Fierce Competition at the Bracknell Half Marathon!

Wow, what a great scrap in the Bracknell Half today between our two quickest men, who battled it out at near six minute mile pace throughout the race. After 80 minutes of fierce racing, Alastair McGeogh-Williams came home in 11th place in a time of 1.20.19, and close behind was Danny Mahoney with a time of 1.20.56 in 14th place, placing 3rd in the Male Veterans category.

We know that Ali's dad Nigel was out on the course, hopefully taking pictures on a lovely sunny morning, so when we have some photos you'll see them here first!

Some other super times on the day included Jenny Livesey's 1.32.34, finishing 7th overall in the Ladies' race, and 2nd senior lady. Pete Mannion ran a very quick 1.27.09, finishing in the top ten male vets and 33rd overall out of 925 finishers.

Full results were as follows - if we missed anyone, or any other new PB's, please let us know. Congratulations to all our runners!

Alastair McGeoch-Williams	11	01:20:20	01:20:19	9th Senior M, New PB
Danny Mahoney	14	01:20:58	01:20:56	3rd Veteran M, New PB
Peter Mannion	33	01:27:12	01:27:09	8th Veteran M
Jenny Livesey	86	01:32:41	01:32:34	2nd Senior F
Mark Wye	312	01:47:23	01:47:03
Phil Wragg	439	01:52:31	01:51:44
Robin Wakefield	492	01:55:10	01:54:04
Richard Sherlock	529	01:56:37	01:55:29
Lyn Taylor	739	02:08:44	02:08:24
Amanda Borthwick	796	02:16:22	02:16:02

Update: Julia Robinson, who is a second claim member with us, first claim Brackenll Forest, was the winning Ladies Vet and 2nd lady overall, with a very quick 1.27.27, great running Julia.

We shared Bracknell Council's photos, which include most of our runners, on our Facebook page  <--- click to see them.

See the official photos here:
http://www.prosportphotos.com/running/2013/bracknell-half-marathon/index.htm
These are the running numbers that you need to search the pictures:

Alastair McGeoch-Williams	1175
Danny Mahoney	516
Peter Mannion	815
Jenny Livesey	964
Mark Wye	931
Phil Wragg	275
Robin Wakefield	313
Richard Sherlock	1093
Lyn Taylor	490
Amanda Borthwick	492
Julia Robinson	104

April 10K Handicap Results

Competition from the Bracknell Half Marathon and people still recovering from the London Marathon gave us a smaller turnout for this month's race - but still a high quality field with a tightly packed finish. Once again we were favoured with a cool sunny morning and a light breeze to give good running conditions that produced 3 new PB's.

Fastest runner of the day was Dario Cambiano, and most accurate predicted time was by Lisa Norman, who was only 5 seconds out last month and bettered that by being just one second out today. Predicting a new PB and then delivering it that accurately shows good confidence! First across the line (with our least accurate prediction!) was Malcolm Vaughan.

Steven Handley set a new PB just 24 hours after doing the same for the 5K at Frimley Lodge parkrun, and now has his time down to 42.24. Ben Feltham took a minute and a half off his previous time in bringing in the day's other PB. We welcomed Karim Jaser for his first race with us, and Karim came home just under his predicted 50 minutes.

Mark Coxhead was taking photos so we hope to have some on here soon

Full results:

Dario Cambiano	41.48
Steven Handley	42.24	New PB
Geoff Williams	43.32
Keith Hull	43.45
Sachiko Dixon	46.12
Karim Jaser	49.41	First Time
Ben Feltham	51.43	New PB
Nick Cook	51.49
Tony Sheridan	52.54
Mark Coxhead	53.15
Malcolm Vaughan	54.39
Sue Hadwen	54.49
Zira Longley	55.24
Pam Berriman	57.38
Lisa Norman	58.59	New PB

London Virgin Marathon 2013 - "how was it for you?"

As you will have read in an earlier blog posting we had a large number of WV members taking part in the London marathon last Sunday.

I thought you may like to hear some personal thoughts from those of us who took part; we hope it will inspire you to enter for 2014!

(entries open 29 April 2013 http://www.virginlondonmarathon.com/).

"About twenty minutes before the start, most people either go to the toilet or have a final drink of water, or both.   However there was one girl in her thirties having her final cigarette before lining up!"

"The Marathon was one of the most exciting days of my life that I will hold forever. I saw London in a different light. I am still on a high and not sure when or if I want to come down"

"I found it an incredible experience, I loved the atmosphere and was grinning from ear to ear most of the way round. My lasting memories will include the unbelievable crowd support, the contrasting quiet in the tunnels, and the blind runner I saw just after tower bridge"

"I was trying to avoid being sprayed by a fire engine hose at Poplar, which was unsuccessful, I caught the full force.  Surprisingly this was quite refreshing and gave me a bit of a push".

"My abiding memories.....the unexpected heat; the amazing support the whole way round, not one bit was left without supporters and the incredible walls of sound as you ran through the cheering, second to none.

"Overall, a wonderful day, something every runner should try and experience before they retire from running!"

"It was 26 miles too long!"

"A combination of beautiful weather and the "Boston effect" meant the crowds were larger and louder than ever. The organisation and volunteers were brilliant"

"I would recommend it to anyone thinking of trying one marathon in their running life. They may like it so much they return 21 times like me"

"I hope Sir Richard Branson appreciated my sweaty handshake after I crossed the line!"

Heathland Running - please take care

Ken Anckorn writes:

Now that the sunshine is out at last, most of us will be taking advantage of the weather and lighter evenings to run off road. If you are running on heathland sites, eg Chobham Common or Lightwater please can you stick to the main paths during bird nesting season (March to end August). Nesting birds, particularly ground nesters such as woodlark and nightjar are particularly vulnerable to disturbance and consequent egg loss. From experience I know how difficult it is to spot a nest and nests can be very near paths and in short vegetation but well hidden. It is not just treading on a nest that causes harm but disturbing birds can lead to egg desertion or attract the attention of a crow to a bird flushed from a nest site.

So enjoy the countryside this summer but have a thought for the wildlife.

Woodlark

Nightjar

Good running!

Ken Anckorn

WVR Chairman and Wildlife Trust Conservation Officer.

London Marathon Results and First Pics!

Great performances by our ten runners in Sunday's London Marathon. Here are all their results:

Name	Finish time	Place overall	Place gender	Place category
Keith Hull	03:26:41	4128	3652	25
Lorayne Hockin	03:36:10	5681	890	42
Chris Drew	03:49:47	8347	6744	84
Dee Green	03:55:25	9679	1978	242
Ross MacLagan	04:00:21	11054	8737	4671
Karen Davies	04:26:11	16771	4123	2416
Kayleigh Calderbank	04:34:30	18808	4901	2903
Anna Holland	04:44:17	21014	5732	685
Zira Longley	04:46:22	21494	5928	373
Mark Coxhead	04:53:52	23141	16538	1288

We have three pictures, courtesy of Tony Sheridan at the 40K timing mat, though Tony's battery then ran out so he couldn't take any more! Anyway, here are Chris, Karen and Keith all clearly enjoying the sunshine

Click the images for larger versions.

Meantime, we are awaiting our runners' reports and photos from the day. We feel sure that Captain Dee will tell us about her race, at least. And we'll add pictures as we get them.

Paula Fudge, who knows a thing or two about running marathons, sends a message to all those who ran:  "Just  to say well done to all the club's runners that competed in the Brighton and London marathons.  Trust you all enjoyed the races and are recovering well.......  I'm always looking out for results from the club's athletes and wish you all good luck with the coming season." Paula is struggling with injury at the moment but is hoping to be back running with us soon.

Update - we found this picture on Facebook of Anna looking deservedly pleased after the race:

PS Who saw Dee on TV? At two minutes past two, the BBC cameras followed her as she ran past the front of Buckingham Palace!

Website Archive is live

Thanks to long-time webmaster Phil Morley, our website archive is now live.

It is based on our previous website, which was live from 1997 to 2012, and contains all the reports, newsletters, photos, race results etc from that period.

So you can now relive Miles' exploits at the North and South Poles and everywhere in-between, you can find out who ran 20 marathons in 2004, you can see pictures of Tony Sheridan with more hair than he has now ...... and lots more

Visit the archive from the "Past Times" menu on www.windlevalley.com, or go straight to it from the image above.

Kayleigh and Simon are now married!

Farewell Kayleigh Epton, welcome Kayleigh Calderbank....

Club members Kayleigh and Simon have got married. Here are some pictures of their big day at the end of March:

Congratulations and best wishes from us all at Windle Valley Runners.

Kayleigh also sent us this picture of the beach in Thailand where she went running during their honeymoon!

Coppices, Chiff Chaffs, Charcoal and spectacular views - Run of the Month

Thanks to Ken Anckorn for leading our April "Run of the Month" yesterday at Norbury Park.

The weather turned out as forecast, giving us a sunny mild morning. Heading off into the park, we passed an area of the woods that is being coppiced, where Ken gave us a quick explanation of why and how. After another mile, we reached a viewpoint in Updown Wood that gave us a spectacular view over the Mole Valley to Box Hill. Further on we passed the sawmill which produces furniture from the park's trees, and also produces charcoal. They were in the middle of a charcoal-burning session - a quick stop to chat to the head charcoal man left us a lot wiser but also a lot smellier, as the dense charcoal smoke drifted all around us! It was reassuring to know that it was 99% steam  but the other 1% was certainly very stinky!!

We then ran down to the River Mole - which left us a long uphill run back to the park, where we saw swallows and chiff chaffs to show that spring really had arrived, plus red kites and buzzards, before getting to our finish at the tearooms

Next month we have somewhere just as nice planned for you, so we hope you'll put May 12th in your diaries:

(Updated) Good start to Marathon Week, well done Sachiko, Rachel and Pete!

Congratulations to our first three marathoners of the season, Sachiko Dixon, Rachel Hind and Pete Hansen, for their runs in the Brighton Marathon yesterday. Sachiko and Rachel were both running their first ever marathons, and both were running for charity, Sachiko for Thames Hospicecare and Rachel for Cancer Research - the links will take you to their donations pages.

Pete and Sachiko both ran negative splits (which most of us only dream of!), Sachiko running the second half (1.53) three minutes faster than the first (1.56) for a time of 3.49.25, while Pete beat 3.30 by 12 seconds, running a 1.45 and a 1.44 for a time of 3.29.48, which was a new PB and 9 minutes quicker than Edinburgh last spring.  Rachel completed her race in 4.47.08.

Well done to all of you, we are very proud of you.

We look forward to seeing your photos and hearing your stories of the day!

Coastal Trail Series - Exmoor

It seems like yesterday I was writing about the coastal trail series in Sussex, and yet this morning I set off yet again for another race of this series. This one in Exmoor.
The website classified it as "extreme", the toughest category for these races, and the weather looked set to be extreme as well with rain and high winds forecasted.
Once again I had to downgrade to the 10km, this time my excuse was that I am still recovering from a nasty bout of flu I came down with last week.
Julie, my daughter, who came down for the 10km was relieved I would be doing the same race as her.
To our surprise and relief we arrived at the start to find blue skies and sunshine. It made a nice change from the blizzard of my last race.
The race started on a forest path down towards the sea for about a mile and then it was a vertical climb that didn't stop for 4 miles. We were rewarded with stunning sea views at the top of the cliff, where the climbing eased a bit. At the checkpoint,at the highest point of the race, we were told we had run 5.5 miles and still had 3 to go but that it was "all downhill from here". (I spared a thought for Julie , who thought she was doing 6.2 miles but instead was 8 miles!) Good news about the downhill though, I thought! Until I saw the vertical downhill and all the runners I had painstakingly overtaken on the way up started overtaking me. I did my best to free fall down the hills and not think about broken bones, but still was overtaken by 2 women and lots of men.
I finished in 1:16 and despite the women passing me on the way down, I should still be in the first 10 women finishers. Julie finished in 1:33 and had great fun on the downhills - at least one of us enjoyed that part!
Then it was back to the car, a trek one mile up another hill, and Julie spent the whole walk up cursing the organisers for making us climb another hill to get to the car...
Great day out though, and yet again stunning views!
Sabine

Orienteering Night - a win for Katie, Lucie and Sam

Thursday evening saw a dozen of us roaming the streets of Heatherside, trying to navigate our way around lamposts, play areas and cul-de-sacs to accumulate points in our latest orienteering club night.

As usual, Pete Jones had things well organised, and by 7.15 we were ready for the off. 

45 minutes later, Katie's all-family team were declared the narrow victors, with 22 points, a single point ahead of teams led by Tony and Ben!

It was a great fun night, and many thanks go to Pete for arranging and refereeing it, and to those members who turned out to take part.

A Good Friday for our runners at Maidenhead Ten

As we had a large number of runners entered in the Maidenhead Easter Ten last week, and it turned out to be a nice sunny day, I thought I'd go over with my camera.

The resulting video can be seen below - the highlight must be Ali's sub-60 minute race, in fact he finished so early I did not get back to the finish line in time to see him cross! What a brilliant time.

And well done also to the five others who achieved new PB's on the day, and to Keith for his prize for 3rd Vet 60.

Click To Play The Video

Keith gets the chocolate bunny

Steve

parkrun - 1st 100 Club Member

Hi,

Congratulations to Peter Mannion, who is the 1st Windle Valley Runner to reach 100 parkruns.

Well done!

Robin...(currently @ 71 parkruns)