Spen Road Records - Now Official!

Good news!

Last Friday I attended a club committee meeting and proposed that the road records we have been accumulating get accepted as the official club records. It was seconded by a couple of people and accepted by the committee.

So next step is that I clean up the document and send it for posting on the official web site. I will continue to update the document, and hope that we can improve it over time by verifying some of the results that have so far eluded us.

In the meantime, thanks are in order to all those who have contributed towards the verification and collection of records, especially Vic (who planted the idea in the first place) and John Henry (for scouring the Athletics Weekly archives), without whom....

And...John managed to find the results of the 1998 Abbey Dash, verifying Steve Moss's V50 time of 35:00 (not 35:01 as Steve's own record showed) so the next update will reflect this.

Spen Road Records - Draft #11

It's been a while since the last update, partly due to my procrastination, but also because I suspect we are getting somewhere nearer to having a fairly accurate set of records, and the input of new entries is drying up somewhat.

However, thanks to Vic, who discovered some new results on the Askern & District RC web site, we have new records in the V50 and V55 category for Keith Williams over 10K and 10 miles.

I've also received an incredible V50 10k time of 35:01, from Steve Moss at the 1998 Abbey Dash, which would beat Keith Williams' time, but so far I have been unable to ratify this time with any official results.

Does anyone have a copy of the 1998 Abbey Dash results? With luck, it will have a mention in Athletics Weekly, and John Henry might just have a copy .

I'd like to take the current results to the next committee meeting to try to get the "rubber stamp" and make them the official club records if possible.

Spen Road Records - Draft #11

Spen Road Records - Draft #10

Just a couple of updates, which are verifications of Graham Walsh's V50 10K and 10M records. This means if we can get verification of Graham's 20M records (which is somewhat embarrassingly the Spen 20) then apart from the 5K record which belongs to Steven Moss, Graham will have a clean sweep of the entire distances in the V50 category. So pound for pound (or year for year) it could be argued that he is our best ever road runner!

Spen Road Records Draft 10

Spen Road Records - Draft #9

Thanks once more go to John Henry for poring over the Athletics Weekly archives and both verifying and uncovering more top performances from Spen athletes past and present.

Spen road records - draft 9

We still need more records to be verified, so come on folks, we know you've got old news clippings, athletics weekly mags in your closets. Don't worry, I won't tell anyone! You can even send them to me anonymously if you like.

Anyone from other clubs who happen to be reading, and can verify some of these we'd be appreciative too.

Spen Road Records - Draft #8

Yet another update, and I'm starting to fade a bit! But here's the latest:-

• I've put in actual race dates, not just the year, where it's been possible. This is so we can resolve any age category disputes later
• I've also added the source of where the time was verified, or in the case of the "pending" records, who supplied the information
  
• Chris Drake has provided me with results from his archive, some of which I've been able to verify, and some not. I'm hoping we can verify more of them. If we can, then Kath will make a clean sweep of the Ladies open records.
• I've added a page for the Ladies records Pending Verification

I really need some help with both the mens and ladies results which are pending verification, so anyone with old copies of athletics weekly hidden under the stairs, it's time to dig them out.

Spen Road Records Draft 8

Spen Road Records - Draft #7

Hot on the heels of draft #6, we have the next instalment.

1997 Nottingham Marathon results courtesy of John Henry and Athletics Weekly means we have new mens marathon records for the Open and M40 categories, those now going to Darren Hanson and Dennis Hoey.

John has quite an archive of Athletics Weekly's so we might be able to verify some more results!

John - can you take a look at the last page and see if there is anything on there that you can confirm?

Draft #7 Results Here

Spen Road Records - Draft #6

A few changes since last time, and a status update.

• Chris Drake is still looking into Kath's times
• Frank has a copy of draft #5 which he will analyse and compare to any results he has on record
• Graham Walsh takes the M50 records by storm

This begs a question...

At the moment we have a number of records which are "pending verification". What I mean by that is that, I have not been able to find an on-line result, or seen a paper copy of the official results. Graham's records are a case in point, as most of them are from his personal archive. However, I have no reason to doubt that they are correct. How should we handle these? Do we just accept them (some are a bit more vague than Graham's)? Or do we require hard-evidence? Perhaps we can accept them if they are "seconded" by another Spen athlete/official?

Thoughts everyone?

Road Records Draft #6