean, it's more UK-based news, the car parking there is free and plentiful the toilets are well posh the cafe is great and I had a hugely uplifting morning and priceless quality time my mum loved it as she always gets a lot of hugs affection and attention from body listeners of which there are a bunch as is often the case at early events with tourists visiting now if you want to hear more about the day I'll save my profile for with me now out later this week and where you can learn about the link ben's yard has to pink floyd amongst other things

00:11:33Melissa Ellis: Oh, Danny Norman, you dropped in a teaser.

00:11:35[crosstalk]

00:11:35Danny Norman: Yes, I did. Exactly. Come on over and hear about it.

00:11:39Melissa Ellis: And I like the English flavour that you bring to our recording. What did you say that I just thought was very British? Shire.

00:11:46[crosstalk]

00:11:48Danny Norman: I point out that as an exaggeration as well. Not all I see is people going around going shire. That's just a with me now thing.

00:11:54Melissa Ellis: Do you know we have shires here too? This is true. And of course it's coming from our colonial days, but some urban areas will be called councils.

00:12:04Danny Norman: Right.

00:12:04Melissa Ellis: But more country areas are often a shire.

00:12:07Danny Norman: Okay. And I'm speaking a little slower. I'm trying to go a little slower this time. I know that some Australian listeners, I am a quick speaker of English. And I tell you what, I will give a warning now. Those of you who think I speak quickly, if you ever go to France or Spain and you learn the language, you're going to come in for an even bigger shock. That's all I'll say. All I'll say.

00:12:29Melissa Ellis: It was well posh was the phrase that you used.

00:12:30[crosstalk]

00:12:32Danny Norman: Yeah, well posh.

00:12:33Melissa Ellis: Now, let me tell you about my morning.

00:12:35Danny Norman: Please do.

00:12:36Melissa Ellis: I was at event 542 of my original home, Berwick Springs parkrun, on the lands of the Wurundjeri people. It was my 71st occasion at Berwick Springs, which is currently using an alternate course comprising of one single loop of the man-made lake system, nestled within the suburb of Narre Warren South in the outer southeastern suburb of Melbourne. It was election morning here in Australia, and we had travelled across town the night before and stayed at a friend's house, which meant it was only a short drive to parkrun. And with a busy day planned, Dave and I had already cast our votes at a pre-polling booth earlier in the week. Election morning saw 256 participants, and I was actually a fan of the temporary course. I do love a single loop and I discovered a toilet block on course approximately 800 metres from the finish. Now it's been close to seven years since I left the area so I wasn't aware of the toilet block and I had confidently claimed to Dave that there was no available toilets at the park. I'm pleased to have been proven wrong and glad that there has been improvements in the local facilities in my absence. Not much else to say other than we had a lovely mild autumnal morning, probably about 8 degrees when we arrived. The course is also very flat and quite pretty with green space, autumn colours and the lovely wetland Lakes. So a repeat for me, but always good to go somewhere where you feel at home.

00:14:05Danny Norman: Absolutely. Absolutely. Sounds a nice morning, all in all. I will not get into politics, but I was aware of you guys having an election as well.

00:14:14Melissa Ellis: Yes.

00:14:14Danny Norman: And Labour back in, is that right?

00:14:16Melissa Ellis: Labour got back in, yes.

00:14:17Danny Norman: Hopefully a few more independents.

00:14:17[crosstalk]

00:14:19Melissa Ellis: I don't think so.

00:14:20Danny Norman: No? No. Oh, okay.

00:14:22Melissa Ellis: Quite a resounding win to our Prime Minister.

00:14:25Danny Norman: Anthony Albanese, is that right?

00:14:27Melissa Ellis: Yeah.

00:14:28Danny Norman: Yeah. No, I keep tabs. I know that politics is a very dangerous subject, and certainly someone in the UK trying to chip in. I'm not giving any opinions. I just, I do watch the Juice Media. Have you ever heard of them on YouTube? And I do. Yeah, so they're a good channel that I watch, and they keep tabs on various things that go on in politics. So, no, I keep myself...

00:14:47Melissa Ellis: abreast of certain stuff so okay yeah labour was expected to regain power I think we had looked to the results in Canada yep okay and thought that the public might retain the sitting government okay it was just a surprise to everybody how well they did right okay but Danny right there moving on quickly

00:15:10Danny Norman: some stats yes absolutely so across the ditch which is New Zealand we had 55 events across the ditch actually from me is not New Zealand across the ditch is Ireland or France um but yeah 922 volunteers supported 9 655 finishers with 1347 setting PBs and 569 genuine first finishers

00:15:31Melissa Ellis: Fantastic. And we should thank TOC for jumping in and supplying us with the stats this week. And we do include, I should say, we include New Zealand in a lot of our reporting because we feel that we're sort of over here on the other side of the world, the Antipodes and our Anzac spirit going on.

00:15:49[crosstalk]

00:15:53Danny Norman: Absolutely.

00:15:54Melissa Ellis: Including them as our... Brethren. So meanwhile in Australia we recorded 68,545 finishes at 498 events with 6,160 volunteers. 10,849 of the finishers recorded a PB, and we had 2,967 genuine first-timers. So still going strong over here.

00:16:20[crosstalk]

00:16:22Alison Fraser (King): Absolutely.

00:16:23Melissa Ellis: I think the weather is pretty stable at the moment across the board in Australia. We haven't got any floods or cyclones, and Victoria and Tasmania are still recording some mild weather, so we're still doing well.

parkrun news bulletin

00:16:35Melissa Ellis: Nice. Now, I couldn't find much going on in the parkrun News this week, really. It's been pretty quiet. Obviously, last week we announced the new… CEO. Is it CEO? Yeah. Yes, of Lil.

00:16:47[crosstalk]

00:16:51Danny Norman: Lil, yeah. Duggan, Lil Duggan, yeah.

00:16:54Melissa Ellis: Yeah, so maybe Karma C's. Yeah.

00:16:58Danny Norman: Yeah, I'm fascinated by it. I won't go deeply into it. I prefer to see what's going to happen before I make any judgments and who knows what will happen. I mean, I do need to go over... You read out the release, the press release, as it were, from parkrun. And Lil, I know, is not a parkrunner, as it were, to the degree in terms of that she hasn't really participated. I know that if they're coming into parkrun and they've got fresh eyes, it's quite valuable in a way because they had that. with when people come to park and you need people who understand it and get it and they can understand operations and manage that but if people can come in with a fresh pair of eyes that might be able to make decisions that other people who are a bit too stalwarty might otherwise decline and not be so open-minded to then that has value too so I'm particularly interested to see how it pans out. And I recognise that a lot of stuff, a lot of these decisions are all UK centric based. And it does impact globally that you guys on the other side of the planet are having to watch on while all this goes on over here. That the parkrun Global Board has to be UK based. From a legal point of view.

00:18:05Melissa Ellis: That's because it's the charity and that's the regulations, isn't it?

00:18:08Danny Norman: Yeah, the law, the legal law. If you've got a global charitable board and it's UK based, then the board needs to be comprised of UK people, even though ideally it would have a wider global impact and input from it, I should say.

00:18:20Melissa Ellis: She might actually bring a refreshing new perspective. Hopefully she listens and takes time to observe before she starts to make any decisions. But it could be a really good thing because she won't be ingrained in preconceived ideas.

00:18:33[crosstalk]

00:18:35Danny Norman: Yeah, and I like that. I like that a lot. You mentioned it was fascinating. It was interim. I don't know what on earth is the point of the interim thing. It's either go with or not. Also, without preconceptions, they'll not have preconceptions on... parties and people and things and yeah I think that a lot more objectivity about parkrun as a whole so it could yeah let's let's wait and see shall we let's see how it goes two or three years down the line I certainly think it was being steered and directed in a wonky direction by the incumbent but um is that right the the predecessor sorry I should say But here we go. Here we are. Let's see. I'm sure we'll be fine. I mean, it's growing. parkrun's booming. It's doing really well. And yeah, I might say it's onwards and upwards.

00:19:20Melissa Ellis: Well, the only other news I had was that my parkrun goodr sunglasses turned up in the mail on Friday, as did my book, My One Small Step Forward.

00:19:28Danny Norman: pre-ordered book but I did want to ask you Danny do you have the goodr sunglasses over there in the UK or is this an Aussie thing no they are here they are here so London marathon was a week or eight days ago last Sunday and I went to the expo because my partner jem was doing it I went up with her to the expo she hadn't been to the expo before and we had a good old walk around and gooder had a stall there and I went over and they had some gooder parkrun glasses to just try on And Bev, so my landlady, Bev, she has bought a pair as well. I tried on the goodr and with this often the case with my potato head is that either sunglasses fit me or they don't. And I tried them all on. I tried various goodr sunglasses, including the parkrun and apricot ones. They, I don't feel comfortable in them. And that's not because the sunglasses are only, Jem loves kind of sunglasses. She's got a few pairs, absolutely adores them. I know that a lot of the people who have them really enjoy them. The fact that they can run in and they don't slip, they just don't fit my head. So I'm not going to have any. But yeah, we do have them. I've seen them. Very apricot, as you know, I'm sure you know. So yeah. Yeah.

00:20:42Melissa Ellis: So you have the same problem as TOC basically?

00:20:44Danny Norman: Yeah.

00:20:45Melissa Ellis: Well, that's fine.

00:20:46Danny Norman: I'll have to miss out in that respect.

00:20:47Melissa Ellis: I'll have everything. I just thought maybe you need them for your museum, your parkrun museum.

00:20:54Danny Norman: Well, I will steal Bev's pair. So that's all good. Yeah, absolutely. I'm relying on other people to start buying all the things now. And then I'll just go and have it off on one by one for the museum in years to come, yeah the collection of all the official stuff sounds like a good idea yeah in terms of parkrun news I like you I agree there's not very much we've had park walking over here the only thing that I will mention is we had Johnny Wilkinson who's the do you remember the rugby player who uh helped us win the world cup about 20 years ago in rugby union no no see it's all very that game no all uk-centric all the stuff so this is yeah otherwise yeah relatively quiet

00:21:21[crosstalk]

00:21:28Melissa Ellis: But he park walked, did he? He park walked, yeah. He was leading the promotion? Like a face for the park walking push?

00:21:35Danny Norman: Yeah, because of course, it's fascinating because you have park walking over there. This stuff which is going on with Vitality is a lot more, again, a lot more UK-centric. And we've had famous sports people come along to take part. We've had the faces of them. We had Gabby Logan, who's a TV presenter. Johnny Wilkinson was at Bracknell Park walking at the back. So yeah, I think they're using Vitality ambassadors from the UK to come and take part and visit a parkrun over the coming weeks.

00:22:04Melissa Ellis: And maybe we didn't give context last week when we discussed it, but it's more of a push in the UK because I think parkrun historically began more as a time trial. Therefore, there was more emphasis on running. Whereas I think Australia launched so many years later when there had been a significant shift in trying to encourage a wider variety of people to participate. So we didn't launch with that same aspect of it being a running event.

00:22:36Danny Norman: I see it first hand where there's a culture of the early early events many of which I've been around to that they still have retained that attitude that not universally but there are ones out there that end up going anything more than 45 minutes shouldn't be done and that part walking they're averse to and it's all about speed and effort and the whole concept of people going around an hour walking is a bit offensive to them which gets under my skin enormously So, yeah, it would help and benefit the UK in that respect. The culture is fascinating. The numbers are flying up. It's great. With my 20 year parkrunner hat on, my only concern is that it's great to have more people come in. You always have to be conscious of that. Whilst you're pouring more people into these events, you need to make sure you've got the capacity for it. And I do think that some events are creaking at the edges. There's nothing to do with park walking. I just love to see more parkwalkers come in. And I think it also helps to have that spread. That it's nice if you're going to throw more people in, you don't want tons of people all going in at 25 to 30 minutes. If you can have more people going in at 35, 40, 45 minutes and have those numbers go up, then you are spreading those numbers out, which also helps. Spread the field.

00:23:49[crosstalk]

00:23:50[laughter]

Roving reports & the Channel 5 News crew

00:23:51Danny Norman: yeah yeah I hope it helps too so yeah all right set the world bang to rights thank you very much for having me on this morning right so I need to throw to roving reports is that right yes please okay am I allowed to say who's first up or do we say afterwards you can okay over to Alison in New Zealand across the ditch to Alison

00:24:05[background music]

Roving report Alison Fraser (King) — Hagley parkrun

00:24:16Alison Fraser (King): Kia ora koutou, it's Alison here reporting in for the Channel 5 News crew, parkrun adventurers, all the way from Hagley parkrun on the South Island of New Zealand in Otautahi Christchurch. And we've just had a very memorable Hagley parkrun. I'm with today's Run Director, Mark Boone, known as the Sheriff or Booney. Tell us about today, Mark, what made it so special? [Te Reo Maori: "Hello / greetings to you all (addressing three or more people)"]

00:24:41Mark Boone: Oh just getting the opportunity to marry the Event Director and her fiancee together, Leen and Maria and Leen together. So just really exciting to bring those two together. Two parkrun friends of mine on the shores of the lake here. Really good eh? Just yeah, great day for it wasn't it?

00:24:55Alison Fraser (King): Oh it's a beautiful autumnal morning. Nice and fresh.

00:24:57[crosstalk]

00:24:58Mark Boone: No rain.

00:24:59Alison Fraser (King): No rain.

00:24:59Mark Boone: Met a bit of rain this week.

00:25:01Alison Fraser (King): The colours from the trees are gorgeous and so much colour from the parkrunners and the volunteers.

00:25:09Mark Boone: Just running our alternate course because of the rain, but no, it was a really good setting under the sun, so it was a really good day for it. Yeah.

00:25:14Alison Fraser (King): So we've just had a parkrun wedding. We've just had a parkrun wedding. Once everyone's finished, the Tail Walkers come in, we've submitted our, I was timing, so we've submitted our files. Tell us about that.

00:25:27Mark Boone: Big day. Big day. Yeah, because, I mean, Hagley's a big event. You know, there's a lot of people here, probably 700 people here today. So, yeah, just getting through all that, making sure the event goes to plan. But, yeah, just really, you know, a great event to get everyone together for Maria and Len today and have them all celebrate together with them, you know, at their favourite park on course. Yeah.

00:25:44Alison Fraser (King): Well, caveat it by saying it wasn't the official ceremony. Correct. But I reckon it was probably a lot more fun.

00:25:49Mark Boone: Yeah, we had a lot of fun, didn't we? Yeah, a lot of confetti thrown around, rice and lollies and cakes and sweet treats. So, yeah, no, really good.

00:25:55Alison Fraser (King): Yeah, and the rings?

00:25:56Mark Boone: Yeah, the rings, yeah, absolutely, yeah.

00:25:57Alison Fraser (King): Tell us about the rings.

00:25:58Mark Boone: Oh, a little bit of a shopping excursion to the warehouse last night. Pick up a bag of lollies, yeah, but no, they're all good. They'll enjoy those later, which is good. So, yeah, some lollies, definitely.

00:26:06Alison Fraser (King): Yeah. So you've been involved with Hagley for a while?

00:26:10Mark Boone: Yeah I started parkrunning here about six years ago yeah yeah um under that under that barbecue area over there so yeah six years to here pretty much yeah so done a hundred over 100 Hagley's here now which is good yeah.

00:26:20Alison Fraser (King): And what got you to that first event?

00:26:22Mark Boone: Uh just a friend of mine he got a bit ill he couldn't run anymore so yeah just started to start doing something and my mate of mine that just said goodbye to me then he was he printed me my barcodes and we met over there and started running yeah in that direction yeah down there yeah.

00:26:35Alison Fraser (King): No one can see this, Boonie.

00:26:36Mark Boone: Yeah, I know.

00:26:38Alison Fraser (King): But why do you keep coming back?

00:26:39Mark Boone: Just the environment, just the people, you know, just the community. Yeah, it's just really good. You know, it's not about running all the time. It's about volunteering as well and just helping out the community and getting it across the line. Days like today make it all worthwhile. So, yeah, that's why we do it.

00:26:52Alison Fraser (King): And you're an event ambassador now as well? Yep.

00:26:54Mark Boone: Yeah, that's cool. Help them bring on new events online. We've got Lost Lagoon starting in a couple of three weeks up and over in Westport. So that's exciting. Get one on the West Coast. So they'll give someone a parkrun to go and try it over there, which will be good.

00:27:06Alison Fraser (King): When you tell people about parkrun for the first time, what do you tell them about it to try to get them to see what it's about really?

00:27:14Mark Boone: Probably that it's not always just about the run, you know, like it's about the bigger picture. You know, there's so much more facets to it that you can do. You know, it's not just about running. You can walk, you can spectate, volunteer. You can volunteer one week, run the next. It's just a whole range of ways of getting involved. You know what I mean? So, yeah, it's just a really good, inclusive way of getting involved in your community.

00:27:32Alison Fraser (King): I know you've done a lot of your parkruns here in Hagley but you've also done quite a few elsewhere so I'm gonna ask you without naming hegley for your favourite three other parkruns and why

00:27:46Mark Boone: Hanmer's my favourite because it's just such a beautiful course, yeah. Foster's pretty much home, second home for me at the moment, yeah, just in terms of the community. It's a really family vibe. And then Broad Park, just with the trail, just a beautiful trail. You can just be five minutes away from housing and you're in the bushes and the trees and then hear the sound of the sea. So, yeah, those three are definitely, all have their different reasons, but, yeah, Hanmer's definitely top. Yeah, it's a great course, yeah. Yeah.

00:28:10Alison Fraser (King): And for people who've never been to Hagley parkrun who are listening probably from Australia because most listeners are Australian what can you tell them about Hagley parkrun like can you describe the course and how many people you tend to get?

00:28:23Mark Boone: Yeah we're getting about average about 700 now into the autumnal months when it gets a bit cooler so yeah we sort of get up with the sort of close to 900 during summer so makes it a pretty big animal to muster but Yeah, it's just a flat, nice course. We've just changed the course a little bit just to accommodate just different parts of the area. So it's just a nice flat 5K under the trees and, yeah, nice and simple, easy breezy. So, yeah, no real obstacles, just nice and sweet.

00:28:46Alison Fraser (King): Cool. Well, thank you so much, Boonie. I think we're going to go to the cafe now for more. Absolutely.

00:28:50[crosstalk]

00:28:51Mark Boone: Let's go get a coffee.

00:28:51Alison Fraser (King): For a wedding breakfast. Yeah, 100%.

00:28:52Mark Boone: Yeah, man, how good.

00:28:53Alison Fraser (King): Yeah, and I think the last time I came here was 2019. Oh, wow.

00:28:58Mark Boone: Yeah, I might not have even been parkrunning then. So, yeah, now it's a wee while ago.

00:28:58[crosstalk]

00:29:00[background music]

00:29:02Alison Fraser (King): It's changed quite a lot.

00:29:03Mark Boone: Absolutely.

00:29:04Alison Fraser (King): It's always cool.

00:29:05Mark Boone: Awesome.

00:29:14Melissa Ellis: And thank you very much, Alison, coming to us, as we said, from across the ditch at Hagley parkrun with a marriage on the shores of the lake there. And I did reach out to Alison to get a little bit more context. It was a pretend ceremony there on the lake. And the real thing happened later in the afternoon. The RD acted as the fake celebrant. And they do have a Run Director and a fun director out there at Hagley. So the fun director was Lisa, and she organised the confetti, amongst other things, for the ceremony.

00:29:48Danny Norman: Fun director. Love it, love it. It was just prompting me, a conversation that you and I had. I'm sorry to make your point extra long and make it some more work for yourself.

00:29:56Melissa Ellis: I kind of thought this might happen.

00:29:57Danny Norman: Well, I'll try not to. I'll stop doing it now.

00:30:00Melissa Ellis: No, we're happy.

00:30:01Danny Norman: But you have, yeah, somebody followed me on a social media platform where it was like park fun. You're always going to get people who go, okay, how can I tie into parkrun? All I need to do is change a letter. So you have like parkrun, dark run, park fun and so on, park pun. We have all those things. Somebody followed me and they're going to do park funder. They're going to produce some items. And I looked at the account and they'd used AI to produce examples of their items. And I'm like, if anybody looks at that, they go, this looks like a con. If you know, it makes sense. If you have something that's authentic, if somebody is providing you a marketing image and it's made in AI, sorry. And. And you can clearly see it's AI. You think this is a scam. It's just a really poor decision.

00:30:43[crosstalk]

00:30:43Melissa Ellis: This is becoming a big problem, this AI, isn't it?

00:30:46Danny Norman: Yeah. It's going to have many benefits in many ways. I think it's the same as like social media. Something new comes in and there's pros and cons to everything. The internet, people were worried about the internet. The internet is amazing and fascinating. It does change societies and cultures. There are huge benefits to the internet. At the same point, there are many cons, and it's then having to manage that as you go along. The same thing with AI. It's going to help medical advancement enormously at the same point. It's also going to provide people the ability to con innocent parties out of certain things.

00:31:18Melissa Ellis: Oh, my goodness. They'll be doing podcasts soon.

00:31:21Danny Norman: That makes my life easier. So, fine. An AI version of Danny doing all the work. I'm okay with that.

Dazza's

00:31:29Melissa Ellis: Alrighty, well, let's move on to Dazza's. And this week, Dazza said, today is wordsmith day. May the hills on the parkrun you did be variations in tone and the turns on the path be turns of phrase you use when telling us all about it. Dazza is a man of very few words, but he'd love to read yours. So come on in and tell us how your parkrun was. Now, the adventurers Listener Challenge this week was to feature your adventurers buff in your photo. So we have chosen a selection of comments, both interesting and that fitted into both of those topics. First off the line was Ingrid Botha coming to us from New South Wales. And she said, Wordsmith Day. OK, I'll play. Three cheers for parkrun Day. I huffed and puffed, but it wasn't too tough. I ran at Cooks River in the buff.

00:32:17Danny Norman: I like that.

00:32:19Melissa Ellis: So she was a bit clever using both the themes. But no photographic evidence.

00:32:24Danny Norman: Oh, okay. I don't mind having no photographic evidence because we're an audio format. But you lean into it a lot more, don't you, with the photographs? We do. And Birthday Boy, Simon Mackley. Do I have to say Queensland as well? Because you've got all where they're from. Do you always say where it's from? Yeah, we do. Okay, sorry. I have to become more aware of that. Plover's Puddles. It is Plovers, isn't it? Not Plovers. Uh-oh. Anyway.

00:32:49Melissa Ellis: Ooh. This is the theme of the night, isn't it? Hang on a minute. Pronunciation.

00:32:52[crosstalk]

00:32:53Danny Norman: Plovers. It's a bird, isn't it?

00:32:55Melissa Ellis: I say Plover. It's a bird, right? I say Plover. Yeah, yeah, it is.

00:32:59Danny Norman: No, it is Plover. Yeah, why would I ever say Plover? Sorry. Plover sounds like I'm abbreviating a jumper. Plover. I'm putting a Plover on. Yeah, so plovers, puddles, paces and a palindromic position today. And I've ruined his entire message because of all the all the letters, the alliteration. Sorry. And a palindromic position today at Redland Bay parkrun. And then there's a picture of Simon zooming on course by the water side. Thank you.

00:33:24Melissa Ellis: Now, we also heard from Yvette Turner. She came to us from the ACT. Today, I graduated from the black 100 t-shirt to the green 250 t-shirt. I was so excited to run this morning and complete my 250th run that I had butterflies. It was a stunning morning at Gungahlin parkrun with a slight mist rising off the water to reveal the swans. It was only a little chilly at the start, but we had beautiful sunshine warming us as we ran the loop of Yerrabi Pond. I had lots of friends join me for photos before the event, and we went for a delicious breakfast after. I'm forever grateful for parkrun, as it has taken me adventuring to places I might not have been to, and I've met the nicest people and made some wonderful friends, and I get to wear this beautiful parkrun adventurer's buff. And Yvette posted a photo of herself with the 250 sash, the green tutu, green 250 shirt cutout and her buff. So congratulations, Yvette, on your milestone.

00:34:22Danny Norman: Next up is Sunil Tamun from the UK. Hi, Dazza. Given I'm in Northern Ireland, I should be able to kiss the Blarney Stone and be blessed with lots to tell you. However, I haven't found the stone, so I'm going to let the... I haven't found the stone. I'm going to let the Majesty of the Stormont Parliament Building do the talking for me. Stormont parkrun is simply beautiful. Tree-lined almost the whole route. And then Sunil shared a selfie with the Parliament House with a blue buff around his wrist. Danny, what is the buff in the notes? What is the buff? Is that for me?

00:34:53Melissa Ellis: Yes. I thought you might have been able to tell me what buff Sunil was wearing.

00:34:58Danny Norman: Did your parkrun adventures blue buff?

00:35:01Melissa Ellis: No, it wasn't our buff.

00:35:02Danny Norman: With a blue buff around his wrist? Well, it won't be a With Me Now one.

00:35:05Melissa Ellis: No, I know. So I don't know what it was. It looked like it might have... Oh, you want me to go have a look?

00:35:11[crosstalk]

00:35:13Danny Norman: Sorry, was I meant to go have a look?

00:35:14Melissa Ellis: Because I should have put the photo in the notes so that you could see it.

00:35:18Danny Norman: Okay.

00:35:19Melissa Ellis: I apologise.

00:35:20Danny Norman: No, I'm going to see how fast I can be to find and discover what it is. Why don't you read the next one? Yeah. Okay.

00:35:25Melissa Ellis: Okay, all right. So next we heard from David Messenger coming to us from the West Side. Pace a week at Bibra Lake parkrun, running 29 minutes in an unusual condition for WA of heavy rain. Met up with fellow parkrun adventurers, the Gores, and took temporary responsibility for budgie. I don't plan to leave WA for parkrun travels over October, so happy to pass on to another adventurer. I will be at Galup Reserve parkrun for the next three weeks. And David shared a photo of himself with Karen and Chris Gore looking a little wet out at Bibra Lake parkrun. Now, David, well, we've put the message out there. I think somebody might be getting in touch with you soon regarding Budgie.

00:36:05Danny Norman: Guess what?

00:36:05Melissa Ellis: How did you go, Danny?

00:36:06Danny Norman: I found it. I found it about 30 seconds ago. I've got it. And he has a blue buff on, and I don't know what it is. He's got 2020 on, so I think it's a race buff that he's done that year. That's all I can tell, I'm afraid.

00:36:20Melissa Ellis: Okay. I thought it might have been, they looked like circles. So I thought maybe it was parkrun related, that old buff I didn't know of.

00:36:28Danny Norman: I think it's just a generic race. We have a buff given out. I'm sure you have the same in Australia. Sometimes instead of medals, you have buffs given out. It's one of those.

00:36:37Melissa Ellis: Right. I thought too much into it. Anyway.

00:36:40Danny Norman: I think it's just a generic buff he may have under his ownership. Right, moving on. Adrian Luscombe from the UK. A record attendance at Bracknell parkrun this morning. Not surprising as rugby union hero and vitality ambassador. Oh, look, I've already spoiled all this. Johnny Wilkinson's TV rocked up for park walking duties. Sorry, Adrian. My bad. Hopefully no controversy from that. Yeah, and there's a photo of Adrian and Johnny together.

00:37:03Melissa Ellis: Yeah. Alrighty, next we heard from Eric Banner coming to us from Japan. Eric said, parkrun in Japan, Yodogawa, Riverside, this is a haiku. And there was a photo of Eric with his enablers, Martine and Andrew, and Andrew's sister and her husband. And they were at Yodogawa kasenkoen Hirakata chiku parkrun.

00:37:31Danny Norman: Well done. Yeah, it's good. I think you did well there.

00:37:34Melissa Ellis: And it looks like from the photo that Eric has picked up a friend. But it also just might be that Japan, instead of having selfie frames and pop-ups, have banners.

00:37:45Danny Norman: They have banners, yeah, by the looks of it. Yeah, instead of pop-ups, I've noticed that. Yeah, I had a couple of friends over. Obviously, well, my co-presenter Nicola and Poppy have been over there in Japan for a few weeks. And we've also had some friends local to us who've gone over and I've been looking at all the photographs on their Instagram. And it looks amazing. It's certainly a place I really would love to go if I ever got the opportunity one time. On the way to Australia, of course, to see your good self. So next up, Andy Paul, UK again. Oh, you're giving me all the UK ones. Thank you. We found an upside of jet lag and waking up at 4am, no alarms, and taking advantage to drive three hours up to Edinburgh to tick off Oriam parkrun with Wendella Poole. And Andy and Wendella are there with the pop-up and wearing their adventurer buffs in the photograph.

00:38:26Melissa Ellis: Yay. Last but not least, we heard from Johan Duvenhage coming to us from Sudafrink. And Johan said, And there's a photo of Levi and Johan, wearing his buff, that's Johan, but also Levi was sporting apricot parkrun buff around his neck. So, TOC, I hope you got enough buff photos to keep you satisfied.

the Obi Award — Eric Banner and Ingrid Botha (shared)

00:38:59Melissa Ellis: Now, Danny, I have...

00:39:00[laughter]

00:39:02Danny Norman: I've thrown me under the bus, is what you're doing here.

00:39:05Melissa Ellis: Yes, because you've got the Obilope. Right.

00:39:11Danny Norman: I have to choose. Okay, well, I'm definitely torn between two. And it's the creative side of things. I was going to go with Eric Banner because his haiku is superb. But I really like Ingrid Botha's. Wordsmith day, okay, I'll play. And tough and buff. Because it includes us, doesn't it? Yes.

00:39:30Melissa Ellis: Okay.

00:39:34Danny Norman: Hooray. Can I cut the envelope in half and share it between the two? Or does it have to be one person?

00:39:39Melissa Ellis: It can be two. I'll make up the rules, Danny.

00:39:41Danny Norman: Okay. Eric Banner and Ingrid, both of you, please. Thank you very much. They can have the overload. Yay.

00:39:49Melissa Ellis: Thank you. All righty. Now.

Emails

00:39:52Melissa Ellis: Moving over to emails, we did get an email this week. We had an email from Mickey Mansell, who sent us three photos from his recent tourist trip to Tauranga parkrun on the North Island of New Zealand. Mickey said that their home parkrun of Puarenga was cancelled for the Rotorua Marathon, so they took the opportunity to travel to nearby Tauranga. They're very similar sounding names, those two. And there's a lot of marathons going on around the world at the moment, it seems. Now, the three photos showed the family in the selfie frame, the little New Zealand version of their core flute, Jarvis and Miles in one and Miles, Leanne and Mickey in the other. And the other photo featured the course with a New Zealand totem alongside the trail out in back course. Now, as an aside, I did a deep dive into the totem, and a totem pole is called a pou whenua, which is a land post.

00:40:50[crosstalk]

00:40:52Danny Norman: I'm sorry, but it's really hard not to laugh at poo. It's so childish of me. It's so… yes yeah school ground gosh and I and I wrote it phonetically so that I could try to pronounce it that's why that's why I'm laughing because you have spelt it out and I'm laughing at you doing that the poof and what

00:41:01[crosstalk]

00:41:12Melissa Ellis: And they are carved wooden posts used by the Maori, the Indigenous peoples of New Zealand, to mark territorial boundaries or places. So thank you for sharing, Mickey. And I did notice that all four Mansells appeared in the Consolidated Club Report at Tauranga. So thanks for being a part of the Adventurers Club too.

00:41:25[background music]

Club Corner

00:41:30Danny Norman: So now we should go over to Reginald and a club corner.

00:41:40Reginald 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. For non-Australians, in my introduction, the word country with a capital C does not mean a city-state. Rather it is a term used by First Nations peoples to refer to the lands, waters and skies to which they are connected through ancestral ties and family origins. When discussing international affairs, the word country is lowercase c, country. For parkrun within Australia, we operate on the country of various indigenous peoples' nations. For parkrun around the world, we operate within various countries, and the remainder of today's Club Corner is using the word country in the geopolitical sense, with a lowercase c. Today, we are starting a series about parkrun countries. How many countries have a parkrun? And since I am asking silly questions, how many holes does a straw have? But back to parkrun, there are 31 things that are countries with parkrun. Though, those 31 could easily be considered 34...or could even stretch to 35. Now, before you get super angry, or pause the pod to count on your fingers and toes, hear me out. To quote from Britannica Kids, a country is land that is controlled by a single government. Countries are also called nations, states, or nation-states. Countries can be large or small. Alternatively, to quote Article 1 of the 1933 Montevideo Convention on the Rights and Duties of States, The state as a person of international law should possess the following qualifications. A. A permanent population, B. A defined territory, C. Government, and D. Capacity to enter into relations with other states, end quote. I shall leave off reading the remaining 15 articles. For parkrun, a country that I will talk about could be referred to as a protectorate, a jurisdiction, an overseas territory, a self-governing dependency, etc., etc., you get the gist. If you want the Gospel according to parkrun, then there are 22 countries listed on their website, so by all means, stop counting at 22 if you wish. Here is a quick list in alphabetical order of the 22 countries. Australia, Austria, Canada, Denmark, Eswatini, Finland, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Lithuania, Malaysia, Namibia, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Singapore, South Africa, Sweden, United Kingdom, and USA. Few In future weeks, we are going to talk about those 22 countries, plus the other dozen or so countries that also do parkrun, so stay tuned for our future club corners. Oh yes, a straw has one hole.

00:44:35Melissa Ellis: And thank you very much to Reginald giving us all that information about countries. So one thing I wanted to point out, and Johan has brought this up before, that is Eswatini, which is definitely a parkrun country. It's listed on the parkrun webpage, but it doesn't have its own flag when it's in the results profiles. So it always comes under the South African flag. Is that your understanding, Danny?

00:45:03Danny Norman: When Johan is referring to that on terms of the profile, does he mean with the Chrome extension attached or the actual what parkrun gives it by throwing the curveball in there? Because I know flags, flags can become a very sensitive subject about certain things.

00:45:19Melissa Ellis: No, I think it's parkrun. It comes under the parkrun flag.

00:45:23Danny Norman: banner of South Africa and it doesn't give the the um so therefore when you get the crime extension you don't get a swatini flag no so list so it's between the only country listed on the park on web page it doesn't have it it it tends to be there's a lot of temperamental things with flags and I know that flags can become very it could become a a This could be a particularly thorny subject matter, understandably. So early days when I was working for parkrun and we were doing adaptations to emails and things, they were putting the little flags on the emails you'd receive in the corner. But of course, putting the union flag into the emails received by people in Northern Ireland was... would be a very particularly politically thorny subject. So that was blank in that respect. Eswatini with South Africa, I will assume it'll end up being because it's being managed by South Africa. But the reason why they don't have the flag, I have no idea why. And I'm not even going to begin to try and predict as to why this is the case. It's a good question. I'm sure there will be a decision somewhere along the way, potentially technically, potentially for cultural reasons. So...

00:46:29Melissa Ellis: I think the 5K app might have addressed this, though, because the 5K app has a lot more... Flags, yeah. ...ability to...

00:46:34[crosstalk]

00:46:36Danny Norman: Put flags in, yeah. Yeah, basically. Yeah, because you had that as well. Jersey, Guernsey have their own one. If you do all the countries in the UK, as it were, then you get... I think you get individual ones, then you get the collective one.

00:46:52Melissa Ellis: Yeah, it's... Would you get a Welsh app?

00:46:54Danny Norman: Yeah, yeah, yeah. You get a Welsh one, you get a Scottish one. Yeah.

00:46:57Melissa Ellis: Okay. All right. Well, the 5K app's filling a hole in that respect because it keeps people happy because they think it's official.

00:47:03Danny Norman: Yeah, yeah. Ideally it would have been or at least produce a parkrun app that is official that does that too. It would be nice. Yeah.

00:47:10Melissa Ellis: Moving right along. Another question I had was, I was curious, I haven't ran in a country that has since- Stopped, yeah. Do participants retain their results in their profile and the country flag, or what happens there?

00:47:34Danny Norman: So, again, the flag thing is fascinating. So, if you look at my account, so I have been to France. I visited two parkruns. Yeah. Is that right? Yes. Rouen and Ledoyne, which is Bordeaux Way. Yeah. So my results are still here. So if I type in Rouen, for example, yeah, parkrun to Rouen is in my feed. If you list down it, you can see that. So it's definitely stay there. If I click on parkrun to Rouen, it will go to the website. And it actually shows you, as a matter of fact, no, it doesn't. It doesn't display the results. So that's interesting. It depends on what you click on. Something is appearing still. If I click on All, if I click on the – so I'm sure people can go and look at my account, guys, if you want to go and look at my one. 482 is the ID for the suffix and the URL. I can see the results from that particular morning. So it does prevail. It does still exist, the data out there, in some form or another. Regarding the flags, there's no flag on my account unless you're looking at it through the Chrome extension. Okay. So this is the fascinating thing that I'm finding about Johan saying about the flags under people's names. So if I look at my challenge progress with the running challenges, which does put the flags underneath my name, then Italy, America, Germany, Poland, Norway, Sweden, Norway. Netherlands, interesting. Not there now. France is not there. So that's been dropped. So the Chrome extension, because it obviously reads off of the server, is then not picking up its existence anymore. So the flag has gone in that respect. Hopefully it kind of answers that question.

00:49:16Melissa Ellis: So that would indicate that perhaps the Chrome extension is pulling from the list of countries. So that's why. No, because then there would be an Eswatini flag.

00:49:25Danny Norman: I have no idea. More technical people will know better than I. I'm sure they'll be in touch.

00:49:30Melissa Ellis: Why did I bring it up? It's Reginald's fault.

00:49:33Danny Norman: Yeah.

Consolidated Club Report

00:49:35Melissa Ellis: All righty, moving on. The adventurers Consolidated Club Report for Saturday, the 3rd of May, 2025. Of a total of 781 members, 541 took part in 10 countries across 280 locations. In the UK, there were adventurers at 61 events. There were 10 events in South Africa... Six in Japan, two in the USA and one each in Netherlands, Italy, Norway and Singapore. Locally, we had adventures at 54 events in New South Wales. So the UK smashed us this week.

00:50:08Danny Norman: You sound sad about that. Should I be celebrating or?

00:50:13Melissa Ellis: Yes, you go, hooray!

00:50:14Danny Norman: Hooray!

00:50:17Melissa Ellis: Look at the UK and compare them regionally with us in our different states. Anyway, New South Wales had 54. Queensland had 48. Victoria had 45. West Australia had 15. There were 11 in South Australia, nine in Tassie. The North Island and ACT were equal on six. The South Island had three and there were none in the Northern Territory.

00:50:21[crosstalk]

the Frond — Bibra Lake parkrun — largest Aussie frond, 9 adventurers; Walvis Bay

00:50:40Melissa Ellis: Now, the largest international frond came to us from South Africa. It was at Walvis Bay. We had five adventurers there. We had Stuart Henderson, Denise Evans, Andy and Debbie Airey and Mark Pinney. Every time I see Stuart Henderson's name, I want to say Hendo Stew.

00:50:58Danny Norman: Hendo Stew, yeah. Well, it's like a certain friend of ours, Monty Slade, who has a, yeah, that's a pseudonym.

00:51:06Melissa Ellis: Correct. Now, there was no adventurers this week at Bushy, so no pilgrimages. What, pilgrimages?

00:51:14Danny Norman: No pilgrimages. Can I make up for that, though, while you're slipping over there, tongue-tying over pilgrimage? Can I pseudo be a pilgrimage because I run in that park at least three or four times a week? Does that kind of cater? Yeah.

00:51:29Melissa Ellis: We'll take it.

00:51:30Danny Norman: Thanks.

00:51:30Melissa Ellis: We'll take it. But where was our largest Aussie frond?

00:51:34Danny Norman: Largest Aussie frond was nine at one event, Bibra Lake in Australia. Clint's, well, obviously Australia, because that's why it's the Aussie largest frond. Sorry, why did I read that out? I'm like out of, it's Anchorman, isn't it? If it's going to be on the screen, I'm going to read it out. Clint Slomp, John Percival, Andrew Yeachman, David Messenger, Janet Changwony. Sorry, Janet, is it Changwani? Would you pronounce it that way? I hope so yes Brenton panzich Chris and Karen Gore and Amanda Mitchell a special mention eight oh there's eight uh frond there you go also Gungahlin in the ACT where Yvette has celebrated her 250th parkrun also eight at South Toowoomba in Queensland where Kristine Vergara also celebrated her 250th and congratulations to both women am I allowed to give feminine claps for that

00:52:20Alison Fraser (King): Yes, let's do that.

00:52:21Danny Norman: Sweet. And then I'm going to carry on. Greenery Day in Japan. That was... Because it's Monday today, isn't it? It was yesterday. And I have... I mentioned Nicola and Poppy are out there. And they were at... I don't know. Do you know who these two people are? Do you know who they are on the...

00:52:39Melissa Ellis: I do not, but I don't think they would be Nicola because I don't think Nicola's in the adventurous club.

00:52:41[crosstalk]

00:52:44Danny Norman: Needs to pull a finger out and add it on. So Futakotamagawa had two. And you've absolutely done me over here again by having to read these out. Gongendo 2gou kouen had three. Hikarigaoka koen has one. Oiso undokoen, one. And Tsurumi Ryokuchi has three. And if you've got any complaints about my pronunciation, yeah, feel free to send an email in to the parkrun adventurers because I won't see it.

00:53:11Melissa Ellis: Thank you for taking the bullet for me, Danny. I appreciate that. You did a great job and much better than I would have been able to do. I appreciate it. And adventurers, remember, you can add the Adventurers Club as one of your five affiliations on your parkrun profile and you can add with me now too. We don't mind.

00:53:28Danny Norman: Yeah. I forgot all about that. And then I got reminded, did it for a little bit. And it was like, yes, a lot of effort. You have to put a lot of effort to get this data out. So respect you in that sense.

Launches and anniversaries"Where is the cake?"

00:53:39Danny Norman: So launches, yes? Launches next? Launches. Yes. Hooray. So USA, one in the USA, Branch Brook parkrun is located under 15 miles from Central Park, New York. So listen to that very carefully. 15 miles from Central Park, New York. So that's the nearest to Manhattan now. And it's in the suburb of Newark. So just west of Manhattan. And the course is a three-lapper around a 360-acre park. And 76 people finished week one. Supported by six volunteers and 10 of those were first-time parkrunners. And I do know everybody's going to hear this and go... When we go and do the New York Marathon in November, that's going to be rather handy. I believe I've got good information that says that they will be cancelling that weekend. I know people will be sad to hear this, but can you imagine though? Because they are going to get as big a number as London would. 56,000 probably plus finishers are around that mark. Even a small proportion of those go and visit to do the parkrun, they'd get absolutely hammered. Yeah, that's understandable. Yeah, London events rise up and they have a saturation. They have a bunch and they go a lot larger than normal. But yeah, can you imagine a new event that's only been going for what would it be a few or maybe half a year that easily top? I think they top a thousand people and they're all close to 800 to a thousand would go easily.

00:54:59[crosstalk]

00:54:59Melissa Ellis: Yeah, best they take the easy road there. They don't have all those years of experience like the London events have.

00:55:06Danny Norman: Veterans Park in Delaware and Raritan Canal, they can't be got to. They're just not as close or convenient. So there you go. Sorry.

00:55:13Melissa Ellis: Nice. Now, we also had a launch in Norway at Berger Stadion parkrun, just south of Oslo. This is another three-lapper, but in woodlands. A third of the people at week one were first-time everers. Everers. Everers. Thanks, TOC. Everers.

00:55:28Danny Norman: and in total there were 67 finishes assisted by nine volunteers and stadium equals stadium absolutely and I've had a little look at that because I read somewhere that you have to get well you can get a ferry from oslo across so it's very near oslo but you get a ferry over to where they are so that's very exciting I'd like to go back to oslo I loved it really lovely place New Zealand had a new one a Caroline Bay parkrun on the southern island in Timaru New Zealand's newest parkrun is another three lapper with two larger laps and one short lap 17 volunteers supported 130 finishers with 50 of those being new to parkrun or first time first ever as or whatever TOC put in

00:56:07Melissa Ellis: Now, over in the UK. Oh, I got the UK one. You did. Park in the Past parkrun.

00:56:12[crosstalk]

00:56:12Danny Norman: Yeah, unusual name. Very unusual.

00:56:14Melissa Ellis: It is. Located just to the west of Hope. This one is a two loop running through a fort, followed by an out and back. So we are calling it a three lapper. 156 finishers were cheered on by 23 volunteers. Three people completed their first ever parkrun.

00:56:30Danny Norman: Just for a bit of UK context, west of Hope. If you said that to me, I'd have no idea where that is. But if I say it's near Wrexham. That will give people more of an idea. So it's in Wales and Wrexham obviously is being very famous of late because their football club is being taken over. I say it's being owned by Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney.

00:56:48Melissa Ellis: Oh, I saw that on them. They won and he was excited.

00:56:52Danny Norman: The first club to ever do, I think it's five promotions back to back. All the way up. So yeah, here they come. Keep on rising up. Yeah, keep on rising up the leagues. I think, are they in the championship now? I haven't paid loads of attention to it, but if they've gone to the championship, they're not far away from the Premier League and the big boys. So there you go. Yeah, it's over that way, just in case people are wondering.

00:57:13Melissa Ellis: Thank you.

00:57:14Danny Norman: South Africa, Sun City parkrun towards the north of South Africa and on the edge of the Letsatsing game park. We welcome Sun City parkrun. The course is described as deservedly ranked as one of the most prestigious golf courses on the African continent. The Gary Player Country Club is 18 hole par 72 walking course with a 5k running trail along it. Nearly half of the 199 finishes as 87 were first timers to parkrun. A total of 18 volunteers helped on the day.

00:57:41Melissa Ellis: And last but not least, there was a launch in Canada. Victoria Park Beach parkrun in Cobourg.

00:57:48Danny Norman: Cobourg, I would have said, yeah.

00:57:49Melissa Ellis: Yeah. On the foreshore of Lake Ontario, the course is four laps around and in front of the beautiful Cobourg Beach and around Victoria Park on a flat course with a number of bends and corners. Week one saw 48 people complete the four loops, assisted by 14 volunteers. 46% were first timers. Hooray. Hooray.

00:58:09Danny Norman: And thank you to TOC for providing that data. And well done to you, Mel, for managing to still read it with the occasional grammatical or spelling error as you go through it. Well done, TOC. Yeah.

00:58:10[laughter]

Watching the Numbers at Alice Springs Telegraph Station parkrun

00:58:21Danny Norman: I'm giggling. Sorry, yeah.

00:58:22Melissa Ellis: Now, Danny, I've got an ongoing segment. It is called Watching the Numbers at Alex Springs Telegraph Station parkrun.

00:58:31Danny Norman: Is that your jingle? Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

00:58:33Melissa Ellis: And I'm still getting my tongue around that. I think I said Alex Springs instead of Alice Springs. Anyway, never mind. 147 parkrunners took part in event two. So I had a bit of a look and dissected the numbers. This was 39 less than the launch week. 73 of these were first timers to Alice Springs Telegraph Station parkrun. And hopefully many of them were last week's unknowns. and have registered. Speaking of unknowns, this week there were 22 and 34 people recorded their second parkrun. So we like that stat. We like to see people coming back for their second parkrun. This is showing fabulous community involvement for an event that sits so remotely within Australia's Red Centre and so far, to my knowledge, not been accessed by anyone from the regular tourist community. So I'm going to keep my eyes on who the first adventurer to visit will be because it's not going to be any easy feat to get over there. So planning is required.

00:59:38Danny Norman: Nice.

00:59:39Melissa Ellis: All righty.

parkrun adventure challengelistener challenge

00:59:40Melissa Ellis: So the next thing on our agenda, Danny, is a listener challenge. And the purpose for the listener challenge is it helps us identify in our social media who actually is the listener. Because we have discovered over the time that a lot of people that interact with us in the socials have no idea that we are a podcast.

01:00:02Alison Fraser (King): Yeah.

01:00:03Melissa Ellis: and we like to highlight when we do record the people that are actually listening because they're going to get a kick out of hearing their names.

01:00:10Danny Norman: Yeah. They have to do it quite quickly, though, don't they? Because by the time we release, they'll recognise that there's some people who obviously play catch-up. So it's the ones that are really enthusiastic and listen. So when it comes out, they've got between Thursday and Saturday before when you post up on Dazza's as to put this thing in. Is that right? So these are the super enthusiastic ones.

01:00:26Melissa Ellis: Well, it is. But they're the passionate ones, aren't they?

01:00:26[crosstalk]

01:00:28Danny Norman: Yeah, I understand.

01:00:29Melissa Ellis: They're the ones that they download it straight away and they listen.

01:00:32Danny Norman: Have you got an idea as to what's going in? Sorry? Have you got an idea as to what your challenge is going to be? Because you've not written in the notes. Are you going to ask me to provide you something?

01:00:39Melissa Ellis: No, I haven't because I haven't thought one up yet.

01:00:41[crosstalk]

01:00:42Danny Norman: Can I give you one then in that case?

01:00:44Melissa Ellis: Yes, please. Well, there you go. I was hoping you might.

01:00:46Danny Norman: Because it always needs to be something which isn't... It needs to have context to those who have listened and not particularly apparent to those who haven't. So do you mind if I ask people to put in hashtag D, because the capital D, and then lowercase O-R, and then uppercase B. So it would be Dorb, hashtag Dorb, it would be Dolly or Bev. Oh, okay. So if they can do hashtag Dorb, then we know that you've been listening between the release time and when Dazza's goes up, yeah good job okay okay I better write that down or I'll forget what it was and also you can also have people see all these daubs that go in there and then just copy them and hope that that's the thing as well so well that's true there'll be lots of people going what's the Dorb stand for yeah and it creates engagement and the response is hashtag arbitrary of course as we know

01:01:30[crosstalk]

01:01:40Melissa Ellis: Well, this is bringing us towards the end. Would you like to tell us where you're going to be on Saturday, Danny? Where are you at on Saturday? Where am I at?

01:01:49[crosstalk]

01:01:50Danny Norman: You may plagiarise, you may imitate, you may copy as much as you please. And I recognise that we're in around an hour. I haven't talked as much as I thought I would do. Hopefully not made your life too difficult in terms of the editing process. But, yeah, where I am, I... Well, I'm aiming... Oh, which reminds me, I need to contact relevant parties. Ludlow. So that is toward Wales. It's sort of west of England. And it's just over a couple of hours west of London by car. And I've messed up my timing with landing. So I don't know if you... I'm keeping tabs on this. I'm trying to do my 500th different event. And I wanted it to land in a particular location. Oh. And I wanted it to be in the UK, so if people who want to come along could make it. And it would be a place called Sheringham, and that's on the North Norfolk coast. It's very beautiful. It's near a place called Cromer, apparently. It's where my grandparents used to go on holiday on occasion. But I have messed up because I'm doing some European overseas extras. I'm doing the Scandinavian extra and the Netherlands one. Now, if... So I'm 495 plus four. I have three weeks to go. So I either repeat for three weeks or go and tour. So if I tour now, then I'm going to land my 500. And it looks now, if I keep to do that, I'm going to land my 500 in Scandinavia. I'm going to have Jem with me. Tiny Steve's going to be there with me. If those guys are there, then it's important either way. So I haven't done my... It's a lot of information to basically say I'm going to go to Ludlow. But all the best laid plans, I've kind of mucked up a little bit. So, yeah. I mean, what would you do? Can I ask what you would do? So if you have... You either have three weeks and you want to hold on to something, would you repeat for three weeks or would you tour for three weeks and just make do with it and have it done overseas? Yeah.

01:03:43Melissa Ellis: Or it's a tough one and I've got to tell you, I am actually agonising over a very similar decision because my 250 different is approaching and I am trying to decide whether I do it local... Or go somewhere special. Or go somewhere really remote where less people can join me.

01:03:59[crosstalk]

01:04:06Danny Norman: Yeah. Yep.

01:04:07Melissa Ellis: Actually, what I'm trying to do is... is line up my 250th different with my 500th actual.

01:04:14Danny Norman: Nice.

01:04:15Melissa Ellis: On the same day.

01:04:16Danny Norman: Yeah.

01:04:16Melissa Ellis: Which I could do the 500 local and have more people and maybe family come.

01:04:22Danny Norman: Yeah.

01:04:22Melissa Ellis: But then it wouldn't be a – it would be a repeat, so I couldn't have my 250th on the same day.

01:04:27Alison Fraser (King): No. So –

01:04:29Melissa Ellis: There's so many things to consider and I like to look forward to a new event every week. So I'm doing more repeats than I used to and I'm finding ways to enjoy that through Dave because they're new events for Dave.

01:04:29[crosstalk]

01:04:44Alice: Yeah.

01:04:44Melissa Ellis: So I feel like I'm hosting him at these events and introducing them to him. So it's giving me a different perspective. But I get that it's a decision that's a hard one. Yeah.

01:04:54Danny Norman: Yeah. I know what some people would choose to do. Like for yourself, I know that if Nicola's listening, it should be like just milk it. Do you 500 one week and 250 the following? You get double loads of cake in that respect. Yeah, I can see. Yeah, it is what it is. And do you know what? It's always nice to have a partner who you value a lot. Mine with Jem is that she's very level-headed about it. She's not as... obsessed about these things oh it doesn't trouble her as much this sort of thing and she said look it is what it is where it is it doesn't matter try not to let it stress you out and she's right so what will be will be because there's no guarantee that we go to some of these events and it even happens who knows what all the best laid plans have in front of us and so yeah we'll see

01:05:41Melissa Ellis: I think you're very similar to me, Danny, that we are overthinking it. Very. And we should just let it happen naturally.

01:05:44[crosstalk]

01:05:48Danny Norman: Have you ever been... Did you grow up being told off that you overanalyze or overthink things? I did. I get it. And I still get it. I used to get it a lot when I was younger. I was always doing things wrong. Always talking too fast. Always too skinny. Always this or that or whatever. Didn't... Yeah, I... I had that as well with the whole overthinking, overanalyzing. You can't help it. It's natural, do you?

01:06:10Melissa Ellis: I did. I was always talking when my mum had a car accident, so it was always my fault.

01:06:14Danny Norman: Oh, wow. Blimey.

01:06:18Melissa Ellis: And I know that I always feel like I'm too much...

01:06:22Danny Norman: so you are you are you you mean well and you have these little quirks and characters some people saying it's wrong and it's too much or bad in that particular way you don't do it deliberately like yourself we don't overthink deliberately it's just the way we are it's the way we're programmed if there's an element of neurodiversity in it that's fine and it's for other people to try and understand and accept and that's why I empathize with you in that respect is that you know that we we know we do these things we we We overanalyze. We self-analyse. We are introspective about it. But that's what molds us and shapes us and makes us the people we are. And so we should lean into it. Yeah.

01:06:59Melissa Ellis: Exactly. Yeah. I think as I'm getting older, I'm being a lot kinder to myself.

01:07:05Danny Norman: Yeah.

01:07:06Melissa Ellis: And accepting of how I am. And I think learning about neurodiversity helps.

01:07:11Danny Norman: Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah.

01:07:15Melissa Ellis: We have different brains.

01:07:16Danny Norman: It's amazing, though, even at our ages, though, isn't it? We're still having, you can tell these elements of trauma from our conditioning from being brought up as to how this impacts us throughout our life as to how we respond and behave and act. It's fascinating. Sorry. Sorry for this therapy session. Shall we tie up the pod?

01:07:25[laughter]

01:07:36Melissa Ellis: Well, it's come to the time of night that I will thank you very much for sharing an hour with me.

01:07:42[crosstalk]

01:07:42Danny Norman: I've enjoyed it a lot.

01:07:43Melissa Ellis: Talking parkrun. I've really enjoyed it. I appreciate you coming on and filling in. Thank you for asking me. We hope you've had a good night, Simon.

01:07:50Danny Norman: Yeah, I hope you had a great 50th.

01:07:52Melissa Ellis: I hope you had a good night, Danny.

01:07:53Danny Norman: I did. I hope you had a wonderful 50th and I'm very grateful and appreciative and very flattered that you've asked me to come on and share this time with you. I do appreciate it.

Sign-off

01:08:01Danny Norman: Thank you very much for asking me.

01:08:02Melissa Ellis: You're welcome. Now, next week, it's back to me and TOC. Hooray. And as always, everybody, you can contact us via the 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.

01:08:17[14 seconds of audio that could not be transcribed]

01:09:01Melissa Ellis: So, Danny, Sarah reminded me that at the end of my guest co-host with you, you put me on the spot to name my top three Aussie events. Now, I know you don't like to name your top three. So, I'm going to phrase it this way. What three events would you recommend to me when I visit the UK and why?

01:09:20Danny Norman: Oh, wow. Okay. So... it's just going at the end of the pod because you need to contextualize the fact that you've forgotten to ask me a question you had it on a post-it note don't tell him that my audio will be different so you can't we can't stand uh you can't I'd say sandwich it in you can't shoehorn it into the pod now because the audio will be different because you're recording straight okay I stuffed up I forgot to ask him We didn't start far, but there's a lot going on this morning and evening. Wow. The three events, have you come to the UK? Yes. Yeah. Okay, fine. So I did get asked once when I was on parkrun adventurers when Mel and Scotty, they said they bought your top three at the time. And I gave in and said it, and I wish I hadn't, because that hangs over you. You can't ever remove that from the internet, um but obviously things have developed and changed and more events come online and I'm always with the mindset that there's some of the amazing ones are still yet to come okay three that you come to UK for one but everybody knows it you're gonna have to do the pilgrimage you know you're gonna come to bushy at some point Also, the fact that I live local to it. So if you were to be there, I'd love to be able to sort of come and meet you, but maybe not necessarily at the parkrun, but I'd actually be in the vicinity and would happily show you and guide you around. So Bushy would be the one that I would tell you to try and focus on in that regard. Otherwise, I'm sure people will be shouting at this about certain ones, quirky element ones. Some people may tell you Fountain's Abbey. If you're going to go from an aesthetics point of view, people are going to tell you potentially you can get to Ireland for Bere Island or Fountains Abbey. I have a thing about Durlston Country Park, which is on the south coast, of England I would send you to bushy and delston I love the course it's tough the the view uh the community I mean the way that they have the volunteering side of things down pat is just amazing so there's your two third one this is UK only right UK yep so I've actually I've tested Ireland and bear island as well and so if it doesn't count that is um so UK would be Fountains Abbey in terms of beauty aesthetics but some people will be shouting at it um I've had experiences at parkruns where they may not be the most aesthetically pleasing, but they are just some amazing locations. Do you know what? I'm going to play it easy. Okay, do it. Bushy, Durlston, Fountains Abbey. That's what everybody will say. I have many other ones that I would send you to. This is the beauty of having gone to nearly 500, that many of those have such intrinsic value just beyond how they look. I know this is the most sort of noncommittal answer fencing I could possibly do, um I don't think this I think the job is I don't think there's enough time to do it all justice the same if I came to Australia if I only did three I would end up missing out on 400 and well 500 plus at this point I would say exactly and I'd miss out on 500 so I'd have to accept that so yeah there you go there's there's the three thank you very much Danny Norman yeah thanks for that thanks for doing me over thanks for that I appreciate it

01:09:28[crosstalk]

01:12:30Melissa Ellis: bye bye