The day started off at a brisk 20 degrees, but the SUN was shining! So for the 120 runners, walkers, and volunteers who joined us this week it wasn’t as icy as expected. Some people even wore shorts.
Part of my job as the week’s run director (= boss for the day) is to write a report on what happened. So this week’s report is about our heroes, high fives, and Happy Valentines.
[We’re sure it’s entirely coincidental that Lori got to be RD on Halloween and on Valentines weekend. This year we’ll have a July 4th parkrun, just sayin’. --ed.]
Heroes
Sometimes, heroes DO wear capes. Clare Imholtz has volunteered for parkrun 25 times! Clare volunteered Saturday because she had a big race coming up on Sunday, and she was rewarded with this lovely mask and cape. Thank you, Clare!
Amanda Mercer completed her 100th parkrun this week. She tore her ACL (ouch!) a few days after her 99th parkrun and she has been waiting patiently. She finally lost patience and walked the course to get to 100, accompanied by a group of supportive friends! Congratulations, Amanda!
100 is also an important number for Lisa Wilson, our turnaround marshal. 100 has been a notable number for Lisa because:
- In November 2018, Lisa brought her 100 year old father, who is now 101, to do his first parkrun
- In December 2018, Lisa completed her 100th parkrun
- In December 2018, a week later, Lisa also hit her 100th time volunteering (as did her husband, Hump Plotts)
- In addition to those One Hundreds, Lisa has finished in 100th position on 8 occasions, more than any other position.
Happy 100 to you, Lisa!
Andrea Zukowski is a hero for making not one, but two cakes to celebrate our milestones Saturday. Thank you!
Finally, 24 people earned a ring of the PB bell this week. That’s 5 first-timers and 19 who completed the course faster than ever before. Here are just a few of them …
When you already hold the age-group record, you're not supposed to go and set a 90-second PB. But that's just what 16-year old Katie Hirsche did on Saturday, with the fastest female time we've seen in almost 2 years: 19:06. Impressive! She also paced her dad Evan to a new PB a few seconds behind her.
Rebecca White managed yet another PB! She’s edging closer to 70 minutes, and word on the street has it that she has her sights set on a time in the 60s! Go, Rebecca!
The cold seemed to help the speedsters, as 7 of the first 10 finishers this week set PBs, including David Lai and Malik Al-Jame and Mary Commins.
Celeste Pere shaved a mere 1 second from her PB, and seemed to have fun doing so.
And Andrea Solan took a big step towards cracking 40 minutes.
High Fives
CP parkrun is all about high fives, especially when you cross the finish line. Trace and Clare were handing out the high fives this Saturday, and it’s not as easy as it looks, especially if you’re trying to do accurate timekeeping AND keep your fingers from freezing at the same time.
Happy Valentine’s
Even though Valentine’s Day was the night before, many parkrunners and volunteers wore Valentine’s colors.
Volunteer Heroes
A special “Thank You” to all of the volunteers who helped on Saturday: Hump, Lisa, Yancira, Teresa, Külli, Andrea, Clare, Trace, Chris, Steven, Mike, Frank, Patrick, Duane, Zoe, Clark, Rebecca, and Colin.
When you see anyone in a yellow vest on parkrun Saturdays, please give them some love. And if you’d like to volunteer, please let us know. It’s fun! Who knows, you might get to wear the purple cape someday too!
Check out our volunteer roster for upcoming weeks. Drop us a line at collegepark@parkrun.com to sign up for a specific week. And please, please add yourself to the email list for the once-weekly news/volunteer email from Andrea. You can add yourself to the list via your personal profile at parkrun.com.
For this week's full results, see here.
Looking for the full photo album for this week and any other week? Check out our Flickr albums page.
See you next Saturday! Some will be coming in tutus to mark the date (2/22/2020 -- so many twos!). How about you?
Lori Dominick
