The Son was back this week at parkrun and this was probably a momentous occasion in our join running career – the first time that he legitimately took me down. parkrun is not a race and we have never tried to race each other but I am so out of shape at the moment and I doubt that I could have got anywhere near him if we had tried to take each other on.
I have been running at parkrun without him over recent weeks because he had just changed schools and is exhausted on a Saturday thanks to the new schedule of sports on a Friday afternoon. This week he was off school due to teacher training on the Friday so there was no excuse.
The weather fairies had sprinkled their magic dust to provide us with a perfect day for running – nice cool temperature with bright sunshine. We ran with each other at a sedate pace for the first 2.5k so we could chat to each other about the upcoming father & son camping trip and his school trip to France. I silently thanked parkrun once again for giving me the opportunity to engage with The Son and talk about his aspirations and fears. He is slowly morphing into a teenage pod person cocooned in his room so running together is one of those rare relaxed moments where we can open up to each other.
Our aim had been to reach half-way in 15 minutes and then decide whether to push on or not. The Son decided that he wanted to run the rest by himself so sped up down the slope and I found myself struggling to keep him in sight. Thankfully my legs were not the cannon ball bags of recent weeks but my general fitness has fallen apart since I completed the Richmond Park Marathon.
I pushed myself as fast as my little legs were carry me so that I could watch The Son streak through the finishing funnel while I meandered up the finishing straight quite a bit further back. The Son was only 7 seconds away from taking down his Gunnersbury parkrun PB and I suspect he would have done this easily but for our slow chatting pace at the start. He intends to be back next week where we’ll aim to take a chunk out of his previous best.
Running Dan parkrun result:
- parkrun time: 0:28:09
- Garmin time: 0:28:08
- Finish position: 139 / 200
- Gender position: 100 / 116
- Age category: SM35-39
- Age grade: 48.13 %
The Son parkrun result:
- parkrun time: 0:27:40
- Garmin time: not taken
- Finish position: 130 / 200
- Gender position: 94 / 116
- Age category: JM14
- Age grade: 55.30 %
