As we pulled into the car park I shouted out ‘that’s the GB Olympic gold medallist, the one who did the canoe slalom’

Mum – ‘who?’

Me – ‘Joe…joe something. Wait let me google it. Dave hurry up and park the car, lets go and get a photo’

But we’d missed him, or so I thought. Upon entering the park we saw Joe Clarke and Richard Hounslow in their full team GB kit along with their medals at parkrun as part of the #IamTeamGB campaign across the UK yesterday.

Of course I didn’t shy away from getting a photo with them, especially Joe who Tom and I had stayed up to watch when he competed in Rio. He asked if I wanted to hold his gold medal, warned me it was heavy and then I immediately nearly dropped it.

It was super cool getting to compare Richard’s London and Rio silver medals – did you know the Rio medals are actually a little thicker (and maybe heavier?).

It was my Mum’s first ever parkrun, I had to tell her that this was not a normal parkrun! It was her first 5K run so she started at the back, whilst Dave (my step-dad) and I settled in towards the middle of the pack.

I said that I didn’t want to run with him as I’ve been really struggling with my pace at the moment and just wanted to plug my headphones in and run without worrying about anything else…

I turned on my Strava as I’d forgotten to bring a watch with me, and set off, listening to the totally wrong playlist (far too slow!) Instead of focusing on pace I just kept pushing forward, picking people off and trying to overtake them. This worked pretty well on the first 1.5 mile lap, however I found it hard to pick up the pace on the second lap.

I could see Dave two people ahead of me and was determined to overtake him, sprinting it in on the final bit was it wasn’t quite enough! I finished in 26.26 with a bright red face. It was definitely hot out there.

I knew my Mum was still somewhere out on the course, although I was glad that we hadn’t lapped her. I decided to walk back to try to find her, cheering people on as they finished their runs. Upon finding her I took her water bottle and ran along next to her, trying to give her tips for taking in more oxygen. She did have to walk once (she later told me that she thought she was about to be sick! thankfully she wasn’t) but we soon picked it up again.

I am so proud of her – she finished in 42.36.