The question of when Coventry would get a second parkrun was answered a couple of months ago, though the answer to where that parkrun would be was a bit of a surprise to me. There are quite a few other parks in and around Coventry which are arguably more picturesque and definitely larger and offering more amenities, so seemed like more obvious candidates. Those however are only some of the considerations when deciding on a new parkrun location, and permission to use the park and the availability of local volunteers are crucial. Since I wasn’t in those discussions I cannot say which options were on the table, but whether or not it would have been my preferred choice, I’m glad to see my home city finally has another parkrun.
Another increasingly important factor in deciding on venues for a new parkrun is accessibility via public transport, and this is an area where Holbrooks parkrun does score quite well. There are plenty of bus routes within walking distance of the park, and the Arena Coventry railway station is a little over a mile away. That was how I was planning to get there today, but unfortunately it was a rail replacement bus service today, and the amended timetable didn’t really work for me.
I therefore decided to drive, though still parked at Arena Shopping Park, partly so I could do a bit of shopping afterwards, but also so I could test the run from the CBS Arena to Holbrooks Park. The route I took was nice and simple, with just two left turns, and I arrived at the park feeling nicely warmed up. I wasn’t planning to go flat out so didn’t bother with any strides, and instead took a photo for Instagram and enjoyed the bright sunshine as I waited for the first timers briefing.
The start line was one of the more unusual ones I’ve seen. It was pretty narrow, leading onto a path which was probably only wide enough for two runners, albeit with grass either side. Additionally nobody seemed to want to be at the front, so somehow I found myself there despite planning on a steady run. A few people did rush in front within the first few hundred metres, but once things settled down I started counting to see where I was. After about 1km I was in 13th place, probably too far back to improve on my highest parkrun finishing position of 5th, but within sight of a top 10 if I pushed on.
I hadn’t run at Holbrooks Park previously, and enjoyed the fact that the course had a very different feel from any of the other parkruns locally. Warwick Racecourse, Leamington, Stratford, Bedworth and Coventry all attract relatively big fields, and are all either exclusively or mostly tarmac paths. Holbrooks parkrun by contrast had a much smaller feel to it. There were 107 finishers today on a bright, sunny morning, and probably over half of the course is on grass. It felt quite firm and consistent underfoot today, though whether the same will be true in the middle of Winter remains to be seen.
The course itself was two laps around the perimeter of the park, followed by a smaller loop of maybe 500 metres to finish. It is pretty flat, with just 26 metres of elevation gain across the 5km, though pretty much all of that elevation gain was on the grass. Much of the path was slightly downhill, which gave a good opportunity to pick the pace up without any increase in effort. On the second lap I was overtaking some of the walkers, though there weren’t many other people in the park at the time so finding the space to overtake was always easy despite the narrow path.
Across the second lap I found myself slowly working my way up through the field. I still wasn’t putting in a massive effort, and indeed my rather tired old shoes wouldn’t have responded well to that had I tried, but I felt much better than I have recently. Potentially some of that might be due to running much of the course on grass, and I think I’ll test that again on my next run to see whether I can start increasing my running but utilising surfaces with a bit more give in them.
By the time I’d reached the finish, I’d lost track of where I actually was in comparison to the rest of the runners. I’d watched the first runner finish as I came round to complete my second lap, but that was about it. My finish token confirmed I was 7th finisher, with a time of 21:53. Despite the grass, I think it is a course where fast times are possible, particularly over the Summer where the shaded sections of the course would be a nice relief too.
Overall I enjoyed it a lot. Part of that was the fact it wasn’t too busy, and I do wonder how the course would cope with 200+ people, though how often that would be the case I’m unsure. It was my 87th parkrun today and 16th different event, so am still making good progress towards doing my 100th parkrun on my next birthday. Once I’ve achieved that milestone, I might start mixing up which events I run a little more often alongside volunteering at Warwick Racecourse, and look forwards to my next visit to Holbrooks parkrun, hopefully on a day when the trains are running!