I attended parkrun Run Director training on Saturday morning. The Run Director is responsible for organising the volunteer team for the morning (marshals and people to scan barcodes, hand out tokens, open gates) as well as the run briefing and results.
We're trying to get five RDs so that we only take turns every few weeks.
Our Parys parkrun is quite small with 50-65 runners each week. No congestion, no bottlenecks and quick results. We do get some out-of-town parkrunners coming through and expect more in December when visitors come to Parys for the holidays.
It's a pretty route that starts from town and runs along the river. The route has a double loop, which makes it child friendly. We've got a good number of children taking part regularly. Kyla and Ruben have done about five parkruns now and they've both been out on their own. With the loops, we can keep an eye on them and the other parkrunners always shout words of encouragement to the young runners.
I especially enjoyed the results logging process. It really is a nifty system. What I didn't realise is that the volunteers also get logged on the system - receiving points for volunteering - and, where participants receive their results on email, volunteers receive a thank you email. Very sweet.
What? You don't know what parkrun is? Oh dear. Read this and remember to register on the parkrun website to get your personal barcode. It's all FREE. Print it before you rock up at a parkrun (don't arrive without your barcode!)
My RD first RD role comes up on Sat 12th or 19th Dec. The children have already volunteered to hand out tokens and both Celliers and my mom are sure to be roped in too. An instant volunteer team. Perfect!
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