Ireland the most popular place for parkrun worldwide
Ireland is now the most popular place for parkrun worldwide, where around 9% of the population now registered.
Parkrun sees people of all ages and abilities gather on Saturday morning to run or walk a 5km route.
The junior parkrun, which is a shorter 2km run for children aged four to 14 and their families, takes place on Sunday mornings.
There are currently 112 5k events in Ireland, and 42 junior events, making 154 in total.
Midleton Greenway parkrun near Cork and Belcamp junior parkrun in Dublin started this month.
The parkrun movement began in London in 2004 when Paul Sinton-Hewitt started a run as a time trial between a small group of friends in Bushy Park in London.
It has since grown into a global phenomenon, with more than 10 million people registered and events taking place in over 2,600 communities worldwide every weekend.
In Ireland, it has been a runaway success. Last year, there were more than half a million finishes at parkrun events across Ireland, with more than 100,000 junior parkruns.
Parkrun first came to the island of Ireland at the Waterworks in Belfast in November 2010. Two years later, it started in the Republic of Ireland. The first Malahide parkrun took place in November 2012.
In Mullingar, Co Westmeath, one of the flattest routes in Ireland, the parkrun has grown from strength to strength. It started in 2016, and organisers say that before the Covid pandemic, it had around 80 regular runners.
The event now has around 200 runners attending every week to run the 5km route along the Royal Canal and the old rail trail.
"It's beautiful, fantastic, what a venue," declared Paul Cameron Smith as he crossed the finish line.
The first timer, originally from South Africa, completed his first parkrun in Mullingar today.
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