Hesketh Park run breaks national records 

The huge success of Southport parkrun has hit a new record for the national event in the number of visually impaired runners taking part.

The parkrun in Hesketh Park, which is celebrating its first anniversary in June, attracted five visually impaired entrants each with a guide which is more than any of the other 594 parkruns staged throughout the UK each week.
“This is a great achievement for Southport,” said Event Director Keith Lunt. The Southport parkrun had set the previous national record of four visually impaired runners and their guides participating and now they’ve surpassed that figure, which is tremendous. Reaching out to visually impaired people who wanted to improve their fitness was the idea of Mike Leatherbarrow, one of the parkrun Core Team and a guide runner for several years. 

“Since we started we’ve averaged 207 runners a week although we’ve not dropped below 230 since before Christmas. Typically, we’re seeing 30-40 new runners each week.”