No pics weekend report. Sorry.

Thank to all contributors this month, including a double up on parkrun and Bamford, (don’t worry, I amalgamated them). In order of um, well, no particular order actually… Skusey, Nev, MarkyD, DanE, Jeroen, Lynne and IanC.

Bamford Carnival

Bamford Carnival Fell Race. Not as sunny as the last few races and with a fair bit more humidity, this was a surprisingly tough little race. This may have something to do with setting off like a loon, trying to keep in the mix with a particularly strong field. Ben T showed his class just by basically jogging for the first mile then just blasting his way past us mere mortals. He bagged the V40 and 7th overall. I took 16th, Heather J rocking an icy blue hairdo took 93rd, Mary J took 129th, and the Mcgraws claimed 157th (Neil) and 162nd and V70 for Nev. Hope you like the carrot cake Nev 🙂  Let’s get a few more GDH out and about for the midweek races – you don’t want the likes of Pennine getting better results than us do you?

Ben 6th 31.42
Skusey 16th 33.47
Heather 93rd 42.03
Mary 129th 46.22
Neil 157th 50.31
Nev 162nd 52.35

Sale Sizzler

From Nev… Three Harriers travelled to Wythenshawe Park to compete at the second race in the Sale Sizzler 5K series. Results:-

Neil McGraw 22.53

Tony Hillier 23.42 2nd V70

Nev McGraw 26.18 3rd V70

All three improved on their time from the first race:- Tony by 2 seconds , Nev by 38 seconds and Neil by 61 seconds. All received a well stocked bag courtesy of major sponsor Decathlon.

Kerridge climb

From Ian Crutchley: This category A Short race, or “AS”, really redefines the S, and I would argue warrants a whole new category.  The “A-VF-S” race – I’ll let you decide what the extra letters stand for.  At 1 mile and  about 350ft of ascent there is a lot packed in to be fair, and with juniors being able to run the same race as the adults, it seemed a good opportunity to have a drive out.  So Melissa and I set of for Rainow Village Fete, and were surprised to find a fair number of serious lads and lasses, in addition to the many kids you would expect.   Liss and I hung back while the majority set off like the clappers, and then gradually clawed back the places through the steep climb to Kerridge Ridge trig point.  A short traverse of the ridge and we dropped rapidly to a quite dramatic finish funnel where it seemed the whole village out and cheering.  We stumbled through in 42nd and 43rd place.  Melissa finished 1st under 9 girl, and did better than I could have hoped on this route.  I had a burger, but FFS, it was VF£ and XFS.

Holme Moss Fell Race

Despite the excellent reccying weather over the past few months it seems that not everyone took full advantage, meaning there were a fair few navigational embarrassments during the clag fest that ensued at this year’s Holme Moss Fell Race. 4 of our lot took part, but we only had 3 finishers due to an early retirement from Zoe due to various nefarious issues. Ben Tetler continued his good form, transitioning well from the shorter painfests to the longer races, coming in 4th and first v40 in 2:52. Mark Davenport has been adding to his AL experience being the 2nd gdh in… Unfortunately the photo he sent me didn’t include his position, but I can tell you he completed in 3:52.  John Stephenson decided he would go long and got his moneys worth, finally deigning it time to arrive back after about 4:36.Simon Toole has been out there cutting his teeth on the longer and more challenging races, and I dare say that he is almost more of an accomplished fellrunner than his neighbour Mr crossman, despite only having been at it for about a year! Si finished in 5:00. Tis a tough old race that one. Well run one and all.

Parkrun

A record-breaking day at Glossop parkrun for the Harriers. First of all, a slew of Harriers (correct collective noun?) reached various milestones: Lawrence Fennelly returned to this parish to run his 100th Parkrun… With a PB… and was joined on that mark by Christine Peters. Steve Crossman and Jo Brack reached 50. And then Paul Peters, having set a PB a few weeks ago, set a new mark not just for himself, but as the fastest ever Harriers parkrun at Glossop – 17.16. Spectacular running.   Phil Swan finally broke that elusive 70% age-grading. Dan Stinton got his first PB in over a year, reducing his time by almost 50 secs, whilst Dez Mitchell continued his inexorable speeding-up-ness with a sub22 PB. Jeroen also followed suit this week enjoying a 10second PB.

Other stuff

Previously/currently of this parish, Caity Rice was 4th overall and 1st non-international runner at the Snowdon race this weekend, and was in spitting distance of 3rd. (Not recommended, BTW)
The “annual” gdh/pennine challenge has been issued. Im sure you’ve all seen the note from Charlie. It’s on the morning of the proposed bbq/party at Ben’s… So a ideal time to get some exercise in before eating vast amounts of Pavlova. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, email me or look at the front page of the website.

Apologies if this is formatted weirdly. I’m trying to do this on a smartphone….