‘It’s been difficult for everybody’ – parkrun community still waiting for a return date

Yet some eight months after being stopped following the coronavirus outbreak – the last events were held on Saturday, March 14 - there remains no planned return date in England.

For those involved, Saturday mornings saw them take to parkrun courses up and down the UK to get through a 5k to kick off their weekends.

At the same time masses of volunteers and marshals would make sure events were able to go ahead to make a social community hub in all corners of Great Britain.

But, as things stand, it remains another social aspect of life people are being denied because of the pandemic.

Taking events in the Portsmouth area in isolation, numbers were at record highs as we entered the new decade some 11 months ago.

New Year's Day parkruns in Lee-on-the-Solent (987), Fareham (484) and Whiteley (460) saw record attendance numbers smashed as runners came out in force.

Participation was on the rise in the area with average numbers from those three courses - and Havant, Southsea and Portsmouth Lakeside events - topping 1,600 runners on a weekly basis. And that's without taking into account the volunteers.

With those sorts of numbers, it's easy to see why concerns will grow for the impact this may be having of the mental health of those who regularly took part.

Maggie Atkinson, event director at the popular Lee course and an ambassador who also oversees the Whiteley 5k and Eastney junior runs, knows first-hand how hard it has been without parkrun.

But her message is for participants and volunteers to keep remaining patient while reminding runners that Lee can be called upon, albeit only virtually, should they wish for some social contact.

‘It’s been difficult for everybody,' said Atkinson.

‘We’ve got a friends group on Facebook where we’ve kept in touch.

‘A lot of people have got their own issues so it’s entirely up to them whether they want to join in or not.

'Other things have taken over and parkrun is not a priority for some people at the minute.

‘But we’re still there if people want to chat or ask us anything on email.

‘We’re a big social group (at Lee), we go for breakfast afterwards to Leon’s, which is our nominated cafe, where we would do the results and it would be jam-packed with runners and volunteers.

‘From that aspect of it, it is sad. We’d sit there until probably lunchtime.

‘It’s a massive part of your Saturday morning gone.

‘People are getting out and doing the physical running, but it does have a massive impact on people’s mental health because of the social aspect.

‘A lot of people don’t run, they just become a volunteer - that is their Saturday morning.

‘They come along and volunteer, have a chat, have a coffee ... so for those people it is very difficult.

‘We can just keep the channels open for people if they need it, but it’s not the same as being together.'

Plans for a potential return in October for some events in the UK were quickly scrapped as coronavirus restrictions began to be tightened again after a slight easing in the summer months.

It now looks increasingly likely that events across all four home nations will have gone more than a year before any hope of getting back to normal.

The nature of parkrun does not lend itself to social distancing measures. Largely, gatherings of several hundred runners and volunteers descend on parks and courses for a Saturday morning of social activity.

Andrew Smith, event director at Fareham, admits there could be difficulty in getting some events back up and running in the short-term because of the high volume of people involved.

‘Nobody is really going to know the full extent of this until we all get back together again,' said Smith.

‘We have (been impacted heavily).

‘It was a social event and to uncouple that and make it an individual event people lose that aspect - they run with their friends and not on their own. They’ve lost all of that because of the social distancing.

‘But Fareham doesn’t lend itself to social distancing because we run back on ourselves.

‘You’ve got athletes passing quite closely together, so we’d never be able to get away with it until everything has changed, whereas some other courses are not quite so constrained.

‘We were getting at least around 250 people a week from the Fareham area when you factor in runners and volunteers.

‘We’re one of now five local courses, even just the Fareham and Whiteley ones ... it’s a lot of people who are missing out on a Saturday.'

Atkinson pinpointed the fact that parkrun has returned in other nations such as Japan and New Zealand as a positive for the UK.

But those countries are some way further down the line in their controls of the pandemic.

A real worry for Atkinson remains whether some events will return with directors and participants potentially 'finding others things to do' during the long break.

But Smith remains hopeful, admitting: ‘The beauty of parkrun is we can run it with 10 people or we can run it with 50 people.

‘Whether five athletes turn up or 500, we normally accommodate them.

‘As we all know, runners are bonkers - so they’ll be back.'