Cracking Times at Easter Sunday 10K Handicap, March 31st

The twenty members who got up early on Easter Sunday to run the club 10K handicap were greeted by clear blue skies, a gentle breeze and a temperature of about 0°C - ideal running conditions in fact. All had remembered to set their clocks forward, and were there on time to work off their Easter eggs in advance.

Seven of the runners were taking part for the first time, and all navigated round safely!

Fastest time of the day went to Jon Payne in 38.44, especially impressive as it came only 24 hours after Jon posted a new PB at the Frimley Lodge Parkrun.

The mention for the most accurate predicted time of the day (in fact, the most accurate prediction ever!) goes to Jim Brown, who said 43 minutes and meant it, coming in exactly on time. That was a bit unlucky for Lisa Norman, whose 5 second error would have been good enough any time in the last year - but anyway, Lisa had the consolation of continuing to improve her times, with another PB in 59.05.

Here are all the results:

Jon Payne	38.44
Keith Hull	42.36
Tom Smerdon	42.36
Jim Brown	43.00
Giles Blackham	43.54
Laura Hales	43.56
Lorayne Hockin	45.41
Abby Fudge	45.47
Sachiko Dixon	46.30
Phil Wragg	48.59
Mark Coxhead	51.24
Gordon Trout	51.27
Tony Sheridan	51.52
Katie Pearce	52.26
Ben Feltham	53.08
Simon Cutmore	54.58
Richard Harrington	55.27
Pam Berriman	57.25
Maria Mannan	58.32
Lisa Norman	59.05

Thanks go to volunteer scorers and assistants Dave S, Dave P, Bob, Geoff and Steve

Coastal Trail Series - Sussex - Report by Sabine

I woke up this morning of my race in Sussex to a snow blizzard and my first thought was "#*?@~#^*#"! But then I looked out my window and saw the builders outside our house, stomping their feet and hugging a cup of tea to stay warm and I thought "if builders can work in this weather, then I'm sure I can race in this weather as well".
So Jean, Lucia and myself set off, and crawled on the motorways until Brighton thanks to the blizzard and snow gritters.
Anyway, to cut a long story short I missed the start of my half marathon, but was able to downgrade to the 7 miles which started an hour later. By the time we started it had stopped snowing but the wind was blowing us off the start at Birling Gap. Once we got going I didn't find it too bad though as we made our way inland away from the Seven Sisters cliffs. Even though the race was classified as a "moderate", it was still very hilly and slippery underfoot. The views were well worth the effort though. I finished in 1:17, and I thought I might be 1st v40, but was too cold to stay around for prize giving, so will have to wait for the results to be published online.
All in all a really good race with magnificent views all the way, well worth braving the snow for.

HOT NEWS : Jojo and Ashley are getting wed!

  Jo Smith and Ashley Alexander  are getting wed on Thursday 21 March 2013.

On behalf of Windle Valley Runners we wish them loads of happiness for their future together.

 

Yummy Carrot Cake Recipe from Sunday

By popular demand, here is the start of the "Recipes" section on the blog, with the recipe I used to make Sunday's carrot cake :)
Steve

Ingredients:

250g unsalted butter
250g light brown soft sugar
5 large free-range eggs, separated
Zest and juice of 1 orange
170g self-raising flour, sifted
1 slightly heaped teaspoon of baking powder
100g ground almonds
100g shelled walnuts, chopped, plus a few for finishing
1 heaped teaspoon of ground cinnamon
A pinch of ground cloves
A pinch of ground nutmeg
250g carrots, coarsely grated
Sea salt

Method:

Preheat the oven to 180°C Gas Mark 4. Grease and line a 9 inch square or 10 inch round cake tin with greaseproof paper. Beat the butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy. Beat in the egg yolks one by one, and add the orange juice and zest. Stir in the sifted flour and baking powder, and add the ground almonds, walnuts, spices and grated carrot, and mix together well.

In a separate bowl, whisk the egg whites with a pinch of salt until stiff, then gently fold them into the cake mix. Scoop the mixture into the prepared cake tin and cook in the preheated oven for 50 minutes until golden and risen. You can check to see if the cake is cooked by poking a cocktail stick into it. Remove it after 5 seconds, and if it comes out clean the cake is cooked. If it is still a little wet then bake for a further 10 minutes. Leave the cake to cool in the tin for 10 minutes, then turn it out onto a rack and leave for at least an hour.

Mix all the icing ingredients together* and spread generously over the top of the cake. Finish off with a sprinkling of chopped walnuts.

*Steve notes: when I tried that, there was too much juice, and the icing was far too runny, so I did it again adding the lime juice a bit at a time till it looked and tasted OK. Depending on the cake tin size, you may not use all the icing, as it makes a lot.

Me cutting the carrot cake

And The Winner is ...... Pip

Do you keep your eye on our Twitter feed? Either via Twitter or on the website front page?

Remember when we tweeted this last month?

...which linked to this:

Well, Pip Webster-Smith saw it, and entered, and won the competition! 

Here she is on yesterday's run proudly wearing her prizes!

Lucky Thirteen Half-Marathoners

Windle Valley members were out in force at the weekend at the Reading and Fleet Half Marathons. (In fact there were 14, not the 13 we originally counted.)

Braving some fairly grim conditions at both locations, our cold wet runners finished with some very impressive times, and with three "top three" age group finishes and some new PB's to be celebrated.

See just how cold and wet here:

Position Name    Time Race Comment 347 Keith Hull 1:33:28 Fleet 2nd MV60 1611 Steven Handley 1:37:43 Reading New PB! 1675 Philip Ribbins 1:38:06 Reading 562 Lorayne Hockin 1:39:10 Fleet 3rd FV50 732 Abi Fudge 1:43:24 Fleet New PB! 992 Iain Mcdermott-Paine 1:47:40 Fleet 988 Paula Fudge 1:48:44 Fleet 2nd FV60 1146 Martin Cox 1:50:14 Fleet 1278 Robert Littlejohn 1:54:40 Fleet 1411 Karen Davies 1:55:40 Fleet New PB! 6058 Richard Sherlock 1:56:45 Reading 6219 Zira Longley 1:57:25 Reading 1732 Anna Holland 2:04:05 Fleet New PB! 9983 Lisa Norman 2:15:13 Reading New PB!

Thanks to Bob Fudge for Fleet photos. Click on photos for larger version

 Paula

 Keith

 Steven

Abby

A very muddy run of the month in Swinley Forest - more photos added

16 of us turned up this very wet morning for our run of the month from Yvonne's house.
We set off on Coronation road and made our way through Llanvair drive to arrive at the entrance of Swinley forest. At that point we were still reasonably dry, but that was about to change dramatically! Once on the trails, we ran from puddles that could have been mistaken for ponds, to mud baths fit for a pig farm. Along the way, we passed the royal goats having their breakfast, and probably thinking "what are these mad humans doing running in this weather". We then made our way towards the outskirts of the Swinley golf course, and finished the forest section of the run on the trails parallel to the train line that runs from Sunningdale to Ascot.
Once again on firm and dry roads, we all suddenly lunged for a puddle of clean water and decided it was the best way to clean trail shoes!
Back at Yvonne's house, we were all treated to a great spread of velvet cupcakes, birthday cake and a healthy banana and apple loaf, with tea and coffee. Well worth enduring the wet weather conditions!
Special thanks go to Yvonne for being a wonderful hostess this morning and to Jo for finding us a great route through the forest and then patiently showing it to me (twice!) so I could remember it and not get everybody lost!

Update by Steve - here is a set of photos from the run and the post-run feast -> click here

Silverstone Half Marathon 2013

Hi All,
Lucia and I made the trip up to Northamptonshire on Sunday to run in the Silverstone Half Marathon.  It was touch and go whether Lucia would actually start, as she had not done any serious training since cracking a rib late last year.  However, rather than wait in the cold for me to finish, she decided to take part, and we both made our way to our respective start pens.
I started off ok, and was aiming to keep a steady 1:50 pace.
Now, on paper, running round the Silverstone race track sounds great, but at the end of the day, there's not a lot to see for 95% of the course, the spectators are confined to specific sections, and it did actually get quite boring.  It's a well-organised race, but just rather dull (Pam did warn me a couple of weeks' back!).  The course is basically made up of 3 loops of various sizes, all coming back to the pit area and finishing straight, with a few undulating sections thrown in.
After about 6 or 7 miles, a bitter wind started to take hold, and I slowed down quite a bit.  The last mile was essentially out in the open, and seemed to go on for ever - I came home in just over 1:58 which is not particularly great for me, but looking at the overall results, I was in the top half of the finishers, and 44th in my age category, out of 97.
Lucia came home in 2:51, and had managed to run further than she'd expected to, so she was quite pleased.  She agreed that it wasn't the most exciting run she'd ever done.  Quite nice t-shirts though, although the queue to leave the car park was pretty bad.
Certainly not one we'd consider doing again, but other people seemed to really enjoy it, so I guess it just depends what you like.
Robin

John Austin Half Marathon

Hope you all had a good club 10k this morning everyone ! Whilst you were pounding the route through Windlesham Zira & I were getting ready for a 10.30 am start in Brockenhurst ( New Forest ). First we had a walk  of nearly a mile from Brockenhurst college to the start  and  with a biting  wind to blow us up the first long straight uphill we began our 13miles .

We ran through forest, on gravel paths and some tarmac then out through a  flat open bit very cold due to that fierce unforgiving wind again -- very stark and dull . I felt so sorry for the poor marshalls doing a great job encouraging us all - but looking so blue with the cold !  A few muddy bits and forest again then back over a railway bridge to the college so good to be back and finished --- but then we had to run round the sports field to finish -- only a kilometer said the marshall a few swear words later I finished not a nice finish at all but we did it ! Well done to Zira who completed in 2hrs 4mins her 1st half marathon for over a year good one Zira !!

And me? As usual a slow one 2hrs 9mins --- one day I will get back to a sub 2hrs !

So overall quite a tough half BUT a really well organised one - great parking, great facilities , lovely goody bag with t-shirt and medal , well marshalled , loads of drink stations on route ( 5 I think ) , Lovely cheap home made cakes at the finish in the Sports Hall AND the most important ---ALL---- the proceeds go to the Oakhaven Hospice in Lymington -- so come WVR we could get a team together for next year-- yes ?? 

Luv Pam & Zira x

February 10K Handicap Results and Photo

Despite a lot of members running races elsewhere this Sunday, there was a good turnout of twenty runners for the February 10K Handicap, which had been held over a week to March 3rd because of the cross-country race last week.

Eleven of the twenty had also run the January event, and of those, nine managed to improve their times in this race, so some good performances including some new PB's.

Sue Hadwen was first runner home, and winner of the "least accurate prediction of the day" award! Best prediction came from Jim Brown, who was within 22 seconds of his forecast time. Fastest time of the day came from Jon Payne, with a nippy 38.02, and that came on top of an 18.32 PB time by Jon at Parkrun the day before!

Jon Payne	38.02
Pete Mannion	38.56
Mike Waine	39.48
Keith Hull	41.24
Jim Brown	42.38
Laura Hales	43.05
Pete Jones	43.29
Steven Handley	43.41	PB
Geoff Williams	43.57
Sabine El Bacha	44.35
Russell Conaway	45.06
Ellie O'Neill	45.42
Nick Cook	51.26
Tony Sheridan	51.57
Pip Webster-Smith	54.00
Sue Hadwen	54.54
Lyn Taylor	55.52
Yvonne Lubbock	55.55
Lisa Norman	59.20	PB
Amanda Borthwick	65.05