Chan S Nandhray

Another fabulous Saturday of Goodgym combining with parkrun, with Miriam, Liam and Ryan helping out at Edgbaston Reservoir, Chan setting up at Perry Hall and Steven making sure Woodgate Valley happened.

Six Goodgymers made it happen at four parkrun events around and just outside the city today. Chan was out early setting up the course at Perry Hall before Raull came along and brought in the tail for his 50th volunteering day at parkrun. At Edgbaston Reservoir, Liam was the Run Director while Ryan took up a Marshal point on the course. Over at Woodgate Valley, Steven was doing lots of tasks before and after the run, while Ben was at Walsall Arboretum scanning barcodes and taking the beautiful pictures for the run report.

Join in with making parkrun happen and raise the profile of Goodgym among local runners. There are several parkruns across and just outside the city, so look at the links below to choose one close and convenient to you and find out how to volunteer. You will need to send a message to the email address on the page for the parkrun you want to volunteer at, with your parkrun barcode to let them know you are able to volunteer.

I will be usually volunteering at Perry Hall so you can join me there if you wish, or if you have another one closer to home then the address of all individual parkruns can be found on their pages.

Volunteer at Edgbaston Reservoir

Volunteer at Perry Hall

Volunteer at Cannon Hill

Volunteer at Woodgate Valley

Volunteer at Sutton Park

Volunteer at Oaklands

Volunteer at Babbs Mill

Volunteer at Sandwell Valley

Volunteer at Kingsbury Water

Volunteer at Walsall

Volunteer at Arrow Valley

All parkruns have a similar structure, with a run director and a volunteer team who will make sure you are prepared for all you need to do to help.

You will have a full briefing of the mornings events and how to best support everyone participating at parkrun.

Tasks are varied and include: marshalling, scanning, giving out & sorting finish tokens, tail - walker and many more. All of the tasks are explained in full, easy to do and the tasks are a fun insight into how parkrun actually runs every Saturday!

The volunteering role usually finishes around 10-10:30am.

Sign up here to show you are volunteering and I will collate a run report. Let me know by posting any words or pictures into the Whatsapp group or to johnhayes@goodgym.org and I will add them to the report.

I started my day early as usual, setting up the course at Perry Hall. But there was a difference, a slight course alteration to implement, with one of the annoying out and backs being removed after the course was remeasured last week. With everything out and altered, I returned to run, but not before bumping into Chan and Raull, who were on their way out to marshal, and an inspiring job they did of cheering us around. Over at Edgbaston Reservoir, Miriam had a cold morning timekeeping. While at Woodgate Valley, Steven was out being Mr. Everything as usual!

It was a bumper day for the collaboration process as nine goodgymers volunteered at two parkrun events in Birmingham. I began by setting up the course at Perry Hall with Chan and his mum, marking out and checking the course for the runners. I had to run off quickly myself for something I'm about to get to in the report, while Chan got the chance to walk the course and Raull took up tail walking duties.

At the same time, local running club City of Birmingham Striders were doing a volunteering takeover at Edgbaston Reservoir, the place I was in a rush to get to after setting up the Perry Hall course (I got there a few minutes late but managed to get a run around). As there are a number of club members who are also goodgymers, there was a lot of representation, and everyone else here was taking part whether run directing, marshaling, tail walking, timing or token scanning among many other tasks. Well done everyone!

Chan, Balal and Taz took on the challenging park course, well done all of you. Taz supported one of his Big Run Project runners around for her first 10k. Chan got back into the groove of the distance, then caught up with the Lord Mayor of Birmingham, and Olympian Phil Brown, at the finish line. Balal finished in a mighty 9th place and managed to run within 10 seconds of the time he put in at a much flatter Silverstone.