It’s New Years Day. It’s not even a Saturday. It’s only been two days since the last one but it’s now time for another ParkRun.

The Sun had risen 20 mins ahead of my arrival at Stanley Park and, contrary to the forecast, it was a pleasant mild start to the year. A large crowd had gathered around the clock tower eagerly awaiting the pre-run briefing.

Following on from my PB on Saturday I once again set an ambitious target, with the aim to knock 90 seconds off my previous time. I had my mile and km pace times to keep track of progress. And with that, we were off – all 253 of us.

I was up on the first km, slightly down on the second and then back on the pace for the third and fourth km’s. Unfortunately, my left knee was a bit achey on the final km so I had to ease off a little bit. No PB today – just 49 seconds slower than Saturday though – and still better than my time 7 days ago.

Perhaps two “competitive” 5K’s in two days was a tad ambitious at this stage of my training. Regardless, it was a great start to the year. Leaps and bounds better than where I started from back in October. Sure, it would have been great to start 2024 with a PB, but there are now 12 days until my next ParkRun where I have no doubt I’ll smash it!

These GPS heat maps show areas where I have made gains. The 5K distance is two laps. Comparing today with my previous ParkRun on Saturday.

Chalk Guy was back to bring in the new year…

I’m away at a Jaguar event on Saturday, but I’ll be back to build on my progress on Saturday 13 January. In the meantime, here’s a few pics I snapped as I walked back to the car.