Episode 437 - Woe is a crowd

00:00:00[intro theme playing]

Welcome

00:00:23Melissa Ellis: Welcome to episode 437 of the parkrun adventurers podcast, a podcast about life, if your life is all about parkrun. My name is Melissa Ellis and I'm coming to you from Wurundjeri Country.

00:00:36Tony O'Connell: Cooee Mel, it's TOC and I'm from Inverloch and I'm coming to you from Bunurong Country. I left out my cooee, cooee TOC.

00:00:45Melissa Ellis: I was waiting. I was waiting. I know. I could tell because I realised I didn't really write it properly in the show notes because, you know, I had one job and I haven't even followed the script in the first few lines. But anyway, hello. I haven't seen you for a whole two days. Is it two days?

00:01:04Tony O'Connell: Yes, it's two days. It's been like that, Mel. We don't run into each other for a month or six weeks and then three times in three weeks.

00:01:14Melissa Ellis: Sometimes it's longer than that, but yeah, you are right. It's been lots of times lately, which is great. There's been lots of touring happening. I've been touring a lot and you've been on the road. I did a solo one recently, and I've got to tell you a funny story. This is a funny story. I did laugh at myself with this, and I was driving out to one of my morning parkruns where I have the early start, as you know, and I'm driving along, and I am somebody who owns a lot of pair of sunglasses. I'm talking I've got probably, ooh, 15 pairs of sunglasses, maybe 15.

00:01:50Tony O'Connell: How many of those would be gooders?

00:01:51Melissa Ellis: Oh, lots of gooders. Because at one stage it was, you know, I needed to have a different colour gooder to match every outfit I had. And I have a lot of running tops. So, you know, and every time we had a palm, I bought a new pair of gooders. I got a lot of pair of sunglasses. I got to have special ones for the military because I'm not allowed to have fancy colours. And I got some that are prescription. Anyway, a lot. You get the point. And I'm driving out and... because we leave so early in the morning and the sun's coming up and it's just on the horizon and all of a sudden I'm driving straight in oh my god I need a need a pair of sunglasses and I'm in the jiminy now if I was in the barina I would be fine because I got a little can little sort of sunglasses thing on the roof of my car where I keep a pair and then I've got a pair in the glove box and I've got a couple sitting on the dash but in the jiminy in the new car I'm like, surely I've put a pair in the glove box. So I'm reaching over and I'm fumbling as I'm driving in. No, there's no pair in the glove box. And I'm like, maybe it's in my handbag and I'm reaching across and I'm fumbling, you know, while my eyes on the road, but my hands fumbling around in my handbag and I'm getting more and more annoyed. And I'm like, oh, my God, I can't believe I've got so many pairs of sunglasses. I haven't got one pair with me. But guess where they were, Toc? On my head. On the noggin. Right, what an idiot I had them on my oh my goodness me so lucky it's a fashion accessory that I always keep a pair of sunglasses on my head and I was saved I was saved by the sun glare and now peering back behind the curtain I'm sitting here looking at you on the screen and you've got your regular glasses on and your headset on and you have a pair of sunglasses on inside I do On your head. Because that's where I keep them, except I forget that they're there. And half the time I knock them off with my headset and then forget when I need them that they're there. Anyway.

00:03:40Tony O'Connell: I thought this was going to be another Puckapunyal trip where the past had fallen out.

00:03:43[crosstalk]

00:03:46Melissa Ellis: No, but now you'll be glad to know I have got one of my pairs of sunglasses and they're in the glove box of the Jiminy. So now I'll be fine. I won't ever get caught again. Anyway, that's just incidental news, TOC. Surely there's more interesting news going on in the parkrun world than my sunglass story.

00:04:03Tony O'Connell: Well, Mel, we've got a couple of things and we'll touch on them later. But one of the things that caught my eye this week was parkrun have sent out a release saying that the Milestone T-shirts are now available out of the Australian shop up at the Gold Coast. So for the Australians, and I assume possibly the New Zealanders, that's going to mean we should be able to get stock a lot quicker. Yeah, which should be good for those that go out and buy their milestone T-shirts. I haven't got around to my 250-vol one yet, but yeah. Let's see what their delivery time, and I guess their stocking levels, it's very hard. There's singlets, there's T-shirts, there's long sleeve, there's 10s, there's 25s, there's 50s, there's 100s, there's 250s, there's 500s. Are you going to list every single one? It's a lot of stock when you put each size in each item and carry stock of it. So they must have an enormous warehouse that they've leased out.

00:04:58Melissa Ellis: Okay, so is the supply still coming from one central place or do we have our own stockists now in Australia?

00:05:08Tony O'Connell: I'm not sure, Mel. I believe that they're actually being stocked at headquarters, but I'm not sure where they're coming from. And I'd love to see parkrun change their milestone shirts anyway and get rid of the stick-on ones and go to a sublimated print like all the race events do now where the things don't fall off if you wash them in the wrong temperature and that the sublimated printing just seems to be what everyone's doing now.

00:05:36Melissa Ellis: I have to admit bought my 500 recently I got the size wrong so and the material it's all clingy on me and I don't like it at all so I'm gonna drop some kilos and I'm gonna buy another one and hopefully it'll look a bit better but I'm not wearing it at the moment because it doesn't look good I don't really like the material But I've got to tell you something else too. I wanted to bring this up. And this just reminded me, I've got the parkrun jacket. You know, it's like a very lightweight spray jacket and it comes in black and it comes in apricot.

00:06:08Tony O'Connell: Yep.

00:06:09Melissa Ellis: It's stinky.

00:06:10Unidentified speaker: It is.

00:06:11Melissa Ellis: It's stinky. I've had a lot of running jackets and a lot of different versions and a lot of different big name brand running jackets. And I wear this one one time. I don't even wear it when I run all the time and it's stinky. And I have to wash it.

00:06:26Tony O'Connell: It's parkrun Fresh.

00:06:28Melissa Ellis: Yes. I don't know what it is. So I'm sorry to bag you out, parkrun. But, you know, I just wonder if anybody else has got the same problem as me. I don't know.

00:06:40Tony O'Connell: Oh, Mel, onwards and upwards. What have you been up to? We haven't had a chat for a month. Last time I was sitting in a motel room recording in New South Wales. So what have you been up to in the last month, Mel?

00:06:54Melissa Ellis: Well, October was a brilliant... One for me, tourism-wise, I had three new events over the four weeks. I started the month out at the Phar Lap Track parkrun, coincidentally on Phar Lap's birthday. The fledgling event is named after a circular track within Braeside Park, a woodland area filled with wildlife where the famous horse trained in the 1930-31 period, also the fact that it starts with the it's another event for the the club which gives me four out of the six in Australia so I've got that beaches The Ponds The Avenues and now the far lap track and I had to do a little bit of searching to find out the two that I haven't got they're both in New South Wales The Entrance and The Terrace so there you go The following week, I was very excited to travel to Cape Patterson to visit and enjoy the hospitality of yourself and Jacqui, TOC, experiencing the wonders of your beautiful new home at the Cape with its magnificent clifftop views nestled within the sustainable residential project. The Cape development boasts dedicated open space filled with kilometres of walking and cycling tracks. It offers everything you need in a well-planned modern community. To say Dave and I were impressed would be an understatement. TOC, you often say, I'm just a builder, which typical to your character is massively understating what you achieve in your business. TS Constructions is an industry leader in building not only sustainable homes, but commercial projects as well. I'm going to ask you to tell us more about the features of your new home shortly. So as well as the trip to the Cape, I also returned to Inverloch parkrun, reminding me and displaying today of just how fabulous it can be running alongside the Coastal Reserve and sampling award-winning pies at Paul the Pieman's afterwards. The third weekend in October was a solo visit southeast to the relatively new Red Hill Rail Trail in Red Hill on the Mornington Peninsula. I was pleasantly surprised to find many familiar faces, including adventurers Joe Richards, Joe Stingo – I really must find out the proper name for Joe Stingo – Lisa Cuso, Amanda O'Reilly, Susan Kirk and the Travelling Smith family, Daryl, Vicky, John and Donna – Red Hill Rail Trail was beautiful, but be warned, it's deceivingly downhill for the first two and a half kilometres, so you know what that means. This brings us to Saturday Past, where Dave and I took an early start to drive the one hour 40 minutes to Lake Colac parkrun, which was event number five. Now I'm going to do something very unusual for me and leave it there for you to recap the event, but not until after you have told the listeners all about the design features of the SS O'Connell.

00:09:38Tony O'Connell: Thank you very much for those kind words, Mel. Yeah, we're very fortunate to live in the estate called The Cape. It's an estate planned. We've got 52% open space. We've just got parks and wetlands. And I Joe can say I look out the dining room window and there's a kangaroo a metre away from our window but you can also look out two metres away and there can be an echidna or there can be a wombat so we're just surrounded by nature and we're very fortunate to have that. Our house itself, Victoria has a minimum star rating of 7 stars I think ours is 8.7 stars so it's a fair way above the minimum but we've designed it around a passive solar principle where We use the sunlight and the natural ventilation. So we don't, I think we've run a heater maybe twice in 10 weeks that we've been in there. And it's just to take a bit of the chill off the air. We put a lot of things in like natural ventilation, but we've also got mechanical ventilation. So we've always got fresh air being brought into the house through a heat exchanger. And you will have... When you go for a shower, you push the button and we don't have the noisy exhaust fans. It's all controlled by a thing in our laundry and you just don't hear the extraction running. We've got all these little features, you know, PVC windows and we've got them triple glazed on the ocean side because we look out and we do see Bass Strait. We see whales. We're lucky enough, we've seen an aurora last week from our bedroom.

00:11:06Mitch: Last week? Last week, Mel, you were too early.

00:11:10Tony O'Connell: You're a week early. Yes, we've sent an aurora out of our bedroom. But we also threw a few little quirky things. You know, I think they're quirky. Like, we got a whole heap of crushed blue glass and scattered it through the concrete and it's been polished into the concrete. So we've got a polished concrete slab with blue glass everywhere and different colours. And, you know, we've carried that ocean blue theme through stone splashed back in the kitchen. So it all ties in. So you look out of the kitchen window and you've got the blue splashed back in front of the ocean. So it all blends into... So there's a lot of things in the house. I just love it. I love building down here. I've built 90 out of 120 houses in one estate. And yeah, we're averaging well over eight stars, which is just so far beyond the Victorian standard that we're really proud of that. So thank you for asking. I'll get off my soapbox and...

00:12:04Melissa Ellis: No, I wanted you to tell the listeners because I don't think they really appreciate just what you do. And like what I noticed about the house, it's so quiet. You just don't get any noise. It's so well insulated for sound as well. And what was the other thing I was thinking of? Oh, you've got solar panels and you've got a battery or you've got two batteries?

00:12:26Tony O'Connell: No, we've just got one big battery. We've got a 20 kilowatt battery. But the house, as you said, is very well sealed. We're one of the few builders probably in Victoria that actually do blower door tests on our house to look for air leakages so we can seal the house up really well because there's no point... Running a heater, flat chat, and having all the hot air escaping through holes in the building. So we test our houses with a blower door test and we're so far below the Victorian average, which you want to be below it, you want to have minimal air leakage, we're so far below it that it's just not funny. And we're probably one of the few estates that actually enforce that you can't move until you've had a blower door test done.

00:13:04Melissa Ellis: Wow. I want to get one of them done on my house. Not that I think it would be very good, but you can always do improvements on your home regardless, can't you?

00:13:12Tony O'Connell: You certainly can. And the blower door test guys are great. They come in and do the test, put positive pressure on the house, and they walk around with a can of spray smoke, and they just give it a squirt, and you can see the smoke disappear through the gaps in the window. You wouldn't think there's a lot of little things like the little power points. They leak an incredible amount of air through a power point, through the three little slots in the power point and every house has them on external walls they leak a lot of air so we learn things like that and we seal the back of them we seal the holes where the wires get drilled through the external wall frames with silicon so that they don't leak air just little things like that make a huge difference and you've you've seen what it's like and heard how quiet it is it's a different sort of living I love it thank you thank you for sharing

00:14:00Melissa Ellis: All righty. Well, that was my recap, but yours, it will be a little bit of the same, a little bit different.

00:14:07Tony O'Connell: Yep. Well, after we had our chat, as I said last time we chatted, I was sitting in a motel in Cairo piggybacking off dodgy Wi-Fi with no camera because we couldn't get enough bandwidth to run a camera and a microphone at the same time. We ventured down the following week and we went to Jerrabomberra Mountain Reserve parkrun near Queanbeyan and very close to the ACT. Great course, absolutely loved it. Where you found Red Hill was 2.5km down and then you turned around and you had to run 2.5km out. Jerrabomberra is the opposite. It's two and a half K straight up. And if you look at the run profile, I think I've got about 130, 140 metres of climb in the first two and a half K. It is straight up, but then you turn around, it's just freestyle down the hill. Yeah, great little event. Absolutely enjoyed it, but it comes with the eight and a half hour road trip back home. So we skedaddled after it and headed home. Week after, we had some very special guests at Cape Patterson, being yourself and Dave. The following week, I was RD at Inverloch, so I was back at Inverloch for the second week in a row. Just love going back to Inverloch. I love travelling as well, but, you know, there's something about the community where you've established a parkrun and you've been involved with one for 11 years and just the people and, you know, it's like catching up with old friends every time you go to parkrun. I love that. And then Saturday... Friday night, we drove up to Lake Colac. For us, it was about a four and a mid-hour drive. And we ran into one Melissa Ellis, as well as Dave and Dermot. And Dano drove up as well. And there were quite a few others. And we'll go into who was... at Lake Colac a little bit later on in the episode. But Lake Colac, as I said when it launched, was a very special one for me. I was involved. I was the ambassador when it was proposed. I went and measured their course and set their course out with them. So you start off down near the lake. You run up a small hill inclined to the Botanic Gardens. You actually run two laps around the roads, a ring road internal inside the Botanic Gardens, but it's actually a gated thing that doesn't open until 10 o'clock. You then run back down past the start line and you follow the lake. There's a concrete path along the edge of the lake. You follow that for about a kilometre lakeside so you've got all the water birds and everything along there. Turn around and come back. So it's a great course if you like talking to people and cheering people on because you pass them a couple of times on the top and then the out and back section on the bottom you sort of catch up with everyone along there. So, yeah, no, a great day. We had plenty of adventurers there. We had sunshine and, yeah, just a really good day out.

00:16:58Melissa Ellis: And you know what Dave said to me? He said, did you see the bats? And I said, no. He said, did you hear them? And I said, no. Did you?

00:17:05Tony O'Connell: I've got to be honest, Mel, I'd say yes.

00:17:09Melissa Ellis: Well, apparently they were there.

00:17:11Tony O'Connell: I've done that course a couple of times now and I'd say, what bats? Mind you, I did run with a couple of our adventurers. So you were talking. I might have just kept talking, I think. Larry and Adrian were running with me and we were chatting. We've run together at a few events, both parkruns and trail runs and all sorts of things. And we were just having a bit of a catch up. And yeah, I think for the first three Ks, I don't think I stopped talking as I tend to do.

00:17:45Melissa Ellis: But you've got something else you wanted to talk about, I do believe, and it involves a certain recent launch up in the ACT.

00:17:54Tony O'Connell: Yeah, look, Mel, Woden's launched very close to inner ACT, so it's probably one of the close ones, just sort of slightly south of Lake Burley Griffin, for those that know the area. And I'm just sort of wondering, are Event 2s becoming the new launch? We used to advertise launches and they used to get... not overrun but they used to get a lot of people at them some of them were getting to the point of being overrun I think I think it might have been the terraces up in new south there was a couple of different ones that um we had Warringal Parklands that was a massive launch probably way too many for the park and for the parking in that in the area I'm just wondering whether event two is becoming the new launch or Or if this particular event at Woden was a bit of a spike due to the proximity of the other ACT parkruns and the fact that there's so many people that are capitalists and that they've run every parkrun in the ACT. And I'm a bit grumpy at that because I only became one two weeks before this launch. I held it for two weeks. But anyway, it gives me an opportunity to go back. So Woden at their launch day, they had 102 finishers, very competitive. quiet launch they kept it really well under wraps just the local uh crew week two the number jumped to 731 finishes that is an act record so for all the events that are up there that have been running for 10 years plus, that is the record by a significant number. The previous record was 659. That was Burley Griffin on Christmas Day 2020. And there were quite a few other events that weren't running on the day, so everyone flocked to Burley Griffin. Before the launch, there were 2,002 people that were capitalists that had done every event in the ACT. The launch saw the number cut back to 38, so obviously there's a few people in the know. Week two, it was a bit of a rush to get back there. There was nearly 200 people regained that capitalist statesman. I was actually surprised when I saw it was only 200. I thought there might have been more people regained. Because if you live in that Canberra area, nearly everyone's probably a capitalist because the events, you've got nine events within 20 kilometres, basically, if you live in the middle. So I'm just wondering, you know, are event twos with the silent launches becoming now... The one that gets over, not overwhelmed, but...

00:20:28Melissa Ellis: It is overwhelmed. Let's call it what it is. That would have been overwhelming. It is.

00:20:34Tony O'Connell: Look, to be, you know, I ask, is it fair on the event? No, it's not really fair on the event. They ran out of finish tokens. They ended up having to handwrite... Finish tokens out. And I saw they were writing them on scraps of paper and then having to manually enter it all. So the event team had a massive job there to try and catch up on the results and get them in. Congratulations to the event team for getting it done, but you shouldn't have to.

00:21:00Melissa Ellis: And I think this is a trend. We've already seen this happen in the UK. We've heard about it when we listen to our friends on With Me Now. Danny's been saying for years that event twos became... the new event ones. And I know we both make an effort now to wait longer than event two. It was event five that we went to at Lake Colac, which is something we probably want to use our platform for, to reach out to our listeners and encourage just to help space out, I guess, the numbers over the first so many events so that this doesn't happen to events. And we all... We all have a history of going to launches. We all loved it. I know I did. I used to love launch day because it was a party atmosphere and it was where all the tourists came together. And when parkrun started to go along the silent launch, I fought against it. I didn't want to give it up. But, you know, we go on a journey with parkrun. And if we can reach out to our listeners and say all the reasons and, use whatever means we can to encourage them to maybe change their behaviours, well, we're only trying to do it for the good of the event team, right?

00:22:22Tony O'Connell: Yeah, and I think, Danny, you made reference to with me now, I think Danny's right in that the gamification of parkrun has really changed the way people see it. People... almost need to be there as quick as they can to regain a status but it's a completely arbitrary status like you know I you know I said I was got up to being a capitalist and I lost it in two weeks well you know I'll probably go back next year and try to catch it up but it doesn't It doesn't affect my life at all whether I go this week and catch it up because I need to get there and get it done or whether I go in April next year or whatever. It doesn't make any difference at all. But people are almost seeing it as they've got to be in the first crew to get there. They need to have that experience. Yeah, that tick to say they've done it. I just, yeah, I'm not sure whether that's the reason to go to a parkrun. I go to a parkrun to enjoy it and catch up with people and have a great time.

00:23:23Melissa Ellis: Absolutely. I love the travel. Tourism has caused me to go to so many wonderful places and learn so much about our country that I never would have learned otherwise. See all the big things and meet all the people. And, you know, it's just brought so much to my life. But... You're right. Like, I'm excited there's another event in the ACT, so now another trip will be in the planning. But I don't have to be there next week.

00:23:51Tony O'Connell: Yep. Next year for Grand Final weekend when Floriade's on, you've got to go.

00:23:55[crosstalk]

00:23:56Melissa Ellis: I don't know if I can wait that long. But there's a rodeo in March. Anyway, we'll get back down off our soapbox now. We'll bring some feedback that we've got from the last episode. And Johan jumped onto the socials and he said, And then he's got the monkey with his hands over his eyes emoji. And he said, currently the event is listed as no longer taking place. At the moment, when it will actually launch is a subject of much rumour and speculation. And he's got a winking face emoji. I didn't actually look to see if it happened this week, Toc. Did you?

00:24:41Tony O'Connell: I did have a bit of a look earlier and I could not find any reference to it. It's a mystery. I actually went onto the events page and typed Innisfree because that's how I generally locate the ones in international ones where I have absolutely no idea where in a country they might be. And Innisfree is not even appearing on the search. Sometimes they appear on the search early. That one has disappeared completely off the parkrun mapping. So I'm not sure what's going on there.

00:25:12Melissa Ellis: Well, we'll have to sit and wait for Johan to keep us updated.

00:25:16Tony O'Connell: Yeah, and I'm sure he will at some stage, and we'll probably see Johan pop up there at an event, three or four, maybe.

00:25:23Melissa Ellis: Well, he is an ambassador, so he's one of those people, if it's his event, he's allowed to go because he'd be volunteering. He wouldn't be contributing to the problem.

00:25:34Tony O'Connell: Right now, Mel, let's start talking about some numbers. And I'm going to start off with New Zealand. This week, New Zealand had 59 events. They recorded 10,983 finishes and they had 980 volunteers. The number was down a little bit, but there were seven events that cancelled. There was a really strong storm that went through. New Zealand took out a lot of their volunteers, parks, they had significant flooding on the west coast of the South Island. I've seen photos of roads completely washed away and roads that were three metres above ground are no longer even above ground, they're below ground. Or below water. Below water, yep. I've seen some incredible photos from Invercargill from Queen's Park, and we did that parkrun earlier this year. It was a stunning park. I actually really rated Invercargill as being one of the prettier parkruns that I've been to. I... Don't tell the people from Queenstown, but I did rate Invercargill quite highly. And there was lots to do in the park. And the park's absolutely been demolished. But I've seen photos from around the town there. And the windstorm has just battered the place. And on the Invercargill Facebook page today, they've put up an overhead. They've done a flight over the top of the park. And the park is a massive park. It's got a golf course in the middle of the park that you run around for parkruns, around the outside and that um it's got a zoo it's got it's got a Botanic garden section it's got every it's it's been flattened so Anyway, that was the reason that New Zealand was probably down a little bit, both in number of events. But yeah, we pass on our best wishes to all our Kiwi friends from over the ditch. And yeah, hopefully you're back and running again soon.

00:27:27Melissa Ellis: Meanwhile, back in Australia, we held 523 events with 6,465 volunteers assisting the 77,215 finishers. 4,649 registered for parkrun and 3,539 participated for the first time. In the junior events, five events occurred where 398 Little Legends were guided by 111 volunteers. There were 52 new registrations and 36 first time ever finishers.

00:27:47[15 seconds of audio that could not be transcribed]

00:28:03Melissa Ellis: So the smallest parkrun back on the 18th of the 10th was Cloncurry in Queensland with four and the largest was Albert Melbourne with 837. Now this last weekend on the 25th of the 10th the smallest parkrun was Railway Park in Queensland with four and the largest was again Albert Melbourne with 930. Railway Park, as an aside, had one out of four of their parkrun participants as adventurers because adventurer Michael Blain was in attendance. So there you go.

00:28:36Tony O'Connell: Michael made up the big 25% out of the four finishes. One of those events where you can be almost in the top three and be the Tail Walker at the same event. Correct. Righty-o Mel, I think we've chatted long enough for a while.

00:28:50[background music]

Roving reports & the Channel 5 News crew

00:28:51Tony O'Connell: Let's throw across to our roving reporters.

Roving report Calum Burrell — Haigh Woodland parkrun

00:29:02Calum Burrell: Good morning parkrun adventurers, we're out in Haigh Woodland, event number 428. We're here for Phil Corker's Cowell but I'm actually having a party at the back with fellow Tail Walkers and tourist buddies and overall good eggs. We've got Graham Holland and we have Katherine Cole. But I believe today, Graham, you've got something else to share. Go on, what's happening today for you?

00:29:26Graham Holland: It's my 50th volunteer location.

00:29:29Calum Burrell: Fantastic.

00:29:30Graham Holland: I don't know, is there an official name for it? I don't know if there is. Volunteer and cow? A vowel. It's a vowel, that's half a vowel.

00:29:33[crosstalk]

00:29:38Calum Burrell: Okay, so go on, tell us a bit about yourself Graham, what does parkrun mean to you and anything else you want to share?

00:29:51Graham Holland: I'm from Liverpool. My first parkrun was the end of December 2017 and I thought if I could if I can do it in in the depths of winter I can do it anytime and I just didn't know when I did my first parkrun by myself didn't know anybody you know that you know six years later I'd be doing 250th parkrun in the same location and people would be coming from all across the country to join me and then you say like what does parkrun mean to you it means community it means friends it means uh seeing parts of the world uh that I wouldn't normally see and and meeting people I wouldn't normally meet and uh just experiencing that that wider joy that parkrun brings

00:30:43Calum Burrell: Okay, brilliant. And quickly, what are your top three parkrun events? You can narrow it down. Or even experiences, whatever you want to.

00:30:51Graham Holland: My favourite's got to be Bere Island in Republic of Ireland. Inis Meáin was fantastic. And Crissy Field. Fantastic.

00:31:02Calum Burrell: And you did another one. You became first finisher in America. I was first finisher, yeah.

00:31:06Graham Holland: Winthrop Trailhead, which is in Washington State. They had six runners. Wow. It was amazing. Brilliant. Really nice community event as well. Fantastic.

00:31:12[crosstalk]

00:31:18Calum Burrell: Yeah, brilliant. Okay, thank you, Graham. And we have Katherine Cole. Tell us a bit about yourself. What does parkrun mean to you and anything else you want to say about parkrun?

00:31:28Katherine Cole: I started parkrunning back in the summer of 2008 when it was fairly new to the North West and I think I did about event 16 at Bramhall so just after seeding advert I then met my best friend at parkrun, when we were waiting to be scanned, they offered to laminate a barcode and then we started running together. After I'd done 50 runs, got a phone call from Tom Williams, will you actually be Event Director at Burnage? So I took on that for six years and parkrun has just helped me. I brought my son up through parkrun, who volunteers and runs, and it's been a really good family for him as well as me. And then I also met my husband at parkrun, and I got engaged at parkrun. So parkrun is very much my life.

00:32:19[crosstalk]

00:32:21Calum Burrell: it is your life yeah and and thank you Catherine because you from doing parkrun at Burnage you introduced myself and Lindsay to so many different aspects of doing the volunteer all the volunteer aspects and you asked us to be Run Directors and uh yeah so we've you know we've got you to thank for for all of that so yeah so we've got quite a range of uh roles that we've done across the you can say we've got quite a range of skills and uh and experience at parkrun so go watch your top three parkruns Catherine

00:32:51Katherine Cole: I think my top three would be Penrhyn Castle in Wales, Edinburgh, and South Manchester. So a range of different areas. Fantastic.

00:32:54[crosstalk]

00:32:59[crosstalk]

00:33:02Calum Burrell: And I should say that, yeah, we've got a beautiful day for it, actually. Haigh Woodland is in the north-west of England, kind of north-west-ish of Manchester. Near Wigan. Near Wigan, yeah. We have all the pies. I don't know if we're going to have a pie later. LAUGHTER But other baked goods are available. And yeah, that'll be us for this particular part of today's roving report. Thank you, Graham. Thank you, Catherine. And thank you for all you do for parkrun.

00:33:11[crosstalk]

00:33:26[crosstalk]

00:33:26Graham Holland: I have got to say, before you sign off, I wouldn't have met you and Lindsay if it hadn't been for parkrun.

00:33:32Calum Burrell: Yes, and it ties in nicely today because we first met you at Phoenix at Lindsay's 50th volunteering location and now it's come full circle we're back with you and we are the tutus at the tail at the back so there you are team tutu we're all wearing tutu so hopefully you see some of those photos as well anyway Calum over and out

Roving report Ruth Perkins — Wöhrder See parkrun

00:33:52Ruth Perkins: Cooee parkrun adventurers, this is Ruth Perkins and today I'm coming to you from Nuremberg and I'm going to mispronounce it now but Wödersee or how would we say this parkrun?

00:34:05Benjamin: It's a Wöhrder See parkrun.

00:34:08Ruth Perkins: Wöhrder See parkrun. And I've very kindly had Benjamin, who is the Run Director here, who has agreed to talk with me today. So thank you very much and thank you for hosting us today. Today is a special day in Germany.

00:34:25Benjamin: In Germany it's October 3rd, it's Unity Day. We're West and East Germany connected together again and we're celebrating it as our national holiday.

00:34:37Ruth Perkins: And do you run parkrun here every Unity Day?

00:34:41Benjamin: It's the first time that we have a parkrun on Unity Day in Nuremberg because normally we have a great city run on our course in the wrong direction. So we have some difficulties to start a parkrun on the same day. But this year they relocated, rescheduled it and we don't have the problems. So we decided to try a special Unity Day parkrun today.

00:35:08Ruth Perkins: Oh, we're very grateful for it. Thank you. And today you've brought the most gorgeous weather. It's so sunny today. Can you tell people a little bit about the course here? Because I think it's gorgeous. It's a one lapper, isn't it? And what kinds of things can people see on their run?

00:35:24Benjamin: It's Wöhrder See, it's a flood prevention lake for the Nuremberg Old Town and we run one lap around the lake and the meadow which is called Wöhrder Wiese. It's connected and we have a flat course all on tarmac and we have a small hill at around kilometre four to prevent personal best times.

00:35:50Ruth Perkins: and talking about personal best times actually I think I've run my second fastest ever parkrun here today and my husband has run his first ever fastest ever parkrun today so it is wonderful here so thank you for that you were explaining that there was a time in this parkrun because it's been here for a while hasn't it that you ended up being RD many times

00:36:14Benjamin: Our parkrun started in 2018, so we were running the first two years on very few volunteers because we were building up. We had 25 to 30 participants and we had sometimes the same 5 to 6 volunteers every week. And so it was a time I was training for a long distance triathlon. I was the best trained status in my life. But we had so few volunteers, I had to be Run Director six times in a row. And I couldn't use my fitness this time to create a personal best time.

00:36:51Ruth Perkins: Frustrating. And you said to me that you have travelled to other parkruns. Which one would you recommend that other people should go to other than this wonderful parkrun?

00:37:02Benjamin: For me personally, being a volunteer in Nuremberg is very nice. But if I want to just be a guest and not have some work to do, most times I travel to Neumarkt. It's 30 kilometres from here. It's a wonderful two-lab course in an old... garden exhibition area. It was a... I don't have the English word for it in German. It's Klärwerk. And they reconstructed it from the 70s. Now it's a garden exhibition.

00:37:35Ruth Perkins: Oh, beautiful. So good views then?

00:37:38[crosstalk]

00:37:38Benjamin: Yeah, of course. Beautiful flowers. Beautiful people also.

00:37:42Ruth Perkins: So, yeah, thank you so much for hosting today, for being the Run Director and helping so many people have a lovely day. Is there anything else you think that people should know about your parkrun, about Wöhrder See?

00:37:57Benjamin: I think the most special is that we're one of the few one-leppers and that we have no problems with wheelchairs, dogs or anything. So sometimes we have race wheelchairs here, which are very fast, under 20 minutes sometimes.

00:38:11Ruth Perkins: Wow, that's wonderful. Well, thank you again so much. Dankeschön. And hopefully we'll come back again sometime. Thank you. [German: "Thank you very much."]

00:38:20Benjamin: I would love to greet you again here. Thank you.

00:38:21Ruth Perkins: Thank you.

Roving report Paul Kitching — Renmark parkrun

00:38:23Paul Kitching: Good morning, parkrun adventurers. It's PK checking in for the first time in a long time. Gosh, I know I'm a roving reporter, but do you think I rove very much? Sadly, not much these days, not like lots of the other awesome reporters out there travelling all over the world, which I love. But I have managed to get out of Adelaide for a change and headed northeast to Renmark, which is the Riverland, in the Riverland area of South Australia, up here for the long weekend to do the parkrun up here. And far out it is glorious up here, right on the river, staying at the hotel with our bunch of other parkrun squad crew. And... We've just arrived and looking forward to finding out more, seeing who's here, seeing how many people they get for their long weekend parkrun and enjoying a bit of travelling, a bit of adventuring. And hopefully this gives you a bit of an insight into one that you may be able to do if you are looking to do some regional adventuring. Let's go and do it. Right then, I'm actually out on the course now and walking with Mitch, one of the Event Directors or the Co-Event Directors. G'day Mitch. Good morning. What a fantastic morning it is as well up here in Renmark. Glorious, beautiful. It's going to be a stunning 32 degree day up here and the sun is out, the people are out. Jeepers, you've got good numbers. Is this normal numbers?

00:39:47Mitch: no no usually we get around 50 odd but of course school holidays long weekend beautiful weather yeah then that's when we get our big numbers I reckon a couple of hundred is big for us yeah what do you reckon you'll get today I don't think we'd be far off a couple of hundred yeah yeah certainly a lot of people have turned up here it is beautiful um so it's a lovely course it's a out and back and out and back um when did it start I think you said like nine years ago uh yes nine years we had our ninth birthday in july

00:39:52[crosstalk]

00:40:13Paul Kitching: Fantastic. And why did you get involved with parkrun?

00:40:18Mitch: I just saw it advertised nine years ago that it was going to start and never heard of it before. So I came out and had a look and still here.

00:40:25Paul Kitching: Fantastic. Well, and why do you do parkrun? What do you get out of it? um oh the exercise but I just it's it's a social thing as much as anything for me I do play other exercise so I don't have to do this for exercise but uh yeah the social side of it as much as anything yeah same absolutely love it um and a beautiful thing also we we get here and of course um we say yeah we're from Mount Barker and then Mitch says oh yeah so is my brother and that's the beautiful thing about uh so shout out to Lee as well if he's listening And that's the beautiful thing about parkrun, you know, wherever you go, you can usually find someone you know, or if not, find a connection or a parkrun that you did somewhere. So got to love it. Have you been, have you adventured yourself?

00:41:09Mitch: As in done other parkruns? I've done a few. Yeah, I've done a couple over on the Copper Coast and Mount Barker once or twice. Nice. Mildura, but haven't sort of travelled too far.

00:41:16[crosstalk]

00:41:20Paul Kitching: And you seem to have a good community here that support it, volunteers, etc. ?

00:41:24Mitch: Yeah, it's really good for a small town. We've got a good volunteer base and the council's right behind us too, which helps a lot.

00:41:31Paul Kitching: Fantastic. Well, thank you so much, Mitch. I'm going to get out there, mate. Really appreciate it. Thanks for everything you do for parkrun.

00:41:36Mitch: No, thank you. Thank you. Thanks for coming.

00:41:38Paul Kitching: What a good man. Wow. Okay. And that one, that's done. So yeah, really good parkrun. Great to meet Mitch out on the course. Actually, I met him at the start, but he was busy getting everyone to join in because there was a great crowd. And yeah, as I said before in my intro, just really good to come and check out some regional parkruns in your area. So yeah, go beyond the norm. Go and do a regional parkrun. This one here in Renmark is fantastic. and a beautiful part of the world. Hope you're enjoying parkrun wherever you are. PK, over and out.

00:42:05[background music]

00:42:20Melissa Ellis: And we are back from our roving reports. Now, I must say, we did hold Calum over for quite a while. It got a bit lost in the emails, but he was there speaking to Graham and Catherine back in August at Haigh Woodland. And we heard from Ruth, who was at Wöhrder See in Germany, speaking of Benjamin the Run Director on Germany's unity day on October the 3rd and then there was PK coming to us from Renmark and he was having a chat to Mitch who is the co-ed out there so thank you very much everybody for your contributions

Dazza's

00:42:59Melissa Ellis: But moving along, we have chosen five comments from each of the last two weeks of Dazza's posts. And back on the 18th of the 10th, Dazza said, we're not even making this up. Today is adventure day. Linguistically, linguistically. linguistically. Adventurer evolved from the French word adventurous, which means about to happen or arrive. The word's purpose was to inspire getting out and grabbing life with both hands. So did you celebrate this special day by going on an adventure today? And first in the door this week, or last week at Dazza's was Cassie Lee coming to us from the Great Estate. Cassie said, focused on improving my pace in my middle kilometre and was rewarded with a PB at Chelsea. And grats to my sister Cassie who is slowly chipping away at her times. I think she has discovered what I love about parkrun. Very proud big sister here.

00:44:02Tony O'Connell: And now next we go across to the UK to Monty Slade. Now that was an adventure. Sun moving house, his wife's first baby and parkrun. What could possibly go wrong? P.S. Wife said no. And that's a no emoji, I think. So I'm in trouble again. And there was a thumbs up photo in the Brookley's pop-up sign.

00:44:27Melissa Ellis: We also heard from Brett Bailey coming to us from New South Wales. Hey Dazza, I adventured over the ditch to Reddall Reserve and met up with the cool kids for a bit of a milestone and a birthday celebration. There was a photo of Brett showing a 250 shirt and I was sad to miss the Baileys on their Melbourne visit. More about that later and a shout out to Bec Bailey for her recent birthday.

00:44:51Tony O'Connell: Yes, well, Brett did let me know he was coming over and I was disappointed because I'd already booked accommodation, but never mind. We had an adventure anyway. Right now, we're going to hear next from Michael Lyttle, who was in the ACT, and he said, After a 12-hour drive from Brisbane to Canberra, we ventured to Tuggeranong parkrun. The locals told me that they all know it as Tuggers. My son paced me to my second fastest ever parkrun, beautiful course around Lake Tuggeranong, friendly group of volleys and great coffee afterwards at 80-20.

00:45:24Melissa Ellis: And we also heard from Andy Poole, who was coming to us from Italy in Milan. Took an adventure to Milano Nord parkrun today, but followed up with a visit to Autodromo Monza to watch some car racing. I hope I said that right. GT3 and British F3 in brackets GB3 championships. That must mean something to car people. Picture of our buff hanging on the wing mirror of the GB3 car. Our son is the mechanic with Wendella. And the photo was as described.

00:45:59Tony O'Connell: And I'm assuming that GB3, without having any knowledge whatsoever, is probably a class of the cars. So that's my little contribution there. Righty-o, Mel. On the second week, which was the 25th of the 10th, this week Dazza said, it's world pass today. So Dazza has whipped up a bacon and egg gnocchi for the cafe special today. Who's keen? Come on in and share your stories of parkrun adventurers with us all.

00:46:28Melissa Ellis: And first in the door was Claire Corkill coming to us from the Great Estate. I finished my beehive with Jack Corkill in Bright this morning and she had the freezing face emoji. But I think it's lies, Toc, it's lies. The photo showed Jack and Claire with beautiful blue skies behind Mystic's Mountain. I'm pretty sure it's called Mystic's Mountain up there at Bright. Is that your recollection?

00:46:50Tony O'Connell: It's Mystic Mountain, that's correct.

00:46:52Melissa Ellis: Go me and my memory.

00:46:54Tony O'Connell: Very well known as a mountain bike track, but yeah, very picturesque picture where you look across the oval and you've got Mystic in the background. And that prompted me, Mel, to have a look at my beehive. I've still got one to go, so well done, Claire. Yes. Yes. Rightio, next we heard from one of our favourites, Sam Schroder. And Sam said, early volley shift for the Punish. Then a lovely, easy walk at Bathurst parkrun for me this morning. And I guess we should qualify that, Mel, with telling people that the Punish is actually a run around Bathurst racetrack. It's not something strange or anything like that. Ooh. It's about a 6.5km run around the Bathurst Racing Track. So it's got a fair bit of a hill up it and then a big flowing descent down. There's a selfie of Sam in her Punish t-shirt showing the parkrunners heading off at the start line.

00:47:48Melissa Ellis: And I was pretty chuffed to see my Uncle Dennis attended Bathurst parkrun as well and he did the Punish. And there's a bit of a racing car theme going on here, isn't it? Because you are correct, it is a racing car track and it is well known as Mount Panorama.

00:48:03Tony O'Connell: That's correct. And I know Sam's a bit of a, almost a racing car tragic because she goes up for the Bathurst weekend as well when they have the big race.

00:48:13Melissa Ellis: Is it the Bathurst 1000? That's correct. Look at me knowing all my car stuff. Go you. I might have to get back there. I haven't been for two years. Anyway, next is another one of our favourites, the lovely Sarah Jefferson. She was coming to us from across the ditch. She said, it was a quick granola before we checked out of our airbnb this morning sauna by the beach here too if only we had time to use it but I did join the Oberg club and there was a running emoji and a sunshine emoji and a photo of Sarah Matt and hadley in the selfie frame woohoo for their Oberg club

00:48:53Tony O'Connell: Rightio, we're going to go across to WA and Gareth Arnold. Yep, Dazza did some laps at Kadina Trail parkrun for their sixth anniversary. High Point was chasing a runner dressed as a cow while dressed as a cheetah. Perhaps if I'd eaten some pasta, I wouldn't have been so hungry. And there was a photo of the start line crowd at Kadina Trail parkrun.

00:49:17Melissa Ellis: I thought cheetahs chased zebras.

00:49:20Tony O'Connell: Oh, it depends how hungry they are. Depends if they've had bacon and egg flavoured gnocchi.

00:49:27Melissa Ellis: Now, the last of our five from this last weekend comes to us from Ryan Stoddart, who's over in South Australia. Super stoked after more than a year of just needing hashtag 57 for my stopwatch bingo, it has finally happened. Oh, what? Why did I get this one? I don't wear a watch when I run, so I don't know my time until I get the results. But today, after finishing with a time of 23.57, I have now completed my stopwatch bingo for the fourth time. What? This parkrun adventure, don't laugh, Toc. This parkrun adventure, I was reunited with Sarah visiting SA for two weeks. Last night we camped at Chookaloo Campground, only a 700 metre forest walk to the Avenues parkrun. The Avenues parkrun is a really nice parkrun with an undulating trail through a Pine Forest with a chance to see koalas and kangaroos, coffee afterwards was at pick a pie bakery a short drive away in meadows with a great selection of doughnuts too and there was a photo of Ryan and Sarah in the event core flute at the beautiful avenues now we also had as a aside another one of our parkrunners Rodney Glossop, who usually hails from WA, and he came to Dazza's and he said, I was Tail Walker at the avenues in South Australia, so I wasn't allowed to go past anyone. Oh, that's a dad joke, Rodney. Good job. I also had a quick chat to Ryan and Sarah as they were wearing their adventurers tops. And Rodney also shared a photo with a friend in the yellow Tail Walker vests.

Emails

00:51:10Tony O'Connell: And Mel, not only did we hear from Ryan at Dazza's, but we also had an email from Ryan, and I'll read that out now. 23 months living in my little Hyundai hatchback, travelling Australia on this amazing parkrun adventure. I'm now in South Australia, here for another seven months, 10 South Aussie parkruns done, and I'll hit 38 over South Australia's 52 before I head up to the Northern Territory for six weeks, then across to WA for a year. SA is amazing. I'm loving the wine regions, the gin and whiskey distilleries, and of course the parkruns. I had my fingers crossed when Palm 2026 was announced, hoping it would be here in South Australia. On the latest podcast, episode 436, Sarah and Simon looked up my stats and noted that I hadn't done Clare Valley parkrun yet and questioned whether I'll still be waiting until March 7th to do it. And has it changed any of my plans? I'll definitely be waiting until March 7th. It fits perfectly with my plans. I've actually based myself around the Clare and Barossa region, often staying at a free RV campground just 15 minutes from Clare Valley parkrun, so it already feels like Palm will be my local next year. Honestly, it couldn't have been any more perfect. The stars have really aligned for this event, not just the location, but the date too. If everything goes to plan, I'll be celebrating my 600 parkrun at Palm 2026 with all my favourite people. Let the countdown begin. Ryan Studdart, parkrun adventurer, A401118. Oh, wow. How good's that? So that's everything aligning all in one great big line there, Mel.

00:52:52Melissa Ellis: Good job. That's amazing that Ryan has everything planned so far in advance. But good to know that we haven't ruined his plans at least. With palm, hooray. Excellent. So that leaves us. We do. Okay.

the Obi Award — Ryan Stoddart

00:53:12Melissa Ellis: I think maybe I've got the Obi envelope. Let me have a look. Office just is just a little bit upside down lately, you know, with the changing in staff and I'm not really sure where everything is. I think we need pigeonholes. That would really work. I'll get the Office Lady on to pigeonholes. Anyway, here we go. I found the envelope. Here it is. Oh, New strong envelopes now. Okay. This week, the Obi goes to... Ryan Stoddart. Pioneer extraordinaire and adventurer in his Hyundai. Congratulations, Ryan.

00:53:35[background music]

00:53:59Tony O'Connell: Yeah, well done, Ryan. I love looking at that little map that you published six months ago of where you're going to be and knowing that in April 2028 or something, you're going to be in Western Australia and having the planning years in advance. I can't even plan what I'm having tomorrow. So well done, Ryan.

00:54:17Melissa Ellis: Fun fact, this isn't the Ryan Stoddard episode, but fun fact, two weeks ago he ran the Shiraz half marathon in McLaren Vale, the same half marathon that Dave and Dermot ran. Okay. There you go. But Ryan wouldn't know that, but Dave and Dermot were there, but they were, and now he knows because he listens. All righty. Now, we have another email.

00:54:39Mitch: You've got mail.

00:54:40Melissa Ellis: And it comes to us from Ryan's girlfriend, Sarah Mars, Mars, Mars, Mars, hi your friends I came across this description of Railway Park parkrun at proston on the 5k app and thought it was very Aussie description of a parkrun I would love to know if there is any parkruns that meet next to a billabong and there was a laughy face emoji yours in adventure Sarah mars mars mars Brisbane a1742835 where's my little description gone I had it posted in their talk and it's disappeared it's gone right across to the it's it's moved it's migrated east has it oh there it is okay so the description the course description of Railway Park coming from the 5k app says begin at the big gum tree next to the park track head towards the railway building and complete the grassed loop head back onto the track and follow it out to the turnaround on Weir Road. Come back to the start line and complete a second lap. After the second lap is complete, head around the grassed loop a third time and finish. So there you go. That's Railway Park in Proston. And I guess the Aussie bit is that it begins at the big gum tree.

00:55:52Tony O'Connell: Next to a big gum tree, Mel. Yep. And there's a lot of our parkruns that do that, but not many that have it in their actual description. Personally, I like to go to a parkrun that starts at a cut-down tree stump.

00:56:05Melissa Ellis: It's a bit sad. It's a dead tree.

Club Corner

00:56:10Tony O'Connell: Right, Mel, I think it's time we listen to what Reginald has to say.

00:56:15[background music]

00:56:21Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III: This is Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III with Club Corner, where we quiz the hosts and listeners with Who Am I? And I am coming to you from Arrernte Country. Who am I is an easy game to play. I will ask questions and you will shout the answer when you think you know it. I will continue asking questions and you will or will not realise how wrong you were, and then at the end, all will be revealed. Let us get going. Who am I? Question 1. I am a very low parkrun. Question 2. My state has not been featured on Who am I? Question 3. Part of my name has featured on a previous Who Am I? And I do not mean the work parkrun. Question 4. I am featured in a few clubs. Is this question an extra hint? Question 5. I am one of the first 13 events to open in Australia. Question 6. I am part of a region of parkrunners. And finally, question 7. I am an out-and-back course beside Throsby Creek. Who am I? I am Newy parkrun. That is your lot for the week, and we will return to our country series with the Southern Hemisphere. And remember, in parkrun life, all non-milestone clubs are unofficial and unsupported by parkrun, so stay tuned for our future club corners.

00:57:51Melissa Ellis: And we're back from Reginald and it was Who Am I this week and I played along and I was a little bit like the clues at the start you know they're pretty broad really to say I am in a state that we haven't mentioned before in Who Am I and I'm like well really I don't track that, TOC. And then it was, I was in the first 13 launches and my little brain's exploding, trying to think. Anyway, I got it just after that clue, I think. Got it by the second last clue. And it was Newy. It was Newy. We've been to Newy.

00:58:32Tony O'Connell: Yes, we have. We've done the Freedo there.

00:58:35Melissa Ellis: And I've been back and done it for reels. Okay. It's one of the four-letter ones, and you know how I like the four-letter parkruns.

00:58:41Tony O'Connell: Yep, the nice short ones. Yep. A short parkrun. Does that make sense?

Consolidated Club Report

00:58:45Melissa Ellis: Moving on to our Consolidated Club report. For Saturday, the 25th of October, 2025, of a total of 842 members, 601 took part in 12 countries across 313 locations. Internationally, their adventure is at 69 events in the UK 11 events in South Africa four in the USA three in Ireland Italy Netherlands and Poland had two and there was one in Canada Japan and Sweden locally there were adventurers at 53 events in New South Wales. 52 in Queensland. 45 in the Great Estate. West Australia had 22. South Australia, 15. Tasmania, 11. There was nine on the North Island. Eight in the ACT. And the South Island had two. And there was none in the Northern Territory.

00:59:38Tony O'Connell: No bowling strike this week, Mel.

00:59:40Melissa Ellis: No. No, the second... Well, no, actually, I don't know how many weeks in a row for the NT was none. But anyway...

the Frond

00:59:47Tony O'Connell: OK, well, let's move across to our largest international fronds. And on the 18th of October, we had a frond of nine at one event. Penistone in the UK. We had Matt Lovelock, Alice Soper, Christopher Miles, Rhiannon Taylor, Tina Dury, Michael George, Debbie and Andy Eyrie and Calum Burrell. And then the following week on the 25th, we had a frond of three at Bon Game Reserve. We had Marianne Smit, and Nico and Jona van der Meer and from the three at the University of Galway with Lee Stott, Gabby Lipschen and Cass Castleton.

01:00:24Melissa Ellis: And on the pilgrimage front at Bushy on the 18th of the 10th there was nobody but on the 25th of the 10th we had two adventurers which was Michael George from the UK and Rory Marriott also from the UK. Now it was Michael's second visit to Bushy.

01:00:43Katherine Cole: And Rory, his first time. So Rory did the pilgrimage.

01:00:48Melissa Ellis: Now, moving on to the largest fronds. Back on the 18th, there was a Frond of 15 at one event, and it was Reddall Reserve. And the adventurers were Karen Hamilton, Michael Sharp, Catherine O'Connor, Lynette Pritchard, Sherry Brandtman, Ingrid Botha, Jan Yates, Britton Tanya Bailey, Michelle Smith, Sam and Luke Schroder, Hannah Newton, James Thomas, and Gaillyn Cooper. And I just realised I said Britton Tanya Bailey. It's Tanya. Sorry, Tanya. Got that wrong. On the weekend just gone, the 25th of the 10th, the Frond of 10 was at Lake Colac, and that was where we were, Toc. It was me, Dermot and Dave, Toc, Jock and Doc, Adrian Heawood, Larry April, Melissa Galichan, and Andrew Reynolds. And remember, you can add the Adventurers Club as one of your five affiliations in your parkrun or on your parkrun profile. My goodness, I've got the tongue ties today. Now, it's really easy to do. You can find a link to your parkrun profile in your parkrun results email that you get every week. So you just follow the bouncing ball and you can add us as a group.

Launches and anniversaries"Where is the cake?"

01:02:03Tony O'Connell: on your profile and if you need help just let us know and we can help you now we're gonna go through some launches and I thought this week there's lots of launches I know Simon and Sarah had the same last fortnight in fact so far in 2026 there's been 152 launches globally across apac that includes 32 in Australia nine in New Zealand and nine in Japan Across the rest of the globe there's been 45 launches in the UK, 18 in the USA, 10 in Canada, 9 in South Africa, 5 in Germany, 3 in Ireland and Poland, 2 in Austria, Finland, Netherlands and Norway and 1 in Denmark. Now, because we're getting so many launches happening on a weekly basis, I think our first week we're going to go through this week, there's eight launches. We've decided to remove the course descriptions, but if there's anyone out there that knows anything really interesting about the new courses, we'd welcome an email. So I'll kick off. On the 18th of October, there was eight launches, and the first of these was at Kilkenny Lane Country, UK. They had 214 finishers, 34 volunteers and that is in central England.

01:03:20Melissa Ellis: Next we had Cameron Park in Wellington, Australia. There were 40 participants, 15 volunteers and that is east of Dubbo in New South Wales.

01:03:29Tony O'Connell: Moving up to Queensland, we had Point Vernon Foreshore Reserve in Australia with 262 participants on week one, 21 volunteers, and that's up near Hervey Bay.

01:03:41Melissa Ellis: Next, there was parkrun Faktoria in Poland, 269 participants, 39 volunteers, and that is in some very strange region that I can't say. Gdankst. Gdankst.

01:03:52Tony O'Connell: That's close enough.

01:03:53Melissa Ellis: Maybe it's a silent G. I don't know.

01:03:55Tony O'Connell: And Mel, I've been lucky enough to draw the Japanese parkrun, and I'm going to say that it's at Muromi kahan koen in Japan. There was 21 finishers, 8 volunteers, and that's in the Fukuoka region. Don't say that after a few drinks.

01:04:16Melissa Ellis: Next, we've got the Oude Warande in Netherlands. 107 participants, 15 volunteers, and that's Southern Netherlands.

01:04:26Tony O'Connell: Next one I found was a bit interesting, the Tom Taylor Trail parkrun, given the gym I go to is the Tom Fit, and that's run by Tom Taylor. But that's in Toronto or near Toronto, and it had 69 finishers, 12 volunteers. Yes.

01:04:42Melissa Ellis: And we have the one we spoke of earlier, Woden Town in Australia. That's in the ACT. 108, no, 102 participants, 18 volunteers.

01:04:53Tony O'Connell: Rightio Mel, moving across to the 25th of October, there was only four launches this week, numbers were right down. We had Parrs Park parkrun in New Zealand that had 150 finishers, 27 volunteers and that's a new one in the Auckland region out to the west of Auckland.

01:05:13Melissa Ellis: And we had Balijbos in the Netherlands, 128 participants, 16 volunteers, and that is near The Hague.

01:05:19Tony O'Connell: Rightio, moving down, we had Pine Park in USA, in Hanover in the New Hampshire state, and 16 finishers and 5 volunteers.

01:05:29Melissa Ellis: And last but not least, St Patrick's Lane in Canada, 21 participants, 6 volunteers, and that is in Nova Scotia. Scotia, Scotia, sorry.

01:05:40Tony O'Connell: Nova Scotia. That'll be it.

01:05:42Melissa Ellis: All righty.

Watching the numbers

01:05:44Melissa Ellis: Next, we've got our favourite segment, watching the numbers at Brooklyn Bridge parkrun. And we're up to Event 9 and 10. So Event 9 saw 274 runners, supported by 17 volunteers. 213 were visiting Brooklyn Bridge parkrun for the first time. We had our third adventurer visiting. That was Bill Troy. He finished in position 150. And he did a very speedy 23.54. So next we had the last one that we're going to be covering, Event 10, which saw 352 runners and walkers supported by 18 volunteers, 273 first-time visitors. And next week, Brooklyn Bridge is cancelled for the New York Marathon. So we had seen numbers coming slowly down event by event, but then we've just had a little bit of an upward spike in the last two weeks. So that's very curious, but maybe people are already moving into New York, getting ready for the marathon. I don't

01:06:53Tony O'Connell: And I think we see the marathon effect quite often at a lot of parkruns all around the world. And I would imagine that if Brooklyn Bridge had been running next week, who knows where their numbers would have ended up. It would have been the bushy 20th anniversary proportions, I think. So, yeah, probably a smart move. Good call, Brooklyn Bridge. Good call. Good call.

Sign-off

01:07:13Tony O'Connell: Get in early.

01:07:14Melissa Ellis: Yeah, so look, we don't really have anything in the calendar for Looking Forward, TOC, so we might just zoom straight over to next parkrun day. Where are you at, Mel? Oh, okay. We'll go to me. I've got an adventure planned. This has been put together just in the last seven days because it is the Melbourne Cup... Long weekend in the Great Estate. Now, it isn't really a long weekend because Melbourne Cup Day is a Tuesday, but guess what happens us Aussies? We like a long weekend. We all take the Monday off and we bugger off somewhere, usually camping, to enjoy an extended holiday. So... I decided that myself and Dave and Ezra we're going to head off to do Lake Fyans parkrun probably not Ezra she'll probably stay in bed but we're going to hang out in the Ararat area, TOC and we're going to have some fun activities because there's a little bit to do out there in that area do you know what they are I know I'll save it I can save it I'll save it for next time

01:08:16Tony O'Connell: Save it for the report for next time, Mel, but yes, there is plenty to do out there. So, no, that sounds like an excellent little adventure. What about yourself, sir? Well, giddy up, Mel. It's the Melbourne Cup weekend, so we're going to Phar Lap. We're going to go and do the Phar Lap course. Seems like a logical extension for the Cup weekend.

01:08:37Melissa Ellis: It does, doesn't it? You will love it. Yes, I'm sure you will love it. And Big Red, Big Red they called him, I'm pretty sure. Yep. But next fortnight, TOC, Sarah and Simon will be back.

01:08:48Tony O'Connell: Back in the hot seat. Bringing you all their news from the last month. That'll be very interesting to catch up on, Mel, with a bit of travelling and Simon becoming the rural adventurer and really hitting the road too. So I guess, Mel, 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 episode. We'll see you all next time for more adventures.