This week, a guest report written by Mark Galpin who was visiting from Upton House parkrun.

After finding out that I have an extra day off this weekend I looked into going to a parkrun event not too far from home to make the most of this event. So this week I decided to visit Winchester. After a pleasant trip up the M27 and M3 I arrived at North Walls recreation ground for this week's run on a magnificently sunny morning in August.

As I am one of many of the parkrun Army why do you not give it a go? It is easy to be a volunteer and you are also able to gain yourself the coveted 25 parkrun t-shirt which you can only get by being a volunteer. It only takes a few minutes to do most jobs or to be a marshal if you happen to have an injury one week.

The information given at the First Timers briefing by Janet Haughton was very informative. I was paying attention to the details about seeing a fair amount of the first field, whilst doing a small loop and then the 2 full loops. We were also told to make sure that we kept clear of the cricket sight screens on our way around on the first lap.

With today being a pacer event I was determined to finish inside 30 minutes which I have done once before on my visit to Moors Valley so my intention was to finish before David Howells. When we set off it was all a bit of a zoo and I was unable to find my pacer to begin with although I eventually found him a little in front of me.

After the first turn I learnt that you have to keep your wits about you as you get clipped by the low branches from the trees that line the River Itchen. As I was told earlier about the sight screens I kept a good watch to make sure that I was not the in race entertainment!

Well with the first lap of the favoured field I started to enjoy my run and see whatever else came my way. At this point I passed the 3km sign for the first time and I was thinking it was going quickly today and after a turn to the right meant a little more branch dodging but more entertaining was trying not to be tripped up by the countless tree routes that show through the ground.

As we make our way around the larger field with a lovely trip down the River Itchen in the offing I hear a raucous racket on the top turn with the supremely cheerful Su Browning giving us a little bit of encouragement. I can understand why this young lady is placed as far from Winchester as possible as she was having a great party in the park giving some much appreciated encouragement. On this lap I stayed to the left of the tree but had quite a few slaps from low branches.

As we make our way down towards the leisure centre I have this feeling of giving in to temptation and joining a couple of the dogs that are happy to go for a refreshing paddle in the river. We now turn back to the bridge to make our way back to the first half of our run this morning and see the sign giving me hope my morning's efforts are nearly done but realize the 4km marker is for our next lap. As we carefully negotiate a couple of bikes I cross the bridge for the 2nd time knowing I'm half way through my run.

Around now I am having a quick look over my shoulder for the pacer I am trying to beat, he is safely behind me and I intend to keep it that way after having passed him in the first few turns. Any hope of being nearer the 28 minute pacer is well lost at this point. I continue on my journey when I get to the top corner the second time Su is still there giving us more cheer to which I replied she was expending more effort than I was and maybe doing the run might be a little less tiring.

As I make the turn for the final time from the Leisure centre I look back to see where the 30 minute pacer is and he's safely in my dust I get to the finish line with my quickest parkrun so far. Thank you to Helen Bonnor for assisting me in token sorting afterwards.

Here is a rundown of this morning's run:

Our final finisher this morning was Christine Brooker and it doesn't matter whether you do your 5km in the quickest time or the slowest all that matters is that you enjoy taking part. I am no Mo Farah either but I turn up most Saturday's when work allows.

We had 118 female and 204 male recorded runners today.

The first place finisher was Jamie Taylor in 17:40 (I was somewhere near the 3km marker at this time)

First Female runner was Karla Borland in 20:09 in 20th place overall (I was just short of Su Browning now)

We had 57 personal bests, 48 first time visitors to Winchester Parkrun, 15 First timers (well done to you all).

The dogs did well on the run and deserve extra credit in the heat of this morning.

Hello everyone.

After last Saturday's parkrun a group of the core team - some of the run directors, volunteers, and regular parkrunners - gathered to talk through some of the potential medical emergencies that might happen during a parkrun. With well over 100,000 people taking part every week, statistically incidents can and do happen, so we thought we'd prepare ourselves a little.

Led by Patrick, one of the core team, and two parkrunning doctors he knows, Lucy and Mary, the group talked through a realistic example scenario - a 25 year old female collapses is the back field. We started by splitting into small groups to discuss how people in different roles might respond, which raised some useful discussion points, before moving on to how to assess the patient and administer basic first aid. This is a great life skill to have and if you'd like to know more then do check out this link https://www.resus.org.uk/…/adult-basic-life-support-and-a…/…

Some of you who were there on Saturday might have noticed a shiny yellow cabinet newly attached to the side of the cricket pavilion. This is now the permanent home for our crowdfunded AED - which will be available for all users of River Park all the time very soon - and we thought we'd use the opportunity to demonstrate how it works. Patrick borrowed a training AED from parkrun HQ to go through each step. The defibrillator talks the user through the steps and monitors the patient to tailor the response and treatment to make it as simple as possible to use.

As with all medical emergencies, time is paramount. Our second scenario was of a 50 year old male at the finish complaining of chest pains and shortness of breath. This situation is one which could precede a cardiac arrest and we determined that discretely asking someone to get the AED from the cabinet would be advisable, just in case.

It was a very informative session and as well as useful learning points for the individuals who there were a number of things that came out which the group felt we could improve as a parkrun community.

Mainly it's about raising awareness. The AED cabinet will be unlocked during parkrun each week so that anyone can access it at any time. If you become aware of an emergency that might need the AED and you happen to be nearby - even simply running past it at the time - then please, please just grab and take it to the scene. In future, Run Directors will brief this each week.

Winchester parkrun has been going for more than 5 years, and so far we've been very fortunate that we haven't had to deal with a serious medical emergency in that time. Hopefully we won't need to for a long time yet. But there are several cases of defibrillators saving parkrunners' lives, and even just knowing where the AED is kept might make the crucial difference.

Thank you for reading and we'd be grateful if you could share this post with your parkrunning family and friends.

Winchester parkrun team.