Posts tagged Run
500 parkruns

Back in 2014 when I got my 50th parkrun Milestone T-Shirt I imagined a time in the far future when I get my 500th. It seemed so far off it was like Science Fiction back then. Based on a rough calculation of completing an average of 45 parkruns per year I worked out that I could complete 500 before my 50th birthday.

That plan would have happened if it wasn’t for Covid thwarting 70 weeks of parkrun opportunities. As we entered 2025, my year of turning 50, I worked out that I would do my 500th run just 6 weeks after my birthday. It also nicely coincided with a planned weekend in Bath with friends.

Having already done Bath Skyline earlier in the year I planned to do either Shepton Mallet or Somerdale Pavilion. My excitement grew when I noticed a brand new event pop up at Brickfields Park. It would also link to another obsession of mine, Disused Railways. With that the venue for my 500th run was set. It also set in motion a series of coincidences that would unfold during the day.

On hearing that my 500th would be in Bath, Paul, a colleague and fellow parkrun tourist, decided to also plan a weekend in Bath with his partner around the event. Coincidence #1 was that their hotel was just round the corner from our B&B. We planned to walk to the event together but after a late arrival on the Friday and some complicated logistics we decided to drive separately and meet at the start.

I arrived at 08:30 with my wife and the friends that we were staying with. Shortly ahead of the First Timers Briefing, Paul texted me to say they had parked a mile away and were on their way. That checked out as we also parked a mile away at the stadium. By the time of the start I couldn't see him but figured that he must be at the back of the group and I’d see him on the out-and-back sections. I didn’t see him at all so I thought that something must have gone awry.

On finishing the run I checked my phone to see a message from him at 09:01 to say “it’s Bath Skyline, right?”. I replied with a Facepalm emoji. He’d travelled from Manchester for a weekend away to be at the wrong parkrun. It was all caused by something wrong with his 5k app not showing new events, so Bath Skyline was the only Bath parkrun event that showed up for him.

The situation also meant that I had two 500 Milestone pre-event shoutouts at two different events on the same day. Yet another coincidence was that Paul had unknowingly booked dinner at the same restaurant at the same time as us later in the day.

The final coincidence was having an accidental race to the finish line with Danny Norman, host of the parkrun With Me Now Podcast. I had met Danny once before but too long ago that I didn’t recognise him. What I did notice was a guy in a 500 milestone T-shirt just ahead of me as I closed in on the finish line. My wife was at the line waiting to video my 500th finish and I thought it would be fun to cross the line next to a runner in a 500 shirt. I sped up a bit to slightly overtake him to get both of us in the video. It was only later in the morning when a different friend of mine noticed Danny in the results 1 second behind me.

As well as all the funny coincidences, it was a lovely day for the run. It was a bright, warm summer day with a field of 282 runners and walkers. As a Disused Railway geek I loved the out-and-back on the old Somerset and Dorset Railway line.

First finisher was Harry McMurtrie coming in at 17:19 with a good spread of timings through to just over 1 hour. There were 174 First Timers to Brickfields Park and 32 PBs.

As always, a huge thanks to all of the volunteers who made the event possible. If you’ve not volunteered before or it’s been a while since you last did it, please consider signing up for one of your next events.

Thanks to everyone who helped make my 500th parkrun at Brickfields Park a fun and memorable event. A final special thanks goes to Neil Chapman who took me to my first parkrun on Boxing Day 2012. Saturday mornings have not been the same since.

More parkrun posts

parkruns are free, weekly, community 5k events all around the world. I started in December 2012 and have been obsessive about it ever since. See my parkrun Collection page for details.

Featured and popular parkrun posts:

Richard gowerRun, parkrun, NCN, Disused Railway, Somerset, EnglandComment
Ales & Trails Chiltern Valley 10k

When: May 18th 2025
Where: Chiltern Valley Winery & Brewery, Old Luxters, Henley-on-Thames, RG9 6JW
Organiser: Racing Line Running
Distance: 10 km
Elevation: +/- 167m
Course: 8 km loop of farms and woodland to the west of the Winery 7 Brewery with a 1 km out-and-back from the start/finish. Mostly farm track, woodland paths. Hilly
Other routes touched: Chiltern Way, Shakespeare’s Way
Finish time: 1 hour, 1 minute, 57 seconds

Richard gowerRun, 10k, Chilterns, Buckinghamshire, EnglandComment
The Lap 75k Ultra Marathon

Ascent of Latterbarrow

When: May 10th 2025
Start and Finish: Low Cunsey Farm, Cunsey, Far Sawrey, Ambleside, LA22 0LU
Organiser: The Lap
Distance: 77km (47 miles)
Elevation change: +/- 2681m
GPX File: get via Buy Me a Coffee
Other routes touched (walk): Windermere Shore Footpath, Windermere West Shore, Dales Way, West Windermere Way
Other routes touched (cycle): NCN 6, 637. Lakes and Dales Loop
Other routes touched (run): Rothay Park parkrun
Summits: Latterbarrow, Loughrigg Fell, Wansfell Pike, Wansfell, Baystones, Orrest Head, Brant Fell, Gummer’s How
OS Trig Pillars: TP4549 - Loughrigg Fell, TP3536 - Gummers How
Map: The English Lakes: South-Eastern Area Map | Windermere, Kendal & Silverdale | Ordnance Survey | OS Explorer Map OL7
Finish time: 14 hours, 51 minutes, 24 seconds
Links: Lake Windermere, Graythwaite Estate, Far Sawrey, Skelwith Bridge, Ambleside, Troutbeck, Windermere (Town), Newby Bridge, Finsthwaite

This was my 14th Ultra and my 5th with my friend Mark. It was also my first big Ultra since the 100k Race To The Castle in 2021. Since then I’d had a few years of local 50k Ultras, waiting for another big one to excite me. After another friend had completed The Lap the previous year and loved it, I signed up straight away.

The Lap is a 75km circuit of Windermere, England’s largest lake. It takes a scenic, hilly route away from the lake with some tough climbs paid back by some great views. With the climbs, I found it hard to estimate what my finish time would be so I decided that finishing would be good enough and coming in before dark would be amazing.

As we arrived at the basecamp for the 06:00 start, the sun was coming up over the hills to the east of the lake. As usual at the start-line, I reminded myself not to get over excited and start too quickly. I need not have worried as the narrow country lanes and single-track through woods kept everyone at a slow, often walking, pace.

After the first feed station at Far Sawtry the pack was more spread out and we could speed up. Latterbarrow was the first climb at 11 km with a short steep climb up to the monument then an equally steep down. Shortly after the descent I saw road signs to Ambleside and decided that we were making very good time and would be there by our target of 09:30. I was wrong. I had forgotten that the route veers away from the lake at its north-west corner and climbs Loughrigg Fell before descending to Ambleside. It was at the second feed station at Skelwith that I realised we were actually an hour behind plan. It was also now getting hot and we still had the 2 big climbs to do. The new plan was “forget the plan”.

The northern section of the route has the 3 big climbs, Loughrigg Fell at 335m elevation and Wansfell at 487m. By Lake District standards, they’re both easy fells to walk but on an Ultra on a hot day they were killers. By the time we were down from Wansfell at the Troutbeck half-way feed-station, most of my running ability was gone.

Mark and I stayed mostly together until Gummers How, the final climb at 57 km. Mark is faster than I am so I generally lose him by the half way point. I often gain a bit of time at feed-stations as I don’t like to stop for long which gives me a bit of distance before Mark catches up with me again. Mark did a great job of encouraging me to run a few extra times rather than speed walk. That probably shaved up to 2 minutes off my total time.

My low-point of the route was a long stretch after Windermere of very similar-looking plantation and not many people around. Mark and I re-connected for the ascent of Gummer’s How. By the time we met Timea, our support crew for the day, we were both a bit tired and grumpy. I was still recovering from a cold and any running was now giving me a headache. Timea saved us with a pasty and some painkillers and we were back on the route.

Timea met us several times on the early evening southern section of the route greatly helping my motivation. After Newby Bridge the route turned back to the north for the final 10 km to the finish line. Although behind my “optimistic” plan, I had some new energy and felt that I could reach the finish before dark. I crossed the finish line at 20:51, well before dark and under 15 hours. Mark very kindly finished 18 minutes ahead of me so that he could be ready to video my finish.

It was in the top 3 most difficult Ultras that I’ve done but also in the top 3 most enjoyable.

Richard gowerRun, Ultramarathon, National Trust, Lake District, National Park, Westmorland, Lancashire, EnglandComment
The One In The Woods - Danesfield Trail 10k

When: March 16th 2025
Where: Danesfield, Buckinghamshire
Organiser: Onerace Events
Distance: 10 km
Elevation: +/- 188m
Course: Single hilly loop around Pullingshill Wood, Rogues Plantation and Rotten Row with a short out-and back section at the start and end from Danesfield School.
Other routes touched: Shakespeares’s Way, Chiltern Way
Finish time: 1 hour, 8 minutes, 58 seconds

Richard gowerRun, 10k, Buckinghamshire, EnglandComment
2024 in numbers

My stats for the year:

TOTAL DISTANCE IN 2024

  • Run (outdoor): 233 miles / 372 km

  • Cycle (Outdoor): 828 miles / 1,325 km

  • Cycle (Zwift): 1,079 miles / 1,726 km

  • Walk/Hike: 739 miles / 1,183 km

  • Total = 2,879 miles / 4,606 km (target was > 5,000 km)

Walk / Hike = recorded hiking & walking events, not general steps.
Total includes “other” activities such as SUP.

KEY EVENTS IN 2024

Richard gowerRun, Cycle, Trek, Zwift, SUPComment
parkrun LonDone+ and LonDone ++

“LonDone” is the name for completing the full set of 65 parkrun events in Greater London. There’s 2 other terms: “LonDone +” and “LonDone ++” that have been widely debated in the various parkrun social media forums.

  • LonDone + is generally seen as being all parkrun events within the M25. There are currently 15 parkrun events that are within the M25 but outside of Greater London or a total of 80 events within the M25.

  • Up to now I’ve ignored LonDone ++ as a lot of the definitions have felt a bit arbitrary. However, one definition that I like is that it includes events that are outside of the M25 but have a Voronoi area that crosses inside the M25. This includes a further 9 parkrun events making a total of 88 events that have part of their Voronoi area within the M25. Note that different parkrun apps have slightly different calculations for their Voronoi apps. For this page I’ve used the Voronoi map from the Running Challenges Chrome Extension.

  • LonDone+ and/or LonDone++ are also referred to as “Orbit-All”

See the main LonDone page for details of all parkrun events within Greater London.

LonDone +: parkrun events within the M25

Note that the Egham Orbit course crosses under the motorway with a short section outside of the M25. I've included it in LonDone+ as the start, finish and majority of the course are within the M25.

LonDone ++: parkrun events with a Voronoi area crossing the M25

Event (County, Region)

Notes on recent changes

  • Thurrock’s Voronoi area extended across the M25 before the start of Ingrebourne Hill.

  • Jersey Farm’s Voronoi area extended across the M25 before the start of Oaklands College.

The images below show the Voronoi area for each of the LonDon ++ parkrun events in blue with the M25 as a red line.

More parkrun posts

parkruns are free, weekly, community 5k events all around the world. I started in December 2012 and have been obsessive about it ever since. See my parkrun Collection page for details.

Featured and popular parkrun posts:

Richard gowerRun, parkrun, London, Hertfordshire, Surrey, Kent, Essex, Middlesex, Buckinghamshire, England Comments
Hangers Way 50k Ultra Marathon

When: June 23rd 2024
Start: Alice Holt Forest, Farnham, GU10 4LS
Finish: Queen Elizabeth Country Park, Gravel Hill, Horndean, PO8 0QE
Distance: 50.4 km (31 miles)
Elevation change: +965m / -951m. Net -14m
GPX File: get via Buy Me a Coffee
Other routes touched (walk): Hangers Way, The Shipwrights Way, South Downs Way
Other routes touched (cycle): NCN 22, 224, East Hampshire Circular Cycle Route
Maps:
- Basingstoke, Alton and Whitchurch: Sheet 144 (OS Explorer Map)
- Haslemere & Petersfield Map | Midhurst & Selborne | Ordnance Survey | OS Explorer Map OL33
- Chichester Map | South Harting & Selsey | Ordnance Survey | OS Explorer Map OL08
Finish time: 7 hours 57 minutes
Links: Hangers Way (LDWA), Alice Holt Country Park, Selborne, Selbourne Common National Trust, Butser Hill, Queen Elizabeth Country Park

This was my 13th Ultra, my 4th with my friend Mark and my 1st with my sister Lisa. After doing last year’s Race The Sun on my own it was nice to be with a group on the same event, even if we all did it at our own pace.

The Hangers Way gets its name from the series of steep, wooded hills known as the Hampshire Hangers. The route itself winds its way from Alton railway station to Queen Elizabeth Country Park, through a diverse landscape of ancient woodlands, rolling hills, and charming villages. The Hangers Way walking route is ~33km so the 50km Ultra route adds in and extra 16km from the start at Alice Holt Country Park plus a bit of extra meandering along the way.

Although I’d been to the country parks at the start and finish before I’d not experienced any of the route in between. It was a beautiful, warm mid-summer day and the countryside was stunning. A pleasant mix of woodland, open farmland and old English villages.

The warm day also meant that it was a bit too hot for my liking. I’ve completed a 50K in just over 7 hours before and I’d love to get in just under 7 one day. Based on the temperature and a glance at the elevation profile I estimated an 8 hour finish time for this one.

Mark and I kept together until the 2nd Aid Station at Selborne before he gradually edged ahead. Lisa was looking after a friend who was on her first Ultra so was taking a slower pace. On her own Lisa would likely have been a similar pace to, or faster than, Mark.

The route became hillier after Selbourne and my slow running became a power-walk. Keeping an eye on my pace via my Garmin, I was doing roughly 5km per hour which would bring me in more or less on 8 hours. I could probably have done a few bursts of running on the downhills but realistically it wouldn’t have got me there much faster so I kept the pace and saved my energy for the hills.

The final 15k was brutal with steep climbs at 35k, 45k and then Butser Hill right at the end. By the summit of Butser I was 15 minutes off the 8-hour mark and could see the finish line in the distance. I found a final spike of energy to get me down Butser to cross the line at 7:57. Very happy with that. Mark had finished 30 minutes earlier and Lisa and her friend came in shortly after.

As with most Ultras the pain soon fades once you have the medal on and talk turns to the next one. Next one for me is The Lap around Lake Windermere next year. It’s 75km on a mountain route so I’ll probably need to do more training than my usual parkrun and a 10k a week before.

Richard gowerRun, Ultramarathon, National Trust, South Downs, Hampshire, EnglandComment
Completing all Nottinghamshire parkruns

There are currently 13 parkrun events in the county of Nottinghamshire. The first was Colwick which started on June 25th 2011 and the newest is Wollaton Hall which started on February 8th 2020. The name for having completed all parkrun events in the county is “Get Nott’ed”

I have not yet completed any of the Nottinghamshire parkrun events.

The interactive maps below take you to the approximate location for the course, typically the centre of the park. See the course instructions in the parkrun page for each event for specific directions to the start.

Beeston

 

Bestwood Village

 

Brierley Forest

 

Clifton

 

Clumber Park

 

Colwick

 

Forest Rec

 

Gedling

 

Mansfield

 

Newark

 

Rushcliffe

 

Sherwood Pines

 

Wollaton hall

 

More parkrun posts

parkruns are free, weekly, community 5k events all around the world. I started in December 2012 and have been obsessive about it ever since. See my parkrun Collection page for details.

Featured and popular parkrun posts:

Richard gowerRun, parkrun, Nottinghamshire, EnglandComment
parkrun LonDone Tracker

If you would like a PDF version of my manual LonDone tracker, please BuyMeACoffee and let me know on the Contact Page. It’s a table of all current Greater London parkrun events, plus all events inside the M25, with space for future new events. You can track your date completed and finish time. It’s simple and you could easily make one yourself, but let me know if you want a copy of mine. 20% of each virtual coffee goes to parkrun Forever and the rest goes toward the running of this website.

Excerpt from the full PDF

Richard gowerRun, parkrun, London, EnglandComment
2023 in numbers

My stats for the year:

TOTAL DISTANCE IN 2024

  • Run (outdoor): 287 miles / 459 km

  • Cycle (Outdoor): 595 miles / 951 km

  • Cycle (Zwift): 1,519 miles / 2,426 km

  • Walk/Hike: 759 miles / 1,215 km

  • Total = 3,160 miles / 5,052 km (target was > 5,000 km)

Walk / Hike = recorded hiking & walking events, not general steps.

KEY EVENTS IN 2023

  • 2 x Ultra Marathons: Goring Gap 50 and Race The Sun 50

  • 1 x Marathon: Brighton

  • 3 x 10k running events: Mortimer Trail, Bradenham Blast and Compton Verney

  • 49 parkruns, including 12 new locations

  • 23 parkrun volunteering occasions

  • 4 new Historic County Tops: Ben Lawers, Ben Vorlich, Ben Lomond, Hill of Stake

  • 28 new Present-Day, alternative or previous County Tops:
    - England: Whitehorse Hill, Haddenham Village, Racecourse Road, Nether Hall, Mill Hill, Staverton Clump, The Slipe, Bow Brickhill, Corley Moor, Meigh’s Wood, Rednall Hill North Top, Bassett Avenue, Fort Southwick, Holly Hill, Liddington Hill, London Road, Heath Mount, Langdon Hill Southwest Slope, Blagdon Hill Farm, Niver Hill, Hanging Hill
    - Wales: Garth Hill, Tair Onnen, Mynydd y Betws, Merthyr Common, Pen March, Coety Mountain, Wentwood

  • 33 new OS Trig Pillars bagged

  • 3 international / island High Points: Pico de las Nieves* (Gran Canaria), El Toro (Menorca), Mt Etna* (Sicily) … *=highest accessible point

  • Completing the Surrey sections of the Greensand Way and North Downs Way

  • The Portsmouth Semaphore Line cycle route

Richard gowerRun, Cycle, Trek, Zwift, SUPComment
Race The Sun 50k Ultra Marathon

View North to the Chilterns from the top of the descent to Checkpoint 4 at Wooburn Town

When: June 3rd 2023
Start and Finish: North Maidenhead Cricket Club, SL6 8SP
Distance: 51 km (32 miles)
Elevation change: +/- 207m
GPX File: get via Buy Me a Coffee
Other routes touched (walk): The Green Way, Maidenhead Boundary Walk, Thames Path, Jubilee River Path, Beeches Way, Shakespeare’s Way, Chiltern Way Berkshire Loop, Wycombe to Bourne End Disused Railway
Other routes touched (cycle): NCN 4, 50, 61, Round Berkshire Cycle Route, Beeches Cycleway
Maps:
- Chiltern Hills East Map | High Wycombe, Maidenshead & Rickmansworth | Ordnance Survey | OS Explorer Map 172
- Windsor, Weybridge & Bracknell Map | Thames Path | Ordnance Survey | OS Explorer Map 160
Finish time: 7 hours 52 minutes 28 seconds
Links: Maidenhead, Cookham, River Thames, Bray, Jubilee River, Taplow, Burnham, Burnham Beeches, Wooburn, Bourne End

This was my 12th Ultra and the second of a 2-part series of local ~50 km Ultras with 3 weeks between them. My legs were back to normal after the recent Goring Gap Run and I was hoping to crack my sub-7 hour target for a 50 km. With a relatively flat course and dry conditions it should have been fine. However, my running nemesis: the sun was also out and it was a very hot one.

Signing up for this race was a no-brainer as it started and ended in Maidenhead where I grew up and took in trails that I’m very familiar with. The original route also went within 100 metres of my house. The final published course took a different route on the second half but still on home ground. My friend Mark wanted to join too as he grew up within half a mile of the start but other friends’ wedding plans took him away for the weekend.

The concept for this race was to start at midday on a Saturday and to finish before sunset at 21:24. This also meant that I could fit-in a parkun in the morning and get to the start line with time to spare to get showered and changed. Timea though this was a crazy idea but I did my best to explain that it was “perfectly normal”. I had done much longer Ultras in the past so the best way to think about it was that it was a 55 km Ultra with a long break between the first 5 km and the rest of it .

The first third of the race was pretty straightforward with a pleasant cross-country run to Cookham and a section of the Thames Path to Windsor. I kept a steady running pace and the heat wasn’t too bad. At 19 km, between the Thames and the Jubilee River, there was a flooded stream crossing the path with no means to keep dry. The only way through it was to get our feet wet. With very dry conditions for the few weeks before I didn’t think of bringing spare socks so I knew this would be trouble. My shoes and feet dried quickly but I knew that there would be trouble ahead.

From 20 km the heat kicked in and my running was over for the day, replaced by a power-march. Somewhere around 40 km I could feel the impact of getting my feet wet earlier with blisters forming on both feet. I knew that my sub-7 hour target wasn’t going to happen so it was now about finishing. It was a tough final 10 km but the finish line eventually came and I completed in 7 hours 52 minutes. I can never be disappointed with a finish time. Just completing is always enough and I was well within the sunset cut-off time.

Richard gowerRun, Ultramarathon, National Trust, National Trails, Chilterns, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, EnglandComment
Goring Gap 52k Ultra Marathon

When: May 14th 2023
Start and Finish: Mapledurham House, Mapledurham, Reading, RG4 7TR
Distance: 52 km (32 miles)
Elevation change: +/- 313m
GPX File: get via Buy Me a Coffee
Other routes touched (walk): Chiltern Way, Thames Path, The Ridgeway
Map: Chiltern Hills West Map | Henley-on-Thames & Wallingford | Ordnance Survey | OS Explorer Map 171
Finish time: 7 hours 32 minutes 51 seconds
Links: River Thames, Mapledurham House, Caversham, Reading, Purley on Thames, Pangbourne, Whitchurch on Thames, Goring on Thames, South Stoke, North Stoke, Moulsford, Streatley

This was my 11th Ultra and my third with my friend Mark. It was also the first of a 2-part series of local ~50km Ultras with 3 weeks between them.

It was a beautiful course starting at Mapledurham House on the north bank of the Thames near Reading. From there we headed east to cross the Thames at Caversham to follow the Thames Path north towards Wallingford. I had covered most of the route before either on short Thames Path or Chilterns trips or on the Race To The Stones Ultra back in 2016.

It was a very nice early summer day which made the views over the Thames, and the villages on the way, stunning to run through. It was also hot though and, not being a fan of warm weather running, the heat slowed me down significantly. Mark and I kept together until around 12km then I started to lose sight of him. My slow run became a fast walk around the half-way point and I could feel that my sub-7 hour target would be challenging. I might have made it but 50km turned out to be actually 52km with a hill at the end so I missed by target by half an hour. Mark, on the other hand, had an excellent run and finished a full 50 minutes ahead of me.

Richard gowerRun, Ultramarathon, National Trust, National Trails, Chilterns, Berkshire, Oxfordshire, EnglandComment