Julie and I are now married over two weeks. Yes everything has changed. Julie now insists that I run behind her at every parkrun…..I’m kidding it’s weird running with my wedding ring on and any advice on that would be appreciated? Otherwise we’re on honeymoon and this is our tall parkrun tale from Italy.

We picked Caferella parkrun because we could get there on the metro in 20 minutes. For those looking for travel advice purchase a 72 hour Roma pass and you’ll be able to zip around the city like a first finisher at parkrun. We landed on the south east side of the park walked through the medium rise apartment complexes. Yes panto crowd from Ireland gasping as you read I’m talking about high density accommodation with a high frequency metro in the middle. I’m also horrified it’s working in another country less than a 2.5 hour flight away. We have our elephants in the room and their turning pink and laughing at our excuses. Housing rant over.

In summary, parkrun has returned and entered our marriage. I haven’t run since I was I enjoying those last hours as a single man trotting around Ballygarvan GAA club slightly worrying that I’d trip turnover an ankle and end up in the dog house on our wedding day. This didn’t happen by the way. My best man had me well warned that potholes now dominated my preferred route. Interestingly half way through the run I remembered that I forgot shaving foam and bought it on the way home using apple pay. Ballygarvan has really changed we only got that shop back a few years ago and now Apple pay at the till. Today in Rome was going to be interesting I’d either phone it in or smash through a PB. Optimism is irresistible.

Interesting Cafarella Observations

The park had a public use van which they used to set out the course markers and arrows. The Run Director or Direttori di Corza as they are known in Italy seemed surprised that we didn’t have the same vans in Ireland. Taken aback by our question about the van he offered my wife Julie the chance to drive the van for post event close down. If this is how fast they trust Julie in Italy in Italy with public works imagine how fast she’d be elected Prime Minister here.

The public water fountain just passed the start line is left on, we survived drinking from it and it was probably some of the best water we ever drank. We were running in 21 degree heat. Hunger is the best sauce and I’m struggling to paraphrase for Water when severally dehydrated after a parkrun PB.

Single horse riders are permitted in the park. For frequent readers or sympathetic fellow Glen readers I remembered that time a sulky drove across our course in front of the Lord Mayor. We didn’t see any horse riders so maybe this is how Italians deal with trouble they permit it and remove the chance of being confused with a cool outlaw. If I seen a horse rider this morning I would have thought sure anyone can do that. They’re probably leasing horses like scooters somewhere around here. I’ll stick Julie on a horse after this run she’ll love it.

Dogs were visibly off the lead like it was some sort of national badge of honour for your Italian dog to be free. The Italians got great joy from their dog having fellow dog friends. The dogs were crowded around the finish area like a wild cheering crowd. No one I could see ran with a dog but how could you it was 21 degrees at 9 am that would have been cruel and also the dogs seemed happy to be off on a little play date with their friends.

Anyway back to parkrun Italy. The course as per my strava screenshot is below. Two loops of what looks like an odd rectangle.

The parkrun was exhilarating clearly the combination of parkrun and honeymoon endorphins drove me to my PB for 2022 (21:54). Despite two and half weeks of our wedding celebrations (2 days) and honeymoon (14 days) consisting mostly of beer, aperol, granité, lemoncello, Italian food (especially desert) Italian spas and not even a thought for running until Friday afternoon as we strolled through St. Peter’s Basilica for the second time and suddenly realised it’s Friday and honeymoon parkrun day is tomorrow I still floored it from the word go. I think going easy lasted for about 400 meters and once I realised that the Vatican bank visit would have to wait a race emerged.

Cafarella Course

You commence the run by the playground. Try not to get distracted by the rabbits. They’re cute but they’ll be there after the run as well.

The RD recruited an interpreter in English for the RD speech and within minutes he gave us a 3, 2, 1 and ANDARE !!!. We ran down hill to the loop which you complete twice. The course is a dirt track with some rocks, muck and dips but it’s largely flat bar one pull at the end as you return for a loop of the playground before you finish downhill.

my Run

I kept it easy in the beginning I was out of training, slightly hungover and we had walked 19,000 steps around the Vatican state the day before. Mentally I was still in the Vatican museum where we had spent 3 hours on Friday filling every historical and nerd urge the papacy were willing to feed us. I was still trying to get into the Vatican bank in my head as we hit the first loop.

Next I was fourth on the second lap of the loop and my brain started tuning into the runner in front of me. He was flagging his form was going and I could here his breathing getting heavy. I’ve been in enough Glen River tough brawls to know when I’m licked and this wasn’t one of those times. I caught him at the bottom of the straight and next there was the guy in second slowing down. This was on. I hugged tight to the turn and hared after him. I was 3.2km in, I could see the guy in first finisher ahead and the last thing to go athletically is your final mile and I was nowhere near athletically finished. I pressed hard. Pressed what a joke of a description I know you don’t believe that….this was Fergusons UTD in the 90s time. This was me throwing the kitchen sink at them.

I scrapped for second after a real tussle with 2 fierce Italian runners. One guy came out of nowhere as I passed the guy in second I hared after from the turn. We swapped position a few times and then came the hill. The hill is a gentle incline compared to Glen River with a slight turn left and then a fast right at the top. I could here my competitors struggling so I attacked the hill using the last few meters of flat to speed up. I lost the two lads here. Glen River tough rang in my head. I lead in the Glen and I coach people to be tough and it got me second finisher here.

I kept chasing the first finisher. I was on his heels at the split for the loop around the playground. He kicked on and I was at full throttle. He deserved the first finisher I’ll need to turn up in better shape another day.

After our parkrun went up to the café for a coffee. Italian coffee should be made mandatory after parkruns. What a day. What a parkrun. What a wonder wife.