Episode 454 - Old and New

Episode details · 212 speaker turns · sound cues from audio analysis

00:00:00[intro theme playing]

00:00:29Lyndell Murray: Welcome to episode 454 of the parkrun Adventurers podcast, a podcast all about life if your life is all about parkrun. My name is Lyndell and I'm recording tonight in Mianjin, the traditional lands of the Turrbal and Yugara. Coo-ee, Toc.

00:00:45Tony O'Connell: Coo-ee, Lyndell. This is Toc, and I'm on Boon Wurrung Country. It's great to catch up with you again. I certainly hope things are warmer up in sunny Queensland than they are down in Victoria at the moment. Inverloch, I always say it's always sunny at Inverloch. I'd be lying at the moment. We're having a fair bit of rain, a lot of cloud, and it's a miserable winter. Yeah, I hope things are warmer up where you are.

00:01:09Lyndell Murray: Yeah, it is pretty sunny up here, Toc. We've had a few showers. overnight here and there but pretty nice weather up here 20 25 degree days pretty nice pretty nice

00:01:23Tony O'Connell: Yeah, I've got to admit, we did have a 22 degree day today, but that was in the office with the heaters running. Outside, it was probably only about 12 degrees. So yeah, quite a bit cooler.

00:01:36Lyndell Murray: So where have you been parkrunning, Tok?

00:01:38Tony O'Connell: Well, I've been doing lots of travelling in the last couple of weeks, Lyndell. I started off at Eildon Pondage a couple of weeks ago. Eildon's one of my events that I support. it's one of my favorite events they've got this really strong community it's a very small event you know they are big crowds 30 or 40 people but it's fairly remote for victorian standards not of course for outback queensland standards but there was 19 finishes on the day 14 of them went back to the cafe and one of the things that i thought and i said to the eds later the you've got an amazing community here there was 14 people sitting around a table and not one person pulled a phone out not one person was looking on their phone and scrolling everyone was engaged and just having a chat good mates and i thought this is just a brilliant community this has brought a whole heap of people together that probably there's a few of them that knew each other but they just can't wait for saturday morning and there's the same crowd that volunteer every week because they just love running the event and it's just a really good feel good community i really enjoy it week after went to red hill trail trail parkrun we did red hill about 12 weeks ago i'm guessing and it was bucketing rain we had hail and it was wet and muddy slippery this week Once again, it was bucketing rain. It was so muddy, so much rain. And it was so much fun. Again, there were people going over. I was about to say something rude then. There were people going over on their back stairs everywhere. We had people finishing the course covered in mud. Everyone's legs looked like they'd been running through mud. It was just so much fun. On the day, Dawn, Cheryl and Mark joined Jackie and I. We just had a ball. Went back, had coffee afterwards. And yeah, once again, a good event. And the week just gone, we all saw the consolidated club report. We went down to Kirkdale for dinner, our son's 250th finish. Come a week after his 100th volunteer, so a bit of a proud dad moment at the moment. You know, Dan's really stuck at his parkrun. He's a run director at Kirkdale, and we love to see that. We went off and had breakfast with Melissa. It was great to catch up with Melissa again. Dave, Dan, Jack, Dawn, Chantel, Oren, and Parth. So it was a good crowd of us for breakfast once again.

00:03:53Lyndell Murray: yeah terrific little frond and well done dan what a terrific couple of weeks with 100 volunteers one week and then 250 runs next that's that's really excellent achievement well done i think he might have planned it that he's run director on his 100th so he could i'm not sure whether he was trying to keep it quiet or what he was trying to do but anyway it was well acknowledged and uh yeah well done dan

00:04:17Tony O'Connell: Brilliant. Lyndell, what have you been up to? What's your couple of weeks been looking like?

00:04:21Lyndell Murray: I've been staying pretty close to home in the last month or so. I headed into New Farm, which was the first parkrun that I ever did along the Brisbane River. Went back there to meet up with Bunyabil friends, Tim, Tara, Pete and Sue. And I tell you what, Pete has got him and his wife Sue's next six months of parkruns planned out he's chasing numbers he can tell you when there's a Fibonacci when there's a I don't do the numbers it's too hard for me oh so Tok Tok's just holding up his spreadsheet of number planning so anyway that was a really lovely morning in with friends breakfast and a nice run along the river since then I've met up with Sarah Jansa at Sandgate we had a again nice run along Moreton Bay out at Sandgate and out along the pier And then a beautiful breakfast at one of the waterfront cafes out there. It was actually quite funny that one of the local businesses that are launching soon had a Forrest Gump dress-up day. It was giving away vouchers to anybody that showed up in Forrest Gump costumes. So there were all of the different Forrests. The Army Forrest, the Czech Shirt Forrest. elvis forest the runner forest with the big beard and the red cap all of the forests were there as well as a couple of jennies you name it so that was quite funny and then this last most recent parkrun day i was up at nambour with fellow adventurer katherine and i did happen to to see fluffy as well so fluffy is still there making friends with the parkrunners yeah so that that's been my few weeks talk

00:05:58Tony O'Connell: Lyndell, your few weeks seem to encompass brilliant photos every week. I love seeing them pop up. That picture from Sandgate with Sarah, that was just a ripper photo. I love those parkrun photos. And the one with Fluffy, it looked like he was just walking along having a chat with her. Poor her.

00:06:16Lyndell Murray: I can tell you this much. I'm not a big fan of birds. I was not talking to Fluffy. I stood there to get my photo taken and then wandered off. But yeah, Fluffy's a real attraction up there at Nambour and he loves his home there in the parklands.

00:06:32Tony O'Connell: Lyndell, I think we should move on to some feedback that we've had from the last episode. And starting off, I'm going to add my own feedback in here and you can jump in if you like. But the hot topic was raised, does pineapple belong on pizza? And I can't even believe that's a question. Surely pineapple does belong on pizza. There's no argument about that. Surely that's just a common fact.

00:06:56Lyndell Murray: It is. It's a fact. So you've thrown that in so that we have this delightful discussion

00:07:02Tony O'Connell: debate about a pineapple or no pineapple you're not getting it from me because i agree wholeheartedly pizza and pineapple go together like fluffy and parkrun i think i had this debate with someone i said the best pizza you can usually get is a vegetarian with ham they always seem to put the best ingredients on the vegetarian pizzas and i just like it with a little bit of ham on as well

00:07:29Lyndell Murray: Well, then it's not vegetarian talk.

00:07:31Tony O'Connell: It doesn't matter. It's still got the only ingredients.

00:07:34Lyndell Murray: Yeah, I love a veggie pizza with pineapple.

00:07:36Tony O'Connell: Hey, I don't care what you call it. I just like it. Yeah.

00:07:39Lyndell Murray: All right, so there you go. No debate there, no sensationalism and no controversy. Let's move swiftly on. We also got feedback from Andrea Booth who commented on Facebook, thanking Simon for the reminder to update her emergency contact details. And she said it was really easy to do in the parkrun app. So another reminder, make sure that you've got your emergency contacts updated.

00:08:04Tony O'Connell: Yep, you never know when you're going to need them and it's too late when you do need them. So yeah, I'd really encourage people to jump on board and do that. We also had a comment from Ian Brown on Facebook. Thanks for the shout out. The building behind us is the Spar of the Church where they go for morning tea after parkrun. Enjoyed listening to the pod on the bus from Sydney back to Canberra at the end of our 11 week trip. We did manage 14 parkruns in seven countries and volunteered at four junior events in the UK too. We gave Ian a shout out in Daz's where he's enjoying tablet at a cafe after Queen's Glasgow parkruns.

00:08:40Lyndell Murray: Okay, we also heard from Yvette Turner and Val Warwick. They both let us know that they have got the dates for Palm locked into their 2027 calendars. So, listeners, if you missed the announcement last week, Palm will be on on March 20th, 2027. And apparently, we're meant to announce the location of this pod, but I don't seem to have an envelope. Do you have one, Toc?

00:09:06Tony O'Connell: I thought you had it, Lyndell. This place is a mess. I think we're going to need a better cleaner in level two. How about we have a look in Smoko or something? Because I haven't got anything. I can't find a thing in this place.

00:09:18Lyndell Murray: I wonder what's going on here. All right. Well, we'll have a bit of a look. Listeners, we'll get back to you, hopefully, maybe. Let's see.

00:09:25Tony O'Connell: Rightio, that's our feedback for the week. But if you enjoyed the pod, we'd love it if you could rate and review us on Apple or Spotify or wherever you listen, whatever platform you listen on. It helps other people find us and it helps us to keep spreading the parkrun adventuring love. Absolutely, it would be great.

parkrun news bulletin

00:09:43Lyndell Murray: Okay, on to our news and our merch orders have now closed and production is in full swing. We've been kept up to date by the office lady and she said that the orders are all being settled and ready to go into production. Deliveries will be expected to commence in about five weeks after the close of orders. So start checking your mailboxes in about a month. And should timing be good for us to keep you in the loop, we will give you a bit of a heads up on the pod if the timing is right.

00:10:14Tony O'Connell: Rightio. In further news, Bushy parkrun hosted their eighth gathering of the Okta and Nonogenarians at Bushy on Saturday the 4th of July. 180 parkrunners roughly completed the course in that age group, including eight men and three women in their 90s. Alan Anderson has been running at Bushy for 18 years and he's completed 820 parkruns and has a four-digit parkrun barcode. That's pretty amazing. I'd love a four-digit. That's so low. I know a few people that have those numbers. It blows my mind. I can remember scanning one at one stage and I thought that he'd missed half his barcode. Oh!

00:10:52Lyndell Murray: That was his number.

00:10:54Tony O'Connell: Out of the top three octogenarian men, we're all in the 80 to 84 age group. And you've got times like Peter Giles ran 23.55 in the 80 to 84 age group. And there was a couple others, Richard Seabrook in 26.32 and Colin Shorrock in 26.42. That's fast. The top three octogenarian women were Fiona Hatton in 30 minutes and seven seconds, Pauline Siddons in 30.27 seconds, And Dorian Abbott in 30-33. That's pretty bunched up and pretty competitive field there, Linda. Very close. And they had a top best age grade, was Joyce Archibald, of 98.55% in the 90-94 category. And she ran an impressive 40 minutes and 8 seconds.

00:11:46Lyndell Murray: That is incredible. I am... floored by those times talk. I am flat out running 40 minute parkrun at the moment when these people have got a few decades on me, that's for sure. So how brilliant, how awesome. So I just think it's great that parkrun allows this and is a place where people can get together of any age. The inaugural Octogenarians Gathering at Bushy happened on the 1st of July, 2017. So it's been going for nearly 10 years. And I got to wondering if any of the OG runners from 2017 are still going strong. So I didn't, don't think I've tracked all of them down, but I found a few. So Alan Anderson, who you mentioned, Tok was at the original octogenarians meetup, as well as George Frogley. I also found that the grandfather of Olympic triathlon champion, Alex Yee, Albert Yee was one of the original octogenarians from 2017. Now the Yee family continues to support the event. Their family business still provides medals for each finisher over 80 at the Bushy annual meetup. So how great's that?

00:12:59Tony O'Connell: It's just amazing. I know I'm hoping I'm still running in It's only 20 years for me before I'm in that category. Yeah. I'm hoping I'm still running in 20 years. And at that stage, I'm hoping my barcode's still getting a regular workout each week.

00:13:15Lyndell Murray: Our research department has chimed in to let us know that the next Octogenarians Meetup in Australia is coming up at Wynnum parkrun. And their Facebook page has got an announcement to say that on Saturday, the 22nd of August, 2026, they'll be holding... their sixth celebration of our senior parkrunners, which we will call Octogenarian Plus parkrun. As with all parkruns, people of all ages are welcome to join, but we especially want to welcome and celebrate those more senior parkrunners. In previous years, we've had people join our Wynnum octogenarians from nearby and distant events, so please spread the word. Touristing octogenarians will be very welcome and there will be cake. So TOC, I guess Wynnum parkrun consider that this is their message getting out there and getting shared. So mark your calendars. If you know any octogenarians, get them along to Wynnum in August.

00:14:11Tony O'Connell: I think it'd be another great event. We have a lady that's in the 90 to 94 age group at Inverloch, and she just amazes me that each week she turns up, she trundles around the course, she finishes, and she comes in and has coffee with us all. And I just think she's amazing. So, yeah, hats off to all of the... More senior opposite partners.

00:14:32Lyndell Murray: I met Maureen recently out at Nathan's Sports Ground. She's a regular out there and she turned 90 not too long ago. So a special shout out to Maureen.

00:14:41Tony O'Connell: Moving along in further news, Victorian news. This is very important to us and it's something that we've all looked forward to for a long, long time. The long-awaited return of one of Victoria's most scenic parkrun events occurred on the 4th of the 7th, which was only a couple of weeks ago, with the relaunch of Werribee Park Mansion parkrun southwest of Melbourne for event 23. For the event, they celebrated the new attendance record of 202 finishers and 14 volunteers. This event last occurred on the 24th of September, 2022. And you think, what would cause an event to be shut down for nearly four years? They had a massive rainstorm. Werribee Park Mansion is a historic mansion with a lot of grounds, part of the Werribee Park or near the Werribee Park Zoo in that precinct. They had a massive flood and actually washed away the bridge that parkrun runs over. So you do a lap around the front grounds of the mansion and then you go off down a track and run over a bridge the bridge actually washed away and it's taken nearly four years in fact it's taken them 1379 days to get back up and going again so congratulations Werribee Park Mansion on your rebirth and welcome back into the family yeah brilliant that'd be a great event to get to one day okay more news we have word on the street is that junior milestones will be changing this weekend

00:16:12Lyndell Murray: The wristbands are changing to new colourways and they will be presented at 10 runs, 25, 50, 75, 100, 150 and 200 runs. And there will be junior only t-shirts in the matching colours to the wristbands. So even more ways to celebrate the junior parkrunner in your life.

00:16:36Tony O'Connell: And Linda, the new t-shirts are coming out. They've got some little interesting designs on them. So little splashes of colour and the numbers aren't just a conventional number. So yeah, look forward to that one. We're celebrating a couple of birthdays last weekend. It would be remiss of us not to mention them. Our very own Melissa Ellis celebrated her birthday on Sunday. So happy birthday for last week, Mel. We caught up with you on Saturday, but happy birthday. And happy birthday to Danny Norman from the With Me Now podcast. His birthday was on Saturday, so he got to celebrate parkrun on his birthday, which is a great thing to do.

00:17:15Lyndell Murray: Fabulous. Happy birthday, Mel and Danny. Okay, this last parkrun day on the 11th of July... saw the handing out of the 25 millionth Finnish token in Australia. Now that is nearly as many Finishes as there are residents in Australia, which is not a bad stat actually when you really think about it. And when you think about the the stories, the friendships, the marriages, the babies that come from parkrun, imagine how many stories you could write out of that 25 million finishes.

00:17:53Tony O'Connell: Yeah, I think all of us, Lyndell, have some amazing stories that we could share about the effects that parkrun's had on not only us but on our friends and just people we've met along the journey. You know, we've all met some incredible people that have done, you know, not, Not all of them have done incredible things. Some of them have just done day-to-day things, but the way they go about it, yeah, parkrun's just full of all sorts of people, and that's probably one of the good things. We have a very, very broad church of people in the parkrun community, and we all gel together to make a really interesting combination, a really interesting event.

00:18:30Lyndell Murray: Yeah, it's one of those places where different ages, different occupations can all just get together. So congratulations, Australia, on 25 million finishes. All right. That's a lot of news.

00:18:43Tony O'Connell: That's a lot of news and we finished with some stats. So let's keep going with some stats. parkrun New Zealand attendance and milestone stats for the 4th of July. In New Zealand, there were 75 parkruns, 10,501 parkrunners and 1,207 volunteers. The biggest event was, surprise surprise, Hagley and the smallest was East Otago High School. Closest to the average number for the week was Oamaru Public Gardens on 141 and the average was 140 so they were very close there. On the 11th of July in New Zealand, there were 73 parkruns, so the number went down a little bit, but the number of parkrunners was 11,176, which was up a bit, and there was 1,172 volunteers, which was down a bit. The largest was once again Hagley, and the smallest was once again East Otago High School, and Omuru Public Gardens was once again closest to the weekly average.

00:19:44Lyndell Murray: Bit of consistency over there. In Australia on the 4th of July, we had 67,206 participants, 6,542 volunteers at 526 events. And there were 3,306 first timers. In the junior events that weekend, there were five events operating where 464 little legends were guided by 101 volunteers. On the 11th of July, we had 75,388 participants, 6,770 volunteers at 539 events with 3,147 first timers. And there was one attendance record set this last Park One Day, and that was at Cairns, sunny Cairns in Queensland. In the junior events, we conducted five events. There were 383 juniors. guided by 107 responsible adults. Now, on both of the last two parkrun weeks, Albert Melbourne was the largest. And on both of the last two parkrun weeks, Railway Park in Proston was the smallest. On Saturday the 4th, there was a golf trend happening for the smallest events though, with Jamestown Golf Course, Zion Golf Club and Pyramid Hill Golf Trail all tying in for the third smallest event in Australia with seven finishes each. This last Saturday, the 11th Southbank parkrun was the third largest event with 666 finishes. So I don't know whether that's an omen or not.

00:21:25Tony O'Connell: I'm not sure, but I like the little golf mean for the smallest one. And I've done two of those. So I always like hearing the names of those little events that I've done because the little ones tend to be really cool events.

00:21:36Lyndell Murray: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. All right, Tok, we've done it. Now it's time to hear some different voices. Let's hear from our roving reporters.

Roving Adventurers (roving reporter crossovers)

00:21:47Unidentified speaker: Roving reporters.

00:21:50[background music]

00:21:52Johan Duvenhage: Coo-ee parkrun Adventurers, it's Johan and I am reporting from a very, very special place in the Southern Atlantic Ocean. I'm on the island of St Helena and with me is the Minister of Health and Social Care, Mr Martin Henry. Thank you very much for talking to me.

00:22:13Martin Henry: Yeah, of course. It's a great morning. You know, it's a beautiful morning and it's a beautiful start to something I hope we can continue to do.

00:22:20Johan Duvenhage: So you were very, I read in the newspaper yesterday online that, or no, it was in the news release from the St Helena government that you think that parkrun has a very special place in St Helena. What is that?

00:22:36Martin Henry: Well, I mean, as the minister, I'm not going to do too much politics, but my campaign and my whole push is about healthy living, preventative health. I come from that environment. I come from ex-military, PTI by trade. I'm a sports scientist by qualification. And this, for me, is what we all can consider low-tech, very easy to do, and it's in an environment which is just beautiful. I mean, it's that combination of physical and mental health that, for me, the parkrun for some people is, you know, it's a good jog, it's a good... It's something to... to achieve in terms of time, etc. For us and for myself, it's bringing the community together to do something positive on a Saturday morning.

00:23:27Johan Duvenhage: So I did also see that St Helena does have a few health challenges and how would parkrun be able to contribute to solving some of those issues?

00:23:36Martin Henry: So, you know, it's we are as you said it's it's an isolated environment we've got not only physical health challenges but also in terms of medicine delivery medicine here um you know this sits in the center of what i've come to this role to do which is which is to encourage people as a as a community to to get us back to what we used to do which is you know be outdoors and and like i said early enjoy our environment simple such a simple solution to so many complex issues we have here

00:24:09Johan Duvenhage: St Helena also has an ageing population and it's very important for the elderly, well not the elderly, people ageing to keep active. I was actually amazed to see how relatively few people are still walking. Do you think parkrun is going to change that?

00:24:27Martin Henry: Well, our environment is a bit difficult, especially for an aging population. You know, you walk out of your door, I walk out of my front door and it's a steep hill. You know, it's up and down. So, you know, this environment we've started this park around is... You know, it's... Saint Helena flat. Yeah, it's Saint Helena flat. I was trying to think about how do I say that, but it's Saint Helena flat. So, you know, it's a little uphill, a little downhill, and a bit of flat in between. And I think it's a perfect environment for that challenge. And, you know, as I said earlier, this can just be a gentle stroll.

00:24:58Johan Duvenhage: There's no need to... And I think if I... I was very glad to see today that whilst we had a few fast runners... The bulk of the participants are really out there to just enjoy themselves and just take a friendly stroll through the most fantastic environment.

00:25:15Martin Henry: And for me, that's just the point. It covers, like I said, it's simple, it's... free in the sense of, you know, besides just getting here, there's no other sort of costs. But it covers all of the elements, it covers the exercise, it covers being outdoors and it covers as a community coming together to enjoy and do a positive thing on a Saturday morning before we all get back to our normal bits and bobs during the week. Bye-bye.

00:25:42Johan Duvenhage: Have a nice day. So what's your hopes for St Helena parkrun or Plantation Forest parkrun? Sorry, I seem to use two interchangeably at the moment.

00:25:52Martin Henry: I mean, we've got a core, a really dedicated core little team. And my hope is that, you know, we can hang on to the majority of that team. And, you know, change starts with a whisper. And, you know, if we have 20, 30 people today, we can continue to just bow on that 30, three or four every week and just turn it into something which then just automatically encourages other people to come because it always starts that way, one or two people. And you get to that number where people just go, this is just a nice thing to do as a community. So that's my, I think that's how the park ran, you know, almost started anyway. And I hope we can fulfill that idea and carry it through like its beginnings.

00:26:34Johan Duvenhage: Thank you very much for talking to me, and all the best. I wish that Plantation Forest will grow and grow, if I can use a very bad pun. Yeah, no, well, like I said, it's a beautiful forest to be in.

00:26:47Martin Henry: But thank you very much for coming, and thank you very much for joining us with this as well. Have a wonderful day. Yeah, you as well.

00:26:52Johan Duvenhage: Thank you. Adventurers, I'm with Stephen Thwaites. I think, Stephen, I don't know if I get that right. No, you got it right. And we've just backed up and finished at the first event of Plantation Forest parkrun in the island of St Helena in the middle of the South Atlantic Ocean. Stephen, how did it go?

00:27:10Stephen Thwaites: I think it was fantastic. Yeah, I think it went better than we'd hoped. We had 76 finishers here, I think, even more on the start line and a full volunteer roster. So the first official parkrun that has ever happened here and what we think is the world's most remote parkrun. But no, it went really well. I think the community turned out in force. We had it started by the Minister for Health here and the Chief Minister also attended. A really nice mix of locals and expats and a mix of fairly quick finishes along with lots of people walking and running and walking. So I think it went really well. The weather did its thing for us as well. It was dry throughout.

00:27:55Johan Duvenhage: Yes, and for running, I think the fact that it was a little bit cooler was actually perfect.

00:28:00Stephen Thwaites: Yeah, it was. I think it helps with the... it's a bit of a... it's a hilly course. It's not flat.

00:28:05Johan Duvenhage: Yes, initially I was told it's flat. It is certainly enough flat, which is a term that I'm going to trademark. That means for every up there's two downs and for every down there's two ups. So Stephen, just quickly describe the course to us and the surroundings.

00:28:21Stephen Thwaites: Yeah, so we're in a bit of an old forest here. I don't know whether it counts as ancient forest or not, but the whole course runs through the middle of Plantation Forest, which is within view of Plantation House, and only... One part of it passes very, very close to Jonathan the tortoise, who's the oldest living land animal in the world, who's at least 193. But yeah, the course runs through some nice forest trails, a little bit of off-road trail as well at the end. We do two laps of this course, so it's up at about 550 metres above sea level. and it's nice and green and sheltered with the odd bit where it breaks open and you get views of the coastline and other bits of the cloud forest on the island here and it starts and finishes at a nice viewing platform here in the middle of Plantation Forest.

00:29:15Johan Duvenhage: So, Steven, this was quite a mission to get Plantation Forest started. It took quite a while. Actually, we've learned recently that the first attempt to start a parkrun was probably as far back as 2014 when one of your local elected officials went to the UK. How has the process been to get it started this time around?

00:29:41Stephen Thwaites: Yeah so we've been at this for over a year now and obviously there was Eddie Duffy was I believe involved back in 2014 but since a group of us have started trying to get this moving over a year ago there was a previous Attorney General here who also helped to start a parkrun in the Falklands and other British Overseas Territory and he started the engagement with them with parkrun in the UK, with the OTs ambassador there. And they've been very helpful, but it's been a little bit slower than we'd hoped. Lots of to-ing and fro-ing, lots of questions remotely about what the route actually looks like, what the risks look like. And it's been a little bit more difficult when we can't just invite someone to come and have a look. But it's been good. We've had a small committee who've been, you know, focused on getting this moving. And ever since we started talking about it, we've been running this route on a Saturday morning at eight o'clock. So it's been happening informally as a parkrun for the last year. It's just fantastic to get it out of the line and do this properly now and get us on the map.

00:30:53Johan Duvenhage: You said something about not getting here quickly. That is obviously one of the big things about St Helena. It is relatively difficult to get here. How does life on the island get affected by the fact that you are about a six hour flight from the nearest airport?

00:31:16Stephen Thwaites: Yeah, I think it touches everything here. You know, getting stuff sent out, getting back to, you know, friends and family overseas. It's always a challenge here, but it's also part of the charm, I think. You know, we get a different type of visitor here. We want a challenge. So I think it's, you know, normally it's one flight a week. In the summer, for a few months, we have two flights a week. And it's, you know, generally from Johannesburg. So it does make it a little more challenging. But we've timed this parkrun so that people can come on the routine flights, get the parkrun done on a Saturday morning and then leave in the afternoon on the scheduled flight. So we've tried to work around that restriction but it is a challenge.

00:32:01Johan Duvenhage: So Stephen, today's been a tremendous success I think. What do you think or what is your hopes then for parkrun going forward?

00:32:08Stephen Thwaites: So I think two things. I hope that we continue to get a good turnout from local residents here. I think you've heard from the Minister for Health already. There's a real health benefit from people walking and running and being active around here. And the island's got a large prevalence of heart disease and diabetes. This is going to help. But on the other side, we kind of hope this is something that... will attract people from overseas to come and do a parkrun in somewhere that's different and remote and, you know, these are really unique surroundings. So, you know, we were supported by tourism here to get this going. And with our registration fees, we hope this will be a real tourist asset as well. So yeah, we want to see visitors come and try this out. And hopefully this will put us on the map for parkrun.

00:32:58Johan Duvenhage: Well there's a map on Google where you can go to and on the parkrun app and if you look very very very carefully in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean you'll find St Helena and please do come to St Helena not just for the parkrun guys there is an absolute massive amount of things to do in St Helena for such a small island especially if you're into any kind of active stuff so I'm pretty sure the St Helena parkrun team or the Plantation Forest parkrun team is looking forward to seeing you but also the whole of St Helena is awaiting you to come and experience the absolute fantastic tourism experience they have here. Stephen, thank you very much. All the best.

00:33:43Stephen Thwaites: Thanks, Johan. I know you've had a fun week here exploring, and I'd encourage anyone else to come out and give this a go. Thanks, Johan. Thanks for all your help this week.

00:33:52Alison Fraser: Kia ora koutou adventurers, it's Alison here reporting in Across the Ditch and today I've travelled to Opaheke Park parkrun in South Auckland and with me right now is the event director and today's run director Gerald. So welcome to the podcast Gerald. [Te Reo Maori: "Hello / greetings to you all, adventurers"]

00:34:07Gerald: Kia ora, kia ora. [Te Reo Maori: "Hello, hello. (literally 'be well' — a standard greeting)"]

00:34:08Alison Fraser: Thank you for organising such an awesome parkrun.

00:34:11Gerald: That's all good, my pleasure.

00:34:13Alison Fraser: So can you tell us the story of how a parkrun came to be and what looks like a brand new park?

00:34:19Gerald: It is brand new. It's officially been open for maybe a year, but in reality only really usable, especially for parkrun since December last year, where the council closed it and did some refurbishments to it. I live just up the road, five minutes up the road from here. And as they were building the new housing estate around here, I noticed that they were building a park. And so as soon as I saw what they were doing and saw the plans that they had put online, I contacted parkrun HQ and registered this as a new parkrun location waiting for the park to be finished in time.

00:34:54Alison Fraser: Can you describe the course to us? What have I just run this morning?

00:34:58Gerald: It's a very basic course. They were nice enough to create a 1.4 kilometre concrete path around the outside of the park. So it's three laps of that course plus a little bit of out and back and a start and finish area on grass. which is a nicer way for it to start. Also, it means as a start, if we ever get lots and lots of people, we can have a very, very wide start line to make life easier at the beginning.

00:35:25Alison Fraser: It's quite a fast course if you know where all the little rises are.

00:35:31Gerald: It is. Once you get to know the course, I run this course probably twice a week during the week. And once you get to know the ups and downs and the flat bits and the fast bits and the slow bits, it is, it can be quite fast. The The concrete path is nice and wide. It's a couple of meters wide, so there's no congestion anywhere. They did a really good job making the course, making the park, and making it interesting. All we've got to do now is wait for the trees to grow, and it'll look much, much better.

00:35:57Alison Fraser: So what's your parkrun story? How did you get into parkrun?

00:36:02Gerald: I started parkrun when I was living in the UK many years ago. So I've been doing this almost 20 years now. But over 20 years, I've only done 150 runs. So my first ever run was in Wimbledon Common in 2007. And my second run was at Bushy Park a few months later. And then my third run was here in Auckland at Barry Curtis in 2013, maybe. So big gap between first and second and third. But yeah, I've always liked this as an initiative. Back when I was younger, I just was never motivated enough to get up on a Saturday morning. Hence it took me to decide to run Auckland Marathon to get back into running properly after coming back to New Zealand.

00:36:47Alison Fraser: So you run quite a few different parkruns?

00:36:50Gerald: Not as many as I'd like. My wife isn't a runner, so we don't go and do parkrun tourism for the sake of it. But I have done Australia, UK, South Africa, a number of different countries around the world where we are on holiday if we're there on a Saturday morning and I've got my running shoes and I'm allowed to, I'll go out for a run.

00:37:10Alison Fraser: So with that in mind, could you pick three parkruns that you've been to where you've

00:37:15Gerald: know that you would maybe suggest other people run or got good memories for you and we can't include your home parkrun which is this one um i would say if you're really into parkrun everyone needs to go to the home do bushy park it's an experience especially if you get there when they have an event on and there are literally thousands and thousands of them um When I did it, it wasn't that big, but it's where it all started. So you have to do that one. My second favorite probably is Barry Curtis because I've run it so many times and I do like the course. It's on concrete, it's on gravel, it's on grass, it's got ups and downs, it's got tight corners, it's got concrete paths on it. It's got everything you need to make it an interesting parkrun. For a third one, Gosh, I don't know. It's been a long time since I've run any parkruns apart from these local ones. I've done a few in Australia. Oh, Albert Park. Albert Park in Melbourne. You can't go wrong with the Formula One.

00:38:13Alison Fraser: Yeah. Cool. It was funny you mentioned Barry Curtis because that was my very first parkrun.

00:38:18Gerald: Okay. Yeah. And it is a good course. I like that course. It's interesting. It was also lucky at the time it was started by a couple of neighbours of mine back in the day. Yeah.

00:38:29Alison Fraser: Yeah. That's the thing about parkruns. You meet a lot of people. I've come to your parkrun today with a group of friends that I've made through parkrun, like based in Hamilton. But standing here there, I saw Kent, who was a former ambassador. Um, Jeff, who was co-ED at Cornwall Park and James, who's normally running with his dog Fudge, he's on the North Shore.

00:38:49Gerald: So yeah, I think the good thing about parkrun is it does build a community and it does build, um, that camaraderie that you get, that you get with running anyway.

00:38:59Alison Fraser: Yeah.

00:38:59Gerald: Yeah.

00:39:00Alison Fraser: So can you tell people, tell listeners, um, who have no idea where Opaheke Park is, how they can, this is a podcast with a mostly Australian audience.

00:39:08Gerald: Okay.

00:39:08Alison Fraser: So how would they find your parkrun?

00:39:11Gerald: Well, you fly to Auckland and then it is in South Auckland by Papakura. Opeheke is a suburb just on the southern part of Papakura between Papakura and Drury. The easiest way to get here is obviously to drive because this is New Zealand and public transport isn't the best, especially down here. And there is a large car park here so it's easy enough to drive to. There is public transport. You can get trains to Papakura. Very soon you'll be able to get trains to Drury. There's a new station opening there, and it's not too far from those points. There's buses that go down the Great South Road, which is only a few hundred metres away from here. So there's lots of public transport.

00:39:50Alison Fraser: But we are very close to the airport, really, aren't we?

00:39:53Gerald: It's probably... Half an hour, 20 minute drive from here, depending on traffic. Yeah. The run, the report writer last week literally flew in from Wellington in the morning, got a taxi here, ran the course, got a taxi back to the airport and flew back to Wellington.

00:40:09Alison Fraser: That's extreme tourism. That is. Well, we're going to go for the tour cafe and extend our parkrun day. Nice. I'll see you there. Yeah. Thank you so much for your awesome parkrun, Jeremy.

00:40:18Gerald: Perfect. Thank you.

00:40:19Greg Moore: Hey, good morning, parkrun adventurers. I'm Greg. I'm here at Gels parkrun in South East Melbourne, Victoria. I'm with a run director, Catherine with a C. Hello, Catherine, how are you going?

00:40:33Catherine: I'm great, thank you. How are you today, Greg?

00:40:35Greg Moore: Good, thank you. Nice conditions out at Gels once again?

00:40:40Catherine: Always a sunny day out here at Gels.

00:40:42Greg Moore: All right, can you tell us about Gels parkrun course?

00:40:46Catherine: Jells parkrun course is one of my favourites, obviously being my home parkrun. It's a two-lap course. We start with a slightly hilly incline and then we have the best downhill ever. You then get to run along next to a lake slightly uphill. The key is to take it easy on this hill because in a little while you've got a nice big long uphill coming. You then go past the beginning line there and then you do it all over again, ascending it on that downhill, taking it easy next to a beautiful lake and then cruising up home.

00:41:14Greg Moore: awesome it sounds really good i actually did it this morning and it was nice and fresh and there was a lot of people how many people were here today about 400 i reckon oh i'm not sure your guess is as good as mine i'd say maybe 360 maybe 340 today oh awesome it was a really good turnout people were just coming from everywhere when i was looking around so For a start, I started my first parkrun at Jells Park back in 2015 and I haven't really been back since and here I am today. Alright, Catherine, can you tell us about how you got involved with parkrun?

00:41:51Catherine: I got introduced to parkrun by a friend who was also quite active and he knew that I was a runner and he thought, he said, hey, parkrun is this. great initiative you can go out it's a free 5k run and I thought oh do you get a medal you obviously don't get a medal but once I joined once I started my first parkrun I knew that parkrun was a great place to be you meet different people there the community is incredible you're with like-minded people it doesn't matter if you're running three minute k's or ten minute k's everyone is just there to be outside and have some fun together and apparently you were in the parkrun Australia newsletter this week Yes, apparently so. I actually didn't realise I was in the newsletter, so I'll go home and read that when I get back.

00:42:30Greg Moore: Why were you in it for?

00:42:32Catherine: I was in the newsletter as last week or two weekends ago, I completed my 100th volunteer at Gels parkrun. It was absolutely incredible. I've done over, I think, 174 parkruns now, but 100 of those have been volunteering. And it's just a great way to be out in the community to meet new people and to share my love of running and being outside with other like-minded people.

00:42:56Greg Moore: Yes, for sure. I like your attitude. That's good. Yes, volunteering. If you don't have volunteers, parkrun doesn't happen. So good on you. Anything else about Gels parkrun or yourself we want to hear about?

00:43:10Catherine: Oh, I don't really know. I love parkrun. People who know me might say that I'm a bit of a parkrun obsessive. I love travelling to different parkruns. I love meeting new people around. So if you see me at your own parkrun, come and say hi.

00:43:23Greg Moore: Awesome. It sounds really good. Thanks very much, Catherine, for the update of Gels parkrun.

00:43:29Catherine: Thanks for having me here, Greg.

00:43:31Greg Moore: No worries. Thanks, Adventurers. We'll see you shortly. Bye for now. Hey, good morning, parkrun Adventurers. This is Greg from... I'm at Giles Park. I'm here with Adam Koops from Giles Park. How are you, Adam? Yeah, good, good. Yourselves? Good, thank you. What's going on? How was parkrun this morning?

00:43:50Adam Koops: It was beautiful and fresh. I volunteered today, did the tail walking with my VI volunteer for the day, Catherine. What's a VI volunteer? What's that? A VI volunteer, it's I myself am blind. Oops, sorry. I myself am blind. I'm 100% blind and I can't attend parkrun or run parkrun without a guide. Um, so that's, could be anyone a parkrunner if they just, if they're interested, if they're keen runner and they see someone who's blind, they can always put their hand up and run along with them and guide them along the way.

00:44:21Greg Moore: And be they walking or running. And you're a pretty good runner too. Your personal best, something like.

00:44:27Adam Koops: I've done 1951, actually, 1951.

00:44:31Greg Moore: That's very good for a totally blind person. That's very good.

00:44:35Adam Koops: Yeah, but now I'm a part of the Fat Dad Club, which we've got a beautiful new daughter, so just taking it easy. What did you say?

00:44:42Greg Moore: You've got a daughter?

00:44:44Adam Koops: Yeah, she's almost two now, so running's taking a bit of a back step, but yeah, I'll come back soon enough when I get some more time.

00:44:52Greg Moore: But that's awesome. You're completely blind and you've got a little two-year-old girl. Yeah, it certainly has its challenges. It's got its challenges, but you still attend parkrun, which is awesome.

00:45:04Adam Koops: parkrun, work, family, rinse and repeat.

00:45:08Greg Moore: Oh, that is all going well. But you still attend parkrun and you still come and you're part of the Achilles running group?

00:45:15Adam Koops: Yeah, Achilles, Achilles, yeah, and also TXR as well. But yeah, just parkrun every single weekend. It's a part of our ritual in our family. I've been doing parkrun since 2015 now, so I'm up almost 380, 400 runs now.

00:45:30Greg Moore: That's awesome. That means that 380 VI guides, what need... Yep. Going with you?

00:45:37Adam Koops: Yep. Yeah, I've walked a couple by myself just because I know the tracks, but yeah, most of them guided, so.

00:45:44Greg Moore: I think all of them guided. But that's pretty cool what you've done. You've achieved 380 parkruns to be able when you're completely blind. That's pretty awesome.

00:45:54Adam Koops: Yeah, just what we do. We get up and sat there. We don't think about it. We just get up and do parkrun.

00:46:00Greg Moore: So this is parkrun Adventurers. So what we're saying is anyone can come out to parkrun, have a go.

00:46:06Adam Koops: Anyone, all abilities, all age groups, everyone and everyone.

00:46:11Greg Moore: So that is fantastic. You've done 380 parkruns, completely blind. Now you've got a little girl in your life, or you've got two girls in your life, so life isn't too bad then?

00:46:21Adam Koops: No, not at all. I did her in my backpack today, the carrier. You did, yes. My partner volunteered because she's come back from an injury. But soon enough, we'll be back up and running.

00:46:33Greg Moore: This is awesome. Adam, thanks for talking to parkrun Adventurers today.

00:46:37Adam Koops: No worries. No, thanks for having us. And yeah, happy parkrunning, everyone.

00:46:42Greg Moore: So if you ever see Adam around, or if you want a VI guide, you get a volunteer credit. And he's always looking for a VI guide.

00:46:50[background music]

00:46:50Adam Koops: Yeah, hear the blind brother up.

00:46:52Greg Moore: Hear the blind brother up, he says. All right. Thanks, parkrun Adventurers. And we'll see you soon.

00:46:57Adam Koops: Cheers. See ya.

00:47:03Tony O'Connell: Rightio, Lyndell. We're back from our roving reports. And as always, Johan has come up with the goods. Johan's travelled halfway around the world, it seems, to attend the launch of Plantation Forest at St Helena Island. And he saved the day. They were having trouble getting their defib over to the island. And Johan packed it up and took it over with him. So well done, Johan. Johan was talking to both the health minister, Martin Henry, on the health challenges on the island and what the health minister saw as the benefits of parkrun. It was actually a pretty interesting little conversation that they had. And then he spoke to the ED, Stephen Thwaites, on the process of starting a parkrun, particularly in somewhere so geographically remote and how you go about getting sending files to parkrun to review and that rather than just have an ambassador rock up on the day and have a look at the course and say it looks okay. It's a bit harder when it involves a week turnaround pretty well to get to the event and back. But we're going to have more details about Plantation Forest later in the pod. We heard from Alison, who was with Gerard, who is the Run Director and Event Director at Opaheke parkrun in New Zealand. And we heard from Greg Moore at Gels Park. He was talking to Catherine Yardee and Adam Koops, who's a blind runner who regularly attends Gels Park.

00:48:26Lyndell Murray: Thanks to all our roving reporters. And well done, Johan, on your mercy dash with the defib. All right, let's check in with Dazza. And as usual, we have chosen several comments from each of the last two weeks Dazza's posts. There are so many great comments. It's always really hard to pick a selection here, Toc, isn't it?

Dazza's

00:48:51Tony O'Connell: It is. Look, it takes me the longest part of the pod prep is trying to pick the comments. We read them all. We do actually enjoy them all. And it's really hard to whittle it down to half a dozen comments. Yeah, it really is. I'd love to put in a dozen of them, but then the podcast would be a two-hour podcast and the long runs aren't that long at the moment, so I don't need that.

00:49:15Lyndell Murray: Yeah, all right. So on the 4th of July, Dazza said, it's Hopper Park Day today. The office lady says that means you need to get out into nature, but Dazza says, who waves his hands in the air like he just don't care. He thinks that you all needed to hop at parkrun today. So did you. And this week we got 102 comments and from them we have selected...

00:49:42Tony O'Connell: Right out, we're going to start with Yvette Turner at Mount Ainslie, who has gone in and tried to perform the function of our research department. She's done quite well here. Hi, Dazza. I had to look up what Hopper Park Day meant, and it's defined as getting off your devices and getting out into your local park for some fresh air and exercise and interacting with your community. Exactly what we do at parkrun every Saturday. Today I volunteered as tail walker at Mount Ainslie parkrun. There were lots of kangaroos and a gang gang cockatoo hopping around in a tree. I was hopping around the puddles as I walked the course. My floating Wilson index also hopped from 26 to 40. And the picture was of a fairly cool and frosty looking event in front of a selfie frame in the tail walker's vest.

00:50:33Lyndell Murray: Next we heard from Sonja Pohlman. And she was at the beaches parkrun. Sonia said, I did not personally hop. However, I did see both whales and dolphins hop out of the ocean from my Marshall spot. And Sonia posted yet another great picture from the beaches. It was a sunrise with Sonia in front of the teardrop flag on the beach.

00:50:58Tony O'Connell: Going a little bit north and a little bit west, Ian Brown once again came to us from East Coast Singapore this time. We hopped to it and volunteered as tail walkers at East Coast parkrun in Singapore. Very hot and humid sub-50 minute walk. And the photo shows Ian plus one other person in tail walker vests. Absolutely no context who the other person was. So we had to pay overtime for the research department to go and do some homework and discovered that the other person was none other than Susan Brown. Context, Ian. We need those dots filled.

00:51:34Lyndell Murray: We do. We do. Okay. Moving swiftly on. We also heard from Dan Joe from Karamu Stream on New Zealand's North Island. And Dan said, an early drive to do Karamu Stream parkrun. I was meant to be going with a group of people, but it was not meant to be. So I went anyways to complete my 70th New Zealand venue. Dan then edited to add, there were heaps of muddy puddles and I managed to do a lot of hopping. The photo shows Dan with the selfie frame on what appears to be a very frosty oval as the sun rises.

00:52:10Tony O'Connell: I think we're seeing a bit of a theme here, Lyndell, of the southern states with cold and frosty looking themes. But one that wasn't cold and frosty was Joe McLean at Port Hedland. Where we camped last night was only 300 metres from the start of Port Hedland parkruns. It was only a short hop to arrive for a 7am start as the sun was rising. Soon you can flat course along the foreshore, friendly volunteers and RD Scott. I had a slight wardrobe malfunction at two kilometres and had to ask a random walker, not a parkrunner, to assist. She did. All sorted to get to the end. And we had a couple of laughy face emojis. And I was just laughing at all sorts of things that you could have had a malfunction with there, Jo. But the picture was Jo in a selfie frame with blue skies and the ocean in the background.

00:53:03Lyndell Murray: We probably need a bit more context on that one. I wonder what the wardrobe malfunction was. I hope it was nothing too serious.

00:53:10Tony O'Connell: I'm sure it was his broken shoe last week.

00:53:12Lyndell Murray: I'm sure. I'm sure. Lastly, we heard from Pippa White at Birkenhead. At least two parkrun adventurers, as I met up with Phil Corker at Birkenhead. At the first time as welcome, the sole Australian was invited to be centre stage of a charming photo. At least I think it's charming. It's all upside down, though. And there's an upside-down group photo, which looks like it's from the first time as briefing, welcome, with an upside-down sign. And whoever's posted it has overlaid it with upside-down text as well. So I can't make head nor tail of that one.

00:53:46Tony O'Connell: I'm trying to work out, Linda, were they having a crack at the people from down under or was that the gist of it? But, yeah.

00:53:55Lyndell Murray: I don't know. They shouldn't have been doing that because I think we lost the World Cup that day, got booted out of the World Cup that day. They should have been more gentle to us.

00:54:03Tony O'Connell: Yes, be kind. Righto, Lyndell. Moving along, Saturday the 11th of July at Daz's. And Daz has said, it's International Skinny Dip Day. Daz, that double dares you. When you're done, get dry and dressed and come on in for a warm beverage and tell us all about your morning.

00:54:21Lyndell Murray: And we heard from Mark Hibbard. I dipped under 30 minutes for the first time this year and did it nude, i.e. with no headphones. And Mark posted a picture of himself doing a zoomie in his adventurer shirt at an unnamed location. But we didn't even need the research department for this one talk because Andrew Blander filled in the gap in his post. He posted a picture of himself, Mark, Eva, Skye and Liam.

00:54:49Tony O'Connell: in the kashola parklands selfie frame it's handy when we've got when we've got research department that aren't on the payroll lindell it helps us out very handy very helpful right here moving across we're going to hear from new zealand brett bailey a bit chilly for a skinny dip but we did swim at the surf club yesterday for our matariki long weekend which is the maori new year the sea water was close to single digits 129 parkrunners at a sub-zero Pegasus this morning with frost on the ground and fresh snow in the hills. And Brett posted a picture of himself and Bronner at parkrun. He looked pretty rugged up with a beanie and gloves. Tanya also posted a picture of the two of them doing their swim the previous day. And I do point out that it was not a skinny dip.

00:55:41Lyndell Murray: Okay. Next we heard from Val Warwick. Val said, We are having a skinny dip on our way to babysitting duties in Hobart. We did the beautiful Hoplars Bridge Reserve parkrun and then had coffee with Lee and Leanne Evans. And Val has posted a picture of creamy garlic and parsley dip. with some parmesan and herb crackers. Well, it's dip-tock, but I'm not sure that it's all that skinny with all that parmesan and creamy garlic.

00:56:11Tony O'Connell: I do like the way that Val turned that one around, though, Lyndell. She did really well.

00:56:15Lyndell Murray: Yes.

00:56:16Tony O'Connell: Next, we heard from Penny Simpson. Dripping despite no skinny dipping at Precinct 18 parkrun Picture Jai this morning. What a beautiful course. And Penny posted a picture of herself before she started dripping with the sweat in the event frame.

00:56:32Lyndell Murray: And lastly, we heard from Stephen Cox. No skinny dipping here, but there was water around and he posted a thinking emoji, so maybe he... second thought his actions and thought he should have gone for a skinny dip. However, Stephen says, a couple of incredible milestones for a fellow adventurer today. I got to towel walk at Maitland parkrun with Heather Morgan, who celebrated a tourist streak of 200. Plus Heather also reached 50 different volley locations. A tourist streak of 200. Wowza. Where will it end? Asks Stephen. And Stephen posted a picture with he and Heather in the fluoro yellow vests with the Walker Dam in the background.

00:57:17Tony O'Connell: Rightio. We've heard a lot from Daz's. There's a lot of comments in both weeks, which is great. We love to hear from people about where they've been. We love to see the photos coming in. Lyndell, do you have the Obi this week?

the Obi Award — Sonja Pohlman

00:57:31Lyndell Murray: I do have it. This week, the Obie goes to... Sonja Pohlman.

00:57:36Tony O'Connell: Well done, Sonia. That was a great photo from the beaches. The beaches always produces great photos. We know that from when we had Palm there. Every photo is a good one, but another great photo of the sunrise coming up over the ocean and the parkrun flag there as well. If we've given you a shout-out in Daz's today, send us an email or comment on the post on Facebook to let us know that you're a listener. It always fascinates me to know which people are just in on the Facebook group and which people actually listen to the episodes.

00:58:06Lyndell Murray: Yeah, we love to know that you listen. Okay, moving over to our emails, and we have no emails this week.

00:58:13Tony O'Connell: You've got no mail.

00:58:14Lyndell Murray: They're all posting on Facebook Talk.

00:58:16Tony O'Connell: That's no good. The old bloke needs his emails.

Club Corner

00:58:20[background music]

00:58:20Lyndell Murray: Okay, so with nothing in the inbox, let's head over and hear from Reginald.

00:58:32Reginald Yardley Pomphrey III: This is Koo E.E. from Reginald Yardley Pomfrey III with Club Corner, where we quiz the hosts and listeners with a very special Who Am I? And I am coming to you from Arundel country. We have a variation today on the typically unasked for and unwanted format Smiley Face. And the variation is that this is a Palm 27 update exclamation point. 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 realize how wrong you were, but then at the end, all will be revealed. Let us get going. Who am I? Pause if you need. Question 1. I am in a territory that was recently featured in our Who am I? series. Question 2. Palm has never been held in this territory. Question 3. I was the 173rd event to open in Australia and the 4th to open in my territory. Question 4. I am an out-and-back course. Question 5. I am positioned by a lake. Question 6. I am named after a famous American. And finally, question 7. No, no need for a question 7, you should have this by now! Who am I? I am the host location for Palm 2027, I am Burley Griffin parkrun in the ACT. That is your lot for the week, and remember, in parkrun life, parkrun now hosts various renamed non-milestone clubs in their app, so they are now official and supported by parkrun, so stay tuned for our future club corners.

01:00:05[background music]

01:00:20Tony O'Connell: Well, Lyndell, I think we know where the Palm envelope disappeared to. Reginald's come up with a big scoop. Next year's Palm is going to be at Burley Griffin in the ACT. I think there's going to be heaps of details coming out in the near future. But have you done Burley Griffin, Lyndell?

01:00:39Lyndell Murray: No, I've not done Burley Griffin. It will be a new event for me. So that's exciting.

01:00:45Tony O'Connell: It's a ripper of a little course. It follows one of the little spits out into Lake Burley Griffin. There's a number of it. And the whole Canberra area, I'm really looking forward to this one because there's just so much to see and do. So many other events around. I'm really looking forward to Palm already. I'm starting to get a little bit keen. We've got the merch coming and now we've got the location. We've got the date. Let's get into Palm.

01:01:10Lyndell Murray: Absolutely. It's very exciting. Something to put in the calendar and plan for. I agree, there's plenty to do in Canberra and the weekend that we've chosen is the Balloon Festival. So hopefully we'll be able to see some balloons in the sky above us as we're running around the lake.

01:01:27Tony O'Connell: Lots of things going on and it's only a short seven or eight months away, so not far to wait at all.

01:01:34Lyndell Murray: And, of course, nobody will be going on any other adventures between now and then, of course. It's not in our nature. So we'll just be staying at home and waiting, right?

01:01:43Adam Koops: That's it. Yep, yep.

01:01:46[crosstalk]

01:01:46Tony O'Connell: Home events from now for the next eight months. Heather Morgan, your 200-run streak has just disappeared. Let's keep the show moving, Lyndell.

01:01:58Lyndell Murray: Okay. Let's hear about the Adventurers Consolidated Club report. And on Saturday, the 11th of July, 2026, we had 944 members. 653 of us took part in 14 countries across 352 locations. So locally, there were adventurers at 63 events in Queensland, 56 events in New South Wales, 54 in Victoria. 23 in Western Australia, 25 in South Australia, 10 in Tasmania, 6 in the ACT and 1 in the Northern Territory. Over in New Zealand, there were 8 on the North Island and 4 events at the South Island. And internationally, there were adventurers at 82 events in the UK, 10 events in South Africa, Three events in each of Canada, Germany, Ireland and Japan. USA and Italy both had two events with adventurers. And Denmark, Finland, Malaysia and Poland all had adventurers. Talk. We got Malaysia this week, but we were missing a few other countries. So we still don't have that full set.

Consolidated Club Report

01:03:15Tony O'Connell: We got 16 countries this week out of the 20 that we can get hold of. So come on adventurers, spread yourselves out and go and share the love out into the different countries. And a fun fact, Lyndell. Talam Pudu is returning in Malaysia, so they'll have the second event. They had their first trial last weekend, so they're a short time before they come back. And there's word that there's a third event in Kuala Lumpur or just north of Kuala Lumpur in the planning. So Malaysia could go from having one event for so long to three events in a very short time frame.

01:03:49Lyndell Murray: Yeah, that's brilliant news. Brilliant news.

01:03:51Tony O'Connell: It is. And once again, KL is a lovely place to go and have a holiday. We went over and spent some time there in the markets and that over there. Some of the parks, the little pocket parks and that in places like that, you know, a city with a massive population, they have these beautiful little parks and things. So a great place to go and visit.

01:04:08Lyndell Murray: Yeah, it's a beautiful city.

The Frond

01:04:10Tony O'Connell: Our international fronds. On the 4th of July, we had a front of six at Peter Pan parkrun, and there's a name that I've just got to go to do that parkrun. That sums it up. And this crew, I saw them all in their Tinkerbell suits and their Wendy suits and everything else looked really cool. The front of six was Andy Airy, Tina Jury, Ivan Stora, Rhiannon Taylor, Claire Potrell, and Wendy Pallant. On the 11th of July, there was a front of 11 at the Lost Gardens of Halligan parkrun. And that was Debbie and Andy Airy, Denise Evans, James Avery, Tina Jury, Ivan Storer, Amy Dodson, Rhiannon Taylor, Kim Leonard, Lorraine and Colin here. And out of that, I know that Andy Airy ran his 500th parkrun. So congratulations, Airy. Well done. I saw you running in a suit top and I'm thinking, man, that must have been so hot over there. I know you guys are having a heat wave. How on earth did you ever get around a parkrun in that?

01:05:12Lyndell Murray: That is commitment. Well done, Andy, on your 500 events. Now, Peter Pan, definitely on the list. But I also think that The Lost Gardens of Heligan also sounds very delightful. So good picks for those two international fronds. Okay, let's look at our pilgrimage. On the 4th of July, there was nobody doing their pilgrimage. But on the 11th of July, Nadine Rutter was there flying the flag for the adventurers at Bushy Park.

01:05:42Tony O'Connell: Rightio, that's our Pilgrim Mix. Let's look at the largest Aussie fronds. On the 4th of July, there was a frond of 11 at Werribee Park Mansion. That was their relaunch that we spoke about earlier. And obviously they had such a massive crowd there. They were Gareth Dowling, Donna Anderson, Andrew Reynolds, Anne Thomas, Christine Hewitt, Abigail Cooper, Chantelle Hosking, Lauren Bartley, Kylie Taggart, John Smith and Kevin Green. On the 11th of the 7th, there was a frond of eight at Albury Wodonga, Australia. That was Yvette, Bill, Fiona and Ben Turner, Abigail Cooper, Christy Hill, Sarah Jurek and Rebecca Gordon.

01:06:25Lyndell Murray: Okay, and remember, you can add the Adventurers Club as one of your five affiliations on your Park One profile. If you need a hand on how to do it, please reach out and get in touch. Let's have a look at our launches talk and on the 4th of July there were five launches scheduled globally. The first one, MacIver Creek Trail parkrun in Heathcote, Australia was scheduled to launch this week but there was significant rain in Victoria and that has meant that the launch was held over till the following week. The course is a two-lapper along the MacIver Creek And when they finally launched, 61 finishers completed the course with 12 volunteers. Now, Toc, you are a local down there. Where on earth is McIver Creek Trail parkrun? Why are they not calling it something more specific?

01:07:16Tony O'Connell: Okay, this is something I just don't get. I understand in the bigger towns, but Heathcote's a small town up towards Bendigo. It's got under 3,000 people. Surely it could have been Heathcote parkrun in a small regional town. I know we have to have rules and we have to be consistent, but I don't know. I would have loved to have seen it as Heathcote. But yes, it is. It's a town northwest of Melbourne up towards Bendigo, so a larger regional centre. Our second launch for the week was Mangere Bridge parkrun in New Zealand, another launch in the Auckland region. They seem to have launch after launch in that area. They're going gangbusters over there. They're loving their parkruns. This is an out and back course which runs under the main bridge linking north and south areas of Auckland. And for those that have been into Auckland and driven back to the airport, it's the bridge you go over, you run under. There were 260 finishers and 23 volunteers for the launch.

Launches and anniversaries ("Where is the cake?")

01:08:11Lyndell Murray: Okay, moving on to Germany. And there was a launch there at Königshof parkrun. There were 49 finishers with 10 volunteers. And the newest German event is located southwest of Hamburg, which is up to the north of Germany. I don't think it'll be sunny there very much, Tok, if it's near Hamburg. This course is an out and back along the Osti River.

01:08:37Tony O'Connell: Moving on to one that's slightly easier for me to pronounce. We know that's always my challenge, these launches. Ballymount parkrun, and of course our people in the UK are going to come back to me and say, that's not how you pronounce it, but that's how I pronounce it. It's in Ireland. It's located in Dublin's southwest area. The launch saw 37 volunteers assisting 371 parkrunners to get around the course.

01:09:03Lyndell Murray: Brilliant. And Brackenhurst Campus parkrun launched in the UK as well. Now this parkrun is located on the Nottingham Trent University Brackenhurst Campus. Try saying that five times real quick. The run looks interesting with out and back legs along farm tracks. So this first event attracted 276 participants and 52 volunteers assisted them to complete the course.

01:09:32Tony O'Connell: Radio Lyndell. To break our run of five launches a week, on the 11th of July, there was four launches. Not sure what went wrong there. The wheels fell off. We missed a launch. We're going to start with Mingo parkrun in USA, which is located in Delaware, Ohio. It's a four-lapper. It's on a mix of asphalt and dirt, and it attracted 34 finishes to week one, of whom 13 were first-time ever parkrunners, and they were supported by 11 volunteers.

01:10:01Lyndell Murray: Staying in the USA and Happy Hill launched. This is in Winston-Salem in North Carolina. And there were 11 volunteers guiding 58 finishers along the out and back course. And I tell you what, Happy Hill sounds like a pretty good place to parkrun to me.

01:10:20Tony O'Connell: All righty-o. We're coming back to the UK. Vale Park parkrun in Burslem. It's a three-looper with an out-and-back section. There's a very interesting recommendation to use trail shoes following periods of prolonged wet weather on their website. So I guess in the course description, it must get pretty wet. The launch had 301 finishes and 34 volunteers.

01:10:43Lyndell Murray: All righty. Last but not least, we have Plantation Forest parkrun. in the UK. Having said it's in the UK, it's a British overseas territory, which we heard from Johan earlier. It's in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, basically on St Helena. So while Plantation Forest parkrun is not the most remote parkrun by distance, It's a close second and it will be incredibly hard to get to. As we were saying, limited flights, quite a commitment to get to this one. So being located on the British island of St Helena, it's famous for being the location where Napoleon Bonaparte was exiled to. And it's approximately midway between Africa and South America. So this one will really test your logistics and your planning. As we heard earlier, Johan was on the island after doing a mercy dash to get the defib to the island in time for parkrun. And he's published heaps of really stunning photos on his socials. So this really is a destination parkrun. The course description is two laps through a beautiful forest on well-maintained dirt trails with 100 metre elevation gain. You will be rewarded by sea views and much of the course is in sight of Jonathan the tortoise, the world's oldest land animal. Week one saw 76 participants with 33 first-time ever parkrunners and 31 with no barcode and there were 10 volunteers on hand to help. Now, we've got a note from Johan. There's another, oh gosh, what is he saying here? Angola is 1,950 kilometres and Ascension Island is 1,300 kilometres away. And its closest parkrun neighbour is Swakopmund, which is 2,511.7 kilometres away. Cape Pembroke Lighthouse remains the furthest away from another parkrun and Plantation Forest is the closest neighbour. A mere 6,084 kilometres separating those two parkruns. Tok, what a place to go. I have many questions. I'd like to make friends with Jonathan the tortoise, but Jonathan the tortoise is probably protected from crazy parkrunners.

01:13:07Tony O'Connell: If memory serves me correct, I think Jonathan the tortoise was 196 years old. I think from memory. So I'm thinking in terms of parkrun, how many parkruns could you get in 196 years? And your age category, how many parkrunners are there in the 195 to 200 year old category? Not many.

01:13:30Lyndell Murray: Probably just Jonathan.

01:13:34Tony O'Connell: I've been watching Johan's socials during the week and he's been doing quite a bit of hiking and walking around the island and the place just looks absolutely amazing. If you're an active sort of person, it is. looks like the sort of place you'd just be out walking around having an absolute ball in but it is remote and it is going to be a challenge to get to from Australia there's obviously no direct flights interesting I noticed that they have an international airport on the island no domestic airport I don't think they're going to have a lot of lounges and that sort of thing but yeah no domestic airport there's no flying from one side of the island the other does look amazing yeah no no doubt we'll see you and hear more about plantation forest into the future

01:14:14Lyndell Murray: Definitely, definitely.

01:14:16Tony O'Connell: Let's keep this thing moving along. We're starting to chew into a bit of time. What are you looking forward to, Lyndell? I know I'm looking forward to Ugly Christmas in July Day coming up on the 27th of July. It's where you get to wear your Ugly Christmas running shirt, singlet or visors out in public again. I also have a problem with that idea of only wearing it on Ugly Christmas in July Day. And in the lead up to Christmas, I'll wear mine ad hoc and at random because they're such cool t-shirts. So let's see if we can get some tinsels out there. Our tinsel is going to be an Ulladulla parkrun. So, you know, we're going to go to a bit of a destination parkrun and there'll be a couple of us in the ugly Christmas shirts.

01:14:59Lyndell Murray: Yeah, I actually wish that I'd worn my fluffy Christmas singlet on the weekend up to Nambour, but I did not think of that until I was halfway up the M1. Anyway, that opportunity is coming up and I'm looking forward to that as well, Toc.

01:15:13Tony O'Connell: And next parkrun day, Linda, where are you off to?

01:15:16Lyndell Murray: I am looking to do an overnight trip this weekend. I haven't thought about it too much just yet, but I might head out to my Nendi, which is at Pittsworth. Or somewhere else out there, maybe Charlie Creek. I haven't quite decided yet, but that's my task for tomorrow, I think, to lock that in and get my adventure planned.

01:15:37Tony O'Connell: Do some logistics.

01:15:38Lyndell Murray: Yeah. How about you, Tocq?

01:15:41Tony O'Connell: I'm going to head over to Newborough parkrun. It's one of the events that I support over in the Latrobe Valley. I don't get over there as often as I'd like to. It's a nice little trail. It's out on another rail trail. I love the rail trail parkruns. Really great team. So I'm looking forward to it. A day trip over to Newborough and back. That's one I can get to. It's only an hour, hour and a half away. So it's in the backyard. It's pretty close.

01:16:05Lyndell Murray: Yeah, that sounds great. Alrighty. As we wrap up for today... We want to say thank you to the team behind the podcast. So thank you to the Office Lady, Dave the Editor, Reginald and the Belinda Ferry.

01:16:18Tony O'Connell: As always, you can contact the team via parkrun Adventurers on Facebook, send us your roving reports or our email. Come on, guys, get onto the email, parkrunadventurers at gmail.com. That's it, another episode. We'll see you next time for more adventures. Bye.

01:16:30[outro theme playing]

01:16:34Lyndell Murray: See you, everybody. Bye-bye.