European Champion.

European Masters Athletics Championships Indoor 2024

Torun – Poland

Paula Williams’ busy European Championships got off to a flying start in Poland with her 60m heat and semi-final on Day 1. Stating before racing that she was hoping to get out of the heats she breezed through them, finishing with a SB time of 8.42. She then made light work of the semi-final by lowering this time to 8.30 to qualify for the final. However the result of this effort was a troublesome achilles problem necessitating a couple of treatments later in the day together with ice, paracetomol and ibruprofen.

Paula then competed in the shot put and in an exciting last round finished in the gold medal position to be crowned European Champion. Her final round throw of 12.49m edging out  Sonja Römmert from Germany by 9cms. 

On Wednesday it was the final of the 60m and what a race that turned out to be. Drawn in lane 5, Paula managed to secure a bronze medal in the tightest of tight finishes with just one hundredth of a second separating the 3rd, 4th and 5th placed sprinters. She took the bronze literally in the last stride with what seemed like sheer bloody mindedness   – I’ve come this far and I ain’t going home without a medal.  This was despite her painful achilles, the impact of which could be seen as she limped away following the end of the race.

Next up for Paula is the javelin on Friday and 60m hurdles on Saturday. On Friday she will be joined by club chairman Paul Hawkins who will be the only GB athlete contesting the 5000m racewalk.

Good luck to both of them

English Schools Cross Country Championships 

Report – Paul Hawkins
 

The 63rd boys and 45th girls English Schools Cross Country Championships took place at Pontefract Racecourse for the first time on Saturday. These championships are always the finale of the cross country season and are the main goal for many young athletes.

Pontefract has staged top-class horse racing for an incredible 375 years, but rarely has the two-mile long racecourse in West Yorkshire witnessed quite so many thoroughbreds as it did on Saturday.

A couple of weeks before the flat season kicks off at the venue, hundreds of the nation’s fastest creatures with two legs, as opposed to four, took to the turf for the English Schools Cross Country Championships.

The recent wet weather threatened to put a dampener on the event but the course was surprisingly dry and firm in the main although there were some softer patches in the lower parts of the course.

There were a number of Stratford upon Avon AC athletes running in the Warwickshire team as well as Olivia Robinson in the Gloucestershire team. 

The leading result from the Stratford contingent was from Junior Boy, Will Hovell who is juggling a fine indoor season with cross country and started fast and held on well to finish 39th in 10.46. The next two Stratford runners were Joel Ledgard (156, 11.21) and Aran Cooper (182, 11.26) who were close together for the whole race. 

Another success was Sam Lambert in the 5000m Inter boys race where after battling with brother Zak, Sam came 48th in 16.20 closely followed by Zak (57, 16.24). The rest of the Warwickshire team included Will Mayes (217, 17.37) and Tom Fisher (233, 17.43) so half the team were from Stratford AC with all running well in a big field of over 330.

The first race of the day had been the Inter Girls where Shaikira King from Leicester, the long time leader, fell with only 8m to go allowing Olivia Forrest of Essex to win although King got up to finish second. There were two Stratford runners in the Warwickshire team and both had strong runs with Annie Silvers (14.52) first for the county team and Bo Algate continuing to improve in 16.19.

Next up was the junior girls race also over 3200m where Marijke Tear-Verweij enjoyed the tough course coming second for the county in 119, 12.29.

Finally, the Senior Girls raced over 4200m which all agreed was a tough course especially having had all the other races loosening it up! This included the most dominant run of the day where Innes FitzGerald, limbered up for the World Cross Country Championships in Belgrade on March 30 with an emphatic win. The 17-year-old from Devon successfully defended her senior girls’ title as she beat Eliza Nicholson of London by 49 seconds as 800m specialist Phoebe Gill of Hertfordshire enjoyed a fine run in third.

For Warwickshire and Stratford Maisie Joy Spriggs and Niamh Hillard have been neck and neck all season each of them having to manage illness and injuries during the season and this time it was Maisie-Joy finishing in 138 (17.59) and Niamh in 156 (18.12) and again providing half the county team along with Abbi Cooper (19.52). Meanwhile Olivia Robinson was making her final cross country appearance for Gloucestershire schools had a good strong run in 193 (18.39).

Most of the Stratford runners will now be looking forward to the track season although there will be some aiming for road races in the spring.

 
Report – Karen Gisborne

The Good, The Bad and The Grizzly
 

Report – Sarah Odell

The 36th running of this amazing event, which is organised by Axe Valley Runners and takes place in Seaton, Devon.  

You can choose from the full distance, which is over 20 miles or the cub which is 9 miles.  

Over the years they have raised over £500,000 for local charities.

Myself, having completed it 5 times and Susan Hunt and Kate Sergent 3 times you would think we would know what to expect!

We decided on the way down we would do Severn Bridge parkrun which was the most surreal experience running alongside the M4 from Wales to England then back to Wales with the most amazing views.

On picking up Kate on Saturday morning finding she had no voice, she was wondering if to drop down to the cub option.  The wise one known as Susan, said “you may as well do the full as you may never do again as you could be dead, next year” so the decision was made, the full for all.

Sunday morning arrived and we made our way down to the prom in the most beautiful sunshine.

The race director did his usual thanks and said be very careful as we have had rain every day for the last 3 months and the course is the worst it’s ever been.  

The Seaton town crier set us on our way after his speech about how the mud would be muddy and the hills would be steep.

The course starts on Seaton prom and within 200 yards you drop down onto the pebble beach, all you hear is the crunching of over 2000 people running over a pebble beach for the first mile, you then head up out of town and onto Beer, once you reach Beer the off road really starts up through the caravan park onto the cliff tops. Due to the amount of rain the ground was very moist and very muddy, heading down to Branscombe you had ankle deep mud which made it nearly impossible to run down, runners were ending on their bums or face down, covered in mud.  

Over the beach onto to woods the mud was relentless, ankle or calf deep, I think all of us spent most of our time concentrating on staying upright, which 2 of us managed.  At around 13 miles you reach the famous Grizzly bogs, usually they are calf deep, not this year we had the pleasure of thigh deep water and mud to wade through.

Across more fields, more hills, more mud looping back round to Branscombe where they had a remembrance tree which you could put a ribbon on. It was then a mile across the pebble beach up to the Stairway to Heaven on the side of cliff top and across back to Beer over more cliff tops and back to Seaton and then a nice last mile downhill to the finish.  

Over 20 miles you climb over 3300 feet, you run on nearly every surface possible and the bogs were deep enough to swim in.

Kate fell and hit her head and managed to give herself a black eye, myself and Susan luckily stayed upright, no course records for us this year.

The course is stunning even when you struggling to stay upright, the hill’s are relentless and keep on coming, the marshalls are all fabulous and free cake, what more could you want on a sunny Sunday.

An amazing race as always, will we be back??

Bath Half Marathon

Report – Jamie Hall
 

A very eventful but successful weekend all-round!

The pre-race schedule for the Bath half was very different to any of my races before. I was completely overwhelmed, full of nerves and apprehension and that wasn’t because of the race!

The weekend started with a walk around Bath and a slight detour for food at a café. All planned so that I could keep on eye on the Coventry City vs Wolves game (as a big Sky Blues fan!). I had been preparing for this day for a while and once we had eaten, my girlfriend and I went for a walk along the river where I proposed and thankfully she was delighted and said yes! Of course, that was the best part of the weekend. But following that, I checked the score to see Coventry had one the game in stoppage time and were off to Wembley! I am claiming the proposal manifested the win!

They say that good things happen in threes – so I hoped a PB at the half was the third positive of the weekend (but obviously, not the most important). And it was my time to come home with some bling. I’m not usually superstitious but my race number was 361 (Saturday’s date in reverse). I thought it must have been a positive sign!

It was good to see a few SAC vests and was great to be joined by Seth for the warm-up. With it being a fairly big half marathon, the start was very busy and not what I have been used to with the smaller local races.  The start of the race was fast and I started far too quickly and went through the first 5k in 17:11 and my target was to go through each 5k around 17:30. The crowds were brilliant and with it being a two-lap course it defiantly helped to push me along. I managed to keep moving through the field and with 5k to go I could see the leading woman (Becky Briggs – Team GB marathon runner) and with 2k to go I managed to move ahead her. I had been telling everyone that the half was flat and that there weren’t any hills. Well, I got that wrong! To be fair, Rich did warn me! I was on for a sub 1:14 until the last km and the hill completely sapped my energy and I felt awful. I managed to hold my position and finished with a time of 1:14:13. 

A very successful weekend – an engagement, a trip to Wembley and a PB. I won’t order them!

It wasn’t just me who managed a PB in a SAC vest. Seth Turner ran extremely well and smashed his time of a sub 1:24, with a time of 1:23:36. Showing that he is in fantastic shape ahead of the London Marathon in less than 5 weeks.

Well done to all of the other SAC runners at Bath:

Gerard Thompson – 1:40:17

James Lake – 1:37:58

Yumi Turner – 1:48:56

Sally Evans – 1:51:57

Tony Tomecek – 2:14:00

Kendra Bell – 2:23:19

‘Joe Shellhorn’ Falesia 5k road race
 

Report – Jill Wilson
 

Graham and I this week have enjoyed a ‘running training’ holiday in the Algarve with friends from running clubs in the north west.

There are lots of serious training camps here at Falesia with some suitably impressive (mostly young!) runners – and then there is the group that we’re with – somewhat older, and very competitive once but now mostly enjoying social running.

It’s been a great week with some running every day – including two races:

Last Tuesday saw us enter the ‘Joe Shellhorn’ Falesia 5k road race – a three lapper which starts off with a long downhill with the third lap continuing up hill to the finish. Challenging for us Stratfordians! But – I knocked a couple of minutes of last year’s time and finished in 32:14, while Graham, coming back after injury finished in 30:13. And better still – I was way off being last.

Speaking of bringing up the rear however, the second race of the week was Thursday’s 6k handicap cross-country with handicaps based on the 5k times.

Graham turned in acceptable performance while I was third starter, caught no-one and was sadly overtaken by everyone else. I did however get to bring home the wooden spoon.

Room for improvement next year….

Podium Festival

Report – Nick Campbell

U23 Georgie Campbell and U20 Alex Pester were in action last weekend at the Podium Festival 5k race  in Leicester. 

Goergie recorded at time of 17.25, a time that places her 37th in the UK rankings for her age category.  Alex recorded a time of 15.24 to finish in 5th place in his race and he was the first U20 to finish.
 

The Podium Festival is a 5k (5 and a bit laps) road run held on a 980m flat tarmac cycle circuit at New College in Leicester and it is setup with the aim of running fast times / PB’s.

When entering you state your current pb or target time and they put you into the appropriate race. The pace is controlled by a lead car.

The races start with Opens for men and women and get progressively quicker throughout the day culminating in elite races in the evening.

There was over £2k prize money for the fastest and other prize money for 2nd and 3rd so it attracted some top GB and international runners. 

The male winner was Ethiopian Hagos Gebrhiwet in 13:19 which I think is the fastest road 5k ever recorded in the UK. Jake Whightman was 11th with a pb of 13:52! The fastest female was Ethiopian Asmarech Anley 14:59.

The big shoe companies had stands there, and live music, good commentary and free beer made for an entertaining afternoon.

There was also a 1 lap time trial that was good fun with the quickest runners getting to hold a large cheque for £2k at the finish until someone beat their time and they had to hand it over.