Our parkrun week in pictures, November 17th 2018

We had so much to celebrate this week. We welcomed our newest event, with greetings from across this big country. We saluted the first US parkrunner to join the 250 club, and thanked some of our most dedicated volunteers. We ate lots of birthday cake. We met old and new friends. And we helped each other out. Better yet, it’s Thanksgiving week, the perfect time to introduce family and friends to parkrun, and in some places we get to enjoy two parkruns in a week.

 

 

It was a gorgeous morning for the launch of Himmel parkrun in Tucson, AZ. Our 27th event, it is the first parkrun in the US Southwest, and it already has a loyal local following.

 

 

Congrats to Lynn Boven, co-event director at Livonia parkrun, who became the first US parkrunner to reach the 250 parkrun milestone.

 

Lynn ran for the first time at Livonia on 11/17/2012, exactly 6 years ago. He has done almost all of his parkruns at Livonia — until 2017 there were no events within a 10-hour drive of home — and most of them with his barkrunner companion Cooper.

 

 

Happy first birthday to Renton parkrun, the first parkrun in the US Pacific Northwest. 

 

This is a perfect course map. Including the salmon in the stream. Almost a pity to eat it.

 

 

The launch of Himmel parkrun brought greetings from all across the country. Lillie parkrun Ann Arbor, launched just two weeks ago, sent its snowy welcome.

 

 

At the launch of Himmel parkrun Run Director Alicia took every thing in her stride. Alicia and husband David are locals who moved back from many years in London just 4 months ago. The very next week they started holding informal 5ks at Himmel Park. 

 

It’s impressive that they now have 15 practice events under their belt and are starting as an official parkrun with a community of runners and walkers and a dedicated volunteer crew already in place.

 

 

Burtt used to run marathons but he now has Alzheimers, and he held Gladys’s hand as they walked two laps of the four-lap course at Himmel parkrun by the time that most runners were finished. They’re looking forward to telling their neighbors about the opportunity to meet the friendly folks at Himmel parkrun.

 

 

Roosevelt Island parkrun welcomed the newest member of the parkrun USA family.

 

 

On the other side of the country at Des Moines Creek parkrun they were excited to welcome a new western parkrun … a mere 1500 miles away.

 

 

If Himmel parkrunners want to do a spot of parkrun tourism, their closest event currently is Aspen parkrun in Colorado, where the climate is a little different.

 

 

The next closest parkrun to Tucson is Crissy Field parkrun in San Francisco. Unfortunately a little too far for these parkrun tourists to change plans when Crissy Field again had to cancel due to the poor air quality from the California fires. The event team still came out to ensure that everybody got a warm welcome.

 

We send our best wishes to all of our northern Californian friends and hope for rain in the near future.

 

 

The other “local” parkrun to Tucson is South Boulder Creek parkrun, which clocks in at a mere 900 miles away. This week at SBC it was a great time to head out with a friend and follow some tracks in the snow.

 

 

It wasn’t only in Michigan where parkrun organizers were celebrating milestones. At Clermont parkrun in Florida co-Event Director Daniel Waterhouse was celebrating his 100th parkrun, a couple of weeks after completing his first Ironman triathlon.

 

This is all the more impressive in light of the journey that Daniel has taken in the past few years, as we described in a story last year.

 

 

More parkrun heroes! At Mountain Goat Trail parkrun in Tennessee, they celebrated event director Kristin Sturgill joining the parkrun volunteer club, for volunteering 25 times. 

 

The event directors at a number of our spring launches all reached the same milestone this weekend: congratulations to Adam Patnoe at Charleston WV parkrun, Natalie DeRatt at Joe Creason parkrun, and Shelley Roy at Aspen parkrun. These folks make the parkrun world go round.

 

 

Another milestone! At Lillie parkrun Ann Arbor event director Stephanie Evans celebrated running for the very first time at the event that she created. But not before lending some words of advice to the assembled parkrunners.

 

 

Meanwhile, *everybody* got to run the course for the very first time at Charleston WV parkrun. This week they debuted a new course that spends more time in pretty Magic Island Park.

 

 

Speaking of first timers, at Livonia parkrun they were thrilled to welcome back Lori and Rick Brauer, who in 2012 founded the event, and with it launched parkrun USA. 

 

When Lynn Boven did his first parkrun, 6 years ago in the 25th Livonia parkrun, only 165 people had completed a US parkrun. This week, as Lynn awaits his 250 shirt we’ll be celebrating the 100,000th finisher at parkrun USA. Thanks to Rick and Lori for what they started!

 

 

This week our barkrun correspondent Foxy took a break from her busy interview schedule to be co-Run Director at Roosevelt Island parkrun.

 

Yes, that’s a quote from Teddy Roosevelt, who valued parks and the benefits of getting active outdoors, and whose statue overlooks the start of RI parkrun. Whoever said that puppy pictures aren’t educational!

 

 

Cindy showed that you don’t have to look super serious to set a big PB at Renton parkrun.

 

 

Hey, east coast types can do that, too. Cotter set (yet) another PB at College Park parkrun this week, and if he has this much in the tank at the 4k mark, we suspect there’s more to come.

 

 

Elizabeth has done her 140 parkruns throughout South Africa, especially at Middelburg parkrun. Jim has only ever parkrun in one place. Both agreed that it was a spectacular morning for a run this weekend at Des Moines Creek parkrun.

 

 

Larry has visited Charleston WV parkrun a few times, but this week he checked out ‘ in Missouri.

 

 

This young volunteer at Leakin Park parkrun loved sharing the fall with friends.

 

 

More leaves, more young volunteers at Deep Run parkrun.

 

 

Kensington parkrun is always a great family affair. This week they’re holding their first ever Thanksgiving parkrun. It’s the friendliest, give-high-fives-along-the-trail-est turkey trot in the DC area.

 

 

They had a big crowd for post-parkrun coffee at College Park parkrun. Jen and her dad Gus (lower left) have a busy week in store. Jen is be doing her 50th parkrun on Thanksgiving and Gus his 100th two days later. Little wonder that they needed pancakes!

 

 

Beautiful sunny morning at Jamaica Pond parkrun, another of the places with two Thanksgiving parkruns. 

 

See you next week.