by Sharon Gardner
Hello and happy Sunday everyone, I hope you’ve all enjoyed the welcome return of the (intermittent) sunshine today! I’m back to work tomorrow so rest assured, Summer will be back properly this week! 😀
The standard of our Run Report Writers is now so high, I’ve been struggling all day thinking about how to write this to even begin to compare with previous weeks. I deliberated about reporting on the carnage at Ashford Parkrun that almost caused a pile up on the final sprint, when a couple of feisty squirrels, completely engrossed in their fighting, ran across the path without a thought for anyone going for their PB. But, alas, I didn’t get any photos so I decided against it! (True Story!)
So here we are, I shall stick to what I know and report on all of the achievements that our members have earned in the last seven days.
First off, we had the first of the Rye Summer Series on Friday evening. The summer series is, as the name suggests, a series of four races over the four months of Summer (June, July, August and September) There are options for 10k or 5k for the first 3 and then everyone does the 5k for the final race. We had a fantastic clutch of members representing us in Rye on Friday with Lionel and Donna Hammond choosing to complete the 5k version and gaining themselves excellent times of 26:24 and 36:59 respectively. Next up and first of our 10k racers was the lightening bolt that is Simon Pharoah, Simon once again made it look easy coming in with an outstanding time of 37:56, a course PB, 3rd Male, 4th overall and first in his age category! Next up was Dave Winchester, comfortably coming in sub 60 with a finish time of 50:14, Ash Robinson was next in with 1:04:36, followed by Ross McInnes with 1:08:07, Sharon McInnes just behind with 1:08:44 and then Lucey Townsend in 1:12:08 – excellent work all!
Then we move on to Parkrun day – AKA Saturday! A total of 51 Striders attended a Parkrun on 07/06/25 , 42 at Ashford, and 9 on tour, we’ll start as is customary at home in Ashford;
Jack Farrant was first strider across the line and 14th overall, with a time of 20:13, he was followed by Keith Haynes with a time of 20:19, and Jason Caldwell third strider, with a time of 21:19.
They were followed by
Terry Sellen, completed his 399th Parkrun in 23:15, Chloe Winham, first female Strider earned a shiny new PB with an excellent time of 23:25, then came Steve Rumsey 24:45, Harry Scott 25:09, Darren Laker 25:12, Claire Green 25:15, Michael Ruck 25:16, Ian Mccutcheon 25:33, George Phillips 25:41, Daniel Schwartz 26:22, Jason Brice 27:12, David Gadsby 27:20, Neil Wood 27:36, Pav Jagoda-souch 28:47, and Jamie Bartlett 29:00. Rebecca James, smashing out the sub 30’s was next with 29:09, Don Dewar 29:16, Amanda James 29:26, David Martins 29:51, and Catherine Wall 30:34. Running together and looking like they were having a lovely time around the park were Lee Gribbin and Lisa Gribbin, both finishing in 30:43, Eloise Pegg was next, 31:17, Stephen Cartwright, coming back from injury and making it look like he’d never been away, came in at 31:25, then Rob Harris 31:54, Josh Stephens 31:57, Tamsin Ritchie 33:30, Dave Warner 34:50, Pauline Tallett 34:57, Lucie Shrubsole and John Latter finished together with 35:01, Penny Grigg 35:21, Sara Dewar 35:56, Sarah Martins 37:35, Nige Terry 37:41, Katarzyna, Heather Fraser 38:16, Helen Rumsey 39:09, Angela Craffey 1:00:49, and last but not least was Jamie Penfold celebrating his 100th Parkrun with a tail-walking party at the back, came in with 1:01:22!
As usual we had a good turnout of Striders volunteering at Parkrun; Jason Caldwell, Isabelle Froissart, Mark Niles, Jamie Penfold and Hazel Wood – Thank you as always to all of you and please, if you’re at a loose end at all, please do volunteer to marshal, it’s so rewarding and very much appreciated!
Parkrun Tourism
Maria Chapman completed the Cyclopark parkrun in 34:24
Nicola Crawley completed the Dinton Pastures parkrun in 52:14
Amanda Watson, this week’s furthest travelled Parkrunner, completed the Foro Italico parkrun in over 30 degrees heat and came in on 31:22.
Justin Burden, Lee Standen and Laura Clark completed the Great Notley parkrun coming in on 29:28, 31:43 and 1:03:01 respectively.
Linda-jean Delport completed the Maidstone River Park parkrun in 22:23.
Justine and Jason Wearn were in Swindon and completed the Seven Fields parkrun in 33:01 and 33:04 respectively.
Still on Saturday we move over to Lanzarote where Russ Berliner donned his Red Strider-Shirt and completed the Sun Run Lanzarote 5K race, which he did in a fine time of 31:43.
Saturday and into Sunday, three members decided it would be fun to enter Endure24 in Reading! This race is on a course of 8km and the aim is to complete as many laps of the course as you can within 24 hours. The race can be run solo, in pairs or as part of a team, our runners very sensibly took the team option with Nicola Crawley completing 3 laps in times of 55:33 at 5:02pm, 1:10:54 at 11:22pm and then 58:09 at 5:40am. Sharon and Ross McInnes, not content with a measly 10km on Friday evening also did three laps each, Sharon at 6pm, 2am and 11am and Ross at 7pm, 3am and midday today! Crazy bunch – obviously you’ve now piqued the FOMO sensor in some other members so I’m sure there’ll be a much bigger turnout for this next time!
Donna Hammond, another Strider not content with one race this weekend, was in Folkestone today for the Race for Life, she raised an amazing amount of money for the charity and completed the race in 38:30.
Four of our members added Swimming and Cycling to their runs today, competing in the White Cliffs Sprint Triathlon down in Dover. This race was a 400m Swim, a 14km Cycle and then a 5km run, first Strider and with a PB was Chris Littlejohn with an overall time of 1:05:35, Next was Richard Randle in 1:14:07, Andrew Cornwell 1:17:16 and finally, well and truly bitten by the Tri-bug, was Vicky Shrubsole with an overall time of 1:24:51.
Final race of the weekend was attended by Michael Davies. Michael was in Staplehurst for their 10k and came home with a lovely little haul of a beautiful VE Day medal and an award for being first in his category and with a course PB time of 45:15.
That, I think is it for this week, outstanding achievements as always everyone!
Have a great week all ❤️
