Just days after a successful takeover of a Stevenage parkrun Fairlands Valley Spartans ORGANISED and provided dozens of volunteer marshals for Thursday evening’s Relays in the Park in Fairlands Valley.
What’s more 41 Spartans ran. Their successes included WINNING the veteran mixed team with ANDREW PATTERSON (09:39), SAM PRETTY (11:23), ASHLEY JOHNSON (11:29) and JONATHAN PARR (10:05) and their veteran women’s team coming second.
The fastest Spartan over the 3K were Andrew Patterson 10th out of 432 in 9 minutes 39 seconds (9:39) and KIRK NDUGU 15th with 9:50. Both under 10 minutes. Their fastest women were SAM PRETTY 11:23 and ASHLEY JOHNSON 11:29. Both under 11:30.
The Relays in the Park included the Hertfordshire County Championships. Every team – men, women, mixed, open or veteran – had to run four stages of exactly three kilometres.
Three Gold Medals
Three Fairlands Valley Spartans won GOLD medals in the County 10K track championships on Wednesday night.
After 25 laps YUKO GORDON won GOLD for women 70 plus in 47 minutes 24 seconds (47:24.70); DAVID BOWKER won GOLD for men 65 plus in 48:09 and JIM BROWN won GOLD for men 70 plus in 53:50.
“No hills and no wind. What was there not to like”, said Jim. A great outing for three Spartan veterans.
Memorial 5K
Also on Wednesday MATT TUTTON ran his fastest 5K this year with his 24:49 at the Doug Anderson 5K in Bedford. JAY PAPA beat 20 with 19:21; CHARLIE ARNOLD came in with 22:52 and PAUL HOLGATE with 32:20.
St Albans Summer 10K
JIM BROWN ran the St Albans Summer 10K in exactly 56 minutes (56:00). Good enough for third place in his category.
Three Events Organised in Nine Days
Not only did Fairlands take over the local parkrun on Saturday 13th July and organise the Relays in the Park on Thursday 18th July then they organised the Fairlands Valley Challenge off road event on Sunday 21st July. More on the challenge soon.
Parkrun Highlights 20th July (#356)
28 of the 472 finishers at Saturday’s Stevenage parkrun were Spartans. GRANT RAMSAY was top three with 18:59. MARTIN DUDLEY ran his 210th parkrun in 24:43; STEVE PLATT his 70th in 29:50; SIMON JACKSON his 40th in 32:26 and PAUL HOLGATE his 70th in 34:45.
JIM BROWN was exactly half way down the field but won his age category with 29:05.
Spartans elsewhere included KELLY McHALE second woman in 24:29 at Henlow Bridge Lakes; JOHN NELMS 24:56 at Clevedon Salthouse Fields; MATT NEWTON 25:04 at Pymmes, Edmonton; THOMAS SAUKA 25:45 at Jersey Farm, St Albans; ROS INGRAM 26:51 at Congleton; GEORGIE HOOPER 28:46 at Letchworth; TIM ROBINSON 30:58 at Wendover Woods; PETE SMITH 31:38 at North Yorkshire Water Park; NICOLA PATTMAN 32:18 at Sherwood Pines, Mansfield; and CHLOE CHAPMAN 32:46 at Houghton Hall, Bedfordshire.
A total of 45 Spartans ran parkruns on Saturday.
