Its the Weekend Report!

Its another week pretty much dominated by Marathons, but a few other things happened too, so lets get straight into it, who dun what?

Beachy Head Marathon

Very little gets in the way of Ian Jackson and a race at the moment, and this weekend he went South, about as South as South goes before you fall off. And a marathon no less, which due to some flooding on the usual route, was swapped to 2 loops of the half marathon route. And that’s pretty tough with almost 3,000ft climb.

No official results available but according to his Strava, Ian made it around in just over 5 hours.

• 

• 

Newport Marathon

Chris Smith was down in South Wales doing his first road marathon.

Chris looks to have been doing brilliantly, really consistent pace, until a groin strain put an end to that in mile 18. Still, he soldiered on and still managed a very respectable time of 3:23:49 (unofficial).

Liverpool Rock & Roll Marathon, Half and 5K

Guy Riddell was running the Marathon today, the 7th and last version of the Liverpool R&R there will be I understand. Guy has managed to run every one of these, but Im afraid I do not have a time for him.

Excellent PB action from Kevin David and Tim Crookes today in the Half Marathon. Again, no official results which is very surprising in this day and age, but according to Strava, Tim did 1:48:19 and we hear Kevin around 1:51.

More impressive still, Tim did the Rock & Roll 5k the day before, also getting a PB in 24:22.

Well done guys.

Great to see club legend Tony Hillier on hand to offer support and words of wisdom (i.e. keep running, and if you can run faster!)

Battersea Peak Autumn Dawn 10K

Another one of our number found themselves darn sarf this weekend, with Emma Peters out for blood in Battersea Park. Emma managed a brilliant 10K time, and a PB, with 44:46. Nice one Emma!

• 

Cross Country, SELCC Heaton Park

The SELCC team was out causing carnage at Heaton Park this week. Some great running here, not least from Frank Fielding, who sent this in….

Saturday  afternoon brought an influx of colour, noise and movement to Heaton Park for the first meeting of the South East Lancashire Cross Country League. For the second week on the trot, the weather and ground conditions for XC racing were good, with just enough  mud to scruff up the shoes. We had enough blue and orange clad warriors, to field teams for both the men and women.

The women were off first at 1:40 as Cheryl Stitt, Emma Rettig, and Wendy  Trelease, set off to do battle with the field of 91 runners.

Cheryl set a strong pace to storm home in 20th place, and not too far behind was an exciting duel between Emma and Wendy, with Emma just managing  to hold Wendy off by a slim 2 seconds  margin.

The collective effort brought a respectable 9th team placing, and, a very  respectable 4th place LV40 spot.

Cheryl Stitt           20th (5th LV45)  37:00

Emma Rettig        37th (6th LV40)  39:29

Wendy Trelease   38th (8th LV45) 39:31

• 

• 

• 

The mens race was away at 2:20 with 127 on the start line. Our male muddyfoots had a distinctive elderly feel to it with 3 of our 5 team members clocking a combined age of 200. (John Pollard,  David Christie-Lowe and Frank Fielding) Fortunately, this was tempered by the young gun, Nat Hicks and ever competitive Paul Skuse.

Nat showed his class with a 17th placing, with Skusey finishing not so many places behind. Further down the field, David, Frank and John ran their own personal battles with those around them to finish with respectability and competitiveness.

Decent overall team placing of 8th with a big bonus 2nd place in the V60 placings.

Nat Hicks                      17th  38:21

Paul Skuse                    31st   39:37 (5th V45)

David Christie-Lowe    80th  46:34 (4th V60)

Frank Fielding              92nd   47:52  (1st V70)

John Pollard                 109th 51:08  (8th V60) 

It was great to have support around the course from Ben Robertson and Phil Trelease.  Good videos from Ben and excellent photos courtesy of Phil.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

Parkrun

Lots of parkrun tourism this week, with Dez Mitchell at Hyde, Alan Tainsh at Greenock, William and David Munday at Horrogate, Paul Amos at Lyme Park, Wyatt and Laurie Barlow at Conwy, Joe Travis at Stamford Park, Paul Gatley at Fleetwood, and finally Chris Webb absolutely nailed Oldham parkrun coming first in 17:37 and a PB to boot.

But the majority of the action at Glossop as ever. Sue Venton managed a great PB with 27:42.

2021 Virtual Club Championships

A message from the Champs Sub Committee this week….

We do hope you’re enjoying the 2021 Virtual Club Champs!! From the start, it has relied on your honesty, and your ability to follow the rules when there’s nobody there to check. Otherwise it just wouldn’t work at all. There isn’t anyone to police it, and it would be impractical and unfair to attempt to do so. So whilst it isn’t perfect, and we’re still learning, the overall series has been an amazing success in terms of participation!

We kindly ask that we continue in the same vein as we approach the conclusion of the champs. New Glossop Fell Race is a tough navigational challenge, where competitors must visit a series of checkpoints in order. A few minor route mistakes have been made, but please don’t worry. We’re not looking to DQ anyone! If you made a mistake, please assess it and add on the appropriate number of minutes for any time you would have saved as a result (please don’t deduct minutes for mistakes that cost you time, nice try!). If you’re not sure, then I can help. Submit this overall time as you normally would.

We also ask that you continue to observe the rules of the Champs, and particularly those that relate to safety. There may or may not have been some deviations from these rules, and whilst again we cannot and will not police these cases, the rules are there to keep you all safe and ensure fairness. We want you to do your best in these champs, but not at the cost of your safety. After all, its just a bit of internal fun where there’s not that much to win, but an awful lot to lose!

Personally I’m really excited about what the next couple of months will bring, and how it will affect the tables. Please note there will be a presentation at the Christmas Do. Please also remember that to qualify for the Overall Champs, you need to do at least 5 challenges, plus one of the anytime challenges – either the Strava Mile (Simmondley Trail), or Glossop parkrun. Ideally do them all, as there’s no cap on the number of points you can accumulate!

Aside this, and whist we’ve got your attention here, we would welcome feedback from the members about this years Champs, positive, negative or suggestions going forward. To a great extent, it will likely influence how we format the champs for 2022. You can comment on the Facebook thread or email me if you prefer, so I can collate the responses for the Champs Committee. Thanks. Ian.crutchley@hotmal.com

Well I think that’s about it that I know of, but as always, we love reading and compiling tales of everyone’s racing exploits.  Keep running, and stay safe!  gdhweeklyreports@gmail.com.