Sheffield GoodGymers made their way to help out at their local parkruns. I went to a damp Monsal Trail where I was timekeeper. If it is raining, you have to keep your phone screen dry as the parkrun Volunteer App thinks the rain drops are finishers. Tip: Take an umbrella; put your phone in a bag; or put it in your pocket and use your earphone switch to record the times.

It's a new month, and another GG Parkrun takeover. Stephen was Run Director, so roped in the team to fill the volunteer roster.

Zofia and Eugene marshaled with mascots in the form of dog and baby respectively. Rachel handed out finish tokens, Michelle and Linda were on barcode scanning, whilst Max was tailwalker.

Seiko arrived 10 minutes late to run, and still managed to finish in a respectable place! We even spotted a tourist from GG Lambeth.

After all getting a little chilled in the wind, we headed to the cafe for warming drinks and brunch 😋

Well done to all the runners and thanks to all the volunteers!

This morning's Graves parkrun had something a little different about it...

At 8:45 it looked like there were more pacers than participants but in true wet wintery parkrun fashion out of the mist came a total of 327 runners to tackle the hills.

Having been kitted out with numbers, lanyards and flags, 13 of Sheffield and Barnsley's finest lined up behind the start line and gathered small crowds of excited participants hoping for a new PB... (there ended up being 42 of them in total, clearly every one of them was down to our pacing!!!).

Everyone headed off and as the first lap was completed we could see that everyone was doing a great job and on, if not ahead, of time.

As the finishers started coming through the funnel, the comments started coming in, all positive for the valiant efforts of our team, some of the highlights posted on facebook afterwards included these...

A great idea. Massive thank you to number 32. I'll catch you next time. :-)

Thanks to Kim, who helped me get under 40 minutes for the first time. Couldn’t have done it without you. X

Got a PB thanks to the walk/run people as it made me sprint the last bit!

Brilliant idea having the run/walk pacers too!

It was particularly pleasing to hear some of the stories of those further back in the field who are normally not included in pacing events. There were some real celebratory moments with people smashing their individual goals, and saying they couldn't have done it without the support they had received from our team.

I hope those people pacing know how much of an impact they had today, even if that was only with one person.

Well done everyone!

We provided 14 out of 25 of the volunteers at Graves parkrun this morning, covering pretty much all the volunteer roles and having a lovely time in the process. Spreading the GoodGym word while helping the community. Wonderful!