Okehampton Community Recreation Association (OCRA) is looking to start weekly parkrun in Simmons Park in Okehampton.

It is looking for at least 12-16 volunteers to help to set up the five kilometre route and has started asking the Okehampton running club if any members are interested. However, it urges anyone - runner or not - to get involved.

‘I am a massive advocate for parkrun,’ said OCRA general manager Ian Blythe. ‘At the moment we are looking to see if anyone’s interested but even if we do not garner the interest I will continue to push for it.’

In the past, OCRA had about 16 regular volunteers over the last 18 months people have moved away or changed address so a new shout-out to those interested is necessary.

This is the first time that a parkrun will take place in Okehampton and Mr Blythe believes that it won’t be long before it begins as a regular event.

He said: ‘It could be as quick as six weeks but it’s likely to be January before it happens.’

Parkrun is open to people of all abilities. Mr Blythe said: ‘The routes that we’ll run are all level. It’s all gravel and it can be done in a buggy or wheelchair. It’s all inclusive,’ he said.

‘There are no losers in parkrun. It’s a community thing. The taking part is more important than the running. You could walk it or do it with your dog and the social side of things, the community side should be a major benefit.

‘Obviously, it’s also beneficial for your physical health, you prescribe parkrun as exercise for people.’

Finish times are recorded but instead of medals or trophies, runners receive a token corresponding to the finish time.

Those who run regularly can receive parkrun milestone t-shirts of varying colours depending on the number of parkruns they have completed.

Runners can earn purple (25 runs), red (50 runs), black (100 runs), green (250 runs) or blue (500 runs) t-shirts.

People who are unable to run can volunteer at the events and can also earn milestone t-shirts.

All participants must register in order to take part and once in the system will receive a unique bar code and ‘A’ number.

Children aged four to 14 can also join in the fun. A two kilometre junior parkrun takes place each Sunday morning. Children earn white milestone t-shirts for both volunteering and running.

Those interested in volunteering need to inform Mr Blythe and send him their name and ‘A’ number, if they have one, via OCRA’s Facebook page or email it to [email protected] Blythe will register anyone who does not currently have an ‘A’ number so that they can receive their unique parkrun ID.

Parkrun is a free international community event in which participants run, walk or jog five kilometres every Saturday morning. Parkrun was started by Simon Sinton-Hewitt and originally took place in Bushy Park in Teddington, London in 2004.

There were only 13 participants in the first run and it was two years before the run spread to Wimbledon, London.

It has continued to expand across the globe and there are now over 2000 locations in 22 countries including Australia, the United States and Germany. There are over 700 parkrun locations in the UK alone.