Coming P1 at parkrun

Coming P1 at parkrun

Don't worry I know that parkrun is a run not a race and I know that it is P1 and not coming first, after all I am an Event Director and someone with over 300 volunteers. At the same time there is still something nice about coming first at parkrun.

In my first 200 (or so) parkruns my best finish position was 3rd place, once, I am now just shy of 400 parkruns and have 8 first place finishes. 6 of those have been at my local, 1 in 2022, 4 in 2023 (I wasn't even that fast), 1 in 2024 and then 1 in Scotland in 2025 and now 1 in Wales in 2026.

Now the parkrun I did yesterday was tough. My time trial at my local was a 17:40, that was 3 weeks ago. Now training hasn't exactly gone perfectly since then but I don't feel I have lost much fitness in that time (even if I have gained some weight).

The actual run:

The event itself was very quiet and hidden away in the hills of South Wales. The volunteers were awesome as always and gave us a friendly welcome. I always knew I was in with a chance of a P1 as given the nature of the course it is not overly well attended, especially by those looking to run fast. I was looking around at the start to see who I thought might challenge me and I picked out 3 people (turned out they finished 2nd, 3rd and 5th).

The start is a steep uphill section. I started at the front but eased myself into it and had 1 person next to me. I felt very controlled at this point and decided to break them early, haha. Sure enough when I moved up a gear they fell away pretty quickly and soon all I could hear was my own feet. Now I didn't look back at any point so I didn't really know what sort of lead I had but the fact that the marshals stopped clapping after I went past was surely a good sign.

There is a turn around point, I am guessing at around halfway which then has around 500m or so that forms part of an out and back. So when I saw nobody for a good distance after turning round I knew I had P1 in the bag and was able to ease off the gas a little. I also (just) passed my wife before I headed off the out and back section and she was running great. That being said the hills were relentless and my lungs were burning a lot! Sure it was pretty much all up until about 4k....

Then the last k was a fairly steep downhill with lots of mud, to the point I pretty much stopped a few times in order to make it through without falling over. I did take the opportunity to glance back a few times to make sure I wasn't easing up too much and I entered the funnel in P1 and 59 seconds ahead of P2.

My time was around 20:30, which on that course is still not bad and well inside the top 150 of all time at the venue. That being said I think I should have been able to run quicker and having weighed myself this morning I can see I have some how gained half a stone in 3 weeks! And mostly eaten very well in that time.

On the plus side that means I have a lot of performance to unlock by getting back down to some sort of fighting weight and I just hope I can shift some in the next 5 weeks before my 10k race, otherwise I likely won't get near my goals!