The first ‘quiet’ week of 2019?

It is a short and sweet roundup this week – still quite a lot of people out running but not so much racing and absolutely no-one taking any photos!  A quick scroll through Strava suggests that this will all change in the next couple of weeks what with half/ full marathon training, HPM reccie-ing and the like.

XC (write up courtesy of Jo Brack)

Due, in part, to a reduced train timetable, there were just 5 GDHers for muddy fun at the final MACCL XC fixture on Saturday, Charmayne and myself for the girls and David Chrystie-Lowe, Andy Burnett and Joe Travis representing the guys.  It was over at Kenworthy Woods near Wythenshaw, a mainly flat course with a few undulations in the wooded area. The sun even came out for a little while. Everyone tried their very best of course!  The provisional results suggest that, in the women’s race, Jo was 149^th and Charmayne was 188^th and, in the men’s race, Joe came 145^th followed by Andy in 227^th place and Dave in place 303.

Doctor’s Gate  (write up courtesy of Guy Riddell)

Only myself and Rich White ran for GDH today, was cracking route, really hard going with a bit of weather thrown in too for good measure. My first AL fell race, and I struggled to be fair. Highlight was seeing Paul Skuse dressed up like the Michelin man at Dog Rock. Lowlight was seeing Paul Skuse from the bottom of Dog Rock and seeing how far up he was.  Needless to say I was 2nd Harrier. Chris Jackson, Frank Fielding & Steve Knowles (3rd overall) were also running albeit in their away kit.

Long Mynd

Lins Palmer was taking it easy this weekend opting to race on just the one day, this time heading to Shropshire for the Long Mynd Valleys Race.  I cannot find any photographic evidence however Lins was 4th W50 in about 3 hours so I assume she raced hard and enjoyed herself…probably.

Carnethy 5

Matt Huxford and Tim Culshaw appear to have been racing north of the border, taking part in the 49th Carnethy 5 Hill Race.  Looking at the photos on the Carnethy website, the team prizes appear to be claymores.  For those of you who, like me, may be unfamiliar with late medieval weaponry, these are Scottish variants of massive swords (typically two-handed or basket-hilted).  Much more dangerous that our typical southern cups or plaques and, I assume, much more difficult to fit in one’s trophy cabinet.

Leodis Marathon

Marie Williamson continues to educate us on the Marathons of the UK, this week completing the Leodis Grim Marathon in just over 4½ hours.  Based on the blurb, the race is grim because it takes in the sites of a number of grizzly historical happenings (madness, murder, torture, explosions etc) rather than because of the weather or the route (which sounds rather nice – a 2 lap course along river, canal and woods somewhere in Yorkshire). 

Parkrun

There was a fair amount of parkrun tourism happening this week with Will Mather and Ian Crutchley joining Nick Ham at Woodbank, David Munday venturing over to Sale Waterpark and Emma Peters checking out the parkrun at Gateshead.  The GDH massive were also represented at Hackney Marshes (Jonathon H.), Medina IOW (Claire C.) and, of course, Glossop (16 of you).

Junior parkrunday saw the Wallroths and the Swans laying it down at Marple whilst half of Team Barlow (Naomi) was in action at Hyde.

Official Stuff

If you would like to spend another year as part of this amazing running community, the deadline for subs payment is 28^th Feb.  Details are on the GDH FB page or, if you have any queries, our lovely membership secretary can be reached via membership.secgdh@gmail.com.

We are still looking for one or more people to take over as RO (or Joint ROs) for the mid-week treat that is the Herod Farm Fell Race.  If you are able to take on this highly rewarding role please let either Sikobe or the Committee know.

Great running everyone – it has been a pleasure researching all of your racing adventures this week.   Don’t forget, the weekly roundup team love to hear about your GDH-related antics and we have a special email address for your reports, updates and photos – gdhweeklyreports@gmail.com.