Original parkrun – how many people used their Garmins?
The first ‘race’ was on November 2nd, 2004, almost 21 years ago. On the day of that inaugural parkrun, I lived 2 km away and regularly ran in Bushy Park (and still do), though I didn’t do my first parkrun for another couple of years.
The original parkrun had 13 finishers, as shown in the leading image above. Over the following years, elite athletes and Olympic gold medallists significantly lowered the maiden winning time of 19:15/5k.
I know some of the original finishers, and most of them have fared well over the years, probably because they are still fit and running: Chris OWENS, Matthew MORGAN, John KIPPS, Andrew LANE, Steve ROWLAND, Peter WRIGHT, Rachel ROWAN, James RUSSELL, Rachel STANHOPE, Karen WEIR, Julie DRUMMOND, Tanya WOLKEN, Simon LAWRENCE.
What intrigued me about this photo, however, was the wrists. Four of the 13 finishers already had their fingers on their Garmins, waiting to be given the nod to start by Paul Sinton-Hewitt, even back in 2004. I don’t remember fingers-on-watches being a thing then…But I guess the evidence speaks for itself.
Which Watches?
These were the days before Garmin had even dreamt of the Forerunner 205 and the breakout 305, so I’m guessing almost all of the watches would have been from the more popular brand at the time: Polar. The Polar s720i was released a few months earlier than parkrun #1 in August 2004, and I don’t think I got mine until the following year. At the time, I had the older Polar s620, and a few of those running may have had the same model as me, though it was quite expensive at the time, at about $200. (hmmm!).
That said, early Garmin watches were also available, so these are possibilities of what could be used in the race, shown with their release dates.
- Forerunner 101: March 2, 2003
- Forerunner 201: August 14, 2003
Q: How many people used their Garmins in the inaugural parkrun
A: Probably about one, maybe none.
For comparison, Bushy Park’s parkrun from last weekend had over 1500 finishers, and I would bet there were easily 1,000 Garmins on show.
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With 20 years of testing Garmin wearables and competing in triathlons at an international age-group level, I provide expert insights into fitness tech, helping athletes and casual users make informed choices.
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🙂 And how many of those 4 forgot to press the stop button as the ran across the finish line?
Oh, I had a 720. Polar was my go to for HR, even after getting the FR310 for GPS. Took a bit before I gave up Polar altogether. I even had the Polar bike computer – can’t remember the model number.
I’ve never done a Park Run. I’m not even aware of any in the US.
so, you’re saying they didn’t have autostop by position in those days 😉
but…yes! probably 2 of them
And no Trim to Finish line feature. Oh, how far we’ve come 🙂
in all seriousness, i think the polar only had one button and that didn’t always work too well!
I could never moan about the size of the metric on display…there was often only one, filling the entire screen
Counter argument: I was faster before all this technology got in the way!