Sophie Wood and James McCrae ran the fastest parkrun times in the UK this week (16th July).

Our weekly parkrun top ten is sponsored by 1001 Running Tips by our editor Robbie Britton. Want to run faster at parkrun or your next marathon then order your copy today.

With temperatures soaring all over the UK we expected the times to be a bit slower this weekend, but nobody told the runners at parkrun.

Sophie Wood, who has featured multiple times in our rankings and is a class athlete. So it’s no surprise to see Wood running 17:02 at Wythenshawe parkrun this weekend. The Sale Harrier is on her 23rd parkrun of the year so far and this one was the third fastest of the bunch (with two sub 17 minute efforts in March, including 16:35 at Stretford parkrun. Add in the small bonus of a 2:38 marathon PB and it’s quite the year so far!

James McCrae was the one man under 15 minutes this week with 14:53 at Rutland Water. A parkrun PB by four seconds and actually quicker than his 5k and 5000m bests, so a new road 5k PB could be on the cards soon for the Hallamshire Harrier. Another PB of note this year for McCrae was a shiny new 100m PB of 12.74, at the National Athletics League.

An Olympian on the podium

At the Belfast Victoria parkrun in Northern Ireland, an event that features often, Paul Pollock was the fastest on the day and fills the second spot in the men’s rankings. 15:03 is not quite the 14:18 parkrun best of the 2:10:25 marathoner but already has a 2:16 win at the Belfast City marathon this year in May and is possibly targeting one of the Championships this summer. Just not the World Champs I’d guess.

Katrina Rye ran a big parkrun PB, jumping from 17:56 in 2018 to a 17:12 today. We can’t find any more information other than the stats on the parkrun website, so if you do know Katrina and can let us know which club (if any) she runs for or similar then we can add some additional information here.

The third fastest male and female runners this weekend were Lloyd Sheppard of Cardiff AAC and Bryony Haines of Birchfield Harriers, running 15:08 and 17:18 respectively at Aberbeeg and Arrow Valley parkruns.

The fastest course?

Another week that saw 20 different events feature in our rankings and a show of the great strength we see across the UK at parkrun.

An additional note this week that at Castleblayney parkrun in Ireland Ryan McMahon ran a rocket-fast 14:35. So Castleblayney can have the fastest course this weekend.

Women’s top 10

1) parkrun: Wythenshawe
Sophie Wood, 17:02, Sale Harriers Manchester
2) parkrun: Colchester Castle
Katrina Rye, 17:12
2) parkrun: Arrow Valley
Bryony Haines, 17:18, Birchfield Harriers
4) parkrun: Royal Tunbridge Wells
Lauren McNeil, 17:22, Hallamshire Harriers Sheffield AC
5) parkrun: Holyrood
Nancy Scott, 17:23, Aldershot, Farnham & District AC
6) parkrun: Lowestoft  
Maddie Jordan-Lee, 17:24, Stowmarket Striders RC
7) parkrun: Market Harborough
Alice Crane, 17:25
8) parkrun: Porthcrawl
Kate Roberts, 17:29, Bridgend AC
9) parkrun: Stonehouse
Pippa Woolven, 17:33, Wycombe Phoenix Harriers & AC
10) parkrun: Widnes
Imogen Wharton, 17:33, Warrington AC

Men’s top 10

1) parkrun: Rutland Water
James McCrae, 14:53, Hallamshire Harriers Sheffield AC
2) parkrun: Belfast Victoria
Paul Pollock, 15:03, Abbey AC
3) parkrun: Aberbeeg
Lloyd Sheppard, 15:08, Cardiff AAC
4) parkrun: Cannock Chase
Lee Gratton, 15:09, Run and Ride
4) parkrun: Leicester Victoria
Mohammed Hussein, 15:10, Roadhoggs Leicester AC
6) parkrun: Norwich
Nick Earl, 15:14, City of Norwich AC
7) parkrun: Rother Valley
Euan Brown, 15:15, East London Runners
8) parkrun: Lydiard
Ben Cole, 15:22, Tonbridge AC
9) parkrun: Frimley Lodge
Kurt Taylor, 15:25, Ashford AC
10) parkrun: Folkestone
Marshall Smith, 15:26, Ashford AC

If you would like to run faster at parkrun we highly recommend 1001 Running Tips by Robbie Britton, found here.