Yorkshire six stage road relay championship and West Yorks XC league

This event takes place on 11 Sep at Leeds Met Uni (note change of venue) 2pm start for men.
Anyone wanting to take part let me know asap.

Tony Bradford will be required.

I hope we will be able to turn out a team again in the West Yorks XC league. I am taking the entries for the Senior men. Lets make a big effort and try and do as well as we did last year.

Web Site

Just to let everyone know, Stuart Hall has taken over the official web site. I know that most vets/fell/road organising goes on through here but we should still keep the site updated if we can. The formation of the site has encouraged a small number of new members down to the club so its all to be encouraged.

Since this blog is 'blogata non grata' with the committee, then please email Stuart direct with any interesting news or races that might be of interest to anyone who considers this blog 'not in the interests of the club!'.

Gareth
(former web master :( )

He can be emailed on webmaster@spenac.co.uk

Cycling is bad for your health!

Hi everyone, hope you are all fit and well!

Just when I thought I was getting into half decent shape again, I spoiled it all by having my worst ever crash on the bike. For the gruesome details and pictures, check out my cycling blog...

http://gonecycling.blogspot.com/2010/07/hospitalised.html

http://gonecycling.blogspot.com/2010/07/injury-update.html

Keep up with the blogs!

The Helen Windsor 10k

Wednesday 7th July

A breezy night in Stainland saw the turnout of 8 Senior members of Spenborough for the Helen Windsor 10k.

An impressive 200 local runners lined up, also having to juggle between the cycle race flying round at what seemed 40mph.

Kevin "the race machine" Ogden flying the flag for Spenborough at what seemed 41mph finished in a very respectable 3rd place (35 mins) having to compete with a host of top runners that turned up, including the likes of Pierson, Crowther and Whitworth!

Gerrad Skippins was second home in an excellent 14th postition in 38 mins 56 secs. Gerrad is going from strength to strength right now. Keep it up!

Oliver Carter 49th back, third home in 44.20, but refused all samples of a drugs test after this impressive time and knocking 6 1/2 mins from last year. Keep off the ale.

Vet 60 Graham Walsh in 60th place was next for Spen in 45.44.

Mick Howard 69th in 46.26.

Emma Maguire - first female vet 40 back in a smashing time of 47.33 coming home in 77th.

Jackie Carter 50.59, nearly 3 mins slower than last year in 109th, followed by Liz Bottomley in 54.27 which she is she is slight dissapointed with but has had back problems, or so she says ;)

Taking in to account this isn't a PB course and it was a little breezy we can all knock 4 mins off our times.

The Reindeer Romp

Tonight six of us ran in this race, This is an off road multi terrain course from the Reindeer Inn nr Wakefield, I have done this for a few years now and it never gets any easier, this year we have a slightly altered course ,for those of you who know the old course we now take a right at the end of the lane at the start omitting the down hill section .

I like this route better I think. it takes in some woods but we still have the hill at the end.
First back for spen in second place (again) Kevin Ogden, you're gonna have to sort that Kevin, Antony Bradford followed by Gerard Skippins (first time for him ) then Michael Howard, followed by myself and Elizabeth Bottomly (first time for Liz too) both have enjoyed it and are waiting for next months race the end of July.
Both Liz and I did a tough boot camp last night and don't know how we managed to race tonight.
Maybe we will give BC a miss for the next one to see if it makes any difference.
Thanks you guys for turning out hope you all enjoyed it , and the free chip butties afterwards.

Joe Percy 10k results

You need windows 2007 to be able to view these results. It won't let me copy and paste them into this :-( and I can't work out how to put an attachment into this blog! So here's spen results typed in manually:-

2nd place - Kev - 34.24
8th place - Tony Bradford - 36.17
21st place - Tony Bradford again! could this be Gerard? 37.33?
27th place - Dan Stuart - 38.36
102nd place - Richard Lee - 43.58
117th place - Mick Howard - 45.21
143rd place - Graham Walsh - 47.06
149th place - Emma Maguire - 47.29
156th place - Alan Whittaker - 48.04
184th place - Donna Winterbottom - 50.14
193rd place - Jackie Carter - 51.22
210th place - Hazel Pike - 53.12
215th place - Elizabeth Bottomley - 53.26
218th place - Suzanne Plimley - 53.46
257th place - Amanda Pearson - 61.27

269 ran the race in total

John Lunn - Leeds City

Just heard the sad news that John passed away in his sleep on Monday night.

John was a well known character in West Yorks athletic circles and a good friend to many people down at Spen.

John was passionate about his beloved Leeds City A.C. and would be seen at many events 'encouraging' the Leeds runners to perform to their maximum.

What a lot of people may not know is that John was an extremely talented athlete in his earlier years and his performances would have won many a race in more recent times.

John's enthusiasm for the sport never waned and recently was still trying to capture many of the Leeds City age group field event records.

I know he will be missed by many many people throughout athletics.

spen athleats at the lamm

Just a few lines to let people know that we do have some competing members left, be it that there sport is slightly different to track,and less appealing to some committee members.

In total 5 spen runners set off on Friday 11th June to compete in the low alpine mountain Marathon taking place at lock fynne in Scotland this is the connoisseurs event and very popular.

Steve Hemingway had to find a partner at the last minute, and he was lucky to get one off the lamm web site he completed the score class with very good results Mark& Josh completed the score with some trepidations as this was there first attempt at this type of event there second day went better than the first with some hard lessons learnt from there first day.(they are now looking forward to the Saunders in July as are we all) I my self had one very good event coming second vets team with Tim Sowood who partnered me last year.From an email from Chris King

who did the B class (witch is some what harder than the D class we did) he had a very good event and came 58th witch is very good as we only bagged to Munro's (hills over 3000 ft for those of you who might think its a walk in the park) and the b class did more than two. Sorry for the lack of detail but to do a write up of the hole event i would have to go see Kieth and get him to do the write up.

Well done Jackie Carter

Many thanks to Jackie for rising to the challenge and getting 15 runners out for the Joe Percy 10k.
I know a lot of time and effort went in to making this happen.

The Joe Percy 10k

What a fantastic turn out at the Joe Percy tonight Fifteen seniors made the effort and I would like to thank everyone for turning out for me,
The weather was kind to us ,Dry with a little wind .
Kevin race machine Ogden had a brill run just being piped to second by 6 seconds young Ben from Halifax harriers was first, another good run for Anthony Bradford chasing in in 8Th position.
Our first lady in was Emma M Gui re who had a good run closely followed in by Donna Winterbottom, both managed fab times on very little training,
A big well done to Hazel and Elizabeth because the three of us had very sore legs from boot camps strength training , it felt like I was trying to run through treacle at times, I would also like to thank Ian Ogden who just turned up to watch but got the job of writing our positions down as we finished, so thanks Ian,
Team photo & results will be on soon .

And then there were two

Unfortunately for the past few weeks there has only been myself and Gerrard turning up regularly for the track training on Thu nights with an occasional visit from others.

For these sessions to have maximum effect it requires as many people as possible to attend. Besides the training benefits it is a chance for athletes to meet, socialise have a laugh and organise racing etc.

I know its difficult for some people to get there made even more difficult by mid week races and track training isn't for everyone, but I believe it is an essential part of increasing speed and endurance for road racing.

As I see it there is little point committing myself to keep attending every Thursday and organise training sessions if nobody else is interested.

Please let me know your thoughts and if anybody wants to do anything different on a Thursday I am open to suggestions.

This is probably just a knock on effect of the gradual drop in the number of adult runners at Spen that have declined over the last few years. Shame that the club has done nothing to address this problem even though the committee has been made well aware of the situation.

Can't blame anybody in particular as there is little appetite from either officials or athletes to tackle this issue.

A sad day for myself really as starting as a young boy at Spen in the early 70's a with no real senior men's squad to speak of and seeing that team build from the likes of Richard Lee, Alan Whittaker and many others to become a force to be reckoned with in the north of England throughout the 80's and early 90's to arrive back where I started from is a difficult pill to swallow.

Thinking back now we haven't had a senior middle distance coach since my dad gave up in the late 80's. (Yep that 20 years!) maybe this is a reason too.

Spen over the years has prided itself as a club that 'caters for all' which may have been true at one time but unfortunately isn't anymore.

A lot of the issues have occurred due to lack of volunteers and a lot of the roles being carried out by a very small number of people.

Unfortunately, wether they like it or not, it becomes the responsiblity of the committee to find those helpers (or replacements) - however difficult.

The Joe Percy 10k

Joe Percy 10k is coming up 14Th June who's up for doing this race this year lets get a team entered .

RECORD BREAKING EXPLOITS SPARK SPEN SUCCESS

Kevin Ogden led Spenborough and District AC to a trio of age category victories, while grabbing a fine third place overall in the annual Esholt 5km road race series.

Ogden, Tony Bradford (8th overall) and Keith McGhie (11th) all went into the last of the three round championship leading their respective sections and each pulled further clear of their nearest rivals, with in-form Ogden climbing among the overall prize-winners with a lifetime best 16 minutes, ten seconds in the final race over the undulating Yorkshire Water owned course.

It was another fine performance from 38-year old Ogden, less than a month after clocking a superb 2 hours, 45 minutes and 16 seconds to finish 321st in the London Marathon.

Bradford too had plenty of miles in his legs - the 45-year old fencing contractor fitting in the Leeds Half Marathon in between rounds one and two at Esholt, then shaving two seconds off of Alf Woffinden’s nine-year old Vet 45 club record.

McGhie also smashed the club best, smashing Steve Moss’s previous V50 mark of 17:17, also set in 2001, by a full 10 seconds in the opening event, before lowering it again to 16:59 a week later.

Ogden plans another crack at his marathon best time, at Nottingham in September, while McGhie, ranked number one in the UK in his age group over 800m last year, will probably revert to the more accustomed surroundings of track racing from now on.

All three could feature in Spenborough’s next Northern Track and Field League Division 2 match at Trafford, Manchester on June 5th.

The Princess Mary Stadium, Cleckheaton-based team lie fourth after the opening round.

London 2010

Well I thought I had better write about the big day after the training blogs. As you know from my blogs we had been following a training program consisting of only 3 runs a week ,1 speed sesh, 1 tempo run, 1 long run, with cross training on a couple of other day's. I have normally just built up my mileage with long runs but we decided to try this out, I must say though it was hard only 3 runs I was thinking it would be easy NO. We were tired. My program time was for a marathon time of 3.45/3.50 based on my mile pace /track times. Visiting the physio regulary helped as the weeks went by we all were having little niggles (injury's) IT problems, pulling muscles, with 3 week's to go I had to give the boot camp a miss and at one point was even wondering if I was going to get round the bloody marathon but I soon put that out of my mind. Nine of us from spen ran, five of us with Meg ,Henry& Stacey watching stayed at the Holiday Inn, very nice it was too, Saturday was a hot day and Sunday was on for a hot day also but it wasn't bad - ideal really except for that shower at 8am just as Hazel was saying it had said on tv it was going to rain. My feeling's on the day!I am normally a bag of nerves ,sweating palms, loo stops, but I was calm and remember thinking come on lets get this over with because I carn't be arsed, the first 9mile was fine doing 8.5 pace I knew Meg&Henry etc would be at 9 , I had actually ran past them ,then realised it was them I just had to run back to them about 50mtrs (well fight my way) sardines or what !Off again keeping pace up feeling good, the miles seemed to be flying by but about 17 my chest was getting tight and I was struggling to get lung capacitiy and at 18 had an asthma do lucky for me I had an inhalar on me , at this point I was thinking of a DNF. again I put this out of mind thanks to the crouds, so from that point I just tried to keep going by running & walking ,though I had no watch on (screen went blank on sat night) I was able to check mile splits and was upto 18 was still on for the predicted time I wanted.got to 25m and willed myself to run come on jac its only 10mins left most , but even seeing the 400mtr mark didn't help as I just stopped and thought sod it ive had enough of this, commentator was stating that Ewan Thomas was very near me with 400 to go and everyone had to try beat him in boy did I peg it ! didn't see him or his long red socks. finishing time 4.17, dissapointing for me but I know I can do better and I will do another marathon not london for a while though I didn't have that buzz.All in all a great weekend we raised £1,750.00 for whizz kidz.

Rant of the Day

I'm not a prolific contributor but, as I mentioned in an e-mail to Chris Jones - at Spenborough it's always been a case of "If I don't get my own way, I'll spit my dummy out and take all my toys with me," which is the main reason we are short of so many good athletes now when, in 1992 when I joined, we were among the top ranked 3 clubs in Yorkshire (with Leeds City and Sheffield) in pretty much all departments.

Unfortunately egos seem to dictate that many folk who carry stop watches and encourage track athletes (and credit to the time they give up if not always to the manner they perform this task) can't bear to think that they don't know it all and that there might just be some aspects they could step back and think about and maybe tweak their approach. ie: listen and learn.

I recommended to Gareth that maybe we just ditch the rest of the website and go back to making it a Vets only thing (with room for ANY other opinions of course)...no-one else seems to update it or add anything!

The website as it remains is just a skeleton and certainly not one which would entice any outsider into coming along and joining the club.

Where's the credit we ought to be giving to Josh Cayenne or Steve McNamara (among the few class athletes we have left)... at the club presentation last year, there would have been no mention at all of them had it not been for me 'adding them into the script'?

Just my rant of the day...

See you at Esholt tonight

Keith

The missing link - part 2

I agree with Chris.

It is disappointing to see the short sightedness of the committee removing the link to the blog. For me it was a breath of fresh air for the club and encouraged people to contribute articles and information that they never would have done so otherwise.

The blog is a forum where members can express there opinions of all aspects of the club whether they be good, bad or indifferent.

It is obvious that from time to time there are going to be some negative comments made but it must be remembered that this is only one persons opinion and sometimes stimulates healthy debate.

Historically we have seen that as soon as any critisism it raised against the organisation it is never taken in a constructive manner and the individual is seen as a 'trouble causer' rather than looking at the issues raised and accepting that actually they may be valid points.

Having spent a year on the committee the organisation is well aware of the problems at the club. Unfortunately there are very few people who want to deal with them. The organisation should be more powerful than any individual member and if this is not the case then, as we have seen before, this will always cause problems.

As the committee has asked for the link to be removed lets here their side of the story.

Come on committee members, here is an open invitation to any of you who read this. Lets have some contributions from you and here what you have to say then maybe as a club we can all move forwards together rather than slip back into the dark ages.

The Missing Link?

I heard a rumour that the link to the blog has been removed from the club web site by official request. Seems a bit petty to me, since the blog has probably done more to help forge a sense of community and publicise the club than anything else over the last few years. Well, the blog will continue anyway, most hits don't come from the official site in any case, so it will make very little difference.


"If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter" 
George Washington(1732-1799) First President of the USA

A slight misunderstanding

It seems that my previous blog post about why my running is having to take a back seat for a while (link) has upset some people at the club. This was not my intention, I simply wanted to let my friends at the club know why Matthew and myself would not be around for a while.

I suppose I should be flattered that more people are reading the blog than I expected, but the negative side is that some of my comments were misconstrued. When I said that we felt Matthew had been let down by the club, I meant exactly that - "the club" - not his coaches, all of whom we are grateful to for their time and effort.

What I was referring to was how some of the things the club has let happen, either actively, or by turning a blind-eye, have ended up in having a detremental effect on the development of at least one young athlete.

One of the main things was the loss of a number of talented young athletes and their parents/coaches a couple of years back, which resulted in Matthew losing some of the assistant coaches who he was developing well under. I just wonder if the affect it would have on the young athletes was considered at the time when all this was allowed to happen? My guess is that it was not.

The fact that the club has allowed what can only be described as "poaching" of athletes from one training group to another without the knowledge of the current coach I also find quite bizarre, and Matthew, having a strong sense of loyalty to his coach, has twice been left in a group that he was happy in, but then the said group was suddenly split apart by this poaching. Why do we allow this to happen?

The fact that Matthew has for the last 2 years has finished in the top 10 in the British Fell Running Championships, yet received no regcognition within the club rankles him. For us grizzled old fell runners, peer recognition is probably what we care about most, but for juniors, they like to see their efforts being recognised. It seems to him that the club only cares about track and field.

From my side, I'd like to know what the criteria are for being invited to the foreign training sessions? If it's not something open to all athletes (and it seems that way), then should this really be something that's endorsed by the club? Again, youngsters are left wondering why they don't get the same opportunities as others.

These are the things that have gradually eaten away at his enthusiasm. For myself, one part of me is sad, because I don't want him to quit athletics, but another part of me is just glad that he's got into the cycling scene which is also a great form of exercise, and more often than not, he's got a smile on his face whilst he's doing it, and that's got to be a good thing.

A halt in proceedings

After some serious thought, and many weeks pretending otherwise, I've finally come to the realisation, that for now at least, and for the forseeable future, my running days are pretty much over. Some of you will know that I've struggled with motivation since the problems I had with work last year, and my running has been the major casualty, but that's not the only reason.

Some 18 months back, I finally managed to introduce Matthew to cycling. I'd been keen to do this, because he was falling out with athletics, and I felt it was important that he had another string to his bow, and because both Matthew, Sue and myself all feel that Matthew has been let down badly by the club. What I didn't expect was how well he would take to cycling, and how fast he would progress. It's now reached the stage where he'd cycle all of the time if he could, and never run, although I'm fighting against this a bit, but at the same time, he has opportunities in cycling that he would never get with running (at least not at Spenborough). Unfortunately, training nights clash at the moment (Mondays and Thursdays), and over the spring/summer, the racing nights are Wednesdays which clashes witht he West Yorkshire league, that leaves little else. Since Matthew is 15 this week, I realise that I only have 3 years of him left at home in all likelihood, and I want to support him as far as I can in his aspirations in cyling. To be perfectly honest, the circuit racing he's doing is fantastic to watch, because the races last over 20 minutes, and you can watch the whole thing unfold. Some of the youth riders are really skillful and tactically aware too.

I have to say, from my observations of the cycling scene, that the general standard of coaching seems to be very high, and there are regular visits from top coaches in British Cycling. There are also opportunities to ride at the Manchester velodrome etc., and there are usually special training events in the school holidays. It's no wonder the UK win medals at cycling and b***er all at athletics. The whole setup appears to be far more professional. The encouragement that Matthew has received so far has been excellent, and his confidence is growing weekly.

Matthew is still going to run the Fell Championship series, and I'll probably run in the senior races alongside those too, and we'll be available if needed for relays etc, but for now we probably won't be down at any club nights. There is a chance his Monday night cycling session may stop after Easter, in which case we will probably be back at the track, so we'll see. I hope all that made some sense.

Cheers -- Chris

HORNBY STILL GOING LIKE A TRAIN

ENGLISH NATIONAL CROSS-COUNTRY CHAMPIONSHIPS
Roundhay Park, Leeds
Saturday, February 27th

It was just like old times with Jeff Hornby leading the Spenborough team home in the Nationals.
Only the now veteran former West Yorkshire cross country winner and top 30 National finisher didn’t have the likes of Lee Warburton, Darren Hansen, Paul Dobson and Gary Damiani in his wake in 2010.
Instead he had to put up with a bunch of enthusiastic muddy oiks, who battled through the Somme-like conditions to make up a Spen team that came home a proud 79th out of the 107 clubs that managed to get six counters home…and remember that MANY, even bigger clubs, didn’t!
Also, whereas the Hornby-led team of the early nineties probably boasted an average age of about 23, the 2010 model was probably double that and, had Dan Stewart and Gerard Skippings not turned up, the average age of the current crop of mud-dwellers would have been about 93!
Undeterred by the changes in circumstances, Jeff grittily drove through the squelchy stuff and, having passed myself (Keith McGhie) midway round the last of the three-four kilometre laps, powered on to finish in a fine 630th spot.
As Jeff breezed past with words of encouragement, I’d just about run out of expletives about the course (bl***y hilly), the conditions and Spike (Michael Dransfield), who had talked me into doing it…and even taken money off of me for the privilege.
I’d lost four wheel drive quite early in the proceedings and, amid trying to stop my rather inadequate shoes from staying planted in the mud as I hauled a leg out, was struggling to get out of second gear by that time.
The most depressing feature was a bloke in a hooped vest in front of me stopping and walking up the infamous ‘Hill 60’ on the final lap and the realisation that, although I was still supposedly running, I wasn’t actually catching him!
33 places (663rd) after Jeff passed under the finishing inflatable, I splashed through with Dave Lane (who had literally bought the T-Shirt (nice grey looking ones) before the start) a few paces behind in 51:52.
Dan was not a happy bunny – usually happy as a pig in sh*t in these conditions, he too had taken a leaf out of the McGhie book and developed a positive disliking (like a negative liking I guess) for the whole scenario.
Dan must have been ghosted by Gerard who was just three further back in 52:32 while Edward Wilkinson heroically completed the team in 1374th place, having been out on the course for what must have seemed like weeks but was recorded at 1:07:41.
Believe me ANY FINISH after 12km of undulating slop was a GOOD finish… well done to the six who turned up.
Thanks also to the supporters club – the likes of Les Fenton, Kevin Ogden John Gallagher, Gareth Padgett, Sheila Bolland, Roy and Marjorie Bain plus others, who all fought their way manfully to the tea tent and occasionally to the course ropes to yell out words of encouragement.
And what of those who weren’t there???
What happened to Frank (Reddington) – some lame excuse about having his leg in plaster from ankle to hip having fallen and snapped a tendon the week before! What? I told him on the phone only that morning that a dim view was being taken of all these tame excuses for not helping the troops, pointing out that more than one of us was EVEN running with a ‘slight head cold’ – now that’s selfless and heroic if ever anything was!
Wimping out for such minor ailments as having undergone surgery the previous Wednesday and not being able to do anything but hobble about on crutches for the next month or more won’t wash, I can tell you Reddington!
I understand Marjorie and Roland have even resigned from the committee after hearing about it.

I think I can safely say: “GET WELL SOON” from all of us Frank.

The ‘Soggy Six’ dedicated this momentous run to YOU!

Spenborough Placings (Senior Men):
630 Geoff Hornby 50:42
663 Keith McGhie 51:01
688 Dave Lane 51:22
758 Dan Stewart 52:29
763 Gerard Skippings 52:32
1374 Edward Wilkinson 1:07:41