baRUNNER - a website for the British Airways Athletics Club

BA Athletics Club News Digest 16th November 2020

 For future weeks: inclusions, with photos, please to Roderick Hoffman at news@barunner.org.uk.

Unrestricted races are currently off so the club continues to operate with Solo and Shared runs as listed above - for restrictions and advice see the Coronavirus footnote at the end of this digest.

Roderick Hoffman

This Week's Events

Please help me by sending me your results, for instance by filling in the tables below and forwarding to News@barunner.org.uk. Some events, such as the weekend achievement, will have "Prompts" set up in Facebook. These allow the posting of a single image and some text and make it easy to flip through everyone's entries.

Weekend Achievement (by 5pm on the Monday) or use the Facebook prompt that will be added on Friday:

Roderick Hoffman

Midweek Running, Jumping, Throwing Challenge - Submit by 5pm on Saturday 21st November

This week’s challenge is to complete a "Hexathlon" - six events testing your running, jumping and throwing ability.  You can try each event as many times as you like during the week.  You only need to declare your best performance.  The best five of your six events will count towards the final standings, so if there is one discipline which you really don’t want to attempt, that’s fine. 

• 1: Running (1)  Shuttle run - Start behind the first line, then run to a second ten meters away.  Ensure that one foot touches the ground beyond the line, turn and come back to the start.  Complete ten runs (100m) as quickly as possible.  Record your time.
• 2: Throwing (1)  Single arm throw - throw a tennis ball as far as you can, with a run-up.  Measure from the point of release to where the ball first hits the ground.
• 3: Jumping (1)  Standing long jump - stand behind a line, with your two feet shoulders’ width apart.  Swinging your arms, jump forward as far as you can without falling backwards.  Measure to where your heels land.
• 4: Running (2)  1000m - An unusual distance,  a very long sprint or a short middle-distance run.  Record your time.
• 5: Throwing (2)  Overhead throw - place your heels on the line, holding a football in two hands.  Bend your knees, then uncoil and throw the ball hard, high and behind you.  You need to record where the football first lands!
• 6: Jumping (2)  Vertical jump - reach up as high as you can when standing by a wall (or post). Then stand a little away from the wall, and jump as high as possible using both arms and legs to assist in projecting the body upwards and record your highest touching point (e.g. with a stick of chalk in your hands). Record the difference between the two heights.

For full instructions please see: http://ww.barunner.org.uk/Event_Hexathlon.shtml

Any queries - ask Steve.

Steve Hillier

Ed: The current deadline for entries is 5pm on Saturday 21st November but I can see that getting extended - please ask Steve if you are keen to do this event but don't think you can make the target.

November Mile Results

We are back up to 19 runners taking part in the mile. Fairly well spaced this month other than a slow Chris just 2 seconds ahead of Emma and both beaten by an in-form Christine who wouldn't have been far off breathing down the neck of Bob. Then Neil was just one second behind Jacqui, despite being over a hundred miles to the north. Whilst Maarten was easily the fastest this month look at the improvement that Eddie is achieving month after month - by February he could be sub 6minutes.

Roderick Hoffman

Street Sentences Results

So, 13 of us took part in this challenge, or 12 once you disqualify me for being the judge and jury. But who is the winner of the most amusing or apt phase or sentence? I was amused by Di Smith's entry though I felt that by starting with "Aaagh!" she was rather rubbing it in about the number of streets starting with vowels near where she lives. I also liked the ingenuity of Fran's entry - making most use of the only vowels available, "A"s. But I'm not sure on the truthfulness of the statement. The Scaifes were truthful, but not humorous, whilst Amanda had a good phase but wasn't convincing that her shoes had actually got that dirty. Alice was clearly trying to win favour by complimenting the event and nearly succeeded but I have to go for Steve Newell's entry as winner for being topical and humorous with it. Note that the count has now stopped and the judge's decision is final, unless you plan to Trump me.

Roderick Hoffman

Club Christmas Event

You will have noticed that we've put an event into the diary for 16th December as the "BAAC Winter Event". There are likely to be two linked elements to this. We are unlikely to be allowed a social meeting by then so we need to anticipate having a Zooming Christmas Social. To save us having to simply stare at each of us wearing Christmas Hats Steve Hillier is offering to organise some sort of quiz. Neither he nor I know how this could work so if you've got any experiences of what works (or what doesn't) in terms of interactive quizzes over video links please let Steve know.

Quiz Ideas => Steve Hillier

And we'll also have a collaborative event. This will involve as many individuals as are willing to volunteer to prepare a GPS letter during a run earlier that week. We will then use the collection of letters generated in a word or phase generating game (perhaps as a round in the quiz). More details will follow once I've dreamt them up.

Collaborative Run => Roderick Hoffman

SOLO Activity Achievements, Weekend 13th November to 16th November 2020

This week 22 members and friends reported activities, lower than in recent weeks so maybe I've missed some people but I don't have the legs to chase people up.  Please try to make future submissions by Monday 5pm, or 6pm at the latest, either by email to me or using the prompt in Facebook.

Roderick Hoffman

Triathlon News

Alistair Brownlee put in an impressive performance at a recent "World Cup" series triathlon in Valencia and was in the leading pack throughout the swim, bike and run stages just losing out by three seconds to current world champion Vincent Luis (FR) after a sprint to the line.

Steve Newell

Coronavirus Warning Footnote [changes from last week underlined or struck-through]

In the UK exercise outside is permitted because it will boost physical and mental health and because the risk of catching Coronavirus outdoors is very low provided social distancing advice is kept to:

• Do not exercise outside the house if you have been asked to isolate or you are unwell, particularly if you have symptoms of the coronavirus such as a fever, or if you share a house with someone who has these symptoms, or if you consider yourself to be vulnerable, such as being elderly or with pre-existing health conditions,
• You may drive to outdoor publicly accessible open spaces irrespective of distance, but you should follow social distancing guidance whilst you are there. Advice is to reduce public transport and shared car journeys,
• The current English lockdown restrictions allow you to run on your own, with people in your linked household (or "bubble"), as part of child care or with one other person
• As you exercise, keep 2m away from all others including those you run with as well as those you meet on the run, by default diverting around those you meet (don't leave it up to them to avoid you),
• Do not push yourself too far, this may weaken your defences against the virus and/or increase the probability of requiring assistance. We all have different limits so you need to judge what would be too far for you,
• If government instructions are updated to limit or prevent exercising outside your homes, or to meet with fewer people, please respect such instructions - we should be fighting the virus, not authority.

If you are unwell yourself, especially if you have symptoms of the virus:

• Put your needs first...
• but please let me (Roderick Hoffman) or Steve Hillier know of your condition/status, but we will keep it to ourselves unless you ask us to pass information on.

During the England lockdown the club is not allowed to organise any club shared activities. When the "Tiers" are reintroduced Club members will be asked not to cross the third tier ("Very High") boundary (in either direction) to attend a club organised event.

Next Digest - Results, news, pictures, feedback, jokes, stories - send them to the editor, Roderick Hoffman, at news@barunner.org.uk.

Not for you, no longer interested? remove me please.

Difficulty viewing this? Read it from the website:- http://www.barunner.org.uk/News Latest.shtml.Club website: www.barunner.org.uk.