Volunteer Time (2)

I wasn’t going to volunteer this week. I was going to run with my GoPro to give you a flavor of my local parkrun. However, when the volunteer email went out on Thursday, the event was desperately short of volunteers. I decided I would help out. I could get my easy paced 6 mile run in later in the day. 

Course set up and turn around Marshall sounded good to me. I’d set the course up and get a 5K walk in with a finishers time too. Two for the price of one.

I turned up nice and early to get my instructions and the trolley full of signs and cones for marking the course. As I’ve run the course a few times I knew where the signs went. But it was nice to get an annotated map of the route that showed all the sign locations. Every sign was numbered. A place for everything, and everything in its place. So easy a caveman could do it.

I was under the impression that this would be an easy task. Walk 1.5 miles, stopping every now and again to put signs and cones out. How difficult could it be?

It can be pretty difficult to put the signs into hard ground that hadn’t seen rain in a few weeks and by the time I reached the turn around I was hurrying and only had 5 or 10 minutes before the event started. 

The turn around comes at the top of a short, steep slope. I had to haul the trolley to the top of the grade to finish putting cones and signs out. That was tough. I have a whole new respect for people who push strollers on races. You are amazing!

The turnaround. It really is a steep slope.

Turnaround set up

I got a few minutes peace and quiet before the runners started to turn up. There was a fairly even flow of them. Most managing a smile even after coming up the climb.

Chandru, accompanied by tailwalker Jeff. Chandru set a new PB for the course today. 

Once tailwalker Jeff, and the remarkable Chandru Sharma, one of our partially sighted walkers, came through, I could tear things down and head back. I carefully made doubly sure that I picked up every sign and cone that I’d put out a couple of hours before. 

Volunteering is very rewarding. I really enjoyed myself out there today. If you haven’t volunteered at a parkrun before, I recommend you do. 

Also this week, we received our new parkrun “bling”. Signs, flags, and volunteer vests. Brooks Running is the official sponsor of parkrun in the US and we now have equipment that is branded with their name. Thank for supporting Parkrun, Brooks!

Photo: Cynthia Smith Strack

Photo: Cynthia Smith Strack

Volunteer time.

As you know, I go on about parkrun a bit. It’s just so much fun. Meeting up with like minded people sharing stories and experiences, running together and just having a good time. Training can be hard, and get togethers like this can help ease the stresses if training gets a bit tough.

When I received the volunteer email earlier in the week, I saw there was quite a few spots open for Saturday, and as I had already run two fast 5K’s in the week, I thought I’d take the day off and help out. 

I figured that if I volunteered to hand out finish tokens, then I could also do some photography. 

A photographer is always needed to record the event, and I love taking pictures. So I filled in the sign up sheet and waited for Saturday to come around.

We arrived just as things were being set up, and race director Glenn handed me the bag of chalks and told me to get creative. I pleaded that after the previous weeks faux pas I was the last person who should do that. He assured me that no-one had noticed and it would all be OK. I made sure I got it right this time.

It’s Court House Lake.

I then set to and added a few inspirational messages to the trail. I desperately tried to think of something witty to write, before resorting to the old standards.

With that I donned my volunteer vest and well and truly felt the part.

I am a proper volunteer now

There were forty runners today, a very good turnout for the event. Quite a few of them were first timers. I hope some of them come back. As Glenn, the race director gave his briefings, I snuck off up the trail a little ways to in the hope of catching some good photos of the runners enjoying themselves. From the speedsters to the walkers all were having a good time as they passed me.

Then it all goes quiet for a while. Fifteen to 20 minutes or so to be exact, while everyone heads to the turnaround point just over a mile and a half away. Chrysa, Glenn, Michael and myself just sat around shooting the breeze.

I set up my iPhone on my tripod because if I was going to hand out finisher tokens for barcode scanning as well, then I was going to need an extra pair of hands. Handing out the finish tokens is pretty important. You have to hand them out to the correct finishers in the correct order. Otherwise, if a group of people come across the line at the some time, and you hand the token to the wrong person they will have an incorrect time assigned to them when the token is scanned. A heavy responsibility. With only forty people crossing the finish line in a 40 minute time span things weren’t too hectic. Nice for a first timer on the job, and once I got a system going it was easy to snap a picture of the finisher and then hand them their token. I was quite pleased with the results. 

So many people giving their alo and having so much fun. This is parkrun.

One thing I always do as a competitor, is thank the volunteers. Several of the competitors thanked me too. Do you know what? It does make you feel good. I shall endeavour to thank more volunteers in future.

Once the event was over, everyone else broke down the start and finish line and I sorted out the tokens and made sure that they were in the correct order ready for next week. Sat on the grass in my own little world. 

“One… where’s one? Three, four, five… Where’s one… 26,27,28,29.  Where the devil is one? In the end I found them all, and got them in the right order ready for next week.

Tail walker Deb, having fun.

There you go then, parkrun is as much fun volunteering as it is running. If you have a parkrun local to you, please go out and support them.

The volunteer crew from L to R: Dennis, Turnaround Marshall. Chrysa, Timing. Michael, Barcode Scanning. Jeff and Tammy, Set up and tear down. Some guy or other, Tokens. Deb, Tailwalker. Glenn, Race Director.