Thanks to everyone who helped out from GG here is the Run Report <3

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University parks parkrun Event #57 was another big one!
👋 513 runners and walkers complete the course. 147 of you were first timers to University Parks and 33 were first ever parkrun! Welcome all of you, Lots of you got BPs too 🌳Jess Buttigieg completed her 52nd different parkrun in a row today, making a year of parkrun tourism! Jess started her parkrun journey at the age of 18 in Australia and has clocked up a total of 242 parkruns! Follow her on instagram @parkrunnerjess 🥕Hello also to our vegan runner friends, who regularly run parkruns but today had a meet up at University Parks we hope you enjoyed it here! Also a shout out to Magdalen college school who brought a big group of kids, teenagers and staff to run, well done 👋 Welcome Ellie, who started her volunteer role with Mind at Parkrun today. She’ll be there to welcome service users who’ve been referred by Mind and to help signpost park runners to Mind services and support in Oxfordshire! Do go and say hi to her next time. Find out more www.oxfordshiremind.org.uk 🤩Thanks to all our volunteers this week, including support from GoodGym you are all amazing! If you would like to volunteer next week or in the future we always need more people, and many roles like bar code scanning can be done if you are a speedy runner as well as running in the event!
🌳Double Funnel – Thank you to everyone who is getting used to our double funnel, now we regularly have so many runners this is our normal, so if you are lucky enough to get a letter A,B,C, etc please hold it with pride as you start a new row of people!
🦆Thanks to everyone who helped with funnel duckers! These are people who enter the funnel and duck out (no quacking idea why?! sometimes to collect something like a coat, and sometimes because they don’t understand the format, there is plenty of time after you exit the funnel).. its really important once you enter the funnel to stay in it and get a token at the other end otherwise the times go wrong (and not just yours!), so if you don’t want to finish then please don’t enter the funnel, if you do want to complete the run make sure you follow it through! Thank you!
🏃🏾‍♀️Speedy runners – A reminder that we do not have priority over other park users, so although we love your speed, PLEASE watch out you do not knock anyone when overtaking, or indeed people who are in the park anyway. We understand on the second lap you will want to overtake slower walkers and runners but please do this with as much care and space as you can.
🌳Tokens – we had a fair few of you take tokens home this week 😭 please don’t do that! They live in the bucket at the end. If you have taken one by mistake please do bring it back next week. I you haven’t got a bar code but take a token don’t worry just put it in the bucket at the end Hope you all have a great weekend and see you again soon Report written by Run Director Trev 🌳 #loveparkrun

Despite being one week late with our International Women's Day tribute (thanks to snow storms) we were not feeling at all blue about our Wednesday evening plans.

Armed with a googlemap of all the women's blue plaques in Oxford, plus litter pickers and bags, we divided up into walkers and runners and set off to explore some of Oxford's female luminaries while litter picking along our route.

Interested in plotting your own exploration of the blue plaques dedicated to women in Oxford? Find them mapped out here.

Over the last several autumns we have planted lots of daffodil bulbs around the streets of Marston. St David's Day seemed like a great time to go and check out how they're getting on and litter pick while we're at it. The cold, dry winter meant that not many flowers were in bloom yet, but we could see that there's been a good success rate in them coming up and budding, even in areas where we weren't convinced they'd be able to survive, so flowers will only be a week or so away.

Food items were definitely the theme of this litter pick - we could have made ourselves a 3 course meal of fortune cookie, discarded burger and half a chocolate bar plus half a rich tea biscuit to finish. Maybe not exactly recommended! Lots of cigarette and vape packets too. Overall not one of the grubbier litter picks we've done, but 4 sacks of grot collected, and some definite sogns of spring coming.

Our Saturday challenge was to help maintain and expand a newly established community orchard at Risinghurst Allotments. Tasks included unearthing weed membrane and removing it from an area where trees are going to be planted next, filling in the worst of the lumps and bumps in the ground so that it was closer to level, pulling up the grass that had got established (techinque note - stick the fork in and twirl it like with spaghetti) , and most importantly rehoming 2 hibernating toads which we found while doing all those jobs. Toadally kermitted to amphibian rescue.

As toad by Goodgym

We also mulched fruit tree saplings with woodchip, tried to keep Cassie the pup entertained, unearthed a multitude of unusual objects (buried tennis ball, rubber pig, barbed wire), and enjoyed tea and flapjacks supplied by our hosts.

It was toadally worth venturing beyond the ring road for a morning of shovelling, digging and munching.

Next up in Risinghurst - Hop on over for frog rescue in the spring. We've been asked to help on Frog Patrol to stop randy frogs getting squashed on the ring road. Times and Dates tbc, so watch this space!