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BA Athletics Club News Digest 25th January 2016

Events:

  • Tuesday 26th January - Round-the-Block* from Heston Venue at 12:30
  • Wednesday 27th January - 5 Mile Handicap* Heston Venue from 18:00
  • Thursday 4th February - Dream Mile* Bath Road at 12:45

New members and non-members of all fitness levels and abilities are welcome at all of these events.  The full diary of club featured events is on the club website at: http://www.barunner.org.uk/Event Diary.shtml.

*Club Event Map: https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=z31P-sSECWno.kIIgdFzUuZAo&usp=sharing

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

Difficulty viewing this email?  Read it off the website instead - http://www.barunner.org.uk/News Latest.shtml. Running related gossip and chat: Facebook "BA Runner" (link: https://www.facebook.com/groups/636199849751546/).


Final Reminder Round-the-Block Tuesday 26th January from 12:30 from Heston Venue

Founded in or before 1982 this event is probably the oldest fixture in the BA calendar. As in past years the race is a single lap course of about 5k, around the Heston area. The start will be at around 12:30 and is a short walk from the changing rooms at Heston Venue (Concorde Centre), so please leave enough time to get to the start. 

Anybody and everybody is welcome to take part including mixed teams of four - at least one male and one female. This is a fun event and ALL levels of runners/joggers are welcomed.  Please pass this information on to anyone else who might be interested.  Lifts can be offered from and back to Waterside and other locations.  Enter on the day at the venue. There is a £1 entry fee which will be donated to the White Lodge Centre charity. There is ample parking at the Concorde Club for your cars and the Concorde Club changing facilities will be available for your use. Please don't leave any valuables including car keys in the changing rooms.

The course is shown on the club event map (see above).

Questions etc. - email Paul.Knechtl@ba.com

Roderick Hoffman obo Paul Knechtl


The Forrester "4-way-folly" Wednesday 20th January Results

Seven runners participated in this event forming four teams, each of which set off in a different direction to run exactly the same 5.1k distance, crossing with other runners every so often during the run. This made it very difficult to work out during the run how well each runner and team was doing. Joe Nolan and Gary Rushmer were paired together and finished with the best overall time of 48:54. Graham Taylor was paired with mr/ms average time and came "second" with 51:37. Then came Chris Kelley and Christine Munden finishing in 52:17. Finishing at the back were Roderick Hoffman and Steve Newell in a combined time of 62:30. Gary Rushmer had the best personal time with 20:23.

Roderick Hoffman obo Brian Forrester


Heart Throb Hash 10th February - Pioneers Relay

The weather remains unpredictable but I've had no volunteers to help on 10th February other than Paul Brandon.  Maybe there will be a chance to have a Pokerchase evening in daylight in the summer.

I therefore propose we have a training evening in the inner circle of the Brabazon Road Estate.  We have done this before as a Heart Throb Hash as it has all the essential ingredients

  • i) Some hard running to get the heart beating
  • ii) barely enough time to get your breath back so you are left gasping from time to time
  • iii) an element of team work, plus 
  • iv) one km warm-up jog to the start
  • v) 500m familiarisation lap
  • vi) option to take a longer route back to the club for those training for a spring marathon.

Maps will be available on the evening but also see the club Google map.

The runners (A and B) of similar ability will be paired into relay teams.  It can be quite a hard session and should be paced thoughtfully.

The event takes place on pavements in a residential area with very little traffic.  The roads used are Johnson Road, Bleriot Road, Cobham Road, Whittle Road and Sopwith Road.  See the club map for the locations and main course.

The run starts from point X (the junction of Johnson Road and Sopwith Road). Initially, all 'A' runners run a semicircular course clockwise along Johnson Road, Bleriot Road and Cobham Road to point 'Y' (the junction of Cobham Road and Sopwith Road before handing over (touch of hands) to their 'B' runner who continues along Cobham Road, turns right along Whittle Road and right again along Johnson Road to point 'X'.

Going clockwise 'X' to 'Y' is approx. 240m, 'Y to 'X' is approx. 280m.

During the first four complete laps, 'A' runners reposition at recovery jog pace from point 'Y' to point 'X' along Sopwith Road to be ready for the next handover.  'B' runners have to reposition by jogging from 'X' to 'Y' along Sopwith Road.

Sopwith Road is approx. 115m long.

After 4 laps runner 'B' rests at point 'X' while runner 'A' does a complete circuit (approx. 520m), hands over and rests / jogs slowly to point 'Y'.  Runner 'B' runs one and a half complete laps, hands over at point 'Y' and jogs to point 'X'.  The action then continues with runner 'B' doing the slightly shorter leg (three more times) and runner 'A' doing the slightly longer leg until the team has completed ten full laps.

Some teams may get lapped.  Once the leading team has finished, no further handovers at point 'X' take place - all teams are deemed to have completed the exercise the next time a runner reaches point 'X'.  This will probably be about 20 minutes after the start.

Runners then have the option of returning to the club by the shortest available route or turning East along Cranford Lane and choosing a longer route.  Food will be served in the clubhouse at 8 p.m.  Baps with various combinations of eggs, sausage and bacon. 

Steve Newell


Club parkrun results for Saturday 23rd January 2016

23rd Jan family & friends time parkrun comment grade
Alan Anderson 29:51 Gunnersbury run #395 70%
Julie Barclay 22:29 Frimley Lodge course pb 76%
Tony Barnwell 34:02 Wycombe Rye run #97, 39th run at Wycombe 54%
John Coffey 25:35 Bushy Park run #200 72%
Ian Cunningham 24:31 Guildford run #228, 6th at Guildford 62%
Scott Davison 22:56 Old Deer Park first run at Old Deer Park 61%
Linda Dodsworth 27:51 Sunderland BA park #224, run #49 56%
David Duggan 41:20 Bedfont Lakes run #133, 90th at Bedfont 37%
Denis Foxley 25:30 Harrow run #30. 27th at Harrow 66%
Joan Foxley 24:12 Harrow run #23, 22nd at Harrow 62%
Neil Frediani 31:24 Bedfont Lakes run #135, 87th at Bedfont 50%
Alan Friar 27:19 Woodley run #186, 44th run at Woodley 65%
Roderick Hoffman 28:53 Leamington run #192, park #140 53%
Kevin Holland 30:16 Guildford course pb 57%
Piers Keenleyside 23:41 East Coast Park park #18, run #123 67%
Chris Kelly 22:31 Woodley run #274, 26th at Woodley 66%
John Lennon 31:25 Bedfont Lakes run #192, 177th at Bedfont 48%
Kerstin Luksch 20:17 Gunnersbury yet another pb 74%
Steve Newell 31:50 Old Deer Park 14th run at Old Deer Park 56%
Joe Nolan 24:59 Black Park 25' pacer 64%
Richard Ruffell 23:20 Tring M-8, run #108 65%
Caroline Cockram volunteer Bedfont Lakes run director
Alastair Heslop volunteer Guildford finish tokens
Benita Scaife volunteer Maidenhead barcode scanning
John Scaife volunteer Maidenhead barcode scanning

The weather had improved a bit by Saturday morning although some courses with grass were a little soft and slippery in places.  Chris Kelly (22:31) and Alan Friar(27:19) ran at Woodley because the course at Reading is in no fit state.  An alternative course at Dinton Pastures will be hosting the Reading parkrun until further notice.

Julie Barclay (22:29, 76.43%) was in good form at Frimley Lodge, that is course pb for her. 

The constantly improving Kerstin Luksch reduced her pb at Gunnersbury to 20:17.  Alan Anderson (29:51) was one of many who had their best runs there for a while.  

Richard Ruffell (23:20) achieved a top ten finish (8th out of 141 runners) at the tougher-than-most course at Tring.

John Coffey (25:35) has finally reached the unrecognised achievement of 200 parkruns.  He ran his pb (20:17) on only his third run at Bushy Park (the only run available at the time) exactly ten years ago on the corresponding Saturday in 2006. He has run 182 times at Bushy Park and seen typical attendances grow from under 100 to over a 1000. 

Following his runs in Tasmania Piers Keeneyside(23:41) dropped in to run East Coast Park in Singapore.  Don't be surprised if he turns up running a marathon in North Africa next week.  He aims to make the most of his retirement.

Our new member Linda Dodsworth (27:41) has run at Sunderland several times before but she was there this week for the first time since she joined us.  That took the club total on to 224 different parkruns.

I mentioned a few weeks ago how loyal Scott Davison was to Bedfont Lakes.  Well that seems to have triggered a bout of tourism.  This week he was at Old Deer Park for the first time (22:56) so he has run at five different parkruns this January alone and the month is only 23 days old.

Roderick Hoffman (28:53) was at his 140th different park, this time Leamington. This was Roderick's 192nd parkrun - the same number run by John Lennon. John however has shown great loyalty to his home parkrun Bedfont Lakes having run there 177 times. Bedfont Lakes was also Roderick's original home parkrun but he has run there just five times (the second of those to collect his 50 shirt).

On the volunteer front Caroline Cockram got her her chance to be run director at Bedfont Lakes after last week's cancellation due to ice, Alastair Heslop gave out tokens at Guildford, Benita and John Scaife scanned them in at Maidenhead. 

Steve Newell

parkrun Tourism surprising addition

This week we have added another country to the list of parkrun countries club members have run in.  So now between us we have run in the ten of the twelve parkrun countries, the only gaps being Italy and Russia.  Now that will come as a surprise to the compiler of the list above and it is probably also a surprise to the runner whose qualifying parkrun made that achievement AND to the other four club runners who have previously run at the same location (including myself). The fact is that parkrun have made an administrative adjustment so that as of this week East Coast parkrun is no longer an Australian administered parkrun but is now the first, and currently only, Singapore parkrun.  Now if you check out the "Most Events" table on the Singapore parkrun website you'll discover that to be listed you must have run at two Singapore parkruns. Currently tricky.  The same is true in France but that situation will have changed by this time next week since parkrun du Bois de Boulogne (Paris) starts on Saturday*. Note that the parkrun websites have only been partially updated to reflect the admin change. This is the Singapore country page: http://www.parkrun.sg/. As of today it displays the Australian flag but I'm sure that will be quickly corrected.  Between us we have now run:

Australia 5 of the 8 regions 16 of 153 parkruns
Denmark Yes 1 of the 7 parkruns
France Yes 1 of 1 parkruns
Ireland Yes 4 of 45
Italy Not yet 0 of 1
New Zealand North Island only [though parkrun don't split North and South] 2 of 10
Poland Yes 4 of 30 including the one that runs into the Czech Republic
Russia None of 7 regions None of 20 parkruns
Singapore Yes 1 of 1 parkrun
South Africa 3 of the 17 regions 3 of 71 parkruns
UK Yes, in all 13 regions including the Channel Islands 190 of 381 parkruns
USA Yes 2 of 5 parkruns

Roderick Hoffman

*I'm probably going to make it to Paris this weekend for the inaugural Bois de Boulogne parkrun - let me know if you'd like to make it there also. Commercial flights from £171.

Singapore parkrun

Just ran the last and 4th parkrun of our Australia trip - the East Coast Park parkrun in Singapore. Despite the high humidity and heat I managed to run faster than in Hobart. My time was 23:41.  If I was in better shape I may have had a chance at setting a club record for the course but I'm way off 22:30 pace at the moment especially in this heat and humidity!

Piers finishing the Singapore parkrun

Piers Keenleyside

PS Piers then ignored the heat and humidity and jogged for an hour to get back to his hotel.


Running Shorts

Neptune Teddy Hall Relays - Wednesday 9th March afternoon

Christine Munden and Steve Norris have done this event in the past and highly recommend it for those who can arrange to be in Oxford on a Wednesday afternoon. Teams of 4 (3 if ladies only) run laps of 3.6 miles ending in the Iffley Road Track.  Teams can be put together on the day but are better if registered in advance. If you are interested then please let Christine know - email

More details: http://ouccc.org.uk/teddy-hall-relays/ 

Harrow Hill race for run lovers

A reminder for those lovers of running that this year's Harrow Hill race (a challenging road 10k with two climbs of the hill) is on Valentine's Day, Sunday 14th February.  Petra Otto has been in touch to correct me and say that she does expect to make the event and so is looking forward to seeing some of us there - though she will be taking her time jogging round in up to 90 minutes. I wonder if she told her doctor it was like a parkrun?

Details and entry: http://www.metros.org.uk/hillrace/hill_race_2016.html

New Heston Pool now open

After a complete demolition of the old pool and a 21 month build project the New Heston Pool is now open on the site of the old one.  The new 25m pool has a much better feel to it and has a larger car park, gym and facilities. £4.80 for a swim (less for concessions).

Details: http://www.fusion-lifestyle.com/centres/Heston_Pool/facility/Swimming_pool


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