By Shelby Brooks
For 250 Saturday mornings, enthusiastic parkrunners have woken up early to get active around Wilson Botanic Park.
Despite a “horrid” forecast, the 66 participants were lucky with fine weather for the duration of the milestone run on Saturday 22 October.
Wilson Botanic Parkrun was first established in 2016 and has hosted thousands of people each Saturday morning for a free, timed 5km walk or run.
A special ceremony was held to present members milestone shirts, with regular Parkrun member Peter Fleming receiving a 250th shirt.
He walks around the course in the opposite direction to the runners to offer high fives and words of encouragement every Saturday.
“250 represents the number of times you’ve walked around the park,” Mr Fleming explained.
“They cheated a bit with me, I hadn’t been there for the 250 but I walk around the park every day of the week!”
Co-event director Peter Sanders said it was a lovely morning with two personal bests and five first-timers participating.
The original co-event directors Mark Barrett and Lynda Manning were welcomed back to run the 250th celebration event.
The 293 individuals who have volunteered at Wilson Botanic Parkrun since it began on 27 August 2016 were also thanked.
“Without each of them, the 250 Parkruns would not have been possible,” Mr Sanders said.
“The support of Wilson Botanic Park management and, in particular, Cathy Rees, Micaela Vaughan and Janet Reid has also been invaluable.”
Mr Sanders has been involved with Wilson Botanic Parkrun since the first event held in 2016.
“I think it’s a wonderful model. You get pleasure from seeing people come along to walk and start their fitness journey and then also seeing the more elite athletes achieve personal bests,” he said.
“For me, Parkrun is about encouraging everyone in the community to get out there and be physically active,” Mr Sanders said.
The Wilson Botanic Parkrun is considered a more challenging course than most, so it doesn’t always get the same high numbers as other local runs.
“We have a really nice small community feel at Parkrun,” Mr Sanders said.
