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Newsdesk 2020
*************************************************** RANELAGH HARRIERS E-NEWS # 572 18th July 2020 Editor: Steve Rowland mailto: sandsrowland@btinternet.com *************************************************** COVID-19 ENGLAND ATHLETICS GUIDANCE FOR ATHLETES AND RUNNERS 17th JULY 2020 Hon Sec Gordon Whitson writes: England Athletics has published on 17th July updated guidance covering the use of outdoor spaces, outdoor activity and exercise for athletes, runners and coaches. All members are encouraged to read and make themselves familiar with the updated guidance which can easily be found on the EA website: https://www.englandathletics.org/. Over the next few days, Ranelagh Harriers officers will look in detail at this revised guidance and come up with an approach to be adopted by the Club which will be communicated to members. Any questions you have should be directed in the first instance to ranelagh.hon.secretary@gmail.com. FROM OUR NEW PRESIDENT Ted Mockett writes: It’s a wonderful honour to have been elected to be the president of such a historic running club. My first duty is of course to thank Becky for her excellent work as president over the previous 2 years and which means I have a lot to live to up to! I joined Ranelagh just over 10 years ago when I was far less fit than I am now and having only run a handful of parkruns. I turned up slightly late for my first club training evening but eventually stumbled on a group of runners in a dark and cold Richmond Park and struggled to keep up with what I found out was the Advanced group. Fortunately, I stuck with it and have greatly improved my running and made some wonderful new friends by joining the club. Whilst Ranelagh has an enormous amount of history it’s great to see the club continue to thrive through these difficult times over the past few months. I’m sure a huge number of us (me included) are lamenting the loss of the usual club races, the end of the Cross-country season and the Summer Road Grand Prix but the number of people taking part in our Virtual race series and Strava segment challenges is really impressive and it’s great to see that club spirit and desire to run and to race continue even when we are unable to hold our usual events. I must say a big thank you to Suzy Whatmough, James Ritchie and everyone else who has been helping to organise these events and therefore giving us something to aim for. We simply do not know when running will be able to return to normal so, in the meantime, we will endeavour to keep as many people as possible motivated to keep running and stay fit. We are therefore looking to publish training sessions for the various training groups on our website and on the Ranelagh group pages on Facebook to give people a structured and varied training session. Whilst we cannot hold our usual Tuesday training sessions, many of you have recently been organising yourselves in small, informal, socially-distanced groups of no more than 6 people in accordance with the guidelines of UK Athletics. If you are unable or not yet ready to run in a small group, we also have many talented and qualified coaches in the club who I’m sure would be happy to provide personalised training plans based on your individual aims. One benefit of lockdown for me is the lack of commuting which, in theory at least, should give me more time to go running. My office is not scheduled to open until October at the earliest and, even then, is unlikely to see a full-time return to commuting for some time after. This means that, once we are able to restart our usual Tuesday training evenings, I hope to make it to the club a little more often than I was previously able to and therefore meet some new (and old) Ranelagh faces. Best wishes Ted KEEP IN TOUCH 1. Join the Strava group 2. Log your run and give it a catchy title. 3. Give our segments a shot! 4. Check back here every week for highlights 5. Note that Activity and Profile Privacy settings will need to be set to Everyone if you want the rundown team to be able to see your individual runs Follow us elsewhere on social: Twitter: @ranelaghharrier Facebook Insta: @ranelaghharriers ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING The Ranelagh Harriers AGM was held virtually via Zoom on Tuesday 7 July 2020. It was well attended, with outgoing President Becky Curtis-Hall opening the proceedings before handing over to her replacement Ted Mockett. Gordon Whitson presented a thorough Hon Sec’s report, and Hon Treasurer Chris Read demonstrated that we are solvent. A few other changes of personnel included Suzy Whatmough becoming the club Women’s Captain in place of Becky Northmore who stays on as Vice Captain. With Ted Mockett as our new President, he understandably does not wish to continue as Trophies Steward, so a replacement is sought. While Rob Curtis is continuing in the post of Welfare Officer, it was felt that there should also be a female Welfare Officer and Clare Fowler has volunteered to take on this role. Finally after many years as our Social Secretaries Michele Gibson and Andy Hayward have finally cried “enough”. So they must be replaced too – either by one individual or by a group of three or four taking on one function each. The main events are the Christmas Party, the Baker Cup Supper and Prize Presentation evening, the summer BBQ and – once every two years - our Thames H&H Mob Match supper. In addition there may be additional irregular events such as quiz nights. If you think you could help with one or more of these please do get in touch. VIRTUAL SUMMER RACE SERIES Our virtual summer race series consists of five events of varying distances at fortnightly intervals during the summer. The latest was the Turbo 10k, the results of which you can see below. The remaining two are: 17 – 19 July Virtual Coad Cup 5 miles Handicap taking place this weekend 31 July – 2 August Virtual Mercurial Mile Details and entries for these are here:. SECRET 7k Virtual Run 25th – 31st July The Stragglers are promoting a virtual 7k to stand in for the popular Wedding Day 7k. Details: VIRTUAL TURBO 10k 3rd to 5th July 10km Organisers Suzy Whatmough and James Ritchie report: The Turbo Ten was our third race in the virtual series and we had a great turnout with 73 runners taking part. For many of us, this was the most challenging of the virtual races so far. Finding a quiet, flat route whilst avoiding the wind was the first challenge, making it “turbo”, especially whilst not in race conditions, was the second. Despite that we saw some very impressive performances. Marianne Malam achieved yet another PB (45:26), with a plethora of male PBs from Gary Armstrong (see below), David Ready (35:19) Jonathan Moore (35:38 and an age grading of 85%), Ed Perry (35:47) Jarryd Hillhouse (40:16) and Hadi Khatamazadeh (44:57). Gary Armstrong set an early lead with 34:39, with Nick Twomey following with a 34:36. However, controversy was to follow as the organisers applied a 4 second penalty to Nick due to slightly too much downhill. Nick was magnanimous in accepting his demotion to second place, which we appreciated. In third was Ross Macdonald, though he was somewhat disappointed with his 34:59 run. Suzy Whatmough opted for the flat Kew Road, whilst Clare Fowler went for fast loops in Bushy Park. Meanwhile Sarah Palmer earned her third place twice - once in Richmond Park then with another go on Kew Road, performing consistently with only two seconds between each. A big well done to everyone taking part and thanks to those of you taking and sharing photos Podium finishers: Men Gary Armstrong 34:39 Nick Twomey 34:40 Ross Macdonald 34:59 Women Suzy Whatmough 40:11 Clare Fowler 41:11 Sarah Palmer 42:21 Age group winners: M35 - Ed Perry 35:47 L35 - Holly McGuigan 43:39 M40 – Gary Armstrong 34:39 L40 – Clare Fowler 41:11 M45 – Neil Rae 40:38 L45 – Marianne Malam 45:26 M50 – Jonathan Moore 35:38 L50 - Wiebke Kortum 45:48 M55 – Marcus Atkins 44:24 L55 - Carol Aikin 52:55 M60 - John Shaw 38:58 M65 - Angus Cater 59:47 M75 - Dave Kew 58:41 In the leaderboards, Gary Armstrong is topping the open and M40 categories, but James Whistler and James Riley aren’t far behind. It’s looking close in the women’s category too, with Clare Fowler only two points behind Suzy Whatmough. Clare has the lead in the W40 category, followed by Marianne Malam. In the V50 leaderboards, Jonathan Moore and Wiebke Kortum continue with solid leads, followed by Paul Doyle and Carol Aikin. Every race counts, so it’s all still to play for in the final two races of the series. Good luck to all those attempting the Virtual Coad Cup this weekend! Full leaderboard thanks to Ken Powley: http://www.ranelagh-harriers.com/ldbd.html . Times 1 Gary Armstrong 34.39, 2 Nick Twomey 34.40, 3 Ross Macdonald 34.59, 4 James Whistler 35.17, 5 David Ready 35.19, 6 James Riley 35.28, 7 Jonathan Moore 35.38, 8 George Howard 35.41, 9 Ed Perry 35.47, 10 Graham Brook 36.03, 11 Andy Starr 36.31, 12 Ian Kenton 36.31, 13 Jonathan Smith 36.40, 14 Rick Jenner 36.53, 15 Mark Herbert 36.56, 16 Phil Collins 37.01, 17 Dave Lawley 37.37, 18 Paul Doyle 37.38, 19 Rich Kimber 37.46, 20 Tom Bradley 38.41, 21 John Shaw 38.58, 22 Pete Smith 39.22, 23 Suzy Whatmough 40.11, 24 Jarryd Hillhouse 40.16, 25 Neil Rae 40.38, 26 Michael Everard 40.47, 27 Michael Morris 40.58, 28 Alex Ring 41.00, 29 Bruce McLaren 41.07, 30 Clare Fowler 41.11, 31 James Ritchie 41.23, 32 Richard Willoughby 41.44, 33 Philip Andrews 42.06, 34 Sarah Palmer 42.21, 35 Natalie Haarer 42.48, 36 Paul Murphy 42.59, 37 Holly McGuigan 43.39, 38 Michael Thomas 43.55, 39 Marcus Atkins 44.24, 40 Stewart Anderson 44.43, 41 Hadi Khatamizadeh 44.57, 42 Steve Aikin 45.07, 43 Marianne Malam 45.26, 44 Alberto Esquevillas 45.47, 45 Wiebke Kortum 45.46, 46 Phil Roberts 46.13, 47 Ed Smith 46.17, 48 Kathy Henry 46.24, 49 Adrienne Baddetey 46.57, 50 Becky Northmore 47.12, 51 Lloyd Camp 47.14, 52 Amrut Sharma 47.30, 53 Gavin Hillhouse 47.39, 54 Rachel Revett 48.42, 55 Rebecca Bissell 48.52, 56 Simon Taylor 49.46, 57 Kevin Knowles 50.13, 58 Felix von Schubert 51.03, 59 Ian Keith 51.27, 60 Claire Warner 52.37, 61 Carol Aikin 52.55, 62 Sally Bamford 54.01, 63 Ella Stanbrook 54.46, 64 Fiona Pugh 54.57, 65 Sue Camp 55.44, 66 Alison Targett 57.28, 67 Dave Kew 58.41, 68 Clare Day 59.03, 69 Angus Cater 59.47, 70 Ellie Lawley 61.42, 71 John Scally 61.43, 72 Keely Philips 61.45, 73 John Pratt 70.47 ENGLAND ATHLETICS VIRTUAL 5km Saturday 11th July Nick Impey reports: “I ran in the EA virtual 5k this morning running 15.44 on the Dulwich parkrun course with the help of a few very fast local lads. I was 7th and it felt like a real race, I think the quickest finisher was 15.08. I've been training with some of the Dulwich runners for shorter distances while I'm staying in Crystal Palace and don't often run 5k races, so I was pleased with a PB!” JOHN KELLY PENNINE WAY FASTEST KNOWN TIME ATTEMPT James Ritchie writes: On 13th July Suzy Whatmough and James Ritchie had the exciting task of running with John Kelly on his attempt to beat Mike Hartley's 31 year old record for running the full length of the Pennine Way, a distance of more than 260 miles with nearly 40,000ft of ascent. John's planned schedule had a significant buffer in, coming in 5 hours ahead of Mike's record of 2 days 17 hours and 20 minutes. John had made sure to get his navigational errors out of the way the day before, by heading to the wrong Cheshire Cheese Inn some 45 minutes away from Edale! John set out from Edale at 10am. The weather was pretty wet with poor visibility initially, but improved by late afternoon. Throughout he was accompanied by at least one navigator and one carrier, whose role was to keep giving John food and water and carry emergency equipment. Suzy and James took on this latter role, running for more than 45 miles in two stints each from Torside to Lothersdale. During the first leg for each of them, John was moving really well and getting ahead of his schedule, though even at this stage he was noting that "everything that you'd expect to be hurting is". By the end of Suzy's second leg he was starting to have problems with eating, and he got very little food down during James's second leg, when he was audibly suffering, though he noted that he now had less than two hundred miles to go by the end of this! As he left Lothersdale with a new navigator and carrier, darkness was approaching. He was more than an hour ahead of his schedule at this stage. It was fantastic to see on waking the next day that he was still moving well and keeping ahead of schedule, though he gave up some of this time with a 20 minute nap at Hardraw at 7am the following morning, and later, still suffering with gut issues, he had a longer sleep at Middleton in Teesdale to leave him down on his schedule for the first time. During his second night he lost more time to be 3 hours behind his schedule the following morning, and with 70 miles still to run. Wednesday was an anxious day following his tracker as it went through each check point to see if he was holding his pace or dropping further behind. By the evening he was more than four hours behind schedule and looked to be slowing too fast - it was starting to look like his chances of success were fading. Over the next leg, he managed to make back some time, and got up The Cheviot - almost all downhill from here. Finally at 2.46 am he made it to Kirk Yetholm in a time of 2 days 16 hours and 46 minutes, taking about 34 minutes off the record. It was great to play a small part in this massive undertaking. There were so many wonderful people who helped to support John, including some who had driven hundreds of miles at very short notice when one navigator dropped out. The way everyone pulled together all the time, especially when things looked bleak was fantastic. It was such fun, whether he succeeded or not, but all the sweeter that he made it. Well done John! NB one former holder of the record was Ranelagh’s Bill Bird who in 1971 cut 18 hours off the previous record with a time of 4 days, 4 hours and 8 minutes LONDON MARATHON There’s no further news yet as to whether the 40th edition of the Virgin Money London Marathon will take place on October 4th. A further announcement from the organisers is expected on July 28th. FINALLY Usain Bolt and his wife are celebrating the birth of their first child in May. The baby girl has been named Olympia Lightning Bolt. TO STOP RECEIVING the Ranelagh Harriers e-news, please reply with the word UNSUBSCRIBE