Springburn parkrun and Ayrshire's Favourite Sons

Pre Race Mingling at Springburn

Saturday 10^th May witnessed the birth of the latest edition to the parkrun familly in Scotland and despite still being sore, tired and stiff from Wednesday's effort at Troon, I made my way to the North of Glasgow for the inaugural Springburn parkrun.

Sir James Reid

I tried a wee warm up, which only proved that I was even stiffer than I had thought and that on top of that my back was sore, so I knew that there wouldn't be any records broken today. That said, with it being a new race, I was guaranteed a Course Best. I made my way to the assemble area beside the statue of Sir Jame Reid, the Kilmaurs' man, who had gifted the park to the community in 1892. The statue had been paid for by a fund set up by the 'St Rollox and Springburn Express' to honour the former blacksmith's assistant who by 1876, had rose to become the sole partner in Europe's largest locomotive manufacturing company, Neilson, Reid & Co. of the Hyde Park Locomotive Works in Springburn. As well as the park itself, Reid had also donated the bandstand, Winter Gardens and New Mosesfield House, which all formed the backdrop to Glasgow's newest and highest parkrun. 

I chatted with numerous running buddies as some 138 of us congregated under the 1903 statue of the Ayrshire born engineer to hear John Owens and his team of volunteers warmly welcome us and describe the course. I may have been at a slight advantage, having helped test the route previously, but I'm not sure it helped too much as we made our way around the two plus lap course, with it's slight undulations, sharp bends, mud and numerous deep puddles.

There would be no mad dash along the final strait today, instead I settled for dodging the potholes and was content enough to place 40^th with a time of 21:45 (tbc) and to chalk up my 138^th parkrun.

After a warm down, I took the old body home for brunch and to listen to Kilmarnock succesfully avoiding the dreaded play offs by beating Hibernian 0-1, with a goal by Kris Boyd.  I wonder if there'll ever be a statue erected for Ayrshire's finest ever goal scorer.  

Full results (to follow)