Run > parkrun

Clare Castle parkrun 1/261

"There's a café there: we could potter round Clare afterwards". "If there isn't a café there, I shall *sulk*" said Fiona.

Seeing the old station building behind builders' hoarding―clearly being renovated―inspired that sinking, swallowed-a-pound-of-lard feeling. Today wasn't starting well, and it could only end worse. Chris (it turns out his name was) finished rinsing his mouth out with mouthwash (he'd slept in the car overnight, as dedicated parkrun tourists do) and wondered whether there were toilets that weren't locked.

After spotting the building site, I was thinking the same thing. A helpful volunteer explained where they were and said (I paraphrase) "oo, they should have been opened". It turns out the park was bought by the local council four years ago and is run by volunteers. By the time we made it to the loos they were open, which was a great relief.

Slightly more of a relief was spotting that the café was actually in an unscathed building some way behind the knackered one, right next to the start/finish area and it would be open at 9. Phew.

The run itself is held over 3 laps (I'm going to get lapped, I predicted) on hard tracks: tarmac or well-packed gravel. Well, apart from about 20 yards over a bit of grass near the end of the lap. It's pretty flat, which is nice, but narrow in places, which is OK when there are only 120-odd runners. Apparently, it's seen 200 and that was OK too and they aren't expecting it to balloon into the 3-400 runner range.

Everyone was very friendly and the course was well marked and -marshalled, so there was no chance of playing the "I took a wrong turning" card to explain what surely was going to be a slow time, though I wasn't feeling too bad for once. The short (70-100m) stretch of 'out and back' near the end of the lap gave me a great view of the lead runner, storming in like a train, and I thought "well, better keep my ears tuned and leap out of his way when he arrives" but I somehow got to the start of the 3rd lap without being caught and relaxed into the last lap.

My time, taken at face value, was my fastest parkrun since May last year but fitbit thinks the course was significantly short (before I knew this, I was talking to a volunteer about my pleasing time "unless it's short, of course": he assured me it had been accurately measured). If fitbit is right, it corresponds to 27:50 for 5km and I had two better runs in April (Rome and Bury St Edmunds) after the end of the poorly patch, which stretched to the last quarter of last year.

Whatever: it's a nice, varied course with plenty to see: open grassy bits; wooded bits; a river ("hello swan!"; just round the corner: "hello stwo!") and a steep central mound to admire and run round instead of over (hurrah!).

Assuming our house move goes through, it will be a short (4 miles) jog from home, which will be nice (confirmed as a nice run by one of the volunteers).

[tl;dr] Nice flat course on hard surfaces; lots of stuff to see; well-marked and -marshalled and friendly atmosphere in a lovely little market town.

Split Summary
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1) 4.7km - 26:04(5:33/km) 312cal