BA Athletics Club News Digest 10th December 2012
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Forthcoming Events
Don't forget the following priority club events:
- THIS WEDNESDAY at the Concorde Centre - 5 Mile Handicap with start
times from 18:00.
- Wednesday 19th December - 'Parkway Mile' from 18:00 (see below) followed by the
Club Christmas Social.
- Saturday 12th January 2013 - BA hosted Men's Surrey League Cross
Country at Cranford Park - details below.
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.
Your (cross) Country needs you...
Dear BAAC members,
The British Airways Athletics Club is hosting the next
Men's Surrey Cross Country League Divisions 3 & 4
on Saturday 12th January 2013 at Cranford Park. We need 10 to 12
volunteers to help us marshal the course and record the finishers. The first
race is the juniors which starts at 2.30pm and then the seniors at 3.00pm.
It is important to the club that this event goes well so please spare us the
time if you can. We'd also like to be able to spare some of our better
runners to score in the event!
If you could help please contact
news@barunner.org.uk or myself
gary.rushmer@btinternet.com .
Gary Rushmer
Parkway Mile (Relay) Wednesday 19th December 2012
We get a much better event if runners enter in advance with an estimate
of their mile time. Teams can be chosen to make a close race more likely.
Please enter via email to
steve-newell@blueyonder.co.uk by midnight on Tuesday 18th
December.
Late entries will be accepted but those who leave it to the last minute
are more likely to have to run twice!
Steve Newell |
Surrey League Ladies Saturday 1st December Result
The Surrey League Cross Country match at Nonsuch Park, Cheam on Saturday 1st
December had a field of 342 ladies running the 6.2K course in Divisions 1 & 2.
Marion Woodhouse represented the BA Ladies Team on this particularly chilly day.
BA was asked to provide assistance in the form of a place recorder, Helen went
along to do this. Unfortunately, no one else was available to run, but we did
have 2 supporters there, namely, Tom Rowley and John Taylor. Marion completed
the muddy course in 42.52 minutes and our team position after 2 matches is 29th.
Altogether 35 teams have completed both matches.
A big Thank You to Marion for 'Flying The Flag' for us at this event. {and
Helen for fulfilling the club's marshalling obligations - Ed}
Our next match is on 12 January at Mitcham Common with the usual start time
of noon. Let's hope we can get a full team out, but please note that this
is the same day as the Mens XC at Cranford Park hosted by our Club.
Helen Smith
Why WARR?
I. The World Airline Road Race is run in a different location each year
– from Honolulu to Hamburg, Calgary to Cape Town,
II. There are 10k and 5k options,
III. You are running as an individual AND as part of a team,
IV. The event includes parties before and after the races,
V. Every finisher gets a medal and there are hundreds of trophies for the
winners across all age bands,
VI. Although it is an airline event non-airline family and friends are
encouraged to take part,
VII. It provides an excuse to visit places as diverse as Qingdau (China) and
Grapevine (Texas),
VIII. Now in its 32nd year it is the world’s largest annual airline sporting
event.
IX. With runners who have been to 5, 10, 15, 20, 25 and now 30 WARRs over
the years we are part of a well established family,
X. You are welcomed to the host city, often by the Mayor, and treated to
what that city has to offer,
XI. For those working for the airline the event counts as an inter-airline
event for which BA Clubs will subsidise the flights,
XII. British Airways hosted WARR in 2010 so we are excused from the
organisational workload for a few years yet!Roderick Hoffman |
Why don't you send in an equivalent list for your favourite form of running?
news@barunner.org.uk
And talking of WARR ...
The 32nd Annual World Airline Road Race will take you to stunning Cape
Town South Africa! Join approximately 1,000 airline employees, family
& friends from all over the world for the fun and challenge of a 5 &/pr 10k
run next October 12th weekend. A T-Shirt Swap Party, Meet and Greet
night and Finale Awards Banquet will round out the event & then you'll be
off on an African Safari or whatever else you want to do for your adventure
of a lifetime!
For more information visit
www.worldairlineroadrace.org
Ron Maxwell {International Committee Chairman}
|
Results Correction
Piers Keenleyside pointed out to the organisers of the Perivale Five that
British Airways is his first claim club. As a consequence the BA Team was
promoted up to 12th place. With apologies to St Thomas's Church Hanwell
who are relegated to 13th.
parkrun Highlights
Steve Newell maintains a spreadsheet of parkrun statistics and you can load
the full sheet
from this link. But here are some current highlights:
- Roderick ran Havant last Saturday which was his fortieth different parkrun -
and that includes eight different parkruns over the last eight Saturdays. He
is now in 42nd place in the list of parkrunners having done
most events
(and the only one with a no-repeat guarantee).
- Havant was also a new parkrun for members of BAAC as a whole which brings
our total up to 47 - can we make 50 by the end of the year? {I've only
got two new ones planned - Roderick}
- Even more impressive is that Alan Anderson has now run 246 parkruns - only 24
athletes have run more parkruns than Alan (see
parkrun
Clubs). Obviously Alan now has the
golden "250" shirt in his sights.
- Alan also holds the age category record for his age band at three different
parkruns but that is nothing compared to Brian Bennett who holds the age
category record at eight different parkruns. Target ten Brian?
- 14 different men and 7 different ladies hold the "Fastest BAAC
performance" at different parkruns.
- There is a current parkrun "#chasetheplace" competition for a London
Marathon place - to be in with a chance one has to attend parkrun for six
consecutive weekends up until the end of the year. Three weeks in and
the field size has fallen from 17,337 to 4,910 but still includes seven BAAC
members {not that we all necessarily want to win a London Marathon place -
Ed}.
- The parkrun BAAC members have run at most is Bushy by a mile...well by
about 1,400 miles to be nearer. Bushy has been run at 534 times and next
on the list is Reading with 214 runs (mainly Chris Kelly and Alan Friar)
followed closely by Bedfont Lakes with 209 (and a much wider spread of
runners). Black Park is next with 155 (mostly by Joe Nolan) but then
starting to catch up is Gunnersbury with 119.
Roderick Hoffman /
Steve
Newell
Piers' Marathon Efforts
The answer to the question "How many 25 mile plus races Piers has run?" is 61
(up to last month's Luton Marathon). He also has another 11 planned for
the next twelve months. Piers has applied to join the 100Marathon club -
you don't need to have done 100 marathons to join though you do need to show
that you are on the way.
Of the five club members who sent in guesses the
closest was Eddie Giles who guessed 64. Steve Newell, Gary Rushmer, Paul Brandon
and Chris Kelly were all further off but on the other hand between them they
have run 68 Marathons so are currently just ahead of Piers as a team (I say this
whilst remembering that back in 2007 Piers ran the Clarendon Marathon and
finished barely a minute behind a BAAC 4 man relay team!)
Standard Chartered Singapore Marathon (SCSM) 2012 – 2nd December 2012
The SCSM has the IAAF Road Race Gold label. This year, 53,000 people
started off from 5.00am on their races across various categories of Full
Marathon, Half Marathon, 10km and Kids Dash. Featuring three different
routes, runners took in the sights of iconic landmarks in Singapore
including Orchard Road, Universal Studios Singapore, Sentosa, Singapore
Flyer and Gardens by the Bay.
The first of the races started at 5.00 am. Some 22,000+ Full Marathon
runners crossed the start line in Orchard Road amid festivities that only
the locals know how. The whole road was beautifully lit with Christmas
lights and upbeat music was blaring through the loudspeakers. There was
cheers and encouragement from spectators and ‘cheer teams’ right from the
start.
I started off comfortably even though I had started to perspire while
waiting for the race to start despite the cool morning temperature. The race
route was slightly altered to avoid the bottleneck situation we experienced
last year. Due to the heat and humidity, there was a water station every 3km
serving both water and cold 100Plus electrolyte drink. There were Shotz gels
and bananas available after the 21km mark, and of course, the infamous Tiger
Balm Muscle cream.
I was trying out a new hydration backpack named Mercury from Workplay,
filling the 1ltr bladder with my own electrolyte. Yes, I know one should
never use anything new on a race but I was asked to give my opinion on the
new product. It sat nicely and was fairly comfortable on the whole distance,
except that it did get rather hot on the back in the 2nd half of the run
when the sun started to blaze down.
About 27km in, a young lady was throwing up by the sidewalk. Everyone that
passed her commented that she wasn’t looking good but didn’t stop to check.
I decided that I wasn’t going to win the race anyway so I stopped to check
that she was OK.
The intensity of the heat got to my just after the 30k mark. I could see
steam coming off my face when I poured water on it (!) and decided not to
push it and risk heat stroke. I was also feeling cramps in my legs so I
walked a lot in the last 10km, accompanied by four runners from Germany and
America. It was like a social walk!
My finished time was 23 minutes over last year’s even though my target was
to cut at least 15 off, but hey, there’s always next year! My final ranking
in the Full Marathon: 594 overall, 207 Masters, 330 Singapore.
Clara Halket
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and the regulars for their input this time - next week could it be you?
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