WFC Runners - Covid-19, Palace Half, Alice's 100th, parkrun

Covid-19 Coronavirus update

Over the past week the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic has escalated and the advice has been changing regularly.  On Monday that advice included measures aimed at "social distancing".  After careful consideration by the Fit Club committee it was agreed that we should suspend all Fit Club sessions with immediate effect and until further notice.  

This also means the suspension of the challenge with immediate effect (as communicated via WhatsApp earlier in the week) and the postponement of the Couch to 5km course scheduled for April.    

Whilst this is obviously disappointing it is the only sensible and prudent course of action that we can take at this time and I hope you understand that it was not an easy one to make.

In anticipation of this announcements races had been cancelling almost daily.  Big casualties early on were the London, Brighton and Manchester marathons and in more recent days the Eastleigh 10km, Salisbury 10 and the Bournemouth Bay Half.  

Whilst this is a massive disappointment for some it is worth remembering that there will be other opportunities to complete these races. The health and safety of you, your loved ones and the vulnerable in society is paramount.  

You are still able to go outside and are still able to run.  I encourage you all to do so and to keep as fit as possible.  If you do decide to organise your own group runs, please do so safely and try and follow any government guidelines that are in force.  

We will do everything we can to keep our community going and to keep you engaged with running, even if we can't practice it together!  Please continue to use our social media streams and WhatsApp group to stay in touch and to share your running adventures (whilst we are still allowed outside)!

The blog will still go out weekly and will contain articles, some of the theory behind what we do and some other bits and bobs.  I'll also be asking you for contributions.

Thank you for your understanding at this difficult time.  As soon as we have any more news we will share it with you ASAP.

News

Despite all the virus chat there was a race this weekend!  Simon and Sally ran the Palace Half Marathon, which starts and finishes at Hampton Court Palace.  This was Sally's first ever official half marathon race and she ran a superbly well, despite the disappointment of London being cancelled and despite a monstrous blister on her foot (she'll send you pics if you want.  And even if you don't).  Their times were fantastic:

Sally - 2:12:28
Simon - 2:22:17

Well done to the SAS team!  


parkrun 14th March

This week we had 28 registered Fit Clubbers at 6 different parkrun venues.

We had 20 at Winchester, James at Itchen Valley, Anne at Cyclopark, Matt at Lymington, Issy at Moors Valley and Sarah, Jenny, Grayson and Katie at Southampton.

At Winchester Alice ran her 100th parkrun! Alice has run at 10 different venues; Winchester (64), Salisbury (20), Bushy (6), Bournemouth (2), Wolverhampton (2), Whiteley (2) and one each at Colby, Rushmoor, Newbury and Southampton. Alice has a super quick PB of 21:26. To make things even better Alice also ran a course PB at Winchester today of 22:06! Congratulations and we look forward to seeing you in your new black 100 T-shirt!

There was also a course PB for Katie at Southampton running a speedy 23:10.

Also at Southampton we had Grayson (Jenny’s son) running his first ever parkrun. He’s only 4 but posted an amazing time of 1:01:03. Cracking time for little legs!!

Thank you to everyone who ran and volunteered.

Here is a link to the consolidated club report: http://www.parkrun.com/results/consolidatedclub/…

If you have yet to register as Fit Club then all you have to do is go to your parkrun profile (link in the results email) and select Winchester Fit Club RC as your club. You will then appear on our results!

General Announcements

WFC Running Club Calendar

CANCELLED UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE

WFC parkrun Club

Winchester Fit Club RC 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 RC and you will appear in the consolidated club report that we get each week.

WFC Runners WhatsApp Group

There is a WFC Running Club 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 Facebook Group

There is a WFC Runners Facebook page where we put the blog posts, news and race pictures.  Follow the link: https://www.facebook.com/groups/976444695871618/

WFC Runners Strava Club

If you are a Strava user there is a Winchester Fit Club RC page. This can be accessed here: https://www.strava.com/clubs/WFC-RC. 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 through the Fit Club website: http://www.winchesterfitclub.co.uk/

Training Kit

The method of ordering training kit will be changing shortly with it all being available through the main website...watch this space!