Denise Clarke invites Canberrans to join her on her 422nd parkrun - with a twist

Canberra grandmother Denise Clarke will walk the five-kilometre course around Lake Tuggeranong this Saturday 27 May (2023) in what will be her 422nd parkrun.

The now-co-event director of Tuggeranong parkrun has been walking the lakeside course with her husband, Gary, since the first event more than a decade ago in February 2013.

But this Saturday on the 487th Tuggeranong parkrun, Denise and others will be joined by parkrun sponsor and private health insurance giant Medibank, which is visiting Canberra as part of its national tour of 12 key parkrun locations. Tuggeranong’s parkrunners will be the first and only ACT group to experience the insurer’s travelling pop-up lounge with free massages, a light brekkie and giveaways.

Denise says she hopes the stop-over will inspire others to experience the joys of parkrun which have kept her and her husband, the other Tuggeranong event director, coming back for the past decade.

“It doesn’t matter if you walk, jog, run, volunteer, push a pram or walk your dog. It’s encouraging and and it’s a supportive environment,” she says.

“Hopefully that messaging will come across and more people will actually come along and experience what we enjoy every Saturday.”

The couple’s Saturday ritual has grown from a group of about 50 at the inaugural Tuggeranong parkrun in 2013 to an estimated 250 to 400 people every week.

Denise says this diverse group comes from all walks of life, including mums with bubs in prams to an 85-year-old woman.

“I think that ultimately we are seeing more walkers coming along to parkrun because they’re realising that it’s not all about the run,” she says.

“It’s about just coming out and having that connection with the community [as well as] getting your exercise in on a Saturday morning.”

The course has two dedicated volunteer park walkers who provide company to new walkers who don’t want to walk alone and a ‘tail walker’ who trails the group so no parkrunner ever finishes last.

Denise and Gary love parkrun so much, they both began volunteering within 12 months of their very first Saturday out on the Lake Tuggeranong course. Today, most of Canberra’s parkruns have the couple’s fingerprints on them with Denise estimating they’ve set-up about 75 per cent of the courses between the two of them, as well as parkruns across the border in Jindabyne, Goulburn and Queanbeyan.

But back in 2013, only two years after parkrun was established in Australia, Denise remembers not even knowing what it was.

“One of our friends actually popped a photo on Facebook and it was at the Ginninderra parkrun and we thought, ‘Oh, what’s this parkrun thing all about?’,” she says.

“We did our own little Google to find out what it meant and that’s when we did actually find out that Tuggeranong [parkrun] was starting the following week.

“We went along and immediately enjoyed it … and because we loved it so much, we got involved in the volunteering aspect.”

Denise and Gary weren’t alone with an average of 60,000 people in Australia now estimated to take part in parkrun every weekend across 450 locations.

Parkrun’s goal is to grow the total number of Australia-wide participants from 850,000 to 900,000 by the end of 2025 and establish 150 new locations.

Medibank live better ambassador Tim Robards has been touring the country with Medibank to rally Australians to this cause.

“What I love about parkrun is that it’s always there, consistently when you are ready for it,” he says.

“You can get your friends together and make it a healthy catchup rather than a beer at the pub and you’re able to participate at any fitness level.

“It’s nice to know I can keep my Saturday morning free and tie my catchups in with a good run and some even better endorphins.”

To learn more or to register for Tuggeranong parkrun, visit the parkrun website. A first-timers’ briefing will run from 7:40 am this Saturday 27 May 2023 for an 8 am start.