Return of parkrun still 'weeks away' despite coronavirus restrictions easing

The return of parkrun in Wales is still "a matter of weeks away" despite the Welsh Government announcing that larger outdoor events can take place from Monday.

The free 5k running event normally take place every Saturday at 9am in 44 different locations across Wales.

parkrun events have not taken place since March 2020 in Wales due to the coronavirus restrictions.

On Friday, the First Minister Mark Drakeford MS said organised outdoor events like concerts and football matches will be allowed to go ahead with up to 4,000 people unseated and 10,000 seated from Monday.

But organisers say more more needs to done before running events can resume safely.

"We've got quite a lot of work to do", Chris Davies from parkrun Cymru said, "on the back of today's announcement we have to approach all of the landowners in Wales that stage parkruns and that process does take time.

"What we are hoping to do is learn from England and try to drive a consistent answer answering all their questions from the Senedd to the national sports groups where all of the local authorities can see consistency".

parkrun has not taken place in Wales since March 2020 Credit: parkrun Cymru

Chris Davies is the Regional Event Ambassador for parkrun Cymru. He was not able to give a definitive time frame for the return of events but said it was some weeks yet.

"We can't start parkrun events until the majority of landowners say yes because otherwise there would be overcrowding at the events that were open, so we have to be careful about safety and that does take time.

"We are measuring it in a number of weeks."

parkrun Cymru says the dialogue with the Welsh Government has been "excellent" and denied that forewarning of lockdown changes would have sped up the process.

Chris Davies said parkrun would be "essentially the same" when it returns, but with added safety measures in place, laid out in a document called the "Covid Framework", published by parkrun.

Over 13,000 parkrun events have taken place globally July 2020 under the framework, and parkrun says no Covid cases have been linked to any of those events.