Helsby RC weekly round-up 25th Apr to 1st May 2016

Here’s a list of the awards made at our presentation evening on Friday celebrating a year of excellent running at Helsby Running Club. We can run well and party well!! Here’s a list of trophy winners for the 2015/16 club counter season. Well done to all who ran throughout the year and here’s to lots of club counters by all this season!

For those interested in the detail, a full set of results/calculations will be put on the blog soon (we need to strip out the age data before it goes viral!)

Plus

A reminder about this coming Wed #Helsby vs #Felsby competition at Dinas Bran 4.3m 1150ft, 7:15 start LL20 8TG, for those wanting to car share please meet at the club ready to leave at 6pm.

A reminder about the fist race in the mini trail series at Thurstaston Country Park  Tues 10th at 7:15, again meet at club at  6:15

Plus the running club AGM the following evening 11th after out club run, 8:30 in the

So this was our last borders league race of the season and was probably the most important for the men, having fighting off relegation over the last 2 meetings we had to make sure we had 10 runners turn up and make sure we didn’t get any penalty points, and after an end of season fixture change for a midweek race from Shotton to Prestatyn I was a little worried we might struggle….oh how wrong was I!

Another superb turn out by the men’s and ladies team seen us fight hail, wind and rain for an out and back course along the sea front, which was great going out but not so great coming back with a full on head wind.

Some fantastic performances on the night yet again but I won’t single anyone out what I will say is it’s been a pleasure seeing you all turn up week after week and making me a very happy man. We are the envy of other clubs and I really do think that we will just get stronger, even some of the Felsby crew seemed to have enjoyed the races (probably because there free)

Some awards that we received included 1st V35 for Jo Lacking, 9th & 10th Overall men, myself and Col T, and 2nd V50 lady for Carol S.

Hopefully you’ve enjoyed it as much as me, now for a few months off before pre season training starts in July and I start moaning at everyone for breaking rule 4.3 thou shall not drink 48 hours before a borders league race.

For full results see below

30 of the green army travelled a hell of a long way to Kingsley on Thursday night which could only be described as a lightning fast 5k course, and I now know the reasons why, a mile downhill seen everyone post extremely quick first miles splits whilst the second wasn’t so fast as it was all “uphill”. You are then greeted with the start line again with still another 1k to run, yet again all downhill to the finish

You can see why some of the top running clubs around the northwest had plenty of runners out in a very strong field. pb’s galore were being broken much to the annoyance of Gaz and Helen sat on their sofa’s at home 🙂

If you’ve not done this before and want a PB this is the best course around by far and at a tenner it’s great value for money, they even through in hale for at least 5 mins at the end…lovely

For full results

Helsby results:

41st Chris Fitzpatrick 00:17:20
46th Colin Bishop 00:17:30 (1st in age cat)
54th Adam Gordon 00:17:41
94th Christopher Murray 00:18:52
101st James Higgins 00:19:07
104th Ian Hamling 00:19:12
108th Jane Ashbrook 00:19:15 (2nd in age cat)
113th Richard Hankins 00:19:20
133rd Paul Frodsham 00:19:44
135th Joanne Lacking 00:19:47 (2nd in age cat)
141st Davyd Michell 00:19:56
162nd Carl Pratt 00:20:23
182nd Tim Palmer 00:20:54
184th David Feakes 00:20:55
200th Michael Williams 00:21:25
201st Carol Shaw 00:21:38 (2nd in age cat)
234th Rachael Holden 00:22:29
235th Stephen Wiggins 00:22:38
245th David Madders 00:22:47
255th Debbie Read 00:23:11 (3rd in age cat)
269th Geoff Collins 00:23:35
296th David Wiggins 00:25:03
299th Jackie Keasley 00:25:16
306th Lesley Feakes 00:25:32
357th Janet Shaw 00:29:36 (2nd in age cat)

Twixt in between Borders, 5k and 10k Green Army members still managed to get out onto the hilly stuff. Big thanks to Tim Palmer for this report…

As a local favourite but not a counter this year, the Llangynhafal Loop saw a Helsby turn-out of 7. Janet Robertson, Sue Buck, Jim Jones and Tim Palmer running; Joe, Mario and Andy Smith supporting/marshalling/taking photos. On arrival at the Golden Lion, the weather kept most in their cars or the pub and the walk to the start wasn’t much better (some of the Helsby contingent were sure whether it was hail or snow). However the weather improved for the race. The infamous gully was as always a challenge; but the last climb (which is a bit of sting of the tail) was improved with Helsby supporters at the bottom and top – thanks Joe, Mario and Andy. Tim was the first Helsby runner home just ahead of Jim; followed by Janet and Sue. As usual, all ended up in the Golden Lion for the presentation – a highly recommended race. Full results awaiting on www.wfra.org.uk

Saddleworth Cake Race
Any race with “cake” in the title is worth a go at, Ben Fletcher and Jamie Dowdall certainly thought so and found themselves towing the line in Saddleworth, over to Ben for his take on the race…
I decided to give the Saddleworth Cake Race at Diggle a go. This fell race is famous for the cakes after the race & it didn’t disappoint, there were 3 huge tables full of them! It was £5 to enter or free if you supplied a cake bargain!
At just short of 10miles 1700ft over Saddlewoth moor it’s a cracking race. I wasn’t expecting to see anyone I knew, then Jamie Dowdall in his Darwen vest shows up. After a quick chat with Jamie we were off into the hills.
Ben Fletcher 1.18.03 22nd Jamie Dowdall 1.33.18 89th
Full results
http://saddleworth-runners.co.uk/cake-race-2016/

 Liverpool Spring 10k (6th road counter)

The Liverpool Spring 10k is 2 laps of Sefton Park, billed as flat but not exactly – some energy sapping long gradients and tight turns certainly made it a bit of a challenge, as did the horrible weather. That didn’t hinder our Green Army contingent from setting PBs galore though, a huge well done to everyone for running so well and some of our newer members who have improved so much recently. Big thank you to Colin and Jane Bishop for their support on the day, Jane even had a selection of fresh baked cakes for us at the finish to replenish those depleted carbs! Result!

Please find the Helsby results below:

16^th Colin Thompson 0:35:26
83^rd Gary O’Connor 0:38:47
136^th Richard Hankins 0:40:38
172^nd Davyd Michell 0:41:47
198^th Carl Pratt 0:42:00
382^nd Helen Owens 0:45:43
383^rd Rachael Holden 0:46:02
669^th Stephen Wiggins 0:49:00
732^nd Rhea Thomas 0:49:48
1092^nd Tanya Downes 0:53:36
1101^st David Wiggins 0:53:42

Please find a link to the consolidated parkrun results from Saturday. Well done to everyone who ran, especially Col Bishop for another fantastic win at Widnes! Well done mate.

http://www.parkrun.com/results/consolidatedclub/?clubNum=1721

And finally, it’s big congratulations to June Swift and Jim O’Hara who have been selected to run for Cheshire at the Inter-Counties Fell Running Championships on 14th May. Well deserved after a brilliant season, be sure to congratulate them on their fantastic achievement.

Phew! That’s it this week. Many thanks for all the excellent reports, if I have missed anything please get in touch and I can always update the blog later on.

Cheers

Colin