Carrying on, with friends!

When the South Boulder Creek parkrun scheduled for March 14 was cancelled along with all other US parkruns, my running buddy Dave said “Sam, let’s just run everyday until the pandemic is over.”

Dave had just resigned from his job and I’m retired so it seemed like a fun idea … at least for a few weeks as, according to some politicians, it wasn’t that serious.  I started the following day, March 14 with Dave joining me on March 16 and with that we started a consecutive running streak that for me is still going over 300 days later.

At around 50 consecutive days we were joined by another local parkrunner, Rob Holmes. Dave and I reached 100 runs in mid June by which time we were meeting at 7 am each morning to avoid the summer heat. Dave ended his streak on 100 but I was determined to carry on and although, in the back of our minds we all thought that 100 was the goal that would outlast the virus, I decided to continue running indefinitely at least 5km / my own parkrun every day.

 My daughter Natalie joining us for run #100

In Boulder county we are lucky to have so many excellent trails, including our own South Boulder Creek parkrun and my support team, Dave and Rob, joined me whenever they could to help me achieve the next milestones. Summer turned to autumn and the milestones came and went. We also used the parkrun milestone banners that one of our South Boulder Creek run director team created.

The streak is still going today and hopefully, barring injury or illness, the next milestone will be run #365 on March 13.

Now we look back and realise what a great experience this has been running together so many days – getting to know each other better, learning about our families and so much merry banter. Covid has been more difficult for some than others – running our daily “parkruns” together has helped us through these difficult times. Only last week, after a short illness and no runs for a few days, Dave said “you cannot imagine how much I miss our runs when I can’t join you” … and that’s how we all feel.

I’ve been a runner for over 50 years and for many of those years I’ve enjoyed training alone. Being an active member of parkrun has changed that. The camaraderie and fun I’ve experienced being part of the parkrun family has definitely been a great help during the pandemic.

Left to Right: Rob Holmes, me, and Dave Barr.

What’s remarkable is that all three of us grew up in wet climates (Rob and myself from England, and Dave from Scotland), yet in my 300 run streak we got wet…once!

Then again, all this pales into insignificance compared to another of our South Boulder Creek parkrunners, John Brackney. John completed his consecutive run #2000 on Saturday Jan 16 – it can get very cold in Colorado but he has run every single one in shorts!

Sam Bennett,

South Boulder Creek Co-Event Director