Feltham parkrun #22 - 20/07/19

Parkrun ambassadors and the Feltham parkrun core team

The two closest London parkruns are located in Southwest London less than 2k apart. One of the events, Feltham parkrun, is held behind a barbed wire fence. 

Started on 23/02/2019 the core team brings all the parkrun benefits to Feltham Young Offenders Institute (YOI) for the upliftment of the inmates and probably the prison staff. 

Formed following a merger of Feltham Borstal and Ashford Remand Centre, in 1991, Feltham YOI has boys between 15-18 and young adult males. An unannounced Inspection in 2017 found that ‘...juvenile units, taken together were not safe for either staff or boys and that violence had increased in the section for older young men…’. As a Personal Adviser working with care leavers, I’ve been to Feltham YOI many times and heard first-hand accounts about the culture of violence, crying in cells and feelings of despair. My job is not to judge young people but to help them, so when this opportunity came up to visit/participate at this event I jumped at the chance.   

I turned up outside along with numerous parkrun ambassadors and the Feltham core team. I’m familiar with the security checks and protocols but today I was taken through different passages before arriving at where the run takes place. The core team briefed us and then the young people came and joined. Many were ‘hench’, eyes down and walking with some swag. Some were doing the volunteering roles with one young person doing the first-timers welcome without making eye contact with anyone 🙂

We lined up, there was a countdown and then we were off with many of the young people running as if this was the 100m rather than a 5k. 

It’s a 3 lap course running along the perimeter fence, with barbed wire along it and through an exercise courtyard. Some prison officers were marshalling and the imposing prison building cast an ominous shadow at parts. At the prison gate all watches had been handed in so I was running blind, I found a rhythm and then had a good shake down to the line with one of the boys. 

There’s often a release of endorphins at the end of a run and it was no different here. As they finished, the boys no longer had that weighty look from when they came out, they were simply young people again; laughing swapping stories about their runs and at ease with themselves. I was asked where I was from to which I replied, ‘Peckham’. Word spread that ‘man was from endz’ and I made a point of speaking to all the boys, high-fiving some, explaining about being in the 250 club to how the skills I’d learnt through parkrun volunteering help me in my everyday life and how running has improved my confidence. 

There are a disproportionate number of care-experienced people in the prison estate therefore I prided myself on being able to share with them that parkrun’s founder, Paul Sinton-Hewit had grown up in care too. It was amazing to see their faces go from disbelief to awe and then ‘what if’, it’s also great to seeing this in a young person’s eyes. 

The core team closed down the event and we walked into the indoor gym. The boys had to put the regulation bibs back on and were escorted away. The energy was palpable, I know many of these boys won’t have visits from anyone for weeks, months, and sometimes years.

When people are released from prison often they’re on a licence agreement drawn up by their probation officer. For people who have done parkrun in a prison I’d like for their licence agreement to include participating in the local parkrun event. Too many young people fail to integrate effectively back into the community once they have been to jail, this might be a way to reverse that worrying trend.