No bibs. No timing chips. Barcodes are scanned at the end of the run for timing.
Conditions were icy and snowy at the Nose hill parkrun on Saturday. I joined 40 or so other runners for my first ever parkrun. Strangely enough it was the 14th annual International parkrun Day. In 20 countries around the world – including Canada – runners ran a free timed 5K run. While the parkrun is held every single Saturday, I was fortunate to take part for the first time on a historic day.
Let me take you back. Fourteen years ago 13 runners gathered in London’s Bushy Park for a free timed 5k run. Fast forward to today, parkrun is one of the biggest running event in the world with more than 3.2 million barcodes scanned. Pretty cool, right?
Funny enough I had recently read two books that mentioned the parkrun. It was my friend Rachel who suggested I check out the run here in Calgary. Must be fate, right? I wanted to run last week but I forgot to print off my barcode. This Saturday I had no excuses. I was a little hesitant because I didn’t know anyone and I wasn’t sure I could run 5K without collapsing. Because it is such a short distance, the run is over before you know it.
After getting the lowdown from the volunteers on how the race worked, I was ready to get going. I regretted not wearing my kahtoolas because it was really icy in spots. Thankfully I stayed upright for the entire run. I’m not really calling it a “race” because I don’t think that’s really the point. I think it’s more apt to call it a “challenge” where everyone is chasing their own personal best.
Before we started, one of the volunteers welcomed us and shared some key points about the route. She told the first timers not to worry about setting a personal best – to just get a feel this week. Then come back next week and set a new personal record. That was great advice especially in these icy conditions.
I ran with the goal to finish under 35 minutes and to not fall. I accomplished both. After the run, a bunch of the volunteers and runners headed to a local cozy coffee shop called Friends. It was a really fun morning. I think I will go back as much as I can this winter. Obviously I would like to get a better time for my 5K. It will be fun to see how I progress over the winter. What’s really neat too is that we can see how we stack up in our age/gender group and globally. (The average global run time is 31:40.)
It was a good morning. Sometimes you just have to run.
That sounds like a great series, I have not been loving timed events lately (I’m shit at running). Not sure about the snow yet, yikes!
Susan recently posted…Hello There
Hello sunshine! Thanks for stopping by. You’re not crap! you rock!
Still blown away by the snow—it’s been mid-twenties here for a few days! So where do you get your barcode from?
You have to go on the website and download it. All very high tech 🙂