News Update
Details of the Cross Country Championship are on the Champ Tables page
Latest 5km times see Chatboard
Essex Way Relay
A huge thank you to the 89 Springfield Striders that ran yesterday.
It's a great achievement to have you all competing in the yellow and white, especially the newer members for which this was their first competitive event.
I hope you all felt the team spirit that our club enjoys while participating in these events.
Myself and Julian were with the event right from start to finish, and witnessed some fine performances from everyone from the 1st team down to the last. So please pat yourselves on the back for a job well done.
Unfortunately we could only manage runners up positions in all three of the competitions. The Open Men’s event was close on the 1st Leg with a fine sprint finish between Paul Dobson and Colchesters Allen Smalls. From then on Colchester tightened their grip on the title with some consistent top 3 finishes. Although our men continued to fight for the overall result, we couldn't quite match them.
The Ladies started off with some excellent results with 1st positions in the early legs for Sarah Colbert, June Allen, Nikki Brockbank and Tracy Alexandrou. All was looking good for the Ladies winning the team event until the later stages when Benfleet's ladies appeared to turn up and post some excellent results. We thought it would be close in the end but the ladies did indeed lose out to Benfleet.
Finally, the Vets team spent all day posting some excellent results, with no apparent weak legs. I was quietly confident that the Vets were in a commanding position, but without knowing the running results we weren’t aware of a sneaky Grange Farm vets team that were quietly doing their thing throughout the day. Ultimately we finished as runners up, which is still a fine acheivement for the over 45's of the club.
All in all, a great day with a great atmosphere and some great performances. Well done and thanks again
Anthony.
Mersea Marvels
June Allen and Mark Newton took the honours at the Mersea 10 on Sunday. It was June's second win since her return from injury. She won the Dartford Half Marathon last month. Anyone who has seen Mark on Tuesday nights recently will know that he is flying at the moment and that this race victory was on the cards. Chris Burgoyne (2nd) and Paul Dobson (4th) joined Mark to take the team prize. Paul took the vet prize.
June was joined by Vikki Curren and Liz Irvine in winning the ladies team prize. The Striders' men were also second team with Lee Martin, Stu Putt and Paul Anderson in the top twelve.
First Strider home in the 5 miler was young Nicholas Dobson who came in an excellent 15th. First Strider lady was Nicole Callaghan.
Busy Times at Club
With 79 at efforts on Tuesday evening and another 60+ at the Good, Bad and Ugly a surprising number still turned out for two Striders’ organised trail races this week.
48 Striders travelled to the Huffer Puffer on Wednesday with Chris Burgoyne and Tracey Woodyard taking the honours. The weather held for the majority of the field and their were some excellent runs notably from Tony Hopwood and Allison Cook.
On Sunday 35 Striders tackled the latest Lakeland trail from Bocking. A long course but on fast tracks enabled a few unfamiliar names to appear at the top of the leader board. Top Strider was club captain Anthony Marsh with Paul Anderson close behind. The Woodyards were next with Tracey claiming first prize yet again.
Harlow Gold Rush
BRECON FANS WEEKEND, 17th,18th July
CLICK HERE FOR LATEST Fell Champ Table
Pen-y-Fan, 3.5m / 1930'
Conditions were good for the first race of the weekend; a short, steep, climb to Corn Du, along the ridge to Pen-y-Fan followed by a dive off the summit back to the start at Llynbedw. Descent times make interesting reading as many places are traded. The winner Martin Shaw from host club Mynydd Du finished in 34'05". Andy Mason, 1st Strider home reached the summit in 34'25", coming home 39th in 51'59". Other Striders were John Williams, 41st in 53'02" and Neil Bradley 43rd in 53'38". The 75th and last runner finished in 1h37m, taking some 44' on the descent.
Fan-y-Big, 10m / 2200'
This race starts at Llanyfrynach, with a mile or two of gradually rising cross country running. Climbing up the ridge to Fan-y-Big the weather deteriorated, and we were running into a fairly strong wind and rain, with visibility down to 100m or so. After several miles around the ridge in these conditions emerging from the cloud onto the long, grassy descent was especially welcoming, even if the mile on tarmac at the end was not. The winner was Peter Ryder from Cardiff AC, in a new record time of 1h11m41s, some 6' clear of second place. Neil Bradley was pleased to be 1st Strider home, 60th in 1h44m55s, followed by Andy Mason, 65th in 1h47m32s and John Williams, 77th in 1h53m08s. There were 96 runners, the final runner home finishing in 2h44m55s.
There will doubtless be another trip to Brecon for these challenging races next year. More immediate trips to the hills planned in the coming weeks include days out to the South Downs for the Jack & Jill 5mile race on Sunday 25th, and back to South Wales for the Sugar Loaf fell race (7m/1725'), near Abergavenny on Saturday 14th August. If interested in these or other races keep an eye on the fell section of the chatboard.
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