Ongoing numbers for the Glengarriff and Castlehaven parkruns

Following on from the post about the second anniversary of the Bere Island parkrun, I had a look at the numbers for the other two parkruns in West Cork...Glengarriff and Castlehaven. Both began in January of 2016 and the numbers are shown below.

Glengarriff 5k parkrun...

As you can see from the chart above, it started off with the usual surge that accompanies most new parkruns but it took quite a while for the numbers to drop off. In June, they were pretty poor before recovering somewhat during the tourist season in August.

I'm not exactly sure why the numbers were reasonable in March & April and so poor in June when the weather might be a bit nicer?

As the winter approaches, it'll be even more challenging for the numbers to hold up. One of the issues with Glengarriff is that it is pretty remote. The local population of Glengarriff is only about 800 and the nearest large town is Bantry (pop 3300) which is a 20 min drive away. Add in a return trip and that's 40 mins of driving for a 5k run.

Castlehaven 5k parkrun...

The numbers in Castlehaven have been more consistent than Glengarriff and this is probably due to the fact that it is only a 10 minute drive from the town of Skibbereen (pop 2500). It has been averaging about 40-50 per week for the last few weeks and shows no sign of dropping.

This was set up by a local GAA club so that may well be another source of local support.

If you are thinking of trying a new parkrun then both these ones are pretty nice. They are set in woodland and are worth the trip especially if it's a nice sunny day.