May really is the best month, isn’t it? weekend report

A few things happened this week. Um. a sub 2 hour marathon attempt, the sun shone for at least 3 days in a row, people are still obsessed with the 3 trigs around Glossop, there was a Gentleman Runners Of Glossop training session around the pubs of the locale where finally, the coots were outnumbered by the moptops and a whole load of people went running at the weekend.

The champs table has of course been modified due to Buxworth 5 this week just gone – check it out to see how you’re doing… remember you need 5 races to qualify in road or fell, and 7 to qualify in the overall champs. Have a look who is around you in the table, set a target on their back and go race!

Bollingworth 3 Peaks

The Bollingworth 3 peaks was raced by the 3 intrepid musketeers from Glossopdale, a radiant Mary Jeal sashayed her way around the hilly course to come in a rather spectacular first Glossopdale female in 128th – 55:28. Considering her performance during the week at Buxworth 5, she made short work of the gradients, and has now sworn only to take part in races beginning with “B”. The somewhat less radiant and slightly more hungover Mark Davenport ran at the hills with brute force and ignorance and forced his way round to take first Glossopdale male – eventually breaking into a sprint in a desperate effort to beat his glassy-eyed self into submission -128th in 53:59. The ever-delightful Alabama Breeze rounded out the trio with a PB performance over both 5 and 10k distances. All 3 of them rounded out the day with a remarkably well earned malt based recovery beverage. Excellent work.

Buxworth 5

ok – so not strictly the weekend, but it was a champs road race this week. Just over the hill in Buxworth, it was a decently little event, and a mass of Blue and Orange descended on the Navigation Inn for the race. It promised to be quite an exciting and close run race throughout the ranks of the massed Glossopdalers. As the Championships go along, the tables are shaping up nicely and skirmishes are occurring all the way up and down the list.

Cutting a rather long story short, Jamie and I battled it out at the front for a while, and ended with a comedic sprint for the line where neither of us really knew quite what was going on, he took the 30 points, and I’d love to say that I let him, but really, it was hard fought for. Skusey ran hard and managed to get the better of Steve Crossman and Caity, putting the victory down to the fact he was running fast to get back to the finish line in order to put his helly back on. Caity managed a last ditch sprint to get away from “overdistance” Crossman at the final gasp. Dan Stinton cruised around without seeing anyone else from the club and serenely cantered into the finish with no-one else near him, as did Will Mather and Guy Riddell. David Chrystie-Lowe was battling demons throughout, seeing the ghost of Stockport harriers vests all around him as he remembered running in a yellow vest last year, he still managed to comfortably come in before the ever increasing in speed – Dez Mitchell. Nick Ham was taking time out from his hundred milers to see the delightful terrain around the Buxworth valley, just about managing to stay ahead of Pete Walroth on the final flat. Heather Jansevska and Mary Jeal had a brilliant back and forth throughout the hills, but it was Heather who held out on the sprint to the line, with Becky Smith, again holding out on the hills, but losing speed on the flat sections coming in just behind them. John Stephenson and Rachel Walton exchanged lead for most of the race, trying various ruses to get the other to lose time, including John pointing out some rather leafy Kale to Rachel in an effort to get her to stop for cuttings, and Rachel offering to pay for Johns pint as they ran past the Old Hall. John held out for the win and a well deserved pint in the Navigation, which he bought himself. Ezme Brack spent the race encouraging her Mum and then blasted away in the final mile to take the family honours. Charmayne, Alison and Beccy Ashworth spent the race as if elastic was tied between them, stretching out on the climbs and then coming back together again on the downhills. Charmayne eventually got the better of the 2 committee members to come to the line first. Malc Brown and Dan Ellingworth knocked spots off each other over the first few kilometres, until eventually Dan had to concede that Malc had superior firepower on the downhill. Gracefully bringing up the rear of the GDH train were the Charlies Angels of the hill, encouraging and swearing at each other in equal measure while escaping from an exploding helicopter – Mandy Beames, Lynne Taylor and Laurie Barlow, I believe there are a few pints being owed for various shoutings and times etc. so expect more of the same! (yay – exploding helicoptors!)

7th Jamie Helmer 31:09
8th Tim Budd 31:13
17th Paul Skuse 33:01
18th Caity Rice 33:12
19th Steve Crossman 33:23
26th Dan Stinton 35:25
34th Will Mather 36:41
41st Guy Riddell 37:35
49th David Chrystie-Lowe 38:31
56th Dez Mitchell 39:44
60th Nick Ham 40:27
63rd Pete Walroth 40:53
66th Heather Janseveka 41:10
70th Mary Jeal 41:19
79th Becky Smith 42:10
86th John Stephenson 43:23
89th Rachel Walton 43:42
92nd Ezme Brack 43:57
94th Jo Brack 44:00
105th Charmayne Brierley 45:16
106th Alison Holt 45:57
111th Beccy Ashworth 46:12
123rd Malc Brown 49:01
133rd Dan Ellingworth 51:58
140th Mandy Beames 52:56
141st Lynne Taylor 52:57
143rd Laurie Barlow 53:16

Wings for Life

In case you don’t know about this one – the basic idea is that a load of runners are set off at various courses around the world at the same time… then, a catcher car is set off at a specific pace behind each of the races and once you are caught by the car, your race finishes. Lovely idea, and Wendy Trelease has been extending her already packed Palmares by heading down to Cambridge for the race down there. She set off at a sustainable pace, keeping ahead of the pacing car for 16 miles until she realised the car was being driven by David Coulthard, and so decided that he had chased her enough by that time. Rumours that post-chase phone numbers were exchanged are purely made up by me.

Whippersnappers

This weekend we had a fair few of the Youth Section out and about at the Marple Junior Parkrun. The Swan girls have evidently been in good training, (so not listening to their Dad then), finishing within 12 seconds of each other, and each getting a new PB – with Caitlin just squeezing Josie out at the end. Adam Crompton put in a marvellous effort to be within 12 seconds of his PB, whilst Wyatt Barlow paced his sister – Naomi – around to a 14min circuit. Superb running from all – and certainly well worth a Grains Croissant as reward… right? (each, not between them… that’d be a bit harsh).

Parkrun corner

Lots of exciting things happened at parkrun today, the main thing is a very convincing continuation of returning to form for Zoe as she came in first Lady with a new PB. A few rather decent PB’s on the back of Buxworth 5 hill training in the form of Heather J and  Mandy were also witnessed. Matt Kieras also took advantage of the dry conditions to PB though whether that was with or without pushchair assistance, I am unable to say, and who can forget that Steve Pepper – almost certainly without pushchair assistance, rocked around in a new PB as well. Must be all the abuse he keeps getting. Full consolidated report here.

Other stuff

Yup – Jude Stansfield was out doing the Kinder Dozen this weekend – which is up and down Kinder (in different places) in a oner – 3000m of ascent. Quite a feat. Nicely done Jude.

No more Champs races this month – but there are quite a few delightful local ones – look out for the 3 days in May – May Queen, Mount Famine (best fell race start – EVER) and Lantern Pike dash (the most mental race you’ll ever do) over in Hayfield. Have a look here for details.