I’m visiting my mum in Leeds and there are parkruns on New Year’s Day. Of course I have to go. What’s more I want to do two parkruns in one morning. Also I want to do them in rhino costume. All sounds perfectly reasonable to me. Carrie sighed and agreed to come along. I can see so little out of the front of the rhino suit that I need as much assistance as I can possibly get just to make sure I arrive on the start line. Therefore I’m really grateful that she can come along to help.
There’s a fine gathering on the moor. As with last year there seems to be a tradition of gathering near the finish funnel and then moving back to the start for the prerun briefing. Sam, the run director does the briefing. He mentions someone who got what sounded like about 84 per cent in age grading and also someone doing their 250th parkrun. Unfortunately I couldn’t hear much from inside the rhino but many congratulations to them. Sam also does a wonderful shout out for me and talks a little about the sorry plight of the rhino.
The run director counts us down and then sends us on our way around the course. It’s a nice flat course although there are occasional patches of ice. We do a fair amount of looping around and pass some places three times during the run. It’s not the most scenic parkrun I’ve ever done but it’s an excellent example of being able to put on a fine run even in quite a limited space. They’ve really used what they have in an interesting way alternating the loops slightly each time around. I follow someone in an orange shirt for a while and eventually manage to pass by. Then I followed someone in a 250 shirt but I didn’t have enough energy to pass her and she left me staggering along behind. It looks a really nice shirt. Hope they’re still doing them when I get to 250 parkruns.
I hauled myself across the finish line and run director Sam came across for a chat. I thanked him for the shout out at the start and we had a photo taken together. Sam then grabbed my finish token and barcode and scanned them in for me. He then shooed me away to my next parkrun at Temple Newsam asking me to remember him to Ronnie who would be run directing there.
I’ve just received my Woodhouse Moor parkrun time and it’s a new rhino pb:
Woodhouse Moor parkrun results for event #435. Your time was 00:32:49.
If anyone gets the urge to donate to Save The Rhino then please visit the page http://virginmoneygiving.com/jimmowatt and donate whatever you feel you can afford.