It needed to be said !

Report – David Jones

Our ever popular and extremely important fund raiser, the Summer Six took place last Friday, starting and finishing adjacent to Anne Hathaway’s Cottage in Wilmcote.

The conditions were ideal for the marshals but I suspect a tad warm for the competitors, 310  of who completed the race.

The overall winner was Harry Robinson from Nuneaton Harriers in the impressive time of 32:18.

Equally impressive was our very own Georgie Campbell who was first lady finisher and 13th overall in a time of 35:57, 79 seconds ahead of the next placed female runner. The third place lady was again one of our own, with Kate Wright finishing in 35th place in a time of 38:14. Kate also comfortably won her FV55 age category by over 6 minutes. Our 3rd placed lady was Santa Pavlika (112th – 43:51).

Dean Mawby finished first for the club in 4th place with a time of 33:17. Stu George in 36th place was our next placed male with a time of 38:19 and just 3 seconds and one place further back was James Lake (37th – 38:22)

Just 8 seconds separated Kate, Stu and James.

For the results of those listed as our club members, please follow the link below. I did notice Kate Wright was not listed as an SuAAC runner, so apologies if any other are missing

https://www.racetecresults.com/results.aspx?CId=16418&RId=964&EId=1&dt=0&adv=1

Report – Georgie Campbell

I made my Summer Six debut last Friday, which is about as local as it gets for me. It was a lovely evening made even better by the weather! 

I decided to make the most of the downhill on the way out of Wilmcote and hold onto the pace as best I could without dying (which I did a bit!) on the way back up. Overall I was really happy with the time and it was a step in the right direction towards improving my half marathon time in the autumn.

A huge thanks to everyone who helped put on the event and came to support and well done to everyone who ran. I’ll definitely be entering again next year!!

THAT WAS THE WEEK THAT WAS… 

Week commencing 11 August
 

Report – Kevin Zwolinski

What a week for the club!   We were spoiled by 2 races in 3 days.

The Wednesday Shakespeare races are always fun, this one was fabulous and I do believe rather special. Middle of August many folk are away on holidays but we still had a good entry and a route fully marshalled by club members

I arrived at The Fox at Loxley (aka The Chidgey Arms) in good time on Wednesday evening, the place was full of yellow vests and a lively atmosphere abounded in the pub garden on a beautiful summers evening.

What is not to like?

Easy parking, a quick natter and then we made our way as a 2Km warm-up down to the start where Richard and Anne Dobedoe’s  farm was to provide a simply fantastic route.  It was a warm evening but not uncomfortably so, with a light and most welcome breeze.

The first batch went off at 7 as usual and I did not know what to expect other than not having to worry about traffic. We started in the shade up the drive towards the farm and then left alongside the woodland but a few minutes later we were in the most beautiful woodland setting on a clearly marked out route cut specially for us (thank you Richard) and a further bonus of two such laps.

The open sections across the fields benefited from the breeze and apart from the climb back into Loxley village, the route was fairly flat. The road section back to the village was well worth the effort to get back to the pub and enjoy a pint of beer and a well-presented meal in a community run pub.  Love all of that!

This evening was really most enjoyable.  I have been off running for a short while but coming back to this was utter joy. Bring it on again next year please – such a well organised run and thank you!

And there is more….

Having been pleased with how I felt on my Loxley run I decided to capitalise and run the Summer 6 two days later in Wilmcote. 

Friday afternoon was busy setting out the course signage etc with the most enjoyable company of Susan Hunt – always good value! We finished that at 6pm to catch a breath before the run at 7pm.  Much is already out there on the well-attended event with some 300+ entered from all the WRRL clubs out there, this is clearly a favourite event. 

The start location at Mary Arden’s farm in Wilmcote has a real buzz and the lollipop shape route has a hilly out and back stem but the main loop is mostly flat and a nice countryside route. 

It was so good to be out there on a run with so many club members cheering you on at the marshal points, that really does make a difference. Thank you Selby for the unexpected water that was much appreciated, make it chilled next time?

This whole event just looked so efficient and I can see why it is the envy of other clubs.  But think about it.  Events don’t run by themselves we had two successful events in three days organised and marshalled by club members, OK with a bit of encouragement sometimes needed. But I reflect on last week as a true representation of Stratford Athletic Club and its capability to do great things.

 Well done to all involved in running both events!

Report – Paula Williams:

Sunday 17th August was the EMAA inter Area in York featuring 9 Masters Teams from across Britain competing for the winners trophies. 

Competing clubs were:

1    EMAC – Eastern Masters AC

2    MMAC – Midland Masters AC

3    NEMAA – North East Masters AA

4    NMAC – Northern Masters AC

5    SVHC – Scottish Veterans Harriers Club

6   SWVAC – South West Veterans’ AC

7   SCVAC – Southern Counties Veterans AC

8    VAC – Veterans AC

9    WMAL – Welsh Masters Athletics Ltd.

Five Stratford upon Avon Masters Athletes were selected to represent Midland Masters: David Jones, Elaine Ledden, Dave Wilson and Paula Williams along with Sharon Masters (2nd Claim ) and they all trotted off to York to compete. 

David Jones competed against athletes up to 25 years his junior as he stepped in to compete as an M50. 

After a long day of events the scores were as follows :

Men’s points:

NMAC – 366
MMAC – 328
EMAC – 252
NEMAA – 236
WMAL – 223
VAC – 221
SVHC – 217
SCVAC – 163
SWVAC – 48

Women’s points:

MMAC – 360
NMAC – 347
VAC – 250
SCVAC – 246
EMAC – 235
NEMAA – 231
WMAL – 222
SVHC – 91
SWVAC – 57

Combined points:

NMAC – 713
MMAC – 688
EMAC – 487
VAC – 471
NEMAA – 467
WMAL – 445
SCVAC – 409
SVHC – 308
SWVAC – 105

A convincing overall win for Northern Masters on their home turf with the men winning that trophy too. However … look at MMAC ladies who took the women’s trophy with 13 clear points. 

A great day and what an honour to be one of the athletes representing the Midlands from Stratford upon Avon. 

The next Inter Area is Indoor at Lee Valley in March. Fingers crossed SAC athletes are selected to compete for the Midlands again.
 

An overview

Report – David Jones

It was an extremely busy day for Paula Williams who competed in 5 events plus she helped Midland Masters to second place in the W50 4 x 100m relay.

Her individual events saw her finish 1st in 4 of them and she was 2nd in her 100m with a time of 14.11.

The events she won were:

Discus 27.59 metres to win by 31 cms. 

Shot 13.91m to win by 3.5m. 

Javelin 31.5 to win by a huge 7m. 

80m hurdles 13.68 winning by 2 seconds 

Elaine Ledden, who despite struggling with an injury, decided to compete, running 33.23 in the 200m and 67.05 in the 400. She finished in 3rd and 5th place respectively. Elaine also helped Midland Masters finish 3rd in the W60 4 x 100m relay.

Sharon Masters won her heat in the W50 400m, finishing in 5th place overall with a time of 71.00. She also joined Paula in the 4 x 100m  relay team.

Dave Wilson felt it was definitely worth the journey up to York.  He commented that the conditions for sprinting were near perfect. He felt good in the warm up and was thinking that today is good day for a fast time.  He was up against some extremely fast M50s, so wasn’t entirely surprised he came in 6th but was delighted when he realised he had run his second PB within 3 weeks with his time of 12.95  This was the fastest he’s been since he started Masters Athletics in 2018 and it showed him that you can actually get older and faster. This achievement was despite there being 4 false starts in his 100m race. Dave also went on the help Midland Masters finish in 2nd place in the M50 4 x 100m relay.

I dropped down from my normal M75 age group to compete against the youngsters in the M50s. Running the 1500 and 800m with just a couple of hours in between. Doubling up is not something I would normally do ! My 1500m of 6:40,23 was comfortably a season’s worse  but I was reasonably happy with my 800m time of 3:09.79 considering the earlier race. I managed 7th and 5th place respectively but driving 300+ miles in a day for less than 10 minutes running is not something I plan on doing on a regular basis!