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The 5K run in popular fiction : Reading about parkrun and couch to 5K

Turner, Ellen LU (2023) In Frontiers in Sports and Active Living 5. p.1-11
Abstract
Recent years have witnessed great interest in mass-participation running events (Hindley, 2020), and organisations such as parkrun and fitness programmes like Couch to 5K, have been instrumental in enabling participation for inexperienced runners. Concomitant with this has been a number of fictional works which centre on the 5K run. I contend that exploring fictional texts can offer a fresh take on how movements such as parkrun and Couch to 5K have entered the popular imagination. The four texts explored are Wake’s Saturday Morning Park Run (2020), Park’s A Run in the Park (2019), Boleyn’s Coming Home to Cariad Cove (2022), and James’s I Follow You (2020). The analysis is arranged thematically around the categories of health promotion,... (More)
Recent years have witnessed great interest in mass-participation running events (Hindley, 2020), and organisations such as parkrun and fitness programmes like Couch to 5K, have been instrumental in enabling participation for inexperienced runners. Concomitant with this has been a number of fictional works which centre on the 5K run. I contend that exploring fictional texts can offer a fresh take on how movements such as parkrun and Couch to 5K have entered the popular imagination. The four texts explored are Wake’s Saturday Morning Park Run (2020), Park’s A Run in the Park (2019), Boleyn’s Coming Home to Cariad Cove (2022), and James’s I Follow You (2020). The analysis is arranged thematically around the categories of health promotion, individual transformation, and community building. I argue that these texts frequently operate as health promotional tools and can help familiarise would-be runners with how parkrun and Couch to 5K work. (Less)
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author
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
in
Frontiers in Sports and Active Living
volume
5
pages
11 pages
publisher
Frontiers Media S. A.
external identifiers
  • scopus:85149375827
  • pmid:36860736
ISSN
2624-9367
DOI
10.3389/fspor.2023.1031934
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
b5cf2629-2b8a-4656-9738-cd69d6443f7f
date added to LUP
2023-01-31 13:20:51
date last changed
2023-05-03 03:00:05
@article{b5cf2629-2b8a-4656-9738-cd69d6443f7f,
  abstract     = {{Recent years have witnessed great interest in mass-participation running events (Hindley, 2020), and organisations such as parkrun and fitness programmes like Couch to 5K, have been instrumental in enabling participation for inexperienced runners. Concomitant with this has been a number of fictional works which centre on the 5K run. I contend that exploring fictional texts can offer a fresh take on how movements such as parkrun and Couch to 5K have entered the popular imagination. The four texts explored are Wake’s Saturday Morning Park Run (2020), Park’s A Run in the Park (2019), Boleyn’s Coming Home to Cariad Cove (2022), and James’s I Follow You (2020). The analysis is arranged thematically around the categories of health promotion, individual transformation, and community building. I argue that these texts frequently operate as health promotional tools and can help familiarise would-be runners with how parkrun and Couch to 5K work.}},
  author       = {{Turner, Ellen}},
  issn         = {{2624-9367}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  month        = {{02}},
  pages        = {{1--11}},
  publisher    = {{Frontiers Media S. A.}},
  series       = {{Frontiers in Sports and Active Living}},
  title        = {{The 5K run in popular fiction : Reading about parkrun and couch to 5K}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fspor.2023.1031934}},
  doi          = {{10.3389/fspor.2023.1031934}},
  volume       = {{5}},
  year         = {{2023}},
}