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Dec 2017
6:49pm, 6 Dec 2017
37,243 posts
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While Raptor Knitted Socks by Night
Surprised to see Workington (out and back tarmac, gently undulating) alongside Bramhall (trail, laps, rather more undulating) in that list.
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Dec 2017
7:23pm, 6 Dec 2017
12,201 posts
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Bazoaxe
Surprised Edinburgh Cramond is down at 70, Pancake flat out and back with only 2 turns in the loop. Unless it factors in the fact I think it is slightly long
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Dec 2017
7:26pm, 6 Dec 2017
3,376 posts
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57.5 Degrees of Pain
It is going to take into account weather, Cramond can be a beast in high wind.
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Dec 2017
8:08pm, 6 Dec 2017
12,202 posts
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Bazoaxe
yeah, how did I forget the bloody wind !
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Dec 2017
8:23pm, 6 Dec 2017
8,435 posts
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mrs shanksi
Thanks for that UC, it is weird that it is on the list as Mineralwell Park! According to the list we are the 18th hardest. That figures!
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Dec 2017
8:58pm, 6 Dec 2017
123 posts
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Weath
For the 5 runs I know particularly well I would subjectively have put (quickest -> slowest):
Poolsbrook - Rushcliffe - Brierley - Braunstone (Leicester) - Sherwood Pines
cf. the list:
Braunstone (Leicester) - Rushcliffe - Poolsbrook - Sherwood Pines - Brierley
Never in a million years would I have said Braunstone was a faster course than Poolsbrook, but having checked my ranked WAVAs:
Braunstone - Brierley - Rushcliffe - Poolsbrook - Sherwood Pines
I wonder if things like course 'knowledge' plays a considerable factor here, as that ranking pretty much tally's with the amount of runs I have done at each event.
I have run both Braunstone and Brierley the most times although I last ran Braunstone consistently about 6 years ago. It is still where my 5K PB was set. I now spend a lot of time at Brierley and having learnt the course the WAVA is creeping very close to my 'best' from an original value around 'average'.
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Dec 2017
7:31am, 7 Dec 2017
6,775 posts
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Ceratonia
With the volume of data that runbritain has, it's going to be hard to pick holes in the results. The flatness and surface of the course probably aren't the only factors.
I can think of 3 parkruns where I've walked part or all of a steep hill. Barclay, which has hills but not especially steep and all on paved paths, is below 2 of them in the list. However, Barclay doesn't attract big numbers of runners and not many club runners and there was a 30s gap to the people in front/behind of me. It also has numerous faster parkruns nearby. So I can well believe people take it a bit easier when they go there.
Time to get over the startline for the average runner as opposed to someone at the front is also going to be factor.
The Worcester one does look a bit of an outlier though.
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Dec 2017
9:20am, 7 Dec 2017
53 posts
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Spideog
It's all down to how many fast people have run the course fast and how that compares to their other times.
The more people that run the route the better the ranking the course will get, but a fast course around a grass field will get bumped down the list because whilst the fast people will run if fast on a fast day, the following week when it's muddy their times will be way off and that will skew the results to show the course being slower than it actually is.
Also any course in a big city with lots of fast runners around is going to get bumped up the list as there will be more people doing it. Doesn't matter how fast the straight downhill course in deepest, darkest Wales is if nobody is running it, a slower course in Birmingham or London is always going to get bumped higher up the rankings relatively due to the number of runners.
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Dec 2017
10:10am, 7 Dec 2017
3,496 posts
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larkim
I'm not 100% sure about your last para Spideog - irrespective of the inherent pace of the runners, its the mix of whether they are going flat out or cruising around which will impact the score.
e.g. if 100 20min parkrunners turn up to a pan flat course the day before a major marathon, and they all cruise around in about 23 minutes, that will push the score for that day to a high one, and if that is a common occurrence the average SSS score will be high.
Conversely, if there's a course with only a handful of runners all with 29min PBs but it is one which is highly used as a PB course because it is "known" to be fast (perhaps because it is a new venue, and the other local one is quite hilly for example, and the other one is where lots of the new course runner's PBs were set), if they all run 28:45 it will end up with a negative score.
I suspect that's what's happened with the WP one - lots of runners have established a base on the Worcester parkrun. Then Worcester Pitchcroft has opened up and it is inherently a faster course. A high proportion of runners who's PB data is built around the old Worcester parkrun now transition to running WP more frequently, and accordingly they PB, thus in the short term bringing the average SSS down. After this initial blip (it's only been going 25 weeks) this effect will start to disappear. A credible theory?
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Dec 2017
10:21am, 7 Dec 2017
54 posts
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Spideog
More that if there are only five people running super speedy PB's on the fast course in the middle of nowhere it will not have the same impact as the 100 people running slight PB's on the course in a big population centre. Those 100 runners have far more data backing up their times from other races than the five people running the one parkrun and just the local 10km.
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parkrun Café
Jan 2025