London Marathon

The 100th anniversary of the marathon was marked in London on Sunday with ten runners from Newport and District Running Club competing in the 28th Flora London Marathon. Together, they raised over £8500 in sponsorship for various local and national charities.

In the city where the marathon distance of 26 miles 385 yards was first established at the 1908 Olympics, the perfect conditions (11°C and flat calm) helped create a relaxed and carnival atmosphere at the start. With the women’s elite race already underway at 9:00 followed by the wheelchair event at 9:30, Newport runners went through their pre-race preparations – some at each of the three different race starts.

Making the most of a good starting position, Glenn MacDonald-Jones set a good pace in his 13th marathon but was soon passed by Ed Jopling at the 3 mile mark. Ed who ran his first marathon in Wolverhampton in 2006 and his second in London last year maintained his lead and finished in a brilliant time of 2:58:34 – a personal best by over 15 minutes. Glenn began tiring soon after heavy rain at around 15 miles and was unable to keep up his target pace finishing just outside the three hour mark in 3:05:13. However, both Ed and Glenn finished in the top 4% of runners in their age group. Glenn raised £350 for Hope House Hospice and Ed raised a similar amount for the Severn Hospice.

Maurice Reid in his first marathon had a slower start due to the sheer number of runners but soon picked up the pace until tiring towards the end. Steve Tudor maintained a very consistent pace on this his 8th marathon – his 6th in London. Despite some knee pain finished in an excellent time of 3:17:06. Steve was raised £300 for the Newport X-Ray appeal.

Lorraine Rollinson running in her 3rd London marathon ran a strong race to finish a fantastic 95th out of the 1821 runners in her age group. Having made a steady start Lorraine managed to pick up the pace at the halfway mark to finish in a very good time of 3:28:44. Lorraine raise £1200 for The Severn Hospice in Telford.

Marek Kaminski in his 2nd marathon ran a similar pace to Lorraine in the first half of the race but slowed more than he wished in the second half to finish in 3:41:17 - still a personal best. Marek raised £1200 for Compton Hospice in Wolverhampton.

Running in his 6th marathon but his first for 8 years, Selwyn Plant just missed out on a sub-four hour time by 37 seconds. Selwyn ran a good first half before slowing up to the 18 mile mark. This is often the most difficult time of the race but Selwyn put in a brilliant effort to keep a constant pace till the end. He raised £400 for MacMillan Nurses. Another club member who ran at a very consistent pace was Julie Wyant who completed her fourth marathon in a really good personal best time of 4:10:10.

Putting in an exceptional performance for this his first marathon, David Gallagher ran with his brother Christian and both finished in 4:26:42 raising over £4000 for the National Society for Epilepsy. After a slight dip in pace at around 6 miles, David picked up again through the crowded route around Tower Bridge. Having succumbed to a knee injury in training, Nigel Cooper put in a very steady performance despite his problem knee in this his first marathon. Nigel raised over £750 for the Horton riding school for the disabled finishing in a very respectable 4:44:23.

At only 24, Ed Roper was running his first marathon and kept a steady pace until the 19 mile mark when the pace began to tell. Despite this, Ed put in a strong finish to complete the race in 5:33:32.

At the same time as the London, another club member was also doing a marathon – but on an indoor rowing machine. Dave Heath set himself a challenging target of beating his previous best time of 2 hours 55 minutes. Pressing on through a difficult period at around 11,000 meters, Dave managed to beat his target by 2 minutes as well as raise over £300 for charity.

Paris Marathon

Last weekend Steve Fowles, Mike Taylor and Julian withers also travelled over the water, but went South to France to take part in the Paris Marathon. On their own admission, their training prior to the event had been a bit patchy and they were not really expecting to do too well.
The start was amazing with the masses racing down the Champs d'Elise and across the Place de la Concorde and the Louvre. The race then went out into a forest to the east of the city before turning to head back towards the crowds who lined up along the river Seine and then along to the cathedral of Notre Dame and the Eiffel Tower before entering the park by LongChamps race course and on to the finish on Ave Foch and in front of the Arc de Triomphe.
The only downside to the race was the celebratory beers which cost them 9 euros (£7) a pint, but they had probably earned them.
Steve was first home in 3hrs 27min with Mike Taylor not far behind in 3hr 31min and Julian Withers also beating his prevoius time of five years ago by a minute, to cross the finish line in 3hrs 46min.

Trig Point Race

Around 160 brave and hardy runners set out from Brocton on Cannock Chase on a wet and cold Sunday morning to take on the Cannock Chase Trig Points Race. Competitors had to find their way around the Chase and be checked off at several different points as they ran the 15 or so miles.
Navigation was left up to each individual runner, but they had to visit the check points in the correct order before crossing the finish line back at Brocton.
Noel Hogan and Gary Postins were using the race as a training run for a longer event later in the year and seemed to run together for most of the race, eventually crossing the line in 50th and 51st positions respectively in the identical time of 2hr 06m 41s.
Ian Atkinson also ploughed through the poor conditions to chase them in only a few minutes behind them in 67th place in the very respectable time of 2hr 11m 30s.
Julie Wyant found the conditions tough, but showed great character to keep going and battled bravely on to finish the event in 3hr 09m 11s to be 152nd.
Considering the weather and the ground underfoot, all the runners deserved to be congratulated for turning out to make the event a success.

Running Club Awards

Newport and District Running Club recently held their Christmas celebration and awards ceremony at Moreton Millenium Hall, where well over 100 members and partners enjoyed an excellent evening.
The evening started with the formalities of the awards for the fastest club runners during the year. However, to make it fair, these were awarded using a carefully worked out formula which took into account the runner's age to give an adjusted time so that everyone had a fair chance of success.
In the ladies section, Lyndsay Ferguson took the prize for the fastest 5K and marathon, while Pauline Newton took the prizes for the fastest 10K and half marathon.
The men's prize for the fastest 5K went to Steve Fowles while the 10K honours went to a surprised Paul Parkinson. Steve Tudor was pleased to receive the award for the quickest half marathon and Robin Guy capped a good year by taking the fastest marathon prize.
Mark Deighton took the honours for running the most races in the year, having completed 27 events and Helen MacDonald-Jones was the most prolific female racer in the club.

The evening continued with an excellent meal expertly presented by some of the club members and their partners.
Then came the highlight of the evening for many of those gathered when half a dozen members took the stage to entertain those present with their own versions of several well known songs, but with a running theme or twist to them. This proved to be extremely popular and they were forced to do two extra songs for an encore before the disco and bar took over.
This event really pulled everyone in the club together and was a great way to celebrate the growth of the club through the year as well as looking forward to even more success next year.

Suicide six(ish) off road race

Conditions for running last weekend were not good with a cold wind, rain and sleet greeting the field of almost 770 runners as they gathered for this popular race round Baggeridge Park and Himley Park near Sedgeley.
The rather chaotic start caught out many runners as the start whistle suddenly sounded and the athletes raced across the first field and car park to drop down to the lake before the first of the climbs on this testing six and a bit mile course.
Newport and District Running Club sent 22 runners to compete in this race and they were spread throughout the field with many of them acquitting themselves very well in the conditions.
Robin Guy's strength showed as he pushed all the way round to come in 15th in 42m 23s, a tremendous performance by any standards. A couple of minutes behind in 38th position was Noel Hogan in 44m 44s with Gary Postins chasing him over the line in 43rd place in 45m 00s.
Maurice Reid continued to show his improvement over the year to finish 55th in 45.48 and Nick Cooper put in a tremendous effort to beat several of his team mates and finish 76th in 47m 41s.
Graham Rogers is another runner who has made a lot of progress this year and so it proved again when he finished 82nd in 47.59 with Sandy Mackenzie not far behind in 86th in 48m 24s and Ian Atkinson 93rd in 48.44.
The race itself consisted of a twisting course around the country parks which contained a mixture of hills, mud forest tracks and a river crossing just to make life interesting, but none of this seemed to put off any of the competitors on the day.
Another Newport runner who seemed to revel in the mud was John Taylor who finished in 49.07 to be 101st. Steve Wootton and Mark Deighton seemed to be having their own personal battle, but Steve Just hung on in the sprint for the finish line to be 173rd in 52.36 with Mark 174th just three seconds adrift. Andrew Kay was also in close contention in 179th in 52.58.
Eamonn Dennis had a steady run to finish 308th in 57m 36s and Nigel Cooper was pleased to see the finish line in 58.42 and gain 334th position. The ever reliable Helen MacDonald-Jones showed her class again to be 371st in 60m 07s and take 3rd place in her category.
The evergreen John Brown was 460th in 64.11 with Paul Grubert following him shortly after in 475th in 64.48. One of the club's fairly recent members was Julie Wyant, but she did well to be 485th in 65.19 and Sonya Phillips and Tracy Taylor kept each other company around the course finishing 501st and 502nd respectively in 65.59 and Tracy just a second behind.
By the end of the race conditions had deteriorated considerably with almost horizontal sleet chilling the runners and the long suffering race marshals who had to stand out in it for almost two hours and who probably deserve a medal themselves.
Coming in 569th in 69.25 was Ceri Christie and completing the magnificent club line up on the day in 573rd place was Jennifer Price in 69.29.
All the runners seemed to enjoy the experience and said they would be back for another go next year.

Berlin Marathon

The Berlin Marathon was run recently in excellent weather conditions and the start was a spectacular one with 30,000 runners sent on their way at the same time as masses of balloons were released over the city.
Newport and District Running Club sent a contingent to Germany to contest the race and although they didn't get round quite as quickly as the new world best time of 2hrs 04m 26s, posted by Haile Gabrselassie, the did do very well with Robin Guy finishing in 3h 05m in only his second marathon, but a personal best by 41 mins. Rob Guest was next not too far ehind in 3.19 followed by Lucy Dalton from Telford Harriers in 3. 28 which was also a pb by a considerable margin.
Club stalwarts Steve Fowles did 3.34 and the ever reliable Mike Taylor, with his sister and brother in law as his support team, got round in 3.49.
The club even had an Irish contingent in the form of Bernie Holbrook and Eamon Dennis who did 4.05 and 4.10 respectively, with Eamon's time again being a pb by 15mins. Julian Withers was the final runner home in 4.46, but was still satisfied with his time.
The photo shows the runners in front of the finish at the Branndenburg Gate.

During the last weekend in October several members of Newport Running Club, amongst around 3000 others, travelled to Scotland to participate in the OMM. This annual event was celebrating its 40th year and took place in the Lowther Hills, which although not particularly craggy, consisted of some of the highest and steepest grassy hills to be found anywhere.
Mark Deighton and Sandy Mackenzie were involved in the medium score event, which meant they had a maximum of 6 hours on day one and 5 hours on day two to collect as many points as they could from as many controls as they could visit on what was effectively a giant orienteering course, but carrying everything they needed to survive for two days in the hills.
The weather on the mountains was poor on the Saturday with low cloud and rain making visibility only around 40 metres at times, so accurate navigation was essential to avoid being lost and losing time and points.
Mark was only just returning from a torn calf and his fitness was a little suspect and so it proved with him and Sandy coming in after four and a half hours, but still gaining 140 points on the day.
The overnight camp turned into a difficult experience for many teams. As the winds increased to around 60-70mph and the rain became torrential some teams were washed out or had their tents blown down, meaning they were extremely tired and uncomfortable by the next morning.
Mark and Sandy had quite a good night and were ready to consolidate their previous days score. After an initial climb of over 1500 feet the sun came out on the tops before they reached the first of the days checkpoints and they enjoyed good visibility for the rest of the day covering more ground than the day before in a similar time to gain another 120 points, making 260 in total, 223rd place in their category and a bronze award.
Also taking part in the medium score event were Roger Kerr and His brother Allan who had participated in several similar events in past years and used their experience to gain 190 points on day 1, 110 points on day 2, making 300 points and 200th place.
Throwing himself in at the deep end was Maurice Reid in his first attempt at such an event with his team mate Greg Hilliard who entered the long score class. Maurice really proved his fitness to achieve 195 points on day one, 125 points on day two making 320 overall to give them 176th place in their class. An excellent achievement.
Despite the daunting nature of the event and the awful weather they encountered en route all the participants seemed determined to go back and have another go next year.

The attached file is a picture of Sandy Mackenzie and Mark Deighton at the overnight camp before setting off an Sunday morning

Christmas Do

The main club Christmas 'do' will be at Moreton Village Hall on Saturday 8th December. Please come along and have a good time. There will be a real ale bar, (i don't know why this gets a special mention), excellent food (supplied by Steve Tudor's sister and helpers), live music from a recently formed super vet group and disco, and a coach picking up from Newport and dropping off to Hinstock, Newport, Norbury, and Sheriffhales. More details to follow. Get this in you diaries now. Open to all members and partners. Cost £10 per person plus coach fare (likely to be about £5).If you would like to help out with the organising and selling tickets, please let Bernie Holbrook know at mbholbrook@btinternet.com 01952 691307
Please note band and disco are different to last year.
Thanks
Helen

Isle of Man Mountain Marathon

A number of people have expresed an interest in going to the Isle of Man at Easter to take part in the Manx Mountain Marathon (31 miles ish 8,000ft of ascent) or the Half (talk to Heather about it, she did it last time we went) or the Running Festival which is a 10k Good Friday in Port Erin where we stay, a short hill race on Saturday and a 5k run along the front at Douglas on Sunday (Sandra Pattinson did this so have a chat to her for more info.) We would travel there on Good Friday and return on Easter Monday. Mountain marathon and half are on the Saturday.

We have started to look at ferries and hotel etc. Price for the ferry at the moment for a standard car plus 4 people is £214 (this is one of the dearest ferry crossings in the world). The hotel are getting back to me regarding a price for rooms, they are offering a discount because of the numbers. We have stayed at the Royal Hotel in Port Erin on previous visits. This is good because the 10k is at Port Erin on Good Friday so we can all support those running in that event and because the Half and the full mountain marathon on Easter Saturday both finish on the grass outside the hotel. Also the presentation/pasta party is in the hotel next door on the Saturday evening.

Please let Helen know if you are interested in taking part in any of these events or going just to support, so that I can get an idea how many rooms we may need. Partners and families welcome, there's a beautiful beach at Port Erin and the Isle of Man scenery is spectacular - well pretty good!