Our trip to Rogiet parkrun took us up to 50 different events, so it seems a good time to reflect on my current parkrun goals, both short and long term.
Milestones
I’m currently on 138 runs, so my next milestone of 250 is well over 2 years away. Being on exactly 50 events means I have another 50 to get to the Cowell club, which will most likely take me even longer. So milestones aren’t exactly something I’m working towards, they’re just something I see as an eventual result of turning up at parkrun.
Time
At the moment, my parkrun PB is 25:41. If I actually train at some stage this should be easily beatable. And, of course, I have a big goal of going sub 25. My ultimate ultimate time goal at parkrun would be 23:16, as that is exactly 15 minutes faster than my very first parkrun. I don’t know that I could ever get that fast, but that would be the dream.
Geographical areas
We’ve talked for years (literally) about trying to complete the South West region. We’ve made pretty good progress on the whole, but a few different factors are making us consider the feasibility. Firstly, the regions are becoming much less visible in parkrun, making it harder to track what goes where. Secondly, with two small children, one of whom gets car sick, there’s only so much distance it’s fair to cover at a time. And finally, while we’ve already been wondering how on earth to deal with the events on North Gloucestershire, someone has classified an event in Herefordshire as the South West. Which sort of makes a mockery of it.
So we’re looking at some sub-regions to focus on. We’ve only got one parkrun south-west of Taunton left to do, and obviously we’d also like to finish Somerset again some time (2, soon 3 left to go). Further afield than that, a few tourists use the idea of everything within a certain straight-line distance of where they live, but unfortunately for us that quickly includes a lot of Wales. As a result, we’re looking at creating our own line of virtual pill boxes to mark out our own South West sub-set.
Further afield
It would be nice to do a parkrun in a different country one day. It’s not going to happen this year now. A country that we absolutely love should be getting its first parkruns next year, so that will be very tempting. Longer term, it would be amazing to parkrun somewhere like New Zealand or Australia, but I wouldn’t want to make the trek over until the kids were old enough to appreciate it.
NT & FC
It’s no secret that I love both National Trust and Forestry Commission parkruns. Fantastic courses, and great places to have a family day out afterwards. Although I know that completing all of them is not in any way practical, it would be great to get through more of them. For the National Trust, Penrhyn stands out, but it’s a pretty long drive away with windy roads. For the Forestry Commission, Whinlatter Forest is on my radar, but it’s even further away. Definitely some proper planning needed here.
p-index
There are loads of obscure parkrun challenges out there, and the vast majority don’t interest me. The p-index is one that does, however, as it encourages visiting the same event multiple times. It’s calculated as the number of events you have done that number of times or more. So if you have done 2 events at least 2 times it’s 2, if you’ve done 10 at least 10 times it’s 10. My p-index is currently 3, as I’ve done Longrun Meadow, Burnham and Highbridge, and Minehead at least 3 times. I’ve also done Killerton 3 times, which means to increase my p-index to 4 I need one extra trip to each of Minehead and Killerton. Increasing to 5 would mean an additional trip to each of those and 3 or 4 trips somewhere else (depending on the event I picked). Definitely a long term project!
Volunteering
I have two favourite volunteer roles – marshaling at junior parkrun, and barcode scanning. Family life and a need to keep my balance means I don’t do either that often, but that’s just how it is right now. My current goal is to try out some different volunteer roles. I recently did a First Timers Briefing, which I really enjoyed. My current wish list includes Funnel Manager, Pacer and Results Processing. Pacer is something I can do at my second home of Burnham and Highbridge. Results Processing is a little trickier, as most people only let you do it if you’re in the Core Team, but I think I’d be good at it.
Miscellaneous events
There are a couple of parkruns that for various reasons I would really like to go to.
Barry Island – In a straight line, Barry Island is 26 miles away from Taunton, and as such has often been our NENYD on the Tourist Tool. The actual driving distance is 90 miles, so it will be a pain to get to, but it would be worth it.
Rushcliffe – Bit of a random one, perhaps. I see Rushcliffe Country Park every few months, but always mid-week during work trips. One day it would be nice to go do the parkrun, if only so it doesn’t nag me the next time I visit with work.
Bakewell – Pre-kids, we had a couple of lovely trips to the Peak District, and I really loved the place. One of the highlights was walking on the Monsal Trail, and that is exactly where Bakewell parkrun takes place.
The Biggest Goal of All
The most important thing for me is to keep turning up at parkrun, keep creating precious memories with my family, and keep the focus on what it means to me. In the tourist world it’s easy to get sucked into other people’s goals and dangerous comparison games. But that’s not what it’s about for me. So I guess my important goal is to keep parkrun as my happy place.
Oh, and to not forget my barcode.