Medals galore.

ATW Milton Keynes Triathlon.
 

A Big Day Out for Stratford Triathlon

Report – Neil Gardiner

On Sunday 13th September the Stratford Upon Avon Tri Club went to Milton Keynes to compete in the ATW Milton Keynes Triathlon. This is one of the UK’s only closed-road triathlon events and it takes place at the stunning Willen Lake in Milton Keynes. With a lake swim, a fast traffic-free bike course and a flat scenic run around the lake, the event offers the perfect race experience for both beginner and experienced triathletes and for our the experienced triathletes it proved to be an extremely successful day with members competing in both the sprint and standard distances.

  It was a fab turnout with 4 people racing as individuals, doing all three disciplines and 5 relay teams with each person doing the swim, bike, or run.

The course included a lake swim that was more weedy than my front lawn, a closed-road bike loop, and finished with a run round the lake to the beats of a live drummer.

Time to shine!  There were so many awesome performances:

Individuals:

• Toby James, Sprint, Age Group Winner (lovely to see his Dad pacing him on the run)
• Cara Reynolds, can’t recognise her own husband but knows how win the Sprint Age Group
• New member George Clarke, Standard, Age Group Winner

Relays:

The Stratford teams owned the podium, taking the top 3 placings out of 14 teams.

1st    Camilla Cresswell, Paul Faithfull, Ollie Howe (kindly stepping into Adam’s shoes at the last minute)

2nd    Jess Howe, Ash Habel, John Wilson

3rd    Jane Linforth, Neil Gardiner, Gary Kinley.  Jane also set a PB with her run through transition.

The results are impressive, although in my view the best thing was the craic of racing with so many club mates.  

Thanks everyone for being such a fun and supportive crew – a top day out.

 Stratford’s Big 10k and half marathon.
 

Report – David Jones

This year’s Big 10k saw over 1000 runners completing the course, including 30 of our club members, who enjoyed considerable success. 

The overall winner was Luke Carr in a time of 34:21, but he was quickly followed by a couple of our own, 17 year old Sam Lambert (34:29) and Harry Jolly (34:36) in 2nd and 3rd place, with just 15 seconds separating the first 3 places. 

Harry commented “It was pleasing to run well in my favourite race of the year, superbly organised by Tempo Events as always. Local support makes it extra special and it was great running with fellow club member Sam Lambert, even if he did drop me once he put his foot down”

We had 4 of the top 10 places, with Dean Mawby (6th – 35:56) followed by Matt Burdus-Cook (9th – 36:53). Matt was also first in his age category.

Our first lady finisher was 16 year old Marijke Tear-Verweij (44:19) who finished as 3rd female and 72nd overall.

In the Half Marathon, 605 runners completed the course. The race was won by Luke Williams in a time of 1:16.15 and the first female finisher was our very own Kate Wright, finishing in 6th place overall with a time of 1:28.26. Kate is currently ranked 2nd in her age category in the UK for half marathons.

9 of our members completed the half marathon, with Charlie Staveley (14th – 1:27.10) being first to finish for the club.

For the full list of runners shown as our club members in the official results, please follow the links below:

10k:

https://www.racetecresults.com/results.aspx?CId=16418&RId=1050&EId=1&dt=0&adv=1

Half marathon:

https://www.racetecresults.com/results.aspx?CId=16418&RId=1050&EId=2&dt=0&adv=1

British Masters Outdoor T&F Championships. 

Report – Paula Williams.

September 11th,12th and 13th saw approximately 900 Masters Athletes descend on Moorways in Derby for this annual meeting. 

I was on presentation duty all day Friday and Kathryn Woodcock was also officiating, so we travelled together. 

I had the absolute honour of handing out bronze, silver and gold medals to winners from all of Friday’s events. 

My season has been hampered severely due to a broken ankle in March so I hadn’t entered any of the track events. I thought I’d take the opportunity to play in the throwing events. 

Saturday started with me competing in Javelin and gaining a silver medal with a SB of 28.85m.  I then went back to presenting until the day finished. 

Sunday was about me competing in the other three throws I’d entered.  Starting with hammer – SB of 35.05m and a bronze medal. Shot put was next up and I managed to break my own W50 British record with a PB of 13.99m and gold medal. 

I finished the day with discus (25.69) where I was trying a spin with some success. 4 events, 3 medals. That’ll do. 

Unfortunately this meant me missing the club champs  – but at least it was lovely and sunny in Derby. 

Roll on next season where I’ll be injury-free… hopefully.

Overall it was truly a great weekend where I aslo witnessed a number of my fellow SUAAC Masters Athletes achieving success:

Dave Wilson qualified for both the 100m and 200m M55 finals, finishing 6th in 100m in 13.18 and 4th in 200m by running a season’s best of 27.08 into a -1.4m head wind. He was really pleased with that performance. He fought hard trying to get the bronze but didn’t quite have enough.

Emma Bexson won bronze in the 300m Hurdles (65.86) and silver in the 2000m steeple chase, (9:37.85) with Kathryn Woodcock (12:19.90) following with the bronze.

Phil Brennan’s intention was to throw himself at everything to see if he had anything left in the tank.  He finished with the conviction that it was worthwhile getting back to some serious  training. Plan A was for him to go to the Club Championships after his 5000m on Sunday morning, but Plan B prevailed – go home and have a kip.

What he really took away from the meeting was the absolute delight in meeting his pals from Stratford and beyond, having let himself get isolated for various reasons. It made him determined to do something about it.

Phil also got 3 medals from 4 events. 800m : Bronze 4:10.57, 1500m : Gold 8:17.96, 3000m: Silver – 17:53.70 and 5000m: 4th 32:20.73.