Penarth and Dinas Runners take over Barry Island parkrun 151

Over 30 club members, assisted by friends, family and pets, wearing blue and yellow and waving flags, pennants and pom-poms in their club colours, took on the volunteer roles and also provided a team of 11 pacemakers for the 171 5k runners, joggers and walkers.

The club’s members take very active leadership and volunteer roles at both Barry parkruns, with Catherine Barker, Steven Barker and Sarah Lees amongst the run directors at Barry junior parkrun.

Race director Lyn Evans is one of the two event directors at Barry Island parkrun, as well as being an Event Support Ambassador to a number of other South Wales parkruns.

Notable amongst Saturday’s volunteers was Joanne Bagwell, a founding member of Penarth and Dinas Runners back in 1988.

The club will be proudly celebrating its 30th anniversary next month, on May 23rd.

Since 1988, the club has grown steadily to over 100 members and is known as one of the friendliest around.

It’s well respected for its contribution to the flourishing South Wales running scene and for the 3 races it puts on each year – the Porthkerry 5MT race (on May 13th this year), the Cosmeston Relay Race (July 11th) and the new CF64 Winter Race, also at Cosmeston Lakes Country Park, in January.

All three races are sponsored by the Cadwaladers café group.

To recognise the contribution that Barry Island parkrun makes to both the local running scene and café businesses, Cadwaladers operations manager, and incoming chairman of Penarth and Dinas Runners, Paul Morton, presented a new ‘I ran well bell’ to run director Lyn Evans.

Paul also started the run and welcomed the volunteers back to Cadwaladers’ café where he showed his versatility by helping prepare and serve coffee for the whole volunteer team. In between, he carefully handed out the position tokens the morning’s finishers.

The 11-strong pacemaker team from Penarth and Dinas Runners, introduced to cheers from the appreciative runners just before the start bell were: Ben Butler-Madden (20 mins.), Zoe Dobbs (22 mins.), Ian Warburton (23 mins.), Debbie Evans (24 mins.), Lisa Cleary (25 mins.), Glenn Powell (26 mins.), Frank Atherton (27 mins.), Bethan Apglyn (28 mins.), Louise Hunt (29 mins,), Sarah Lees (30 mins.) and Tania Miranda (32 mins.).

Thanks to their pacing and some hard work from runners, a very impressive 32 new personal best times were set.

These included Richie Williams from SMR (21:10), Simon Jones (23:33) and Paul Trotman (23:45) both from Major Milers, junior parkrunners Rhys McNabb (24:19) and Leo Watkins (24:23), twins Benjamin (29:27) and Patrick Rose (29:29) – with help from pacemaker Sarah Lees, Ceri Witchard (32:01) and Charles Cummings (36:58).

The long list of PBs again spanned the full range of finish times, ages and genders in this week’s results, full details of which can be found on the Barry Island parkrun website at: www.parkrun.org.uk/barryisland.

There were 16 first time Barry Island parkrunners, including 6 people taking part in their first ever parkrun.

At the opposite end of the scale, Justin Doran reached the milestone of his 100th parkrun, 72 of them at Barry Island including the inaugural run in May 2015.

Visitors included a group from Canton Chargers, first finishers Lee Mills (male) of Islwyn RC and Jo Donnelly (female) from Newcastle (Staffs) Triathlon Club.

A number of the participants were using the parkrun as part of their final preparations for upcoming marathons - the London Marathon on April 22nd and closer to home, the Newport marathon on April 29th.

Vale of Glamorgan MP Alun Cairns was amongst these, running in London to help raise money for the NSPCC.

Alun expressed his thanks and encouragement for all the runners taking in an April marathon, especially if running for a charitable cause.

Barry Island parkrun is a free, weekly 5km timed run and is open to anyone of any ability from age 4 upwards – runners, joggers or walkers alike.

It starts at 9am every Saturday morning at Barry Island promenade, normally under the Eastern shelter.

Find out more on the run website at: www.parkrun.org.uk/barryisland.

A rare dry April Sunday morning brought 41 junior parkrunners to Romilly Park in almost perfect running conditions. Milestone wristbands were presented to Martha Rose Richards (marathon) and to Scott Mickelsen (half-marathon).

Lisa Cleary led an energetic warm-up for an enthusiastic crowd of juniors intent on matching her impressive knee lifting abilities.

Four first time runners were welcomed to the park and 3 juniors set new PBs – Rhys Kingdon (8:24), Mia Southwell (11:01) and Arlo Lee (11:16).

A team of 26 volunteers, led by Sarah Lees, ensured the runners’ safety and cheered them around the two-lap, 2 km course.

There were smiles all round and some impressive sprint finishes.

One of the junior parkrun Run Directors, Catherine Barker, was missing from her regular duty on Sunday.

It was for a very good reason, as she was busy taking first place in the Great Welsh Marathon in Llanelli, smashing her marathon PB into the bargain.

Everyone at Barry junior parkrun is looking forward to seeing Catherine’s medal next week.

Barry junior parkrun is a free timed run for 4 to 14 year olds taking place over a 2 lap, 2km course within Romilly Park every Sunday morning at 9am.

Find out more on the run website at: www.parkrun.org.uk/barry-juniors.