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BA Athletics Club News Digest 24th February 2020

Events:

  • Wednesday 26th February - Five Mile Handicap at the Bedfont Club from 18:00 #
  • Wednesday 4th March - BAAC Annual Awards evening at the Bedfont Club from 20:00 (with food, and an ad hoc training run before). Facebook Event https://www.facebook.com/events/1233158283542353/
  • Thursday 5th March - Parkland Mile 12:45 Harmondsworth Moor

Our next Bedfont Club meeting will be THIS February 26th (Five Mile Handicap). March club evenings will be 4th (Awards evening) and 25th (Handicap). All members are welcome.

New members and potential members of all fitness levels and abilities are welcome at most of our events. The full diary of club featured events is on the club website at: http://www.barunner.org.uk/Event Diary.shtml. Last updated: 8th January.

* Club Event Map: [Clickable link to Google Maps] (parkrun details updated 12th February 2020) / # Club Points event.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BARunnerUK/ (formal "front window" club page), BA Runner Facebook Group (informal "back office", ask to join).

Inclusions, with photos, please to Roderick Hoffman at news@barunner.org.uk.


Speedbird Ladies Race 6th May 2020 #

Our popular ladies' race is on again this year. We've chosen the date of Wednesday 6th May and kept all of the other arrangements as last year. It is on Harmondsworth Moor with a start time of 19:00. Please:

  • Pass on the message to anyone you think could be interested in it,
  • If you are a lady, please enter the event (costs £5 to £9 depending on when and how),
  • If you are a man, please put the date in your calendar to help on the evening (and perhaps run round the course at 18:00).

Details and entry: http://www.barunner.org.uk/Event_Ladies.shtml

Roderick Hoffman


BA Sports Relief Run - Tuesday 10th March (proposed)

two weeks ago I was hoping to be able to announce that BA would be having a Sports Relief run over the lunchtime of Tuesday 10th March. I'm still hoping to be able to announce it but I've yet to have it confirmed (I was assured that the publicity for it would be going out today). The proposal is from 12 until 2 to have 1k and 2k courses set-up on Harmondsworth Moor and for any runners with BA links to be able to run any distance they wanted and to record that distance towards a total target of 24,900miles that BA has got for Sports Relief. If the event goes ahead then I'll need two or more additional helpers/marshals and as many runners as would like to take part.

Please let me know if you might be able to incorporate this into your running plans, even given the late notice.

Roderick Hoffman


Five Mile Handicap run 5 preview - 26th Feb 2020 #

The Winter Wednesday Five Mile Handicap returns after a five week break this week (26th February) for run 5 (out of 6).  The five mile single lap circuit starts and finishes at the Bedfont & Feltham FC carpark in Hatton Road. The Helen Avenue variation in the second mile has been retained for the rest of this season.  At the far end of Helen Avenue, runners turn left into a footpath network, then right to avoid Feltham Park and left at the end before emerging onto New Road by Feltham Rail Station.

The best four scores from a maximum of six runs will count in the final league table. Three runners have already completed four runs and can only improve their overall standings by scoring better in the remaining runs. Runners who have completed two or three runs could still end up on the podium by running and scoring well in February and March.  Remember the highest ranking points get awarded to those making a modest improvements month on month – it is just as much an exercise in pace judgment as pure speed.

The current standings are as follows – Gary  Rusher 79.5 points (from 4 runs); Roderick Hoffman 69 pts (from 4); Steve Hillier 59,(4); Simon Turton 57.5, (3); Trish McCabe 45, (3); Maarten Stenham 38,(2); Christine Munden 33,(2); Chris Kelly 31,(2); Steve Taylor 26,(2); Richard Ruffell 25,(1); Paul Prescott 24,(2); Denis Foxley 22,(2); Benita Scaife 12,(1); John Scaife 12,(1); Neil Frediani 10(,)1.

It is planned for the club digital clock to be counting down from 2 hours from 6 p.m. Runners should aim to start when the clock displays their target time plus one hour so that most will finish close to 7 p.m.  Runners should be prepared to record their own run times if no timekeeper us resent (but in Steve's absence Roderick has agreed to get his run done before 6pm and then be on hand to act as timekeeper for everyone else).

Target times for those who have already run the course this winter:-

Benita Scaife 54:30
John Scaife 54:30
Steve Hillier 53:30
Christine Munden 52:00
Roderick Hoffman 50:00
Denis Foxley 50:00
Neil Frediani 47:30
Trish McCabe 46:00
Steve Taylor 42:45
Richard Ruffell 40:00
Simon Turton 38:30
Maarten Stenham 37:30
Chris Kelly 36:00
Gary  Rushmer 35:00
Paul Prescott 35:00

All members are welcome to join in even if they have not participated before.

After the run and shower it is proposed that we go across the road to the Wellington for a curry.

Steve Newell


 BA Cross Country Championships Sunday 23rd February Report #

Cross Country Field

Cross Country SprintResults of the cross country championships run this morning:

Laps Place BA Runner Time Gender
2 1 Julie Barclay 00:23:56 Female
2 2 Trish McCabe 00:29:53 Female
2 3 Christine Munden 00:33:24 Female
3 1 Gary Rushmer 00:32:37 Male
3 2 Simon Turton 00:34:51 Male
3 3 Paul Watt 00:35:41 Male
3 4 Julie Barclay 00:36:11 Female
3 5 Michael Ball 00:41:49 Male
3 6 Graham Taylor 00:44:22 Male
3 7 Steve Hillier 00:48:53 Male
3 8 John Coffey 00:48:54 Male

Julie completed the 2 laps ladies' race, then continued on to complete 3 laps, both times are included in the results.   Christine had run at the Nationals in Nottingham the day before (Saturday 22nd).

The weather was a reasonable 13C, with some wind in exposed areas, and only a few spots of rain briefly near the end.  Although most runners were well spread-out, we had a real sprint finish between Steve Hillier and John Coffey (pictured).

I have pictures of all the runners from today, if anyone wants copies, I’ll need their Email address, and I’ll send them via a transfer service.

Paul Brandon


parkrun Review Saturday 22nd February 2020

22Feb Member parkrun Place Time Grade PB Comment
TRUE Eddie KETTERICK Bedfont Lakes Carpark marshal
TRUE Joe NOLAN Black Park 328 00:30:25 54.63% 30 30 pacing experiment
TRUE Emma Moreton Bushy Park 632 00:27:40 54.94%
TRUE Paul TIMMS Cirencester 44 00:28:03 55.26%
TRUE Ben Chaytow Crane Park 142 00:29:18 47.67% half term family run, pb for Megan (JW10)
TRUE Murray HOGGE Dinton Pastures 17 00:22:25 70.93% PB   course pb by 37 secs
TRUE Frankie HOGGE Dinton Pastures 40 00:24:18 60.91% run #57, 3rd at Dinton Pastures
TRUE Harjit Jhooti Dinton Pastures 137 00:32:20 53.14% first run at Dinton Pastures, park #22
TRUE Piers KEENLEYSIDE Fire Service College 94 00:32:08 50.78%
TRUE David Williams Fulham Palace 159 00:24:23 56.80% 41 volunteers this week so run went ahead
TRUE Oliver MATHAI Gunnersbury 272 00:27:34 61.43% first parkrun of 2020
TRUE Trish MCCABE Hackney Marshes 229 00:28:19 55.15%
TRUE Denis Foxley Harrow 134 00:28:35 61.69% Faster than last week by 1s
FALSE Joan FOXLEY Harrow 282 00:44:55 50.39%
TRUE Steve NEWELL Hazelwood 103 00:47:53 39.58% alternative course round the pitches, lots of "U" turns
TRUE Adrian Haines Ifield Mill Pond 1 00:18:45 79.91% M-1 (again)
TRUE Benita Scaife Maidenhead 311 00:33:25 60.65% 94th run at Maidenhead
TRUE John Scaife Maidenhead 312 00:33:25 50.67% 98th run at Maidenhead
TRUE Petra OTTO Manor Field, Whittlesey 39 00:43:14 49.07%
TRUE Kelly Davis Old Deer Park 101 00:38:34 39.02% 1st run at Old Deer Park, park #18
TRUE Mike Dennison Osterley 6 00:19:56 81.86% M-6, best agegrade% at Osterley in 8 runs
TRUE Maria Jovani Osterley 14 00:21:15 74.04% F-2, 11th run at Osterley
TRUE Anne Bannister Osterley 139 00:27:59 71.35% PB   222nd run on 22/2 / PB by 37s
TRUE Bob Bannister Osterley 52 00:23:27 70.22% run #383, 7th at Osterley
TRUE Zoe OSTLEY Osterley 331 00:39:18 46.69% run #248, 3rd at Osterley
TRUE Roderick HOFFMAN Queen’s, Glasgow 98 00:32:12 49.38% 3rd "Queen" parkrun, 300th different parkruns, new to club
TRUE Jain Reid Richmond Park 183 00:27:00 65.31% six week pb streak comes to an end
TRUE Jacqueline MUSSELWHITE Rushmoor 87 00:24:05 70.45% F-8
TRUE James Shoulder Rushmoor 5 00:18:47 68.68% M-5, 5 secs outside course pb
TRUE Sarah GORDON Salcey Forest 116 00:34:33 57.79%
TRUE Keith Johnson St Albans 106 00:24:32 60.12% PB   course pb by another 7 secs
TRUE Kay Trinder Upton Court 12 00:21:30 82.02% F-1, top age grade% of the day at Upton Court
TRUE Julie BARCLAY Upton Court 29 00:23:46 76.16% F-3, 2nd age grade% of the day at Upton Court, 24th letter
TRUE Paul WATT Upton Court 22 00:22:54 67.10% U What? 24th letter
TRUE Tony BARNWELL Wycombe Rye 541 00:46:15 42.52%
TRUE Caroline Cockram Yeovil Montacute 146 00:27:00 62.10% "Y", To tease Julie & Paul, Yeovil was on this week, 23rd letter
TRUE Ian Cockram Yeovil Montacute 100 00:25:27 58.87% 24th letter. BA Men's record
TRUE David DUGGAN Zandvlei 111 00:31:36 50.74% "Z" in ZA, 2020 challenge - 2nd point. 24th letter. New to club

We don’t get a named storm every weekend and “Ellen” may or may not happen at all but over 100 parkruns were cancelled due to high winds, fallen trees, flooded courses, lions, etc.   Some of our alphabet chasers moved closer to closure with David Duggan (31:36) nailing a “Z” at Zandvlei near Capetown but he hasn’t got a “Q” yet.  Roderick Hoffman (32:12) now has Q in abundance as he had to divert to Queen’s Park in Glasgow after his first choice this weekend was one of the cancellations. He already has Queen Elizabeth Country Park (Hampshire) and Queens Doman, Tasmania in his collection which now totals 300. Paul Watt (22:54) and Julie Barclay (23:46) were joined by an in-form Kay Trinder (21:30) at Upton Court (their first “U”).  Tom Rowley was there as a coach and reports that the grass course was in remarkably good condition considering how much rain we have had.  Paul and Julie are still needing a “Y but hope to find Yeovil Montacute open for business in the near future.  Ian Cockram (25:27) and Caroline (27:00) were there this weekend but they don’t have a “Z”.  Ian has the extra dilemma because Caroline is only on 23 letters - she also needs a "Q". Don’t take it all too seriously! But if you do take it seriously then be aware that rumours of an "X" parkrun starting up have started again, this time based around Xenia Park in Queensland, Australia.

Trish McCabe (28:19) continued her tour of London parkruns and set a female club record at Hackney Marshes.  Dave Dixon’s time there of 17:10 is seemingly out of reach.  Parkrun returned to Fulham Palace after a week off caused not so much by the weather as a lack of volunteers.  The facebook page is quite an eye opener and former member Matt Gardner has weighed in with some comments!

Whilst Eddie Ketterick was helping out with the car parking and another two club members also got volunteer credits there were no current club members in the results at Bedfont Lakes on Saturday. That was the first time since 6th July 2019 and the previous time to that was 17th March 2018 and before that 6th Feb 2016! Bedfont Lakes had been the second parkrun any of our members run at, after Bushy, with Neil Frediani finishing in 48th place in 27:55 at event #1 on 9th May 2009 (behind Danny Norman and Paul Sinton-Hewett and ahead of Chris Cowell). Note that Neil has beaten that time as recently as last September. In total we've had runners in the results at 425 of the 548 Bedfont Lakes parkruns and 53 different club members have in total run there 1374 times.

Steve Newell / Roderick Hoffman

Steve's parkrun stats - club parkrun stats

Full club parkrun database - {read access to new club parkrun database} - Download and explore.

Roderick Hoffman

U What?

Way back last October during a family break in the West-country, during which we enjoyed the Minehead parkrun, Julie and I looked at what we needed to do in order to complete the parkrun alphabet. We ascertained that taking into account the weekends at work and other commitments we were to complete the challenge on my birthday, 22nd February. It was decided that we could, we should and we would go for it. Adding to this, I would turn 55 on the day of alphabet completion putting me in a new age category and thus improving my age grading....I was told that you don’t have to get faster, just get older! We were in the perfect place to make an immediate start and we extended our stay to include a Saturday morning at Yeovil Montacute.....if you can remember the gales on 26th Oct., the day that England defeated New Zealand in the rugby World Cup, you will remember that many parkruns were cancelled, including Yeovil. I had written previously that we drove 55 miles to run the Exeter course for an unofficial X so the weekend did produce a positive.

With shift changes and rearranging, finishing today was becoming a real possibility....until last week. Yeovil AGAIN and this time it was storm Dennis having two-pennies worth and cancellation number two followed.

Upton Court was conquered today and I did celebrate my birthday.....again in rain and wind with no change to my usual age-grading. We almost did it, but not quite. Will we ever run at Yeovil? A couple of working weekends coming up but attempt number three will be in March - Let’s hope that it will be our third and final attempt as Premier Inn are really beginning to like us.

In the meantime, I am sure that Dave Duggan will be seen at Queen Elizabeth Country Park making him the next alphabeteer....well done Dave.

Paul Watt and Julie Barclay

Join the Q

So I accidently got a third "Q" in my collection. The decision to run at Queen's parkrun, Glasgow was taken at 08:00 when the confirmation came through that Girvan Prom was indeed cancelled. Queen's was at that point an hour's drive away (but Scottish parkruns don't start until 09:30) and met the criteria of one I hadn't run before, not being cancelled (though I did stop on the way there and check again) and all on tarmac. But I should of spent a little bit longer checking on the course page since it turned out that Queen's is one of the toughest in the country. I had run at Sunny Hill at the start of the month, Greater London's toughest. There is 45m of climb in the lap of Sunny Hill and you do two laps. Queen's had 42m of climb on every lap...but has three laps. With a total climb of 126m the only parkrun I've done with greater is Lullingstone and that has 3m more. Throw in the strong gusty wind and the threat of hail and you had one tough parkrun. They had their lowest ever turnout, 136 runners on their 18th running and next-door Pollok had half their previous week's numbers. But I survived it and sheltered in the church next door to pray in thanks (and for the £1 post-parkrun coffee and treats).

Roderick Hoffman


ian at the Red Rock Canyon MarathonRed Rock Canyon Marathon 23rd February 2020

My toughest ever marathon! Red Rock Canyon (just outside Las Vegas) is beautiful and a great location for a run. But there is no flat ground and you start from 1100m and go up. So 5:09:46 was my worst ever road marathon time but this isn’t your average marathon!! Oh and it rained for 2 hours .. in the desert .. to make me feel at home.

 

 

Ian Cunningham


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

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