London; beyond Government
It’s amazing to think that we’re already at the end of week five of our Participate World journey. Yet, whilst the time has absolutely flown by, we also seem to have done so many things and spent time with so many incredible people. And the last five days have been no different…
Most importantly, we have now committed to a weekly staff running session, leaving one of our two head offices (Chris’ kitchen or my kitchen) at 11am every Monday. With so much of our vision based on our belief that all human beings have an innate need to be outdoors, active, and social, we felt it was important to kick each week off with a reminder to ourselves of those principles.
On Tuesday we headed down to London, which unusually was somewhat colder than our North Yorkshire base, and straight to the Foreign Office in King Charles Street, to hook up with a number of Chris’ previous colleagues. We feel incredibly passionate about championing the many great community sport initiatives already doing brilliant things in the UK, and working with the UK Foreign Office to share best practice around the world. It obviously helps conversations when so many people have experienced parkrun themselves, including the previous High Commissioner to Eswatini who’d taken part in the Mbabane parkrun on multiple occasions!
Talking of great community initiatives in the UK, we managed to catch up with Ivo Gormley, the Founder of GoodGym, for a fascinating chat about the true power of community sport and the importance of engineering in ‘friction’. Tasks that require human interaction and provide both purpose and value, plus bring people together in a collaborative effort for wider good, really are the glue that hold everything together. Ivo is a true thought leader in community engagement, and it was an honour to hear his thoughts on how we might make the world a better place.
Alongside all of that, it was also brilliant to spend time with Claire Oxlade and Rebecca Sugden, sit down with Jen Browning PLY & Chris Harvey from the international team at UK Sport, and Russell James of BAZBALLERS CONSULTING LTD.
And here we are, once again it’s Friday, and we’re looking forward to a weekend of re-charging with our families, before picking up again on Monday.
So, thanks again, as always, for your incredible passion and support for our efforts to build communities around the world through grass-roots sport.
Finally, do check out www.participateworld.org and let us know what you think.
📷 Me & Chris Lomax MBE at the UK Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO)