08.02.2025 #Event 525 The Catton Parkrun community.

Good evening and welcome to this week’s run report. I had the pleasure of being RD for our 525th event. Unfortunately, I had to begin the run briefing with some sad news. On Monday evening, thieves broke into the large shed behind Buxton Lodge and stole a ride-on lawn mower, trailer and several power tools. As you can imagine, these were expensive items. Not only is the cost an issue, but so is the inconvenience and hassle of replacing them. Obviously, if you have any information about this, please contact the local police. Everything that was stolen helps to maintain and care for the beautiful park where we can run and walk every Saturday morning, but I’m sure many of you will also visit during the week for a nice walk or as part of a run. To show our support, we decided to re-advertise the Catton Park Go Fund My page on our social media and during the run briefing. And, in true Catton parkrun style, we have contributed an additional £610.00 since Friday, which is a fantastic amount. So thank you to everyone who has donated; I know the Parish Council is grateful for your help.

what a happy bunch of volunteers we have, thanks everyone as always

This week’s parkwalkers, Claire and Royston, mingle with our walkers. Thank you and nice trails, Royston.

And now, back to all things Catton parkrun, Saturday was another cold one; when will we get some warm weather? We had some slippery spots on the course due to the rain during the week. We had an impressive 385 participants this week. The numbers are still edging closer to 400, and I am confident that we will pass it very soon. This week, we had 7 first-time parkrun participants, as well as 19 tourists from Norwich, Thetford, Ringland, and Oxford. Again, perfect running conditions resulted in 37 personal bests this week.

For our milestones this week, I only had three to highlight; poor Kelly thought she had a simple task when she took over the socials this week; in fact, 16 of you reached milestones!! So, here we go. Junior Noah is the first to reach 10 parkruns, followed by Paul Denny at 25. Oh my goodness, seven of you have reached 50 parkruns: Sharon Jones, Jessica Rutherford, Marley Lloyd, Lydia Petersen (mother and son duo), Paul Fairchild, Joanne Crowley, and Susan Carver. Lee Wilson, Annie Harper, and Rosemary Jackson are the three people who have reached 100. Finally, Elaine Albrow reaches an unofficial milestone of 150 parkruns, followed by Paul Smith with 200 parkruns, and Colin Ford with an impressive 300 parkruns. Maybe it’s a good thing I didn’t have all of those to announce because it could have been a 9.30am start, but I started at 9.02am this week! This week, we had one volunteer milestone, which went to Lyla Isherwood, a previous DofE volunteer. The great thing about Lyla is that she now comes back on a regular basis with her father Matt and mother Lou to volunteer, which we think is fantastic and demonstrates how welcoming parkrun is to its younger participants. Thank you, Lyla. Much appreciated.

Annie Harper (centre) completed her 100th parkrun. Well done.

Elaine kept this one quiet, her 150th parkrun, but luckily we had a photo from a few weeks ago! Well done, Elaine

Lyla also kept this one quiet, and thankfully, we had a photo in the archives! Thank you, Lyla, for volunteering.

I can’t believe we forgot Andy’s 206th parkrun last week! But don’t worry, we haven’t forgotten his 207th. Well done, Andy

And I believe that is all I have for this week; I can’t think of anything else to tell you about. The Norwich Road Runners are hosting another volunteer takeover on March 15th, and the roster is nearly full. In fact, the roster appears to be fairly healthy for the coming weeks, which is encouraging. There are still open positions, so check out our future roster and see if there is a role that you are interested in.

Future roster | Catton parkrun

Oh, there are some more photos.

As you can see, the RD’s job continues even after you’ve finished and gone home! Actually, I was RD, but I was taking a photo of Kelly sweeping the floor.

Now, those of you who helped set up early or put away the posts will be aware that we have had some issues with the ‘hooks’ that hold the rope; basically, they bend easily and have begun to break off. I took one back to work to be upgraded, and I am happy to say they are super reinforced! So that means the rest will be upgraded in the next few weeks.

Below are some photos of the runners and walkers from Saturday’s event.

As of this week, we are looking for a timekeeper, finish token support, two barcode scanners, and three marshals. James will be your RD this week; hopefully, the speaker will hold out for another parkrun; if not, James will shout! Have a great week, and see you all Saturday (hopefully) to see if we can top the 400 mark.

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