Springburn – Siberian success story

After a week of abandoning me, the human is back in the country. In spite of him complaining about jetlag and being at a black-tie dinner last night he surprisingly kept to his word and I got my Saturday morning parkrun fix.

We decided to visit Springburn again this week. Don’t tell my friends at Drumchapel and Ruchill but I think this might be my current favourite. I’m so fickle! There was a little bit of a late scare when we heard there was a course inspection but we were delighted to hear it was on.

They have such an amazing group of volunteers and marshals, including a few four-legged helpers and the inimitable and brilliant timekeeper Bobby Gemmell whose passion, humour and energy knows no bounds. Double kudos and thanks to all of the volunteers today. That really was above and beyond hanging out for over an hour this morning in those temperatures. Thanks also for keeping us safe and diverting us away from the icy patches. I hope you have all now thawed out.

It was a very chilly one. Minus 4 when we got out the car. Jim kept going on and on about how frozen he was. He just wouldn’t let it go. What a princess. He was sporting his new cow cowl buff and hat and I had my parkrun dogs buff on (well my sister’s as I lost mine).

We had a nice little warm-up jog, I got to play with some cute little Pomeranians near the winter garden then we headed towards the start area where we met the lovely Mel and Ali.

Today was my last parkrun before my 3rd birthday (and the human’s 48th). We both share the same birthday. Can you believe that? A dog can’t even celebrate her own special day without him trying to share some of the glory.

It’s also St Andrew Day today as well as Marcothon Eve. Maybe auspicious signs for today’s run?

Given the icy conditions we didn’t set any big goals for today but hoped to duck in under the 25:22 we clocked here two weeks ago.

We started quite well and got into a good rhythm, keeping under 5 minutes for each of the first two kilometres so on track to get back under 25 minutes. I tried very hard not to tangle his legs this week. Maybe I’m built for cold weather running but I felt strong today and the human didn’t hold me back as much as usual today.

Half way through we decided to get quite greedy knowing that sub 25 and first dog were in the bag. Could we get close to 24 minutes? Could we even beat 24 minutes? Surely not. This was new territory. It felt good.

Into the last kilometre it was still in the balance. The human is renowned for running out of steam late in races (yes I know it’s supposed to be a run not a race bla bla bla) and I was waiting for the inevitable crash and burn. Into the last climb before the flat home straight we pushed hard, stealing some of the encouragement being directed towards another runner by her supportive coach. Amazingly the human managed to keep it together and we finished pretty well. A special shout out to Mel who flew past us with about 20m left. A great finish from her.

I got recognised by the wonderful barcode scanner who said she was a fan. That was so unexpected and a lovely comment to hear. Welcome to the Crumbelistas. Or is it the Crumbelites? Anyone got a better suggestion for my fan club?

But how did I do? We were pretty sure we had smashed 24 minutes but you never know until the official results email comes in. I was one very happy labradoodle when our finish time was confirmed as 23:45, my first sub 24 parkrun and an improvement of around 100 seconds on two weeks ago.

I was super-excited at the end and we got to ring the Spingburn PB bell. Maybe the over-excitement and adrenaline explains me wanting to scrap with the RD’s dog. Oops. Sorry. Naughty Crumble. Hope I’m not banned. I promise not to do it again.

We’re looking forward to a return to Queen’s Park (and maybe a second date with Charlie) and the new Levengrove parkrun in Dumbarton over the next couple of weeks and will hopefully get to Lanark Moor over the coming months too. I do love my parkrun tourism.

Meantime I wonder how many of his Marcothon runs Jim will let me tag along to. I’m guessing somewhere between none and not many.

Anyway that’s today’s work done. A furry good day at that.

Crumble out x