To think Parkrun should have an hour cut-off

[SummerAsh]

200+ participants, all but two completed in under 54 minutes… but the last two women ambled around chatting and took over 1 hour 10 minutes.

I appreciate that Parkrun should be inclusive, but that’s taking the piss, and unfair on the 20 or so volunteers who give up the first part of their Saturday mornings…. It’s hard enough getting volunteers as it is, without expecting everyone to be saintly martyrs with endless patience.

To complete in an hour requires a pace of 3.1 mph (I.e 5km = 3.1 miles)… According to Google, that’s a casual walking pace.

AIBU to think that if you can’t or won’t complete a park”run” at even a casual walking pace, then parkrun isn’t for you. I think that an hour cut off is more than accommodating enough, and an appropriate line to draw.

Otherwise, what is reasonable? Is it reasonable to accommodate a 90-year old taking 3 hours with their zimmer? If not, where the line if not an hour.

Have you ever been? Literally no one sneers, it’s really inclusive and encouraging. But it is for runners or at least run/walkers.

Can point out that OP's attitude is very rare, especially among those who do actually volunteer, every parkrun I've been part of has gone out of it's way to welcome those at the back

I second that. I've volunteered at a couple (at the back because I'm slow).
I usually watch or chat to my relative/s who is/are stationed along the route. Absolutely nobody complains about the timings.

My SIL did the marathon walking and was so slow they removed the barriers, opened the roads and went home before she had finished.

That is a different situation. You can't close roads indefinitely.

I’ve seen people at Park Run who are clearly at the beginning of their journey to fitness and are wheezing around doing the world's slowest jog looking at you DH but at least they’re trying and everyone is very, very supportive and encouraging

I agree. I've never seen anyone ambling and chatting and carrying a cup of coffee. I think we've moved a long way from the OP though, which was suggesting that the cut off time should be an hour. Dh in his 60s ran for the first time a couple of years ago and it took him longer than that. He wasn't ambling either, just had to walk slow a few times to recuperate. He's now well under an hour. Still not ambling though.

Yes, and it's very clear what time the roads will be re-opened and volunteers step down.

They choose to volunteer though, nobody is holding a gun to their heads. If they’re unhappy about people taking longer than an hour they can find something else to do with their time.

Marathons do usually have published cut off times.

I was horrified to learn, after entering Rotterdam, that it's 5 hours! They don't seem to do fun running on the continent, and whilst there are parkruns in some countries, it doesn't seem to have taken off the way it has here.

I’d bet my house that at every parkrun where a PP has said “oh no no no, no one at OUR parkrun thinks like that” there is at least a few marshals who think exactly that. One, we hide it well and two, they’re hardly going to bitch to you about it because you’re far too much of a parkrun saint, who would stay there all day, if they had to, because they’re just so inclusive, don’t you know?

Given that all us horrors who think strollers (not fat people, not disabled people, not old people, not ill people, just BLOODY AMBLERS) are taking the piss have been told we’re shit volunteers and we should stop - well, I wonder what would happen if we did?

Can you show us the bit where she said she is a volunteer

Parkrun is not comparable to the Tour De France

It seems to be for some.

there's increasing average time by ten minutes, vs tripling it!

I don't know why people are acting like OP is suggesting that if the cut off was an hour, everybody outside that is immediately vapourised out of existence or something. They can still carry on, just the volunteers start packing thing up. It's not like you actually get a medal for completing the whole thing, whether you start at 9 and finish at 9.20, start at 9 or finish at 10.05 or rock up that afternoon and run the same route you've still done 5k's worth of exercise, which surely is what the whole thing is about?

Many of us who do volunteer at parkrun disagree with OP are you just going to ignore us?

Count me in on that

Not if it stops enough people from volunteering that the whole thing can't go ahead. As long as someone is prepared to step in and replace OP if she stops doing it, then that's all fine and good though - let's hope so.

Parkrun is inclusive. If you don’t want to help an inclusive event, help out at a running club where you can shame and mock slower people to your heart’s content.

That was then, this is now. Times move on

What would happen if certain part volunteers stopped volunteering?

park runs perhaps would be a better place and people like some of the posters here who have expressed their reticence to join because of sneery comments from the OP and her ilk or a negative previous experience, well, they might enjoy the park run as d esribed on park run's website

If people volunteer to do parks run organising then isnt it expected ut will take at least couple of hours with set up and wrap up.

I coach kids sport as volunteer. Im there 30 mins before the kids arrive then usually 30 mins after.

Or maybe there then wouldn't be enough volunteers to keep it going and it wouldn't be any kind of a place at all, for anyone.

You are probably right that a significant number of volunteers feel this way. Hopefully they don’t make it obvious. Any organisation with people in it has differences of opinion. The ethos from HQ does not agree though. I know there are some parkruns which are more inclusive than others. Maybe volunteer at one of the less welcoming ones and hope that they welcome you as a volunteer (it’s not unknown for that to be a bit of a closed club too).

I do think that having the parkwalker role on the roster template is a reasonable indicator of the ethos of the parkrun. If you are looking for one where you will feel welcome taking over an hour look for that and look at the previous results to see the tail walkers times over the past few weeks. It shouldn’t matter which parkrun you go to but as this thread shows it can do.

No. I did not ask how I can improve. I made the point that as a novice without a clue, I expected parkrun to be somewhere I would be welcome. Clearly that isn't the case for some Park run venues. I am not really sure why you're arguing. There's nothing contentious about that other than to recognise that it very much isn't in the spirit of Parkeun and at least some of their funding.

Is it worth pointing out that volunteers are ordinary people doing their bit once in a while? They'll have a wide range of views.

Some love the whole thing, some feel they should volunteer occasionally because without volunteers it won't happen, others are doing it because it looks bad if they don't etc etc.

Some will love supporting slower runners and walkers, some will be cold and miserable and want to go home.

Parkrun volunteering is split into chunks. Set up and course check have to be there for 8am. Can go home when they've ran, jogged or wallked.
Marshalls and scanners from 8:30, can go home once tail walker has passed them.
Close down, arrive at 8:50, run, jog or walk and on site for 15 mins after the tail walkers have finished and all equipment is put away.
Only the run director is usually there the entire 8am - 10:30. Run director, results processing person and a few others then go to cafe to process results and start sorting tokens. Usually a few of the core team go to.

I’ve volunteered about 20 times over the years. No one would know that I find amblers frustrating - obviously I don’t huff and puff about it when volunteering!

A novice should readily be able to do a parkrun in an hour unless they have significant health issues.