Striders were here, there and everywhere this week at home and abroad. As usual we will start with Saturday and parks across the UK and USA welcomed their 9am weekly visitors aka Parkrunners.
Its unusual to find a Parkrun these days that isn’t graced by at least one red shirt with the iconic tank badge that indicates only one thing…Striders are in town !!
We will start outside of our home territory this week and Mark Niles trundled over to the Bath Skyline event and set off with all guns blazing to record a superb finish time of 23.00 mins.
Northampton was the battlefield of choice for Claire Hall-Dawson and she conquered that in 26:27 whilst at Widnes Parkrun Hazel Turner raised the victory flag in 24:29.
Burnham and Highbridge has seen many epic battles in the past but none more so than Saturday when Stephen Cleaver turned up and stunned the natives with a superb 25:23 run.
Julie Nicholson infiltrated the Malling event and finished in 37:35 and intelligence revealed tough opposition at Whitstable so Striders piled in mob-handed and our trio of foot soldiers Justin Burden, Graham Troman and Siobhan Hagan claimed victory with finish times of 23:21, 26:41 and 28:23 respectively. Martin Whittingham took on Royal Tunbridge Wells single-handedly and brushed the enemy aside with a 33:19 run and across Kent at Canterbury Tamsin Ritchie shook the locals to the core as she stole their show with an impressive 26:25. Lee Standen took his tank over to Mote Park and tested it out on the vast slopes there and it came through the test with flying colours in 32:30 and Lisa Gribbin used the Delaware and Raritan event with our allies in the USA as a mock battle to prepare for her big challenge on Sunday and she came through in 31:11.
Ashford Parkrun saw the bulk of our battle weary troops in action as they prepared for future conflicts and recovered from past ones and General Keith Haynes led the charge with a brilliant 20:33 finish. Kevan Strand was hot on his heels but didn’t have quite enough in the tank (see what I did there ?) to catch him so settled for 20:57 whilst Neil Wood recorded a fantastic new PB with 22:12. Jason Wearn was fourth in the Group 1 face off and smashed out a 22:21 finish whilst Dave Winchester prepared for his imminent promotion to group 1 ith 24:21. Ian McCutcheon ran a great race and finished in 25:55 and David Helme went one better and secured a new PB with 26:03. Nicola Crawley took the first Strider lady place with 26:32.
Jamie Bartlett and Amanda Cooper were the next reds over the line with 27:27 and 28:21 and our most senior officer David Gadsby led by example with an excellent 28:25.
Rachel Tomsett and Richard Randle were seen discussing tactics on the way round and they obviously worked as both came in sub 30 with 28:51 and 28:52 respectively and Amanda James was close enough behind to hear their conversation and came through in 29:30.
Jason Brice and Justine Wearn were next Striders home with 29:34 and 29:59 followed by Rachel Theobold and Kevin York with 30:55 and 30:56. Lucie Shrubsole just managed to pip Dave Warner to the post with 32:12 with Dave just two seconds behind in 32:14.
Rita Cooke 32:29, Lisa Fulcher 32:42, Sharni Copham (Happy birthday for yesterday !!) 32:54 and Vicky Shrubsole 32:56 were the next Strider quartet over the line with Brian and Hazel Forrester completing the Strider ranks at Ashford with 33:49 and 38:55
Thanks also to the Strider Volunteers of which some have been injured in action and others that can’t ride a bike let alone a tank. This week they were Don Dewar, Vicky Stevenson, Andy Found, Darren Laker, Jennifer Watts and Simon Jackson.
With not many races going on this week, Karen Edwards still managed to find one to fly the Strider flag at the M&S Beckley 10k and she conquered the steep hills and pouring rain in 1:05:49 and then there was Lisa Gribbin.
Lisa flew over the pond to the Big Apple to do battle with the Yanks in the New York Marathon. Proudly wearing her Striders shirt she completed it in 5:11:14. A wonderful achievement Lisa and we all hope you enjoyed the experience and you certainly did yourself, your family and the club proud. Huge congratulations to you !!
Well Done to everyone who ran, volunteered and supported this weekend
Over and Out!
Report by Andy Found.
