On Saturday 3,000 runners across the county participated in the popular free events which take place each week.

In Ipswich, men, women, babies in strollers, and even a few dogs, participated in the parkrun at Christchurch park – which delighted organisers with a record 502 participants.

Ipswich parkrun event director Graham Rodgers, put the success of last Saturday’s parkrun down to the “gorgeous weather”, a higher than average number of tourists and the Easter holiday spirit.

Mr Rodgers said: “ It was a fantastic sight to see 500 people running around the park, every individual with a story to tell.

“I’m so proud of everyone and the best thing of all is we get to do it all again next Saturday.”

He added that numbers of people running and walking parkruns in Suffolk has increased over the last six months, with more and more people registering for the event.

Lowestoft parkrun was another to break the magical 500 barrier for the first time, smashing Suffolk’s all time record.

A total of 566 people took part on their run along the resort’s seafront.

Jen Evans, director of Kesgrave parkrun, said: “It was amazing to see so many people come out on Saturday morning.

“The glorious weather and the Easter break certainly helped as does the buzz that surrounds marathon season with many of our runners having already done marathons this year and some doing the London Marathon this Sunday.

“Kesgrave parkrun is a very inclusive parkrun with fast runners and walkers all taking part regularly and reaping the benefit of being engaged with a community event.

“As we approach our 250th event in a few weeks we are loving the people of Kesgrave embracing their local parkrun.”

At the end of last year a GP surgery in Leiston became the first in Suffolk to prescribe parkruns to patients who could benefit from a more active lifestyle.

Parkruns are 5km long and take place at 9am every Saturday morning.

The inspiring video taken at the start of the busy Lowestoft parkrun was filmed by Chris Matthews.