WFC Runners: WFC Runners - Clarendon Way, parkrun PBs and more race reports

News

The main event this weekend was the Clarendon Marathon and Half where we once again had a fantastic turnout from WFC Runners. In the main event Mike, Eric and a number of their friends were running the full marathon. Anna, Sarah, Sam (Eric's wife) running the relay. They were running to raise money for the charity Remember my Baby. Read their story here: https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/run4george18

We also had Glenna, Trish and Fran running the relay and Simon H and Steve running the half. There will be full write-ups in next week's blog.

We also had Mikaela running the Cardiff Half. Mik was running in memory of her aunt and despite some knee troubles and some questionable pre-race fuelling she stormed round in 1:49. Well done Mik, your Aunt would have been proud.

This week was another superb week at parkrun. We had 13 registered runners running at 5 different locations. Glenna was once again at Kingston visiting her son, Alice ran a course PB at Wolverhampton and Lynn was visiting Eastville near Bristol.

Adam was at his new home parkrun of Leszno. He has had issues recently with his barcode not scanning in previous, but I'm pleased to say they have now fixed it! Adam celebrated by taking the first finisher token and setting a new course PB of 18:42.

The rest of the group were at Winchester parkrun and had some fantastic results. There were 9 runners with 4 of those getting shiny new PBs! Jenny (26:07), Anna (23:30), Steve (22:37) and Tom (21:02) were the heroes this week. A special mention should go to Tom who came in ahead of the 21 minute pacer, only to find that the pacer was a little off the pace. That sub 21 is yours next week Tom!

It was odd minute pacing week and Mike H was pacing 27 minutes. He came in in a stellar 27:02, helping a number of runners to new PBs.

I struggled with some shortness of breath and chest pains most of the way round. Thank you to everyone who showed concern when they saw me struggling...especially Tina who offered to get the defibrillator!! I suspect it was just a combo of tiredness and going out far too fast with the 21 min pacer!!

Here is this weeks consolidated report: http://www.parkrun.com/results/consolidatedclub/?clubNum=26888&eventdate=2018-10-06

This week's Thursday running session was a real mixed bag. 2 hill sprints followed by 2 flat intervals all repeated 3 times. It was another fun but tough session which really pushed the runners.

Read all about it here: http://wfcrunners.blogspot.com/2018/10/wfc-runners-4th-october-session.html

This week will see the results of the London Marathon Ballot come out. Best of luck to everyone who has their name in the hat!

Other notices

The Southampton Marathon and Half 2019 has changed it's date to the 5th May due to planned roadworks on the original date. Note; this now no longer clashes with the London Marathon!

The Eastleigh 10km is now open for entries. It is being held on the 24th March 2019 and you can enter here: https://www.fullonsport.com/event/hendy-eastleigh-10k-2019/profile

Ageas Bowl 10km by Charlotte Wing

I got an unexpected last minute place three days before the event, and pre-race nerves kicked in approximately 12 hours later meaning I arrived at the Ageas Bowl at 7:30am having not slept for 48 hours and feeling pretty cold in the 3 degrees! Don’t get me wrong, I love the cold and it definitely gave me something else to think about whilst nervously awaiting the start.

I was surrounded by about 1000 extremely friendly runners, mostly from Hampshire clubs judging by their vests, and we chatted away pretty much until the whistle went and we were off! The course was advertised as flat although my strava profile begs to differ, but it did mean the first 5k was at a nice gentle decline as we ran out of the stadium and round the local roads.

Being a road race, lots of people were standing outside their houses offering support, or cheering through the windows from the comfort of their warm rooms! There was a water station around the 5k point although I have yet to master drinking whilst running and ended up with water on my face instead of in my mouth. This rookie error kept me amused for the next kilometre or so and then I started to feel tired. I now see this corresponded to the start of the incline back to the stadium! Again, lots of cheers from locals, marshalls and fellow runners and suddenly I was back at the Ageas Bowl- this time able to take in how huge it is!

The final kilometre was a run round the upper terrace before dropping down into the “bowl” for a final lap to the finish. As I dropped into the bowl, I spotted the 45minute pacer and got very confused- I had though I was running around 47 minutes! Spurred on by the most friendly of pacers, I pushed for a sprint for the final 300 metres and came in at 44:29, shortly followed by the pacer who was highly complementary on my running (thanks Coach James!).

Would I do it again? Absolutely! It was well organised, well marshalled, well supported and I got a pb so that’s obviously going to bias my view (should I add I’ve never done a 10k race so any time was going to be a pb?!). Plus the reward of a medal and tshirt always positively influence me!

Tough Mudder by Simon Elliott

A few months ago and email came round the office asking who'd like to do Tough Mudder 5 or 10 mile. I put my hand up for the 5 mile but was quickly shamed into 10 mile event.

Tough Mudder is probably the most famous of all Obstacle Race Courses (OCR) and has been running since 2010. Tough Mudder differentiates itself from other OCR's with its mantra "It's a challenge, not a race" focused on teamwork and completion of the event rather than finishing under a certain time.

So, the date and venue were fixed, 29th September, somewhere near Gatwick airport. All that remained was to get ready.

Around 20 of us signed up for the challenge, as well as the physical challenge we set ourselves a hard fund raising target of a combined £5000 for Cancer Research UK, not only a worthy cause, but one of our customers.

There was talk of some group training but this never really got off the ground, it was each man and woman for themselves.

I did the maths, 24 obstacles over 11 miles, that's a short half mile run then an obstacle. Whilst I probably couldn't run 11 miles straight off, I was pretty sure I could manage a series of half mile runs interspersed with painful and challenging obstacles. However I decided if I was going to do some specific training, upper body was the spot to work on. I spoke to Andy Short during one of the Monday evening HIIT classes to see if we could put some focus on the upper body. Being the great coach that he is, he prepared a full upper body boot camp for me that Sunday. I can't remember exactly the reason, but I didn't make it to the bootcamp that Sunday, one thing I'm sure of, everyone who did make the bootcamp was very grateful of my request

As event day drew nearer, there seemed to be a series of injuries and illnesses hitting the Acquia sales team, we went from 20 down to 15 with "bad shoulder" and "sore toe". The final losses were due end of quarter celebrations...

The day of of the race came, (don't bother with the premium parking, just turn up early for the standard parking and you'll feel somoneysupermarket) and we all met in a field near Gatwick and checked into the event.

Tough Mudder is super organised, plenty of toilets, secure bag drop, free water and snacks, permanent markers to identify your limbs with your race number should they become detached.

Groups of around 100 set off every 30 mins from 8:15am; after an hour in the race village it was our time to go. We headed over to the warmup zone for 15 minutes of singing Aerosmith "I don't want to miss a thing", hugging our fellow challengers, shoo'ing some chickens and generally being reminded that camaraderie was paramount, then we were off.
We all set off at a gentle jog up hill towards the first obstacles, a pyramid of straw bales followed by two massive wooden walls. This was when it really struck me that this wasn't a solo event, there's no way you could hit this stuff on your own. As a group of 15, not only were we helping each other, we were helping and being helped by everyone else on the course.

I also realised at this point, my theory of lots of half mile runs followed by an obstacle was wrong, the runs were much longer and the obstacles were grouped.

The second set of obstacles, when we really got a flavour of what was to come, started with rolling through muddy ditches under barbed wire.

From then on it got more extreme, swimming underwater through muddy challenges, sliding down big pipes into baths of muddy water filled with ice cubes, running the "Mud Mile". The overall extremeness of the obstacles was at 9 or 10, there were two obstacles that turned the dial to 11. The first was "Funky Monkey" and uphill set of monkey bars with some spinners hanging over a bath of cold, muddy water. The second was "Electro Shock Therapy", imagine getting caught up in an electric fence whilst falling over in a muddy puddle.

It took us 3hours and 50 minutes to complete the 18kms and 24 obstacles of Tough Mudder. We started as a team, stayed as a team the whole way through, and we finished as a team.
I loved every minute of it and would do it again at the drop of a hat.

We raised just over £4000 for Cancer Research UK, you can still help us hit our target if you'd like to donate https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/acquia-cancer-research

If you'd like to get a bit more Tough Mudder atmosphere, here's a video of our challenge.

General Announcements

WFC parkrun Club

Winchester Fit Club Runners is set-up as a club with parkrun. If you go into your profile (there is a link to it on the parkrun results email and newsletter email) you can select your club. Change yours to Winchester Fit Club Runners and you will appear in the consolidated club report that we get each week.

WFC Runners WhatsApp Group

There is a WFC Runners WhatsApp chat group where we generally just wang on about running, races and cake. If you are not already part of this then please get in contact with Coach James or Coach Mike who will add you.

WFC Runners Strava Club

If you are a Strava user there is a Winchester Fit Club Runners club page. This can be accessed here: https://www.strava.com/clubs/WFC-Runners. Request to join and we will approve!

Booking onto sessions

Booking onto our training sessions enables the coaches to plan the session accordingly. You can book on in the following location: https://winchesterfitclub.simplybook.it/v2/

Race Calendar

Here is an updated race calendar. If you have any others that you wish to add, please let me know!

Goodwood Running Festival 10km and Half - 14th October

http://www.ukrunevents.co.uk/the-running-festival-at-goodwood/

Greenham Common 10km, 5km and Mile - 14th October
http://www.stepup4good.co.uk/?page_id=42

Great South Run - 21st October

http://www.greatrun.org/great-south-run

Hayling 10- 4th November 2018

http://www.havantac.co.uk/hayling-10/

Gosport Half - 18th November

http://www.gosporthalf.org

Victory 5 - 2nd December 2018

http://www.athleticevents.co.uk/page2.html

Stubbington 10km - 13th January 2019

http://stubbingtongreenrunners.net/index.php/10k