WFC Runners - Clarendon write-ups and parkrun news

News

I guess there's only one place to start with this week's news and that is with the London marathon ballot. As with previous years there was a massive amount of interest with over 400,000 people applying for the 25,000 or so places (a 1/16 chance basically).  We had a large number of runners apply through the ballot and last week was when they all found out.  

As we went through the day on Monday, news starting filtering out and for the majority it was a firm NO.   There was a brief bit of excitement when we thought One R has got in, but it turned out to be a practical joke. Then mid afternoon we got the news we were waiting for...one of us had been successful.  the lucky person?  Rachel Mills!  This was shortly followed up by Shelly Oswald letting us know that she had also been successful.  This is fantastic news as a number of running clubs I am aware of had no-one successful through the ballot.     

In addition to Rachel and Shelly we also have Mikaela who got in through good for age, Anne who has a charity space and Charlotte W who deferred last year.  I can't wait to follow their journeys and see how they get on.  

This week we had a number of members racing at a number of different races.   Firstly on Saturday we had Simon Wendy Holman and dog Arthur running The Muddy Dog Challenge at Battersea.  It's an obstacle course challenge that you run with your pooch.  They had a great time and Arthur really enjoyed his post-race bath.   

Then on Sunday we had Glenna running the Goodwood 10km and Lynn running Royal Parks Half Marathon.

The Goodwood 10km is 2 and a half laps of the iconic motor racing circuit.  It was a horrible day with heavy rain and wind making for tough running conditions however this didn't stop Glenna recording a superb time of 58:34 and winning her age category!  Absolutely inspirational running from Glenna.  

Also running through the rain was Lynn at the Royal Parks half marathon.  This central London Half Marathon, takes in some of the capital's world-famous landmarks on closed roads, and four of London's eight Royal Parks - Hyde Park, The Green Park, St James's Park and Kensington Gardens.  As with Glenna, Lynn wasn't deterred by the rain and managed an amazing time of 1:48:35, a PB for the half.  Superb running Lynn.   

Look out for next week's blog where there will be write-ups of all three of these races!

This week's Thursday session saw the runners taking on a classic 12 x 1 minute interval session along Peterfield Road in Highcliffe.  Despite the miserable weather earlier in the day it was a cracking evening for running and the runners smashed it out of the park!  

Read about it here: http://wfcrunners.blogspot.com/2018/10/wfc-runners-thursday-11th-session.html

Next week's session will be meeting at Abbey Gardens at 7pm.  Mike D will be leading the warm-up and start of the session as I am at parent's evening. I hope to be along later to join you, traffic depending.

This week was unique for Fit Club at parkrun...there were no PBs!  There was a great turnout though, considering the weather which was wet and windy right up to the start of the run!  We had 11 of us at Winchester and Allen and Catherine at Lowestoft parkrun (the most easterly parkrun in the UK).  At Winchester we had a number of runners all within 20 seconds of their PBs, these were Tom, Steve and Matthew.  At Lowestoft Allen ducked under the 21 minute mark with a 20:44 and Catherine was only 20 seconds shy of her PB despite a tight bum (her words).  

Other notices

The Running Club constitution and Committee Roles and Responsibilities have now been drafted and are available for review.  Any feedback, please send to wfcrunners@gmail.com!

Club Constitution: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1HbPzBfiWkwyu26h25Ymlbn6wFFtHwR1y

Roles and Responsibilities: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1d1IxRQnN3kHn8DLVUbLbFAgJk8RW-2DS

The running club on the 1st November will be a Halloween fancy dress social run with all proceeds going to Anne's London Marathon charity, Leonard Cheshire (https://www.leonardcheshire.org).  Following the run we will be heading to Number 5 Bridge Street where Anne will also be selling cakes for your consumption (possibly accompanied by a drink).  In addition we will be holding the formal Running Club AGM where we will vote on going affiliated!  

The Naomi House Santa Fun Run is being held 2nd December this year. Last year we had a huge turn out from Fit Club and it looks like it'll be the same this year so get booked on early! https://www.naomihouse.org.uk/events/448-santa-fun-run

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! 

There are a number of 2019 races now open for entry:

Stubbington 10km: It is being held on the 13th January 2019 and you can enter here: http://stubbingtongreenrunners.net/index.php/10k

Romsey 5: It is being held on the 27th January 2019 and you can enter here: http://offbeat-events.com/event/romsey-5-mile-run/

Winchester 10km: It is being held on the 24th February 2019 and you can enter here: http://offbeat-events.com/event/winchester-10km-road-race/ 

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

Other Fit Club Dates

October 31st - Hump Day HIIT Halloween Special, 7pm
November 4th - Fit Club Coffee Morning
December 2nd - Christmas Jumper Social - Slug and Lettuce, 2pm
December 7th - Fit Club Christmas Party - The Willow Tree 6:30pm

Clarendon Way Marathon by Eric Woodward

Last Sunday a few of us came together to run the Clarendon marathon. This event means a lot to me as we run it in memory of my son as part of a Run4George group raising money for some lovely charities.  This year we had 10 people made up of friends and family, which made it a great occasion.

The start line is in a Wyvern college playing field at Laverstock near Salisbury. The event is all very well organised, and an easy ‘Ready, Steady, Go’ is called out before we all set off across the field and into the Wiltshire countryside. This year the weather gods were on our side with bright blue sky and plenty of sunshine and made the first half of marathon actually very pleasant. Yes there are some hills but they are not too long or arduous and the views were lovely. We even found plenty of time to take a selfie or two!  

Once we hit the midway point and run through Broughton, however, it all gets much tougher.  The views are still lovely but this but long gentle hills mixed with some long steep ones!  It’s an ongoing uphill climb from Kings Somborne to Farley Mount and by the third large hill almost everyone was walking.  Thankfully drink stations (with tasty flapjacks) are aplenty throughout the route and once you’ve hit Farley Mount a wonderful buzz hits us as we knew we were on the home straight.  Just another 9k to go and Kings School in Winchester would be in our sight.  

The finish line was awash with supporters and the sense of achievement you have from completing the run is fantastic.  That’s part of the reason why I am back year after year J.  If you are after a challenge and enjoy the wonderful views this part of the world has to offer then Clarendon is definitely for you.

Clarendon Way Half Marathon by Steve Lucas

The annual Clarendon Way marathon took place this week, which included a number of races including the full marathon from Salisbury to Winchester, half marathon from Broughton to Winchester and 5 miler from Farley Mount to Winchester.  There is also a marathon 4-section relay.

A number of Winchester Fit Club members took part including a “Run for George” team raising money for “Remember my baby”. I am new to the club but following the race I saw, Glenna, Trish & Fran who all took part in the marathon relay.

The route is incredibly scenic with some amazing countryside views, made all the better by what felt like summer weather despite being October! It’s certainly not a marathon where you can expect to get a PB. The terrain and hills were brutal. Having looked at the ‘map my run’ app following the race, it started at roughly 30m and end up at roughly 140m above sea level (with a peak of 170m!).

What I loved about the Clarendon Way marathon is how it is not commercialised in any way. It is also really well run by the Rotary club. Thank you to the organisers, especially to the marshals who kept encouraging us.  It was also great to see parkrun legend Pom Pom Sue on the route!

Next year’s race is on the 6^th October.

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!

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

Ryde 10 - 3rd February 2019

Winchester 10km - Feb - Date TBC
Wokingham Half - 24th Feb
Fleet Half - 17th March 2019

Eastleigh 10K - 17th March 2019 

London Landmarks - 24th March 2019

https://www.llhm.co.uk

Salisbury 10 - 14th April 2019 Alton 10 - 12th May 2019 Netley 10K - 19th May 2019 Hook 10K - 19th May 2019 Alresford 10K - 16th June 2019 

Endure 24 - 14th-16th June 2019

http://www.endure24.co.uk

Lordshill 10K - 23rd or 30th June 2019

Clarendon Marathon - 6th October 2019

As ever, if you have any submissions for the next blog then please send them through to WFCrunners@gmail.com

Happy Running!  

Coach James

***************
Kit pictures and prices

WFC Runners - Thursday 11th session

This week once again saw the runners meeting at Abbey Gardens.  It was a overcast evening, but still fairly warm for the time of year.  18 runners were there with another new member.  Welcome to the group Paul!

After the standard chat and warm-up we headed off to where the session was to be held.   This week was another new winter venue, of which there will be a few in the coming weeks and months. 

We jogged along Bar End Road before turning and heading up East Hill.  We then forked right and headed down Petersfield Road.  After the road splits again we stopped and I explained the session to the eager runners.

Petersfield road is a nice straight road with street lighting on one side.  It is gently undulating and fairly traffic free so it is perfect for some nice sprints.  This week we revisited a classic session based purely around helping build speed and endurance.  We were therefore did 12x1 minute with a very generous 1 minute 30 recovery period.     

Why are intervals important?  Here is a summary that sums it up well: 

“Studies have compared intense interval running with moderate continuous running. ... Intense intervals improve your aerobic and anaerobic endurance, increase your VO2 max and improve your running performance.”

Following the session we jogged back to Abbey Gardens for the cool down.

Next week’s session will also be starting at Abbey Gardens at 7pm. 

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

Ryde 10 - 3rd February 2019

Fleet Half - 17th March 2019

Eastleigh 10K - 17th March 2019 

London Landmarks - 24th March 2019

https://www.llhm.co.uk

Salisbury 10 - 14th April 2019 Alton 10 - 12th May 2019 Netley 10K - 19th May 2019 Hook 10K - 19th May 2019 Alresford 10K - 16th June 2019 

Endure 24 - 14th-16th June 2019

http://www.endure24.co.uk

Lordshill 10K - 23rd or 30th June 2019

As ever, if you have any submissions for the next blog then please send them through to WFCrunners@gmail.com

Happy Running!  

Coach James

***************
Kit pictures and prices

WFC Runners - 4th October Session

This week saw the runners meeting outside the River Park Leisure centre.  It was another perfect evening for running with it being pleasantly warm and dry, with very little wind.  There were 16 runners, a smaller turnout than previous weeks, but still a great group.  

This week’s run session was a mixed bag made up of a mix of hill efforts and long flat intervals. 

Once we were all together we headed off to the rec for our warmup followed by a 1km jog from the North Walls up to the bottom of Abbotts Road.  This in itself is quite an effort with it being predominantly uphill!  Once there we went into the main session which was as follows:

Run up Abbotts Road with jog recovery back down (roughly 380m)

Run up Abbotts Road rest at the top – (roughly 190m)

Sprint along Courtenay Road to Stoke Road – short rest – (roughly 250m)

Sprint along Courtenay Road to the top of Abbotts Road, jog recovery to the bottom of Abbots Road – (roughly 440m total)

Total distance 1,260m per set.

All this repeated 3 times.  

Following completion of the session we jogged the 1km down the hill back to the North Walls rec, where we cooled down and finished the session.   

Total running distance for the evening was 5.8km with about 3km of that being a hard effort, either uphill or on the flat.  It was another tough session but one which once again focussed on speed, strength and endurance.  As with all sessions everyone worked extremely hard.

Check out next Tuesday’s blog for a review of the Ageas 10km by Charlotte W and a review of Tough Mudder by Simon E, as well as the usual news and announcements!!

Coach James.