‘It was never in the plan’: Parkrun founder on the journey from 13 runners to a million events

The founder of parkrun has said that a million events was “never in the plan” as the charity is set to reach the milestone this weekend.

The founder of parkrun has said that a million events was “never in the plan” as the charity is set to reach the milestone this weekend. There were just 13 runners and five volunteers when Paul Sinton-Hewitt organised the first parkrun – then called Bushy Park Time Trial – at Bushy Park in London in October 2004.

It has evolved into a global community of free, weekly, timed 5km parkruns on Saturdays, and 2km junior parkruns on Sundays, with more than 2,800 event locations in 23 countries.

“To have done a million events, there isn’t a single event organisation in the world apart from parkrun who might be even close to that,” said Mr Sinton-Hewitt, 65. Nobody ever thought we would get to a million.

“It was never in the plan. But of course now the next million’s going to come so much quicker. It’s not going to be 20 years, that’s for sure.”

He said the “numbers are extraordinary” and added: “There are many people who’ve been born since we started parkrun who just don’t understand a world where parkrun doesn’t exist.

“It’s like knowing that you have breakfast every morning. It’s so part of their lives.”

He said he does not get involved in the day-to-day running of parkrun and is “hoping in a year or so’s time to retire from the organisation”.

“I think the positive message from that is I think that we have such a great team right now that I’m in a position to consider retirement,” said Mr Sinton-Hewitt.

“The only involvement I should have is where the team wants me to be involved, and I think that the future of parkrun is safe and secure.”

In January, the King attended Sandringham parkrun in Norfolk as a spectator.

Mr Sinton-Hewitt, who now lives near Horsham, Sussex, said: “I’d love to meet the King, I’d love to have them involved on a more regular basis.

“But the fact he chose to go down to Sandringham parkrun and to cheer everybody on, that is a huge accolade for parkrun and we’re very, very proud of that.”

He said the success of parkrun was “clearly down to the simplicity… the fact it is for everybody, inclusivity, the nature of that, the fact that it’s free”.

“For somebody who’s coming to running for the first time… a barrier gets taken away,” he said.

The first parkrunner to participate in 1,000 parkruns, Darren Wood, reached the milestone last month.

Mr Sinton-Hewitt, who has completed 614 parkruns, said that 1,000 parkruns “feels a million miles away” but “maybe when I turn 80 I’ll get it”.

He said parkrun is introducing new milestone T-shirts for every 100 parkruns.

“The one thing that we do at parkrun is we try to celebrate everything, regardless of your PB,” he said.

“The fact we’ve introduced these milestones at every 100, it makes sense.

“If you think back to the beginning we didn’t have any money and it was really difficult to provide the milestone T-shirts so we just went 250, 500, thinking nobody would get there, but of course we’ve been proven wrong.”

He said he is “not running much any more because (the) knees just can’t do it” but he still tries to “do the odd walk and quite a lot of volunteering”.

“The one thing that’s still consistent is I still love parkrun and I still love being there,” he said.

Elizabeth Duggan, chief executive officer of parkrun Global, said that hitting one million events this weekend is “just phenomenal”.

She said parkrun has “massive ambitions for the future”, including to increase the number of parkrun countries from 23 to 30 by 2030.

“We have about half a million participants every single weekend globally and we believe by 2030 we will be hitting three quarters of a million,” she said.

She said that parkrun is launching its first health and inclusion strategy in the UK, adding: “We know that we want to reach more people globally, but we also know that we need to reach more and different people.”

She stressed that parkrun is a charity and “can only exist if people continue to support us”.

“Supporting us is both joining us on the weekend to participate but also supporting us behind the scenes, potentially with a donation if you can,” she said.