With the focus of mourning for Her Majesty the Queen having moved to London and Windsor, running events in the South of England have rightly been affected and there has been a number of cancellations or postponements as the National Mourning period continues until the State Funeral on Monday (19 September) which has been declared a UK Bank Holiday.

parkrun UK issued a statement for volunteer organisers that did not require events to cancel, leaving individual parkruns to feel comfortable to pay their respects in any way they saw fit. The parkrun guidance read: "As local communities, where people come together to be active, outdoors, and social, we believe that parkrun events can play an important role in helping us get through challenging times, and as such, we look to keep them open wherever possible."

Of course, some parkruns chose to cancel or were requested to cancel by local landowners and that was also the case for several major running events, including the Richmond RUN-FEST due to take place on the previous weekend of 10-11 September.

The 10th anniversary Richmond RUN-FEST will now take place on 8-9 October and organisers are working feverishly to put together the full programme of races in a very short time. Race Director Tom Bedford issued this heartfelt statement on his event website: 

"The passing of Her Majesty The Queen has left us all deeply shocked and saddened. We are now in mourning for our longest-reigning monarch who dedicated her life to our country and our sincere condolences go to the Royal Family. This weekend was to be a celebration of months of training, fundraising, and personal dedication, however, it is with broken hearts that we are having to postpone this weekend."

"The GoFundMe Richmond RUN-FEST event is hugely unique and we are proud to be in the Borough of Richmond, running through Royal Botanic Gardens, a location owned in part by Historic Royal Palaces and past a floral tribute to the Queen in Old Deer Park. It is for these reasons that the events now cannot take place and this event will have to be re-scheduled". 

The past weekend of 17-18 September saw more than 10 events cancelled or postponed but many races did go ahead, perhaps in the stoical spirit of our late monarch, who carried on steadfastly throughout good and bad times for more than 70 years. 

We'll bring you some of the stories from the weekend's events on our Newsdesk later this week. 

Meanwhile, keep an eye on our comprehensive Race Listing for all the latest information. 

Image courtesy parkrun marketing