The residue of Storm Betty abated just in time for today’s Sligo Parkrun. While it was still wet underfoot, there was no rain during the parkrun and running/walking conditions were good.
Welcome to our many visitors (both first time and returning) who joined us from Westport, Swansea, Laois, Dublin, Cabinteely, Tralee, London, Wexford, Belfast, Derry, Lough Key, Porterstown and Cork (and apologies if anyone got missed!). A few of our own Sligo regulars were on tour too – James was in Cologne while Colin volunteered in Wolverhampton.
A particular welcome to young Sadhbh from Derry who proudly wore her parkun milestone t-shirt; she has an impressive 101 junior parkruns and 17 regular parkruns to her name! Fantastic as always to see the great support from our locals – especially on a day when the sound of rain at getting up time made it VERY tempting to skip parkrun. And thanks to the weather gods who banished the rain as our reward. Major congratulations to the 3 people who did their first ever parkrun today – we hope you enjoyed it and that you’ll do it again.
Also delighted to see Leitrim running legend PJ Leddy supporting his son Seamus today. PJ had an impressive running career in the 1960s and 1970s, including a sports scholarship to the US. He tells me that his favourite event was the cross country 12km and he competed in the World Cross-Country Championship in 1968 and 1969. A little bit of research shows his PB for 5,000m is 14:20; many of us parkrunners would be happy to complete in twice that time! Lovely to meet you PJ :).
Well done to Brian Kinsella – he ran his milestone 100th parkrun today and celebrated that by taking first place too! We also had two 25th parkrun milestones – congratulations to local Ultan Smith and to regular visitor Gerard McMahon. Daniel Gallagher took second place today (with a new PB – well done Daniel!) while Ted Burke from Cabinteely came 3rd. Well done to young Sarah Mulvaney-Kelly; the first female home; she showed a clean part of heels to the adults and set a new PB into the bargain. She was followed by first timer to Sligo, Yvonne McDermott Rees from Swansea while local Aisling Burke took 3rd.
Fantastic to see some great runners but parkRUN (don’t be fooled by the name) is for everyone of all abilities. Everyone is welcome to WALK, STROLL or JOG at their own speed – we will never rush you and there is a tailwalker to make sure that you aren’t the last! You can bring your dog (on a short non-extendable lead), push a buggy, or be guided by a VI guide (email in advance and we’ll check if one of our trained VI guides is available). If you have any queries about the course or concerns as to the difficulty level, please do contact us in advance at sligo@parkrun.com or by facebook message.
Thanks as always to our fantastic team of volunteers – when we say that we couldn’t do it without you, it is absolutely true. Without volunteers, there would be no marshals, no course signs or course check, no timekeepers, no barcode scanners, no finish tokens, no tailwalkers, no first timers briefing, no VI guides, no parkwalkers, no freshly washed hi-vis – not to mention the photos, cheering and craic that goes along with it all. As our lovely new volunteer white board (thanks Regina!) tells us “Your Parkrun Needs You” and we encourage people to sign up a week or two ahead if possible; there is nothing like a full roster to fill a Run Director with joy :).
And speaking of all the things that the volunteers do, there is a lot of paraphernalia needed – which is generously stored by Westeroast coffee shop every week. So you can keep the good karma in circulation by volunteering when you can (once every 6 to 8 parkruns would be perfect) and refuelling across the road in Westeroast afterwards. They had a particularly lovely millionaire shortbread today; along with the coffee, it was just the thing needed to figure out a few glitches when processing the results!
Hope that you all enjoyed today’s parkrun and that we’ll see you again soon. Remember if you can volunteer over the next few weeks, just drop an email to sligo@parkrun.com or send a message on our facebook page. Have a good week and good luck to all taking on the challenge of the Warrior’s Run next Saturday afternoon!
This week's facts and figures are:
71 people ran, jogged and walked the course, of whom 12 were first timers and 6 recorded new Personal Bests. Representatives of 15 different clubs took part.
The event was made possible by 17 volunteers:
M BURKE • Chris MCDONAGH • Linda HIGGINS • Malachy GILLEN • Dervila LAYDEN • Pauline HARAN • Grace CALLAGHAN • Tom MCGAURAN • Mary DAVEY • Shane O DOHERTY • Nick DORAN • Jen HOWLEY • Olive KENNY • Joanne OREILLY • Eithne NILAND • Joe MAHON • Shane MCVEIGH
Today's full results and a complete event history can be found on the Sligo parkrun Results Page.
The male record is held by Conan MCCAUGHEY who recorded a time of 15:12 on 2nd October 2021 (event number 269).
The female record is held by Aoife KILGALLON who recorded a time of 16:44 on 18th December 2021 (event number 280).
The Age Grade course record is held by Irene CLEMENTS who recorded 93.71% (20:25) on 18th September 2021 (event number 267).
Sligo parkrun started on 31st January 2015. Since then 4,592 participants have completed 23,766 parkruns covering a total distance of 118,830 km, including 3,999 new Personal Bests. A total of 492 individuals have volunteered 4,002 times.
