Stevenage Striders Running Club
What a spooktacular week we’ve had, filled with personal bests (PBs) and special achievements. A huge shout out to the Striders who embraced their creative side by dressing up during our lamppost hills session, showcasing both their athletic prowess and Halloween spirit!
Parkrun Highlights
Starting with parkrun, we have some special mentions this week:
– Linda Howell celebrated her 100th parkrun milestone.
– Gemma O’Donnell reached her 50th parkrun milestone.
– Sarah Dennis achieved a new PB of 38:37.
– Andy Coe finished with a new PB of 24:00, placing 3rd in his age category.
– Steve Moore clocked in at 21:55, securing 1st in his age category with an impressive 75.82% Age Grade.
– Helen Moye finished 3rd among females with a time of 25:12 and also took 1st in her age category.
Race Results: Hertfordshire Half Marathon and 10K
The Hertfordshire Half Marathon and 10K took place this week, starting and finishing in front of the picturesque Knebworth House. Eight Striders tackled the half marathon, with outstanding performances from:
– Andrew Manning: 01:35:11 (PB)
– Kevin Fisher: 01:39:35 (PB)
– Keith Dennis: 01:44:30 (PB)
– Steven Dennis: 01:45:08 (PB)
– Neil McKinnon: 01:56:56 (PB)
– Kevyn Hopkins-Hall: 01:58:49 (PB)
– Steve Kinsella: 02:00:35 (course PB)
– Teresa Sutherill: 02:17:00
We also had four Striders participating in the 10K:
– James Cahuzac: 49:55 (PB)
– Veronica Castello-Vooght: 01:11:39 (PB)
– Georgia Clarke: 01:12:17
– Sarah Skene: 01:12:58
– Claire Skellon: 01:17:44 (first ever 10K)
Fantastic running from everyone involved!
Cross Country Update
A beautiful morning set the scene for cross country at Trent Park, where participants tackled some mud, hills, and plenty of smiles! Congratulations to all who took part; the official results will be shared later in the week.
Fairlands Valley Spartans
Trent Park
28 Fairlands Valley Spartans – eleven women and 17 men – turned out for the third cross country league race in four weeks. That’s a much stronger women’s team than last time and helped the club’s performance. The race was in Trent Park.
This Sunday DAVID HARRIS-CHERGUIT ran 19 seconds faster than seven days earlier and moved up from 10th to sixth overall. This time ADRIAN BUSOLINI was one second faster with his 29:12 and he was 15th.
TRACEY JACKSON led in the Spartan women with her 39:33 with YUKO GORDON second in 40:40.
It seemed warmer and drier in Trent Park than previous years.
The Spartan men improved to fourth out of 20 in the men’s race at Barley only a week ago.
The next Cross Country League race, race four, will be in Stevenage on Sunday 15th December.
Spartan One Two At Bedford
Spartan ASHLEY JOHNSON was first female in Sunday’s Bedford 10K with a brilliant sub 40 time of 39:50 chip time and Spartan MARIE COLUCCI was sixth with 48:52.
Ashley and Marie were first and second in the women 40 plus category and 11th and 34th out of all the 263 finishers.
Ashley said, “It was a twisty, turny course. Some muddy, cross country parts. So not as fast as I’d hoped but a win is a win.”
Knebworth – A Win by 15 seconds and Penny was Early
Six Spartans ran the Hertfordshire Half Marathon from Knebworth House.
Spartan KRISTIAN ATANASOV had a top ten run finishing in 1:20:33. He was ninth out of 1,362 finishers and second senior male.
CHRIS WATLING said it was a tough course, very undulating. He didn’t feel overly prepared for today coming off the back of two injuries and only two x 5km treadmill runs during recovery over the last two weeks, but he was very happy with his time! 1:53:45.
Chris added it was good preparation for the Baldock Beast in Feb! Great event and support. Good to see a few Spartans out there today too!
JIM BROWN reckons he’s still trying to get out of marathon mode and didn’t think there was a sensible chance of getting under two hours on the rolling course but, but with a reasonable last four kilometres he got sight of the leading runner in his category, caught him after going through the gate into the grounds of Knebworth House and dug in to be first man 70 plus by a margin of 15 seconds.
PENNY SCHENKEL was early. Clearly delighted she beat her predicted time by more than 28 minutes and finished in 2 hours 31 minutes 55 seconds (2:31:55). The London plan is clicking in.
MARK COLLINS was 80th in 1:33:47 and CLAIRE EMMERSON finished in 2:15:05.
New York Marathon – a Spartan in the Big Apple
Spartan ROSS GALLAGHER ran the New York Marathon in 3 hours 2 minutes 43 seconds (3:02:43).
He ran on Sunday to complete his Abbott World Marathon Majors 6 Stars.
Ross said it was a fantastic race and up there with some of the best crowds at any race with the Bronx a personal favourite. The bridges were just as tough as people say… and he thought parks were flat… Central Park isn’t.
Resolution Track 5K
Five Spartans were among the 39 runners who went 12.5 times round Ridlins Track on Wednesday evening. This was the Resolution 5K, a guaranteed no hills event.
After spinning around for 19 minutes 15 seconds JAY PAPA was the first Spartan to finish. SIMON JACKSON wasn’t far behind in 19:27 then MATT GIFFORD 20:49; BRIAN WHITE 22:31 and KARL SHREEVE in 27:12.
Parkrun Highlights 2nd November
Exactly the same number of runners, 527, finished the award winning Stevenage parkrun this week as the previous Saturday. There were 227 women and 300 men.
This time Spartan GRANT RAMSAY was well in the top ten at fourth with his 18:33. KAREN ELLIS was fastest female from Spartans with 25:38.
PAUL SHELLEY has just one parkrun to go before a major milestone. He finished his 99th in 24:49. MARTIN JACOB ran his 20th in 26:20.
So far there have been 117,694 finishes by 15,674 different people at the 371 Stevenage parkruns. They won the top award at the Recent Stevenage Together awards.
Spartans running parkrun 5Ks elsewhere included SIMON JACKSON 19:59 at Great Denham; ADRIAN DONNELLY tenth at Henlow Bridge Lakes in 22:15; YUKO GORDON 23:09 at Storey’s Field; SUZY HAWKINS was first woman at Wendover Woods in 23:34; MEGAN SUTTON 27:07 and SAM SUTTON 32:45 at Bedford; LUCY FIELD 27:43 at Sandhurst Memorial; CHRIS HOLLAND 30:20 at Rutland Water; CHLOE CHAPMAN 30:57 at the Pocket parkrun; and STEVE SMITHSON who was the lonesome Spartan at Panshanger. He said he had a slightly slippy and challenging powerwalk. He finished in 255th place out of a field of 317 parkrunners in 34:13
Recently Spartans ASHLEY JOHNSON and NIKKI NATION ran the South Norwood parkrun.
South Norwood parkrun ran an event for Black History Month and one of the local running groups called Emancipated Run Crew did a take over.
Ashley was first woman out of 82 in 20:47 and NIKKI NATION 28th in 30:03. 215 ran and Ashley as fifth overall!
An official ParkRun film crew were there and they interviewed both Nikki and Jim Brown
It’s on Facebook if you want to watch it:
https://www.facebook.com/share/v/4Q61SH4SanLStP7y/?mibextid=WC7FNe
Stevenage Phoenix Running Club
Cattle Creepy 10k
On Tuesday 29th October, three Phoenicians took a trip over to Milton Keynes for the Cattle Creepy 10k. The race started in the dark at 6pm and followed a set of trails including meeting some cows! “The highlight was passing through the Cattle Creep, a narrow 30 metre tunnel under the canal used, historically, to move cattle from field to field. All under the light of head torches! The range of fancy dress on show was awesome.”
Chris Leigh came in first, in a time of 50:54, 2nd in his age group and 33rd overall out of 295 runners. Sue Leigh and Charlotte Leigh finished in 1:16:40 and 1:16:39 respectively. This was Charlotte’s first 10k since she broke her leg three years ago and Sue’s time earnt her 1st place in her age group, an impressive nine minutes ahead of 2nd place.
Resolution 5k
Wednesday 30th October saw three members take to the track for Resolution 5K Race 2, at Ridlin’s Athletics track in Stevenage. Katka Laughton was first to complete the 12.5 laps in a PB time of 23:51. Her time also broke the FV45 club record.
Martin Wasley and Simona Leadbetter crossed the finish line together in 27:34. This was a PB for Simona and Martin’s best 5k time in two years.
Cross Country League Race 3 – Trent Park
Cross Country Race 3 took place on Sunday 3rd November in Trent Park. Head Coach Emma Mead remarked it was “a lovely route with perfect weather and great support all around us”. Andy Chapman also had positive things to say about the notoriously hilly course, “an interesting mix of different surfaces, some grass, wooded trail and gravel paths. And excellent scenery too. Probably the most undulating course so far, with a nasty uphill to the finish. But that was outweighed by some excellent camaraderie at the finish. And everyone did amazing”. The results will be released later this week, Andy Chapman, Caitlin Evans, Damla Akkul, Emma Mead, Graham Eden, Jodie Kantas, Ken Hall and Peter Tungate took part.
Hertfordshire Half and 10k
We had a big turnout for the Hertfordshire Half and 10k on Sunday 3rd November. Seven members took on the 10k and eleven members took on the half marathon. This popular road closed event starts and finishes in front of the iconic Knebworth House with the course taking participants around the beautiful surrounding rural roads. Vicky Lang was first home in 57:34. Next was Simona Leadbetter in 59:21 followed by Martin Wasley in a PB time of 59:28. Also coming in under the one-hour mark were Kerry Cunnane with 59:28 and John Harris with 59:37. Joanna Heasman finished in 01:01:20 and David Poulter achieved a PB with 01:04:03.
Ian Young had a great run with a half marathon PB time of 01:40:34. Next up on the PB train was Martin Harris with 01:43:13 and Conor O’Neill with 01:43:20. Conor was very surprised to beat his 01:45 target and now has his sights set on sub 01:40. Neal Crawley completed his first half marathon in 01:47:22 and Katka Laughton was the first woman home in a PB time of 01:51:57, breaking her second club record of the week. Next up was Katie Mitham, who was very happy with her time of 01:56:43 considering the knee pain early on in the race. Jamie Long finished in 01:56:52 and Nick West was happy to get sub-two hours with a PB time of 01:59:19. Ashley Bates, Denise Ricot and Charlie Day completed the team in 2:02:46, 2:32:21 and 02:40:25 respectively.
