Hi All,

The weather could have been a bit nicer, but it could have been a lot worse too. There was a constant drizzle of rain throughout the whole event. The best was saved for the end as the last half mile was into the strongest wind of the day.

With Gary Rushmer not taking part, it was left to Chris Kelly to take the crown in a time of 21:05. This was after his warm up from work on the Bath Road. Less than a minute back was Richard Ruffell (21:52) who was running the event for the first time in about 10 years. Let’s hope it’s not another 10 before we see him again. In third place and great to see back running again was Toby Houghton (22:31). In the ladies event Clare Regale-Day (37:06) has taken the crown. She might have been the only lady running, but she beat everyone that didn’t turn up, so well done. Disappointingly there were no teams this year.

Thanks to Brian Forrester & Paul Brandon for their time keeping and on the day co-ordination. Thanks to Paul Brandon for his First Aid support, which thankfully nobody needed and to Tom Rowley for on route marshalling duties. And finally thanks to all of the you for turning out and raising funds for the White Lodge Charity.

The 'Round the Park' race is scheduled to take place at Waterside on Tuesday 13th September 2016, so don't forget to put the date in the dairy. I will send out some more details nearer the time.

Paul Knechtl

South of England Cross Country Championships Parliament Hill Results

Back in November Julie Barclay said she would like to enter a Major XC Champs for the challenge/experience so we (Julie) suggested the South-of-England Champs at Parliament Hill    OUCH!  We(Julie) started on a 6 week schedule (a relaxing Christmas week period)

A six day week -- five of them running one hour on grass/mud and one on road. 

One run was from Bishop Gate Windsor onto horse sandy bridle path to the copper horse, down the Long Walk on grass, left at gate along alleyway full of mud then left up Queen Ann drive then back onto sandy path to Bishops Gate.

Another run was the Stoke Park 5k course {Upton Court parkrun} twice (10k).

Another run was 2 miles on hilly sand dunes for 20 mins then run for 1/2 hour.

Arrived on the day on 30th January confident we (Julie) had prepared properly although the mud was more like TREACLE.  This was also Julie's first time running from a club PEN at the start.

Many of you are aware of the first 1/2 mile climb including some of our girls in the past; all went well coming up, then into the quagmire (I witnessed three lost shoes).  After the first 2 mile lap Julie looked comfy/smiling and in the finishing "SAFE FAIL AREA" 1/2 mile still smiling and in no trouble to finish in 43.13 (her time) - {Official time 43:15, position 304th of 501 women)

She had achieved her target. Julie's remarks after: "I enjoyed it with no team/individual pressure", "Just run and think who put all this mud in my way".  The worst part? "The final flat 300m where 5 girls went past me"

Julie would like to thank the "Good luck" emails from the lads and pals at work.

One absentee today - Harry Wilde.  I have competed against Harry here 4/5 times and over the past 10 to 15 years Harry has been chief marshal at the top of the first hill, his day starting at 9.30 until 4.00.  But not today - I missed you Harry.

Today it was really " 'appy 'amsted" for Julie and I was also " 'appy"  for Julie.  Julie's next race is on the 27th Feb., in the Orlando 5k event while on leave.

Tom Rowley

parkrun Tourism - new events

There were two big inaugural events Saturday just, only one of which was promoted.

The promoted one was the first Paris parkrun at (or in) Bois de Boulogne.  This attracted a field of 41 runners over half of whom were clearly not Paris based but there were a significant number of first parkrunners including some with French sounding names.  The Les Dougnes (Beudeux) parkrun has had a maximum attendance of just 22 so Paris is well ahead already.  Six parkrunners have run at both French parkruns and hence appear on the French site "Most Events" table. More on that in just a mo.

The un-promoted inaugural parkrun was at Tooting Common in Wandsworth.  This parkrun has had a difficult birth with the local council being dead against any event taking place in one of their parks without a fee being paid and without a commitment to limit numbers to a maximum of 100 participants. Progress has been made to the point whereby the parkrun can run as per normal parkrun arrangements (free and unrestricted) for a trial period.  The local and national parkrun organisation were very concerned that the first event could be overwhelmed by hundreds of parkrun tourists and the first event might also become the last. They had put the word that although anyone was free to attend they would prefer it if tourists stayed away until the event had become established.  On Saturday the event went ahead with 200 parkrunners and, looking through the results, less than a dozen of the attendees could be said to be parkrun tourists (and that is including Paul Sinton-Hewitt!).  There were 23 runners with barcodes doing their first parkrun and 16 "Unknown" runners without barcodes.  It is reported that the event went well but they are likely to continue to be nervous about tourists for a while yet.  We did have one runner at Tooting - Caroline Cookham whose other half was in the large experienced parkrun support team for this event. I suspect that had four hundred tourists turned up then Paul S.-H. and Caroline wouldn't have run but would have assumed volunteer duties instead.

But on the subject of crowds one parkrun didn't happen last Saturday because the previous week's event had proved too popular. Tramore Valley in Cork in Ireland had seen over a thousand people register in just 16 days after some local publicity in January and attendance went from under 150 over Christmas up to 340 on the 16th January and then 533 on the 23rd.  Access roads to the park failed to cope with the volume and with the prospect of even more turning up the council stepped in and asked for the event to be cancelled.  The parkrun team hope to reestablish the event shortly, with revised parking arrangements - like getting the council to provide a safe road crossing from the nearby park&ride car park. Providing alternative parkruns in the city are probably also being actively discussed. One to monitor.

Note that this situation at Tooting should not be seen as typical for future parkruns. There was also another UK new parkrun at Mount Edgcumbe near Plymounth - the inaugural had 131 finishers and tourists were more than welcome at that and future events there - indeed tourists will probably be expected to make up much of the field many weeks.

Back to Paris where tourists were most welcome - and they will be welcome this Saturday also and I will be there to secure my place on the French "Most Events" table.  I'll be pleased at that and I'm proud of my position on the International table (currently 25th). But then I looked around and discovered that at the very top of the US "Most Events" table, having run four of the now five US events, is our own David Duggan (http://www.parkrun.us/results/mostevents/ ). What plans do you have for Washington David? [note that some of his runs were before he joined the BA club - so revisits to Florida and North Carolina are also needed at some point].

Roderick Hoffman