Are Trans Athletes Why Parkrun DELETED Every Record? 

Some strong opinions around this one - let's keep the comments section the correct side of bat shit bonkers 😂

New parkrun rule ... new records only count if you stand on a podium in front of a duck pond

As a barely-sub-17 parkrunner, seeing my name just scraping into the fastest 100 times was massively rewarding, and is my main goal every time I try a new course. I think a lot of people who are about that speed (quick, but not quick enough to do well in any properly serious race) enjoy the feeing of achieving something which is vaguely worthwhile like that, even if it is a bit pointless overall

Dam my 12min 35 sec course record has been deleted 😂 you’ll just have to take my word for it now. 😅

Mark, the only thing causing more anger than this park run stuff is the fact we haven’t had a duck pond podium flash back in forever.

Hello from New Zealand. I stumbled across your channel at Christmas 2022. Feeling fat and unhealthy here was this guy talking about Parkrun. I discovered we had two in our city so early January we ventured out not knowing what to expect and it was a fantastic experience. From not being able to run 200m I now run 20km a week and did my 50th Parkrun this weekend. Thank you for the inspiration and keep up the great content!

As an old person that took up running recently( through parkrun ) and later, switched to a healthy lifestyle ( including quitting smoking after half a century,which ain`t easy) I will miss the age graded records. It gave me realistic targets that meant something. And watching my upwards progress through the top 1000 in my age group at my local parkrun was a great source of inspiration.The details..and fastest runners..were not important. The statistics were.

At first I thought it was a bad decision, but I guess annoying EVERYONE and not just a single group is equality in action 😅

As a runner in an older age bracket who travels to run different parkruns I am very disappointed to not have the age leagues for each run any longer. They helped make me competitive and added interest and motivation.

I did my first parkrun today because of discovering your channel. Thank you. I’ll be back next Saturday

One thing that you (and all media) have missed here is the removal of age grade records. A 50/60/70 year old is unlikely to win one of their local 'proper' races but could target local age grade records. This was a huge motivation for many runners and it was extremely important to them As a parkrun RD one of the most angering things is the complete lack of respect and communication from HQ to the local teams. We dont buy the line about records being off putting as parkrun can provide no evidence. This has been handled just as badly as the dog lead mess a few years back

"nixon- he/him" caught me off guard 🤣

Hi Mark. Fellow Woodley and Reading Parkrunner. I can no longer look up the age category record for any particular parkrun. I hold 3 locally and enjoy....enjoyed the challenge of getting more. Did Newbury parkrun today and possibly got the VM55 but now will never know. Competition is a driving force for good so this is a sad day for Parkrun in my opinion. David.

The government comment lol 😂, I couldn't have said it any better, pure comedy 😂😂😂

9:00 I’m a swimmer who runs for a bit of fun and any time I go for a fast 5k time it’s at a Parkrun. For me, course records were incredibly useful as an incentive to turn up and run faster, bringing me great reward when I first went sub 17 on my birthday to get the 15-17 course record. It made me happier to see my name up there when I managed to lower my time to 16:14 in the past year. These records will be a thing I miss as they have often helped me run faster to try and get an age group record or even an overall course record. Maybe I am in a privileged position where they are a tool I can use to incentify myself but as a runner who doesn’t do many road races it was a nice form of motivation.

my father is upset at his hard earned over 80s course record being expunged

The competition element of it was part of the fun. Changing the approach to publishing results because a few people get upset because they’re slow is mental. It should be inspiring to see how amazing people are doing, and drive you to improve. Not just being salty cause someone is better at a particular skill.

Was waiting to see your opinion on this, just found out about it today. The leaderboard for me and whole system of recording everyone's times has greatly boosted my motivation to get faster every time I go and see my friend's progress too, having age category and gender difference marked down is also a bonus as I get to look at something that says first in age category 😆 I look forward to watching the video

hi mark, I'm a transgender man and just wanted to leave a comment commending you for how level headed this video was. these kind of videos which even offhandedly address transgender people in sports (especially from people like yourself who aren't exactly outspoken social justice warriors) often make me worried that I'm about to find out a RU-vidr I find funny/interesting/inspiring is actually a bigot. I've been enjoying your content for the past year and you've helped me feel motivated to keep up my (albeit spotty) workouts, so I was worried about the content of the video! however you approached this very well and even made some tasteful jokes in the middle, even if I don't necessarily agree with each point you made. appreciate the respect shown to all involved in this, keep up the good work.

I gotta be honest, I really appreciate how progressive your channel is. Not that i'm surprised that it is--but it's just really refreshing and appreciated to hear from a guy who knows stuff who isn't such a Chad about it. We really appreciate it.

Suggesting that the inclusion of trans people somehow ruins park run is bonkers to me. We should celebrate every person who takes part!

My take as someone who does look regularly at these records (context: I've been a 28 minute 5km runner, and a 17 min 5km runner, currently sit somewhere between, and love Park Run): I use the records to work out where to go and run my sessions if I'm somewhere new - e.g. if I'm on holiday in Manchester I'd look at records to work out where I'd likely get a fast field of folks to run with, this is a relatively niche use case, and Strava would also give me this information. My worries with the change are: 1. Records often drive news coverage of Park Run (Ciara Mageean and Andy Butchart both got good coverage recently) and therefore introduce people to Park Run - could less records mean less news coverage? Maybe. 2. Records might entice elite athletes to come down to Park Run for their sessions. Do I want to see Philly Bowden striding off into the distance and crushing my local Park Run while she trains for a 2.25 marathon? Hell yeh I do. Will she be less enticed by lack of a record? Again, maybe. I'd tend to agree that the change won't really impact 'accessibility' - generally I find this patronising, and would rather some honesty than anything else. I'd also rather that Park Run, like every other business on the planet, maybe trials this - could you run a test with a big Park Run for 3 months - taking records off and tracking participation? Yes. Would that be hard to do? Absolutely not. If the framing was "we've tested this and it boosts participation by 20%" I'd have absolutely zero worries about the change...

I love Parkrun and the fact it is freely available to all. For me it's a personal challenge. I'm racing myself and a few mates. I think it's wise to move away from records for all sorts of reasons x

Well put Cindy, well put. Agree with all your points

hey mark, thanks for tackling this topic in a sensible and rational way. i'm a trans woman that is trying to get more into running and does parkrun every now and then. personally i put myself down as male on parkrun's site, partly because i don't care much for contributing to those culture arguments, but also because even for something i suck at like running im too competative to not want to compare against biological males in my age range even if im at a disadvantage to those runners anyway the main reason im leaving a comment is because interestingly enough, you can still look up who has the fastest ever times at specific parkrun courses on their site. if on a course page you hover over results and go to event histroy, you can filter that course's parkruns buy fastest male and fastest female times, so it's not like theyve even scrapped it altogether

As a beginner, knowing the course record is a great way of knowing how difficult the course is although I suppose the average time will still be a good guide? Still haven't done my first park run yet and this won't make a blind bit of difference to when I decide to finally participate but it might make it slightly more difficult to decide which one to do...... Only been running for 8 weeks but ready to have a go as soon as a little niggle in my calf disappears..... Really looking forward to it. Thanks for another great video as always.

"Once the trans issue is resolved" ....... nice, couldn't stop laughing at that one!

Great video. Calm, thoughtful, and realistic, especially in comparison to many of the others on this topic. 👍🏼

As 20min-ish runner trying to make the sub 17 list was quite motivating. I think that’s what bugs me, we all Parkrun for different motivations at different stages of the journey, and it feels like they’ve stripped some objectives from a few, when I don’t think anybody was really put off by them. If that was the issue you’d stop timing the event. Now you mentioned the trans issue, it actually makes a bit more sense.

They are a volunteer organization. They don't have the time or funds for the drama.

Exactly Mark sums it up , I Marshalled here in Cornwall this Saturday it rained for most of the run , so impressed to see people putting in the effort , getting it done in the rain

8:43 is spot on .... I just came from park run today ... Elite runners usually just record their time for fun ... I got lapped by a sub 17 guy today and after recording time he kept on running and again overtook me .... Sub 20 is surely an alien world for me right now pushing towards sub 30 right now.....

In Montana, my closest park run is 9ish hours (by car) away. I'd love to see a park run start up locally. When I heard about this I was worried you wouldn't be able to see your personal stats. Plenty of people could use park run to track their progress without having to spend any money on fancy kit. It sounds like that is still available. Seems like they made the best of a bad situation.

The only people who care about course records are the actual people who have them and who are in the sub17 and sub 20 categories (including myself). It’s pretty annoying that the competition side of parkrun has been completely dismissed because of a tiny minority 😢.

Forget the leaders, i need to stop eating as much, my last three parkrun times have been awful. Need to get back under 30 mins again. Then again it was a mudbath in yorkshire today! Me and three others discussed this at the finish today, we all agreed turning up and actually finishing today was most important thing, by a long way. I really wish i could talk more people into parkrun as best thing I've doing in past year.

The only people that are genuinely upset about this are the ones that are constantly checking their statuses on Strava or racing you off the lights with their midlife crisis cars.

Held my breath clicking on this video but i think you're pretty much spot on - why this is parkrun's problem to solve is beyond me. Professional athletics is another issue, and still one that can be approached with compassion and without the hatred of innocent individual people who just want to exercise, run amd even compete as themselves.

The problem is that this isn't Parkruns's problem, and in the current climate they have no way to do anything that won't anger a large cohort on either side. I'm very data-focussed, so I like the records, and all the stats, and don't find it off-putting at all.

Really need to try a Parkrun someday. Saw there's one in Stuttgart which is a bit of a way to get there but... I mean I'm always running relatively long in training and forcing myself to do a 5k with higher intensity could be a lot of fun

It's only delusional to think that I can mark my age as 82 if I'm 62; but I could surely set some nice records. I would be ashamed if I did though....

Mark, I found out about, and started running at Parkrun after binge-watching you in July last year. I'm 51, 87kg now. I was 139kg in May 2022 and currently run 40k a week. So, thank you very much for the introduction and the self-help inspiration, to get myself above average, which I will be very, very soon. As for the Parkrun changes, I think it's the first step on a downward slope. The way these things generally go, the loud voices that drown out all others just make more and more demands for change. So this is the first attempt at appeasement, and is far from the last. I wonder what will be next, finishing position? Your time? The number of participants? The same argument can be made for the removal of all of these.

Basically, there is your beer mile time, Olympic medals, and all the rest is just jogging around.

Thanks for the video Mark, I wasn't aware ParkRun had removed the records. I'm running my first ParkRun soon and was genuinely curious not really to see the fastest or slowest times, but to see where I may come among people in my age range. I guess in the fullness of time I'd have liked to know that for my age and stage I was at least above average; or strive eventually to be so. The course average will have to do then I guess. Anyhow, thanks for the video, helps a lot!

Spot on there! This is FREE weekly timed event every Saturday, my own records are still there, I never was interested in who was fastest just average time which gives indication on how tough it is and that was my aim to be above average doing parkrun tourism

This whole discussion is confusing to me as a back of the pack-er. Before doing a race for the first time the stats I'm checking are the slowest times, to make sure the volunteers won't be out there an extra 30 minutes just for me. I don't care AT ALL what the front is doing.

Who's next Strava, Zwift? Ebikes and weight dopers? It's supposed to be fun. But we all love stats..well some of us do. Your points are all valid and rational but I feel that Parkrun is the worse for it all. It's a shame. Parkrun is still amazing and I will continue to support and participate..but hold no age group course records

I think you sum it up very well mark. I was very close to my parkrun record a few years ago, it's pushed on another 30 seconds now so probably out of my reach. It was a fun thing with a few other runners who you see most weeks and was a big motivator for me for a time. I appreciate I have other event and things going on but that does feel a bit like "oh they're fast so they don't need those little things to make the feel good, or motivate them" I'm probably a bit more personally offended Vs you but I don't really care. It does leave me with the feeling though that another thing in life is being removed due to over sensitive people pressuring big companies/institutions

Thanks for adding your voice to this particular conversation. Both entertaining and thoughtful as always.

Exactly. Your point that slow/new runners wouldn't be put off knowing what the course record is is exactly right. Like, nothing is stopping them from looking up the world record for 5k either. Also, if you run a parkrun slowly, you ALREADY KNOW you are slow - when you get lapped! Parkrun is essentially disincentivising those faster runners who would do the lapping from attending the event, to make everyone feel less bad about themselves. It's so bizarre, and frustrating.

some events I been in have the non binary category.

Perfect analysis, 100% spot on Mark. Top drawer.

I've never done a parkrun, we don't have them here where I live but after watching this video and hearing about what they did it makes me wonder one thing: Is Strava going to follow suit? They have the KOM and QOM stats for segments. Will they remove it for all or put it behind the subscription so they can make some money.

We don't have this in US, so who knows. I always thought park run was an unofficial event. Not a race. So you show up and run. Yes, they tell you a time. But it's not a race, not official. So I don't get why they ever published anything. Makes sense to not release results.

It's definitely not for Parkrun to sort this out, even if it needs 'sorting'. The rules on eligibility from England Athletics (via UK Athletics via World Athletics) for competition eligibility aren't overly complex but well beyond the scope of a volunteer organisation to contemplate dealing with. It's hard enough for affiliated local clubs to do and we cop enough grief when trying to comply! I'm an infrequent Park-runner but I really like being able to see the course records and historical results, particularly age-graded. Partly to see how I stack up against other 50-somethings and it's nice to see what others can achieve.

As a 63 year old non club runner, Park Runs gave me the age group competition to better the local oldies and got me out of bed to drive 10 miles to my local Park Run on a Saturday morning. It is now pointless, I can just do my close to home beach and bush runs and run against my smart watch.

I had a few course records here, i’m not devo it. But the timing, the course records and the age grades were great. I have a coach, a training group and I race during the domestic season. My mum walks, she doesn’t have people to compare herself to on a weekly basis, she loved knowing her age grade each week.

I agree with you 99%. 2 things. 1) you can still see the 'course record' just sort the results by fastest time on event history 2) whilst you, and I, would not be put off in the slightest by there being a course record and it being prominently displayed, I believe 100% that are is a non-trivial number of people that are that sensitive and would be put off by that, and they are the exact people that should be doing parkrun.

Should onus not be on how you register? Trans issue is not really an issue if people registered correctly. There should be a distinction made between trans males, trans females, cis-male, cis-female. I think the records are a good thing to measure your progress.

Great video. You are so good at speaking. I love your jokes and parables. I think hopefully the controversy will attract more new members to parkrun. 😂

As a guy I would like to know how the female competitors feel about this situation being it is mainly them it would affect.

Strava segments next, those pesky cyclists bagging running records and then electric bike cyclists bagging bike records 😂

I wish ppl would understand that even just turning up and getting round a 5km is better than 99% of the population (yes I pulled that number out my ass) but you see my point.

Think you’ve pretty much summed it up. Nice video 👍

The only time I took any real notice of previous records was when looking for my first Parkrun my nearest was far to fast for me at 65 so I found one more suited to my abilities. Because of that first informed descion I am still at Parkrun and dont know if this is allowed any more but enjoy the competative spirit amongst people of the same ability / age has massively improved my fitness and made saturdays something to look forward to.

If Parkrun isn't a race and times aren't important, why are the results posted on the Power of 10 and Run Britain?

If the performance data isn't important to Park Run _only_ now it didn't need to be collated in the first place.

Just found your channel. And subscribed. You are definitely better at this RU-vid stuff than me 😂 . Regarding parkrun. You can still easily find the fastest Male / Female times. Just go to event history and order by Male/Female first finishers. What you can't easily do now is find the grade rated records, which I always found that more interesting. I like to put the course stats on my RU-vid parkrun vlogs so it is a shame that parkrun are making it more difficult to find the records but they are still on the 5k app (for now).

Hi Mark. I've had a hard time relating to runners being a tall overweight bloke myself. Your videos have inspired me and now I've lost a stone and I have two 5k runs under my belt

I’ll provide no commentary and just give you a this comment to help your algorithm. Love the channel

i miss the results tbh, i like the numbers esp for the juniors. Some of the neurodiverse kids that come along are totally motivated and study the stats, its kinda their thing and helps keep them interested. i went touring today and did miss my glimpse of my age group at the new place. it gives me a feel for how popular and you can see if there are famous people who ran it even if you didnt go the same week as them.

One thing that's important to note, as someone who has never done a parkrun but was thinking about doing one, is that I'd like to see the number of participants. It would be good for me to decide which one I'd like to do as a high number of people running it each week must mean it isn't a terrible course.

I got my results from this Saturday so they haven't brought this rule in just yet, I've only started running this year and just completed my 5th parkrun, I've been saving the parkrun result email in a folder so I can compare my results, it's a shame they feel they have had to do this. I have a sports watch that tells me the time I run but I liked the 'official' confirmation

The obvious point for me is that park run does not have the resources to verify records. And any steps to so would be way to over the top. Its a fun run that's getting all a bit too serious. Its a shame the records can't stand - but if there is no integrity to them - they are pointless anyway!

Idk my parkrun record was kinda important to me, because I never did very well in proper races

Age category records for kids were a good source of motivation. Lots of kids would try to get the JM10/JW10 etc. record before they aged out of the category, or they'd try get a course record at junior parkrun before getting too old for it. It was nice for their development as they got older and faster.

Like several who have commented below, I too am an older runner who found it really motivating to have records of times ran by other men of my age. Personnely, I have no problem with anyone being trans but, I think we should consider passing a law to make it illegal to misstate your biological sex. Ok I'm happy to accept a new category called something like "presented gender" but that needs to be clearly separated from biological sex.

If this is due to the Trans issue, where does that leave the future of organised 10k's, half marathons, etc where the sexes are categorised in a similar manner. As someone that's never likely to hold a record I'm completely indifferent to the records being removed.

It’s total BS - top 500 fastest runs was such a great feature

I was a fatty! I went with my kids. I was welcomed and encouraged at my park run! The volunteers at Aspatria park run; shout outs to Roy, Sue, sally, Geoff and Fiona; they welcomed and encouraged me! I lost weight, I got fitter my times improved! Let’s just welcome and encourage each other

Yep, good analogy 😂 when I saw the change described I was very concerned. Seeing my time improving and comparing myself to others in the same age group is quite motivating. The reality though, as you say, is that it only really affects runners who will be setting great times in actual races. Still sad to see the toy thrown in the bin but I don’t see how parkrun could solve the issue being complained of in an effective way.

I used to love looking at the age group course records, they inspired me to improve and train harder, even though I would never attain one of the records, very disappointed.

You've got a great attitude Mark, very positive and very in tune. I totally agree with you, in fact I can't see any other way of looking at this. They're right to delete the records, it isn't athletics...it's not a competition, it's a communal social run.

As a club runner and a run director at my local Parkrun I don’t actually care or mind the change. Although if they are trying to get the message across that parkrun isn’t a race. Then why do parkrun results go on power of 10?

I'm just completely envious of people that HAVE parkruns around them. The nearest to me is 90 minutes away, here in the states near Philly. I don't think the records would mean a damn thing to me, though I'm proud of my time as an old guy. What's more important by 100 fold is if I could get my wife and my family to participate in the parkruns. I am sorry there are trans athletes and people who hate trans athletes that want to make this a big issue. Parkrun is wonderful and I just hope they continue and thrive and spread.

For most people nothing has changed. I did parkrun yesterday, the result email had all the usual info including placing, age category and wava. Volunteered at juniors today, again nothing has noticably changed. There are some seriously worrying things going in in the world that people should get exercised about, but this?! Thanks for the vid. 👍

My wife just fell out with me about this issue. I like recording my times because I want to get faster. She is put off from entering because she's worried fast people will look at her time and laugh. Someone in all sport has to come first, and someone has to come last. Surely everyone in between (including the person who came last and first) is inspired by knowing where they are? The 20 min times are inspired to go faster, the 40 min time has motivation to go faster.

“Run across a muddy field then go for coffee and cake” - what a great summary of what parkrun is! Love it!

I’ve never done one but I use Strava for cycling - surely there’s a segment for the parkrun courses, or one could be made? Then you have the leaderboard back and the splits for age, gender and weight?

Keeping records is important. I’m not a park runner but play other sports and even if it’s for fun you need to have a winner. This everyone is a winner and everyone gets a trophy needs to stop. Having a winner is great for motivation to try your best That’s one of the reasons the world is going to shit these days everyone a winner I don’t need to give it my best I’m a winner. Nothing wrong with healthy competition

Been heavily involved in parkrun for years, and in fact was Run Director this morning at my local event. I love parkrun, even though I can't even run anymore, and I always will. But I love it a little less now. The stats they got rid of were frequently inspiring and informing. A bad decision, under admittedly awkward circumstances

My PB is around the 20 min mark. As I get better I'm sure I'll get faster, and always enjoyed seeing what the top performers could do on any given course. I drew inspiration from it and felt like it gave me something specific to work towards on any given course. So it was a feature I liked. Not broken up about it, but it certainly is a mild inconvenience.

Now that you point it out, average time should surely be the one with more potential to put a few people off. Near enough everyone is slower than the fastest time, but the average time genuinely splits the field and is far closer to home for the mysteriously offended. Thus we can regrettably conclude that the parkrun management are being deliberately misleading. This is a change that has to be entirely due to unfair competition in the female category (which should be "biological female", to avoid disagreement) and not really about records inexplicably putting people off.

Thanks for this! Finally a voice of reason. The tantrums I have seen in the community seem to be from people who don’t even really want the toy, they want to be having the fight over the toy. I would counter the idea that this move won’t make parkrun more inclusive. It’s been a fairly strong signifier that they won’t be bullied by the bullies and that it is a safe space for trans athletes. In a world where many spaces aren’t. For that reason alone, I support the decision.

The appropriate way to deal with it is to require registration by sex at birth, not by gender.

Inclusivity is about everyone. It means removing barriers to entry, looking after those at the back and also looking after those at the pointy end. Competition and records is not more or less valid than personal participation, but it is motivational to some.

I am very happy they're notbshowing records anymore. To me, park runs should be about easy, inclusive fun and connection, not competition and complex social issues. Interestingly, i feel like cis men are more likely than cis women to be disappointed in not having those results displayed. And to all those who are, I say this: keep track of your own time. And if you go with friends who are competitive, track yourselves as a group. There's no need to impose your competitiveness on others, AT A PARKRUN! either that, or volunteer/donate so that instead of being displayed publicly, it cam be sent out to those participants who want the results.

Non competitive running. It should be about your own time not what anyone else is getting. It's nice to have the times to map your own progress and goals but that should be all it is.

Thank you for once again bringing some sanity to a silly blown out of all proportion situation.

Great video, sums up my feeling on it all perfectly.

Honestly, sometimes the fastest runners at my local Parkrun piss me off when they shout at slower runners to get out of the way. Just join an athletics club, there's literally one less than a km away. I guess as someone who stands no realistic chance of finishing at even close to these course record times, I find the whole matter deeply unserious.