At the start of 2023 a big number meant I was almost in touching distance
This was also the day that I took my favourite ever parkrun picture
The following week I reached my 50th volunteer credit at Rendlesham Forest and clearly was enjoying 5km parkruns again
The same weekend I was reaching my 300th credit at Ipswich juniors
In a much less positive scenario, we received notification from Ipswich Borough Council (IBC) about a potential new Sunday morning market that might be taking place, effectively in the middle of our course. At this stage they were saying that they were consulting with us to get our feelings and finding out our views. I started mapping out an alternative route on the other side of the park. Once we received firmer details of the proposal, alongside seeing that the market organisers had started advertising for stall holders we felt that IBC were being totally disingenuous with us which led to a total fall out with them and left a very rotten taste in our mouth. We communicated our dissatisfaction with the process. Sadly our contact at the Council decided to take a very aggressive stance on the situation which did not help.
Despite the issues with IBC other positive things were still going on and Rendlesham Forest was just about to have it’s first birthday. Over a period of 3 months I had been putting together a photo album of it’s first year to give to Hilary as a gift on the first birthday.
The album can be found here https://rorymarriott.com/rfp.html
On the day itself, everything went smoothly and my day was made even better as I parkscootered around with Lisa Dalton and Melanie Tatnell-Evans who was completing her 100th parkrun.
We went for a big breakfast after the run which was attended by many of the regular volunteers and runners and I was able to present Hilary with her photo album.
Later that night I wrote the following
Sadly, we were then back to dealing with IBC and they were now requiring us to sign where they are requiring us to sign a Park & Open Spaces Hire Terms and Conditions document. We felt that only HQ could sign off on that so handed it over to the Ambassador. At that stage there were 6 members of the core team, 4 knew what was going on with IBC due to being married to the Co-EDs so we decided to tell the other 2 what was going on. As well as telling them about the ongoing issues we also had to advise them “IBC want the document signed and returned by March 15th, however, we didn’t know if HQ would be able to deal with it by then. At the moment we are unclear whether we need to have these terms and conditions signed and in place by 15th March or whether there may be some leeway. Therefore, at this stage we do not know if we will be in a position to continue beyond Sunday 12th March at present.”
Sadly, this entire experience with IBC left us very demoralised and on March 4th we made a decision as an entire team that we would all step down on the 9th birthday. At that stage the team would had completed between 7 and 9 years of service and in my opinion it was the right time to step down. To ensure we communicated with people in a logical way we decided the announcement would be
Adam Keer – Telephone conversation Thursday 9th with follow up email
Colin Grogan – Telephone conversation Thursday 9th with follow up email (Suffolk CC)
Mark and Nessie - Telephone conversation Thursday 9th (recent former core team)
Vikki and John - Telephone conversation Thursday 9th (recent former core team)
John Wheatley, Linda, Mark – email Friday 10th March (parkrun ambassador team)
Community – Sunday 12th at event, on Facebook and Newspage
On the 12th I had this post on Facebook
On the news page the post was
A few weeks later I reached 500 volunteer credits at 5km events only. 866 in total.
And a week later my total parkruns number hit 900
The start of April saw the return of my parkrun anniversary email which was a major surprise
And as a result, I did a bit of a parkrun story post giving a very potted history
It takes a very special reason for Hilary and I not to go to Rendlesham Forest, however, when your parkrun friend is completing their 500th, you simply have to go along. In addition, since the new shirts had become available and because I knew someone to ask, we arranged for a 500 tee to be ready to present as Linda finished her 500th run at Alton Water.
With a lot of work going on in the background, once his parkrun DBS came through, we were finally in a position at the end of May to announce the new Ipswich juniors Event Director
It’s always a great day at parkrun if you can get a picture with James
The end of the month saw us in Warwick for a concert, so we stayed overnight and did a rare spot of voluntourism at St Nicholas juniors. Took away a great idea for the new Ipswich juniors team as they had a fantastic equipment trolley.
You might recall from the May 2020 section that a “Marriott” club had been coined, well due to some work on the Australian parkrun Adventurers pod it was actually getting some traction
And it continued the following week too
That was also the weekend when I hit another big volunteering number
Having decided earlier in the year that I was going to combine my 1000th volunteer with the 100th time that I receive both a volunteer and participation credit on the same day, it was no surprise that by the end of August, 2023 became my most “active participations” year.
To be totally honest, however, I was a bit bored of scootering around which probably explains why I only did it two more times for the rest of the year.
September was destined to be a huge month as far as parkrun was concerned.
To coincide with it’s 11th birthday, Ipswich parkrun was also celebrating event number 500. There really was no where else for me to be.
As the only members of the Ipswich community from the beginning to have reached 500, I grabbed a picture with Robin Harper by the banner flag in recognition of the day.
As it had been agreed that I would do a run report to earn my volunteer credit, I decided I would whizz round the course on my scooter and see how quick I could be. 31:19 as it so happened which was not only a scooter PB but an all time Ipswich PB by 40 seconds.
A copy of my run report follows
Saturday 9th September 2023 Ipswich parkrun event 500 plus the 11th birthday
Run Report by Rory Marriott A130428 The original Event Director
With a UK event able to hold 54 parkruns a year (including NYD and Xmas day) it is most unusual for a “Century” event to also happen on a birthday, however, that is exactly what happened on this amazingly sunny and hot day at Chantry park. Without the “Covid 19 pause” event 500 would have happened in December 2021.
As we know though none of these 500 events could have happened if 1,570 super hero people hadn’t volunteered 14,519 times and today for event 500 our 43 super heroes were
Rory MARRIOTT • Ian ELDEN • Robin HARPER • Dave SOLOMON • Kate HUTSON • Lorna WEBBER • Dave NEWSON • Keith BORRETT • Karen SKENE • Steven UTTERIDGE • Vincent STEENSMA • Trevor STEVENSON • Sandra BUMPHREY • Lindsay WELTON • Gary TAYLOR • Mark FLATMAN • Peter EDWARDS • Steven WEBBER • Andrew BUDD • Jim HENDERSON • James FLATMAN • Ian WALLIS • Graham RODGERS • Emma LEE • Anna CLAPTON • Vanessa THORPE • Mandy CHINERY • Frances BARNARD • Jo HARRIS • Matt MAKIN • Laura CROSSLEY • Dan CLAPTON • Jane ARKELL • Stuart WARD • Nicole ANSCOMB • Kyla WEBB • Sally MADDAMS • Sue RUSSELL • Holly LEWIS • Adrian PHILLIPPO-GREEN • Deb CHING • Jason SKILTON • Helen YELLOP
A considerable number of those volunteers were from local club Capel Cheetahs
As mentioned during the pre event run brief, the Cheetahs are holding their annual “Capel 5” race on October 8th. More details can be found on their website https://www.capelcheetahs.co.uk/capel-5.
As this is such a special occasion, I thought I would take this opportunity to give an insight into the history of what happened back in 2012 that resulted in the start of Ipswich parkrun.
Ipswich parkrun history
At an early stage in year 2 of my own personal parkrun journey, I decided it was time to stop the long commute to Cambridge parkrun whenever I was in Ipswich at a weekend and I enquired of parkrun HQ whether there had been any enquiries from the Ipswich area about starting an event, as I might be able to give the team some occasional help. At that stage there were 112 parkrun events in the UK. HQ came back to me and said there had been no enquiries from Ipswich but they had one from Forest Heath. Unfortunately, that was too far for me, however, later that same day I got another email from HQ telling me that an inquiry had just come in from Ipswich Borough Council (IBC). I got all the contact details from them and later that day I had my first ever conversation with Adam Keer at IBC. From that conversation I discovered they were still in the early stages of planning and they were hoping to hold a meeting at some stage with interested bodies from Suffolk County Council, IBC, parkrun and a few local runners. I advised I would be happy to come along and share my experience as an Event Director at Valentines parkrun and offer them some help getting set up. I’m unsure when I got the details about the meeting, but according to Facebook I went on a reconnaissance trip to Chantry Park on Tuesday 29th May 2012.
This was my first ever trip to the park and it was certainly different to what I had become familiar with at Valentines park in Ilford..
Moving forward a few weeks and Facebook has the following post
Not surprisingly I remember the day very well. I turned up quite early as I wanted to take another walk around the park. On this occasion though I was joined by Jo Sinton-Hewitt who was at the meeting as the main (some would say only) parkrun event activator. I recall having a brief conversation with her about an area of the park that had potential to be either a start or finish area. At the meeting itself was Adam Keer for IBC, Colin Grogan for SCC, myself and 3 local runners, John Adams, Ali Ostler and Paul Horne and Terry McEntee from Suffolk Sports. I suspect others were also in attendance. I don’t recall much about the meeting other than me giving a talk about my experience at Valentines as ED. IBC and SCC agreed to pick up 50% each of the set up costs. Despite having no intention to, my Facebook status fully explains how the evening finished for me.
One of the first tasks to do was to design the potential course at Chantry Park for Ipswich parkrun. A very early effort can be found on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nIpdDq7vOlo after filming this clip, I went to do another circuit but had a little accident on my bike and went head over heels (the things I did for parkrun).
Given that we hadn’t really met before the initial meeting about Ipswich parkrun, the three members of the core team thought it would be a good idea to go out for dinner and have a good chat.
Ali’s post on Facebook, hit the nail on the head.
By the 17th August (test event night) we had expanded the core team to 4 with the addition of Colin Shaw. His is quite a funny story. He sent in an email saying he was interested in helping out with the event. Looking at the results system he has a 5 digit barcode number, suggesting some experience to me (I have a 6 digit number). I snapped up the offer and due to his low number invited him to the core team. It was several years until I discovered the truth and although he had registered for parkrun very early, his first time volunteering was at the Ipswich inaugural and his first run was June 2013!!.
Although the test night was 3 weeks before the inaugural, this was to accommodate the fact that I was a Gamesmaker at the London 2012 Paralympics so that was the best night to have it. We managed to get 19 local runners along and the feedback was very positive. The 19 were as follows.
What is pleasing to note is that at least 12 of the 19 continued to parkrun for many years after this test event. We also managed to get ourselves a regular volunteer who had just turned up to the event as her son was familiar with one in Nottingham. Once we were established as an event, it didn’t take us long to invite Marcia onto the core team.
This leads very nicely to the Ipswich Inaugural event. Like every inaugural event we had no idea how many people would turn up. In those days though, we would scream and shout about inaugural events. Turning up to inaugurals wasn’t a big deal then, in fact it was encouraged
Based on Events still in existence on 13th May 2023 Ipswich was the joint 163rd event worldwide and joint 136rd in the UK. That compares with 2,000 worldwide and 800 in the UK on 7th September.
I was quite nervous during the build up to the big day so it was a good job I had my Gamesmaker duties at the Paralympics to keep me occupied. On a daily basis I was checking the registration numbers for Ipswich and was happy with the progress.
On the day itself Adam (IBC) had arranged for two local Olympic torchbearers to be there – Helen Davies, local international athlete and Paul Sheldrake who is big in the local tennis scene. I used them for the main start line photograph.
Naturally I also captured them with the core team.
The morning itself couldn’t have gone any better as far as I was concerned. 95 participants in the run of which 71 were first time parkrunners. We had 8 volunteers making the magic happen.
Event 500 report
Without doubt you could describe the weather for the birthday as “Scorchio”, not surprising when it is due to be the hottest day of the year.
Event number 1 was also a warm day although not as hot as today. I’m sure that Neil Gillingham, Robin Harper, Rachel Page, Chloe Godbold, Mandy Godbold, and Adam Keer could back me up on that, as they were also at both event 1 and event 500.
Chantry park was looking magnificent, and having been away for 18 months, it reminded me why this is such a fantastic venue for a parkrun event.
317 people ran, jogged, walked or scootered around the course, of whom 24 were first time visitors to Ipswich.
A big hello and welcome to the parkrun family to Joshua MILLS, Curtis GARWOOD, Sarah BUTLER, Karen STACEY, Michelle HAMILTON, Tim GORNALL, Haydn INGRAM, Tracy POPE, Bev WARD, Curtis DODDS, Donna ROGERS and Alfie WELHAM who all made their parkrun debuts today. Congratulations to you all, I hope you enjoyed your first parkrun and are looking forward to coming back to Ipswich or another event, to continue your parkrun journey.
Many congratulations to Sultan TUSA, Daniel BORRETT, Alex ARCHER, Nathan LAUD, Bradley CLARK, Piers MORGAN, Daniel FREEMAN, Louis LUMMIS, Katie MATTHEWS, Joseph BARTON, Alexander KEMPTON, Tess KIRBY, Lucy BENNEWORTH, Rochel THOMAS, Matthew GARNHAM, Philip HUNN, Peter DRAIN, Lily JACOBS and myself for recording new Personal Bests. Given that I was on my mobility scooter and found it hard work out there, massive kudos to all you other PBers.
And congratulations to the following people on achieving a new running milestone
Don’t forget to click on the “manage my profile” link in your results email from today to order your milestone tee shirt.
Kate is your Run Director on 16th September and is looking for her band of Super Hero Volunteers. If you can help please send an email to ipswich@parkrun.com.
Don’t forget to look at the Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/Ipswichparkrun) to see the fantastic pictures that James and Holly have taken.
As an analyst in my day job, it’s only fair that I finish my report with some numbers.
Since it started on September 8th 2012, 6 Event Directors (Rory Marriott, Colin Shaw, Ali Ostler, Graham Rodgers, Mark Flatman and Nessie Thorpe) have overseen 500 events. They were supported by 1,570 super heroes who have volunteered 14,519 times. This has allowed 13,551 participants to complete 124,249 parkruns covering a total distance of 621,245 km. This is equivalent to 15 trips around the equator followed by a journey from the North to South Pole with a spare 1,183km. A journey to the Moon is only 384,400km.
Whilst I was at Ipswich, Hilary was at Rendlesham. As the following post recognises this was a rarity
The following day was my final solo RD stint at Ipswich juniors whilst also being co-ED
Not surprisingly I had to put together a few statistics for the outgoing core team.
With some very clever planning I managed to get most of the core team members over the 9 years of Ipswich juniors to attend our final event. Without doubt this will be one of my all time favourite pictures.
That day was also the end of almost 12 years as a parkrun Event Director
The very next night all members of the final core team for Ipswich juniors had been invited to attend The Suffolk Community Awards 2023 ceremony as we had been nominated for and subsequently won the Event Organisers of the Year.
I summed up how much this meant to me on the actual day of the 9th birthday for Ipswich juniors
Without doubt it was the perfect way to finish our time.
At the start of November, I recorded my 400th volunteer credit at junior events and in true style I rolled out the numbers
During December I realised how much time I had devoted to parkrun over the last few years with this remarkable fact
A few days later I completed the following for quite possibly the final time
I commissioned a new woolly hat and it arrived just in time for me to wear at the Christmas Day event at Rendlesham Forest.
In preparation for our trip to Australia I came out of RD retirement and did two weeks at Rendlesham Forest in the RD jacket.
As I’m a stickler for the 09:00 start I ensured everyone knew what was going to happen
For only the third time (also did it in 2016 and 2017) we both started and finished the year at parkrun and both Hilary and I volunteered over 100 times in the year.
During 2023 I completed 26 parkruns (my most ever) and recorded 106 volunteer credits. These were done at 10 events including 3 new ones, and 26 times I did both run and volunteer. This took my run total to 126 and took my volunteer number to 950 of which 94 times I did both. These were completed at 132 different events.