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BA Athletics Club News Digest 22nd December 2013Forthcoming Events:
New members and non-members of all fitness levels and abilities are welcome at all of these events. The full events diary is on the club website at: http://www.barunner.org.uk/Event Diary.shtml. This news digest is being sent to you because you are on the BA Athletics Club email list. To be removed please email us at news@barunner.org.uk. Difficulty viewing this email? Read it off the website instead - http://www.barunner.org.uk/News Latest.shtml. Have a great Christmas and a Happy New YearThere will no no digest next week so use the facebook group to keep informed of running opportunities and news. To find it search for "BA Runner" in the facebook search box (with the space between BA and Runner) or link: https://www.facebook.com/groups/636199849751546/. Roderick Hoffman, Club Communications Secretary Reminder: Parkway Mile ResultsWednesday 18th December 2013 brought us to the 25th running of the Parkway Christmas Mile. The weather for the first run in 1989 was extremely wet - "nice weather for ducks" as we said in those prehistoric days. Because of flooding, the start had to be moved to the far subway entrance where it has been ever since. The first run was a standard race, the relay format was adopted a few years later. Team names have always had a Christmas theme. This year we had the dream entry of a multiple of four runners but heavy traffic caused Steve Hillier to miss even his fourth leg start time and Richard Ruffell had to run two legs with a 9 minute gap. Steve Hillier arrived just seconds later and was able to put in a timed run before Harry Wild lifted the turnaround cone and headed back to the club. We have allowed the introduction new technology to run hand in hand with tradition - due to an incident some time ago, when Harry was left out in the cold for far too long, the start team was in mobile phone contact with Harry to give him the all clear. Several streetlamps were not working. Let's hope we are not reporting the same in 12 months time. Last year we were complaining about a huge puddle which eventually got drained by the Highways Agency. The same one that had caused us to move the start and finish in 1989. More cyclists were using the cycle track than we are used to seeing. This year we saw a family team of three generations of Coffeys who between them ran seven miles in one mode or another (escort ,racing, pacing or just trying to keep up!). There was rain threatening in a gusting wind throughout, conditions were not ideal and many runners were slower than their predictions. An exception was Steve Taylor who matched his predicted time exactly (7:10). Steve Taylor, Roderick Hoffman and Neil Frediani all ran significantly faster (a whole minute!) than in 2012, attempting to reverse a general trend of a 25% decline in performance over the 25 years. Eddie and Alan Anderson were slower than last year as they continue to recover from recent injuries. Gary Rushmer, was the only finisher who came back in under six minutes and was the fastest for the second year in a row. Team captain leading from the front. Thanks to Ann Coffey, Paul Brandon, Alastair Heslop and Brian Forrester for timekeeping, Paddy O'Shea and Harry Wild for marshaling. The evening concluded with sandwiches and mince pies at the Concorde Club.
Steve Newell Thank you to Steve Newell for organising this event this year and most years since 1989. I've added to the table above to reveal the effort put into the planning - had Steve Hillier arrived on time then the gap between the fastest team and the slowest team would have been much reduced - just 45 seconds had we all run to our predictions and with the team that actually came 1st back in 4th or 5th. Roderick Hoffman ASCA Cross Country 2014 - Hosted by BAAC on Saturday March 22nd - combining with BA Cross Country ChampionshipsThe Athletics Club has been asked to host the 2014 ASCA Cross Country event and we have decided to do so on Saturday March 22nd combining the event with the BA Cross Country Championships that had been due to be held the next day. More details will follow as they get confirmed but please put this date into your running & marshaling calendars for next year. Roderick Hoffman Ladies XC 3nd Match Details
Club family parkrun results and stats for 21st December 2013
parkrun HighlightsRichard Ruffell runs at Gunpowder for the first time and takes Tony Hird's local record. That is the eighth different parkrun that Richard has run in the last eight weeks - he is becoming quite a parkrun tourist. We have three runners closing in on their red "50" shirts - Robert Fleming who usually runs at Bedfont is on 49, Tony Hird who always runs at Gunpowder and often with a wife and son running as well is on 48. After his sub 20' run at Fulham Palace this week Gary Rushmer is up to 47. Once earned and arranged each of these is invited to notify us when and where they anticipate collecting their shirts and we'll publicise it so that you can have a colleague or two to hold the camera. Now one change in the stats this week is that Adrian Haynes has changed his club to be Crawley AC which means that both Paul Knechtl and I have our records back and the club family loses the Brighton & Hove parkrun. It must have been something I said (or wrote). Seriously though parkrun does use England Athletics for its third party insurance so it is appropriate that we should all register under our first claim club as Adrian has now done. We do include in the family some second claim runners if they also pay us a membership fee (Piers for example) and we will report on Adrian and others with weaker claims - but we won't include them in the club records. Talking of what is in the parkrun computer counts - my reported time of 25:02 is the third time I've recorded that time in the last four parkruns. And two of the last seven have had an almost identical time of 25:04. That is according to the parkrun computer - two of those times should have been given to the place behind me with my actual time being several seconds faster. Christmas and New Year's day parkrunsIf you have nothing better to do on these two days then consider running an extra parkrun or two. The following are local possibilities: Christmas Day - all 9:00 start: Bushy park, Crane Park, Guildford, Reading, Richmond and Woodley. Note that Father Christmas MAY be a valid excuse for not doing a Christmas Day parkrun depending on the age of the kids involved. New Years Day: Black Park (9:00), Bushy park 9:00, Crane Park 10:30, Guildford 10:00, Kingston 10:00, Richmond 9:00, St Albans 9:00, Woodley 10:30. Note that New Years Eve is NOT a valid excuse for not doing a parkrun on New Years Day. Roderick intends to do a parkrun despite being on a flight for 24 hours up until 6am. Or take advantage of quiet roads or accommodation with relatives and do a parkrun further afield - the full list is here: http://www.parkrun.org.uk/christmas-compendium/ . Check the start times carefully because they do vary - but note that you CAN do two parkruns on New Years Day and they will both go into the parkrun computer! Roderick Hoffman ShortsHere are some further Coaching and Official training opportunities: www.barunner.org.uk/attachments/Course flyer 17.12.2013 onwards.PDF & www.barunner.org.uk/attachments/Officials courses 17.12.2013 onwards.pdf. The club welcomes anybody going on such courses and will consider supporting you financially. If you are interested but the locations are a problem let me know and we can research other venues. Steve Hillier Virgin London Marathon December Newsletter (including dates of all of their events next year): www.barunner.org.uk/attachments/VLM Newsletter December 2013.pdf The sometimes popular Harrow Hill race will be on 16th February next year. This is a five mile race including two climbs up Harrow Hill - good training for anyone thinking of doing the Berkhamsted Half-Marathon in March. enter on-line >> LATE NEWS: Multi-terrain, wind and rain at the start didn't stop Piers Keenleyside finished the Portsmouth Coastal marathon today in 3:35:18 (17 minutes faster than last year). Jasvir Modaher finished in 5:46:13. News for the next BAAC News Digest?Please send items for inclusion in the next Digest. Results, news, feedback, jokes, stories - send it to us at news@barunner.org,uk. You can copy Paul Brandon and Roderick Hoffman in BUT the news@ address is the one that we use when the digest is compiled. Club website:
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