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BA Athletics Club News Digest 27th May 2013

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Forthcoming Events

Don't forget the following priority club events:

• Saturday 1st June - Club Featured parkrun - Wormwood Scrubs (details below)
• Sunday 9th June - Concorde Five Mile Road Race - Runners and Marshals needed
• Wednesday 12th June - BA "Freedom Run" parkrun at Crane Park, Hanworth

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.

Club Featured parkrun Saturday 1st June Wormwood Scrubs 08:40 for 09:00

On the 1st June the club will descend upon another local parkrun. This time we are going to Wormwood Scrubs (the park, not the prison) near Shepherds Bush & North Acton. This could be a good breakfast stop for a trip into central London or to the nearby Westfield shopping centre. You may even be able to do a track session at the neighbouring Linford Christie Stadium!

For those making there own way to Wormwood Scrubs by car note that the postcode to head for (if using SatNav) is W12 0DF. The car park is free on Saturday morning. There are directions on the parkrun website http://www.parkrun.org.uk/wormwoodscrubs/course/ but they are summarized below.

Try to get to the course at least ten minutes early so that we can take a team photo. Also if you would like a post parkrun coffee at the Thames Valley Harriers clubhouse at Linford Christie Stadium when open (or if not, at Coffee Cup Cafe, 22 North Pole Road, London W10 6QL) - please come and join us.

Location Of Start

On the piece of grass that faces the entrance of the Linford Christie Stadium Car Park. The car park is at the end of Artillery Lane which runs up from Du Cane Road between the prison and the hospital.  It is labelled as the car park for the hospital.

Getting There by Public Transport By Bus:

to Scrubs Lane: 220

to Du Cane Road: 7, 70, 72, 272, 283

By Tube:

East Acton (Central Line) - Half a mile: walk Erconwald Street until you reach the Park. There is a footpath along by the prison. {Ed: Some of us may remember this footpath - it formed part of the 1908 Marathon course that we reran in 2008}.

White City (Central Line) - One mile: walk north on Wood Lane then Du Cane Road or follow the bus routes listed above.

Roderick Hoffman

Wed 22nd Richard Ruffell Runaround Results and Rite-up

It was a dry and cool/warm Wednesday evening, when 12 contestants and 4 helpers gathered for the Ruffell Runaround with a theme based upon the TV program Countdown. I kept looking around but there was no sign of Rachel, Susie, or the stud Nick, I guess they didn't get the Emails. Three of Richard's thane helpers were given bags containing letters and sent to three far-flung points in the local area - with a few extra shouts to make sure they were in the right place.

The runners had 45 minutes to skid round to each of the three helpers in any order they wished (repeat visits allowed and expected) to collect a randomly selected single letter at each visit - but they weren't totally random since Harry had all of the vowels, Paul had less frequently needed consonants whilst Patrick had the better consonants.  Patrick was also the most remote over the hill of the Motorway bridge which led to him receiving many a jibe from the runners. Slower runners were given one or two bonus letters to start them off.

After finishing running, the runners then used their oxygen starved grey matter with the goal of making the longest word possible from the letters they collected - all within the time constraint with one letter time penalty for every minute exceeded which is how the results shove Dennis Foxley to the back - apart from for Alan Anderson who managed to collect mostly the letter A with an X or two thrown in for bad measure - flames from him for the letters he got.

Afterwards we all gathered in the Kennedy room where the winner (we marvel at Chris Kelly for getting a seven letter word) was presented with his prize as current countdown champion.  {Some may recall a countdown themed event several years ago now where I had sourced various Countdown themed prizes.  The winner of the signed photograph from Carol Vorderman probably still has it mounted next to their running medals}.

Thanks to the Marshals:

• Brian "Fraternise" Forrester
• Paddy "Dashed" O'Shea
• Harry "Hardly" Wild
• Paul "Abandon" Brandon

Richard's Runaround was followed by Joe Nolan giving us the low down on his recent Athletics Leadership course.  As a follow-up we are currently considering building a club evening focused at improving our running AND we may hold one or more such events at Harmondsworth in the run up to the BA Fun Run.

Words randomly generated but also from Paul Brandon, Richard Ruffell and Roderick Hoffman in that order {I felt that the write-up should have been as confusing and entertaining as the event itself}. Also see http://www.benmason.net/countdown.qsp for quick solutions for words from randomly assigned letters.  The eight letters I was given and gathered were IDOSKPJU.  On the way in I thought of KIDS and SKID and a risky UKIPS but the website suggests the most KUDOS I could have got would have been for five letter words so I don't feel such a DIPSO for being PIOUS and sticking to my answer.

*PS I was spoilt for choice with my name - I used "D.Chairman" since I am currently Deputy Chairman of the running club but I could have used "Comedian", "Demoniac", "Hardcore", "Charmer", "Comrade" or "Confirmed".  Some are more apt than others.

Free Beer!

I thought that that would get your attention.

Lucie Barney at Cancer UK is one of the organisers of this year's Fullers London Pride 10k on 23rd June and for the first time they are doing proper times and results.  For that reason she contacted me and got an explanation as to how we do the times and results of the BA Fun Run.  By return I wasn't surprised to get her thanks and the message "If you, or any of the athletic club members fancy popping over on the Sunday to help us then we would of course be very grateful and there would be a free pint of London Pride in it!".  So if anyone would want to help, particularly if you have worked with our finish/results processing, then let me know and I'll pass your details on to Lucie. Visit the website for details of the event: www.londonpride10k.org.uk .  The start/finish area is at the Brewery so this offer might appeal most to those able to walk home from there!

Roderick Hoffman

Just a reminder though - our priority marshalling events are the Concorde Five on Sunday 9th June, the Standard Chartered on Thursday 11th July and the BA Fun Run on Thursday 25th July.

Iffley Road

I mentioned Bill Byrne's commercial venture the other week.  The website is now fully up: http://www.iffleyroad.com/

World Airline Road Race Registration OPEN

Registration for this event is now open: http://worldairlineroadrace.org/registration.html

There is still a shortage of details which hopefully will be addressed shortly but the race day would appear to be Sunday 13th October and the location is Stellenbosch, just outside Cape Town.  For what to do in Stellenbosch on Saturday 12th October see next item!

Registration for the race and the awards appeared to have cost me a total of $104.01.  I'm sure that it will be well worth it!

Please let me know as you register and/or if you intend to register later on.  I'll be trying to do Team Captainee things unless someone else wants to do so.

Roderick Hoffman

parkrun Results and Statistics

First an achievement - Steve Taylor beat his parkrun PB at Gunnersbury. Then a few of us ran at different parkruns this weekend - Barry Walters joined Chris and Alan at Reading, Steve Newell made it to Nonsuch and I made a second visit to Gunpowder Park.  Gunpowder parkrun is in the "London" lists and can be reached with an Oyster card but it isn't in a London Borough - it is beyond the limits in Epping Forest.  But more trivia about Gunpowder parkrun - there are now 259 parkruns worldwide at all points of the compass but Gunpowder is the only parkrun that can claim to have both an East and a West.  How come?  The Greenwich Meridian crosses the park and the parkrun straddles it including having the Start in the Western Hemisphere and the Finish in the Eastern Hemisphere. 

The 259 parkruns worldwide included last Saturday a new parkrun called Root44 with 136 runners which is not only in South Africa, not only in Cape Town, but is actually in Stellenbosch the venue of this year's World Airline Road Race!  So that can be our warm-up run on the Saturday!  I must remember to warn them that they may have a few tourists.

Thanks as ever to Steve Newell for putting together the stats to enable such trivia.

Steve's parkrun stats

Roderick Hoffman

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