Runners, walkers and volunteers have been celebrating 10 years of parkrun in Suffolk.
Chantry Park in Ipswich established the first Suffolk parkrun in 2012 - and since then a further 20 have been started across the county, with more than 2,000 participants every week.
Parkruns are free weekly community events for everyone, that take place around the world. They include a 5km route for running, jogging, walking volunteering or spectating, taking place on Saturday mornings.
There are also junior 2km events for those aged four to 14 on Sunday mornings.
Regional parkrun ambassador John Wheatley said: "It’s been a real success.
“It’s the social side rather than just the running. People make lots of new friends, they get out, they feel good after a bit of exercise, whether it be walking, running, jogging or even volunteering.
“We hope to have another parkrun starting in Suffolk probably at the end of this year.
“We cover most of the county but there are one or two patches where we could have another one.
“You can walk it as slowly as you want to start with, you can gradually build up to run if you want or you can carry on walking, or just volunteer."
As of August 14, 2022, a total of 4,257 parkruns have taken place in Suffolk with 8,850 people volunteering 81,351 times.
This has allowed 84,459 individuals to complete 615,599 runs covering almost 2.9 million kilometres.
An estimated 10% of the Suffolk population over the age of 16 have at some point taken part in a parkrun in Suffolk.
Speaking after completing the Chantry Park tenth anniversary parkrun on October 15, Adrian Peake from Ipswich JAFFA Running Club said: “It’s a social get-together, there’s a great atmosphere, it’s something I look forward to doing on a Saturday morning.
“You’ll make friends here."
Fellow club member Mark Banham said: “I moved up to Ipswich this year and have been doing a few Ipswich and Kesgrave and other runs around the area, I’ve got eight-year-old twins and they come round with me.
“They walk and we jog and we’re not usually the last to finish so if anyone is thinking about doing it then there is no time limit – there's always someone that walks behind the last person.
“It’s a good social event and gets you out of bed on a Saturday morning."
Founder of parkrun, Paul Sinton-Hewitt, said: “Achieving this milestone is fantastic for Suffolk, it’s incredible to see communities coming together to be together, social and active in the great outdoors.
"We look forward to seeing the continued growth of parkrun in Suffolk over the coming years."
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