Start times at both the brand new Wallaby Track parkrun, which had its first running on Saturday and the Ballarat parkrun at Victoria Park, have been staggered to allow people to complete both courses.

The Wallaby Track parkrun, which had 160 participants in its inaugural event on December 28, will start at 8am, while the Victoria Park parkrun will begin at 9.30am.

Both events are free, timed 5km events, with runners and walkers of all speeds encouraged to take part.

There are even some hardcore runners who plan to run the Wallaby Track course, then jog the 6.9km to Victoria Park for the second parkrun.

The launch of the Wallaby Track event is another sign of the traction the grassroots running phenomenon is gaining in Ballarat.

It began in Ballarat in June 2015, a little over a decade after the first parkrun took place at Bushy Park in south-west London.

Founded by Englishman Paul Sinton-Hewitt, the parkrun movement was born in October 2004. There are now more than 1,400 parkruns in 22 countries across five continents. The first parkrun in Australia started on the Gold Coast in 2011.

Earlier this year, the Victoria Park event was held for the 200^th time, an occasion marked by the opportunity to "beat" Steve Moneghetti, who volunteered to be a tail walker.

That event, probably not coincidentally, also attracted a record number of participants, with 320 people turning up for the chance to say they had finished in front of the Ballarat marathon great.

On Saturday, there was a combined total of 312 runners and walkers who took part in both Ballarat parkruns, with 160 completing the new Wallaby Track Course, and 152 at Victoria Park.

Organisers believe that the number of participants combined in the city will continue to climb, with a second event allowing more people to take part.

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