Leazes parkrun

Saturday 21st September

Finally catching up on a few parkrun blogs, after an extended period of absence. Mainly due to holiday adventures to the other side of the world, but also due to the odd injury and illness getting in the way of running in general. Needless to say, my fitness has taken a bit of a hit. But as I’m writing this, I am in the beginning stages of marathon training for the London Marathon 2020 so my weekly mileage is finally on the up again!

Leazes parkrun was a bit of a last minute decision (as far as I remember… it was a while ago now!) as Becca wasn’t particularly well and I almost bailed too. But a last minute mental nudge in the arse pushed me out of the door and onto one of the newer local parkruns in Newcastle. Leazes parkrun was warmly welcomed to the parkrun community due to the overcrowding and bottlenecking at the Town Moor. A mere 10 minute walk south west of Town Moor, through the RVI if you fancy some medical treatment along the way, is the beautiful Leazes park that overlooks St James’ Park (the Stadium that it…not another park!). 

My stats:

• Time: 26:33
• Overall position: 102/200
• Female position: 22nd
• Age category position SW30-34: 1st
• Age-graded score: 55.74%

Location: 4/5

With it being probably the more central of the (now 3) Newcastle parkruns, Leazes is probably more easily accessible by public transport. It is super close to both Haymarket and St. James’ metro stations, making it exceptionally easy to get to on a Saturday morning whilst also thinking of your carbon footprint. Something I should probably be considering more when I am driving to ALL of the North East parkruns… I’ll do something to counterbalance it later!

There is a small car park off Richardson road, and some off-road hospital parking which does mean you can drive there, but spaces are limited and costly, so I would suggest other means. If you’re familiar with the area, there are some other housing estates round the back of Leazes (off Barrack Road) which has some free parking and is very convenient to get to the start.

I’m pretty familiar with this park as I walk through it most days to get to and from work. But putting my work-associations with it aside, I do think it is a very nice park. It has a great view of St. James’ park with a lake, gazebo-like thing (I’m sure there’s a word for it, but its just not coming to me!) and a lovely little cafe too. I’m not aware of any toilets at the park (I may be wrong!), but there are facilities in the hospital just 5 minutes away, and I’d perhaps plan a little in advance if you need to do some pre-parkrun business.

Course difficulty: 4/5

Two words: LAPS and HILLS. Leazes parkrun has both. Eurgh! Starting at the top of the park (bottom left on the map), you run two large full laps, down towards and around the tennis courts, up to and around the lake, and then back up to the start, and then one final lap, that cuts the top of the hill off (thank you race organisers for sparing us that final 20ft elevation!) to give you a nice flat finishing straight to the gazebo-thing.

Given that it is both laps and hills though, you do get the opportunity to fly down the hills as well as struggle up them. Any advice I can give on this one would be just to make use of the downward sections to catch your breath, as the uphill sections do feel long and tough!

I personally found that the path around the lake was a little slippery too, so I would just be careful with footing around there. There are some geese/swans/ducks that may also prove to be obstacles on the run, so just be a bit weary of those too.

Enjoyability: 3/5

I think the scenery of this parkrun just about makes up for the fact that there are hills and laps. I did find that I enjoyed the parkrun whilst I was doing it (I do usually find that I enjoy parkruns when they’re over), but this one was fun whilst I was actually doing it. It is just a nice park to run around.

I did also particularly enjoy overtaking someone I had previously been on a date with and had rejected me (which tbf was one of the nicer/ gentler rejections I had received!).

The atmosphere at this run was really nice too, the marshalls were all very friendly and encouraging, and I enjoyed doing a little bit of socialising with some new insta-friends at the end of the race. I think some people head to the cafe for a quick coffee and a piece of cake after, which I probably would have done had my bestie been there to join me.

Overall experience: 3.5/5

Besides the hills and laps (yes sorry to repeat myself about the bloody laps!), I did enjoy this one. It’s not up there with my favourite parkruns of all time, but I would certainly go back to it, given how local it is to me. It’s one of those parkruns that you can go to with the intention of giving yourself a bit of a challenge.

I quite like that it is a completely different style to the Newcastle parkrun, which is one big lap of the Town Moor. It does give you a new option. I do believe that the latest Jesmond parkrun is completely different again so I’ll review that one when I get round to it/ drum up the courage to do what is probably now the hilliest parkruns in the North East!