Since it began in August 2018, Severn Bridge parkrun has been a hotspot in the parkrun tourism community. There are various reasons that parkruns achieve this sort of ‘cult’ status. Jersey parkrun had it for a long time due to the fact it was the only UK parkrun to start with the letter ‘J’. Fountains Abbey has it because it is so beautiful. Bushy has it because it was the first parkrun, and remains the biggest in the UK. For Severn Bridge, the attraction is threefold; the parkrun spans two countries (Wales and England), it is run almost entirely on a huge bridge, and it is literally right next to a motorway. Any single one of these elements would have been an attraction, but the three together make it a very unique parkrun.
When the event was first started, the bridge tolls were a hindrance for us, as the run starts on the Welsh side of the river, and it would have cost us £5.60. However, the tolls were scrapped in December, making it freeeeeeeeee (other than the circa £12 it cost us in fuel). In fact, despite being outside the South West region, this was probably the quickest parkrun to get to, of those we hadn’t yet done. Parking was well signed and marshalled, but it did fill up early, and is a five to ten minute walk from the start. There are toilets near the car park, at Thornwell Football Club, which is also where people meet up afterwards for a drink.
Runners congregate in the M48 underpass for the pre-run briefing (although it does have to be noted that the volunteer in question was shouting “race briefing” 😲). Honestly, I couldn’t really hear anything of the briefing, despite the fact they used a speaker system, and I was stood relatively close. Having not looked up the course before we arrived, I wasn’t prepared for another walk, up from the underpass to the bridge, where we apparently started. By which I mean, we were still walking towards the start when I heard a noise, and the run had started.
Honestly, I was a little miffed; I wasn’t even that close to the back, so some people would still have been a fair way back down the path, walking along, with no idea that parkrun had started, and they were against the clock already. In fact, Lolly and Lani were more or less in this situation. Anyway, it wasn’t ideal, but it’s not like I’d be getting a PB anyway: I was running with KK in the buggy, and Severn Bridge is NOT flat.
The course runs on the bridge for essentially 4.7 of the 5 kilometres, a simple out and back. The path is about four runners wide, so wide enough for two in each direction; though with the buggy, four was decidedly uncomfortable. As such, the start was pretty congested and slow going with the buggy. I had intended to start a bit further forwards than I usually would with the buggy, expecting the congestion. But never mind!
It took me until about a quarter of a mile in to get above nine-minute miles, as I weaved through runners, and around the odd piece of car shrapnel. There was a ‘gentle’ wind, which seemed like it was diagonally, a combination of a cross- and following-wind. More on this later. The bridge is quite a significant climb to its centre, which I had heard before from club-mates who had run the Severn Bridge Half Marathon, but it’s still something of a shock quite what a hill it forms. We actually went beyond the middle too, so started to drop gradually down the other side before the turnaround point.
And then, oh boy. It was not a ‘gentle’ wind. As usual, what is a barely noticeable following wind turns into a horrible gale-force headwind. Okay… it wasn’t really that bad, but it sure felt it for a while, particularly when pushing what is, in essence, a rolling windbreak. I had been looking forward to the return leg, as it was mostly downhill, but the wind made it such hard work. Still, after passing the tail walker, I knew that I had the full width of the path at least! We continued back to the start point, and then followed the path down off the bridge and motorway to the underpass. In the damp conditions, this path was pretty slippery, though this was probably exacerbated by the fact that I was running sub-6 minute mile pace.
A sharp right turn at the bottom of the hill was followed by a (roughly) thirty metre dash to the finish line. Competitive Ben took over, and I out-sprinted someone to the finish to come in 39th at Severn Bridge’s 39th event. KK was pretty adamant that he wanted to get out of the buggy, which was fair enough, so we abandoned the buggy in the underpass, and went for a walk up to the bridge to cheer on Lolly and Lani when they came through. They’d taken somewhat longer, as they had apparently taken time to appreciate the alleged ‘stunning views’. I wouldn’t know, having spent my time focussing on running…
Severn Bridge parkrun was my (arbitrary) 150th parkrun, and Lani’s 10th, earning her membership of the 10 club, one that neither Lolly nor I were ever able to be in. The t-shirts are out of stock at the moment, but hopefully we’ll be able to order her one soon.
All done, we headed back to the café for post-parkrun breakfast. I’m pretty sure that Lani considers this the most important part of parkrun, and KK is quickly heading that way too. The clubhouse only offer bacon baps, so Lani and I opted for one of those each, while KK had a glass of orange juice. Lolly picked up a wrap from the Tesco up the road as we left, as she’s not too keen on meat at the moment.
Severn Bridge parkrun is well worth the trip, and has opened our eyes to the possibilities of hitting more Welsh parkruns, as many of these will be closer than a lot of the South West parkruns. But next up, we’ll be heading back down to Cornwall to tick off the last Cornish parkrun (for now) we haven’t done, but one we’ve wanted to do for a long time, because it looks stunning; Tamar Lakes parkrun.