Off-road – trail and XC
On Sunday, in another example of an unfortunate diary clash with the County XC series (see below) the 35th running of the ever-popular Dursley Dozen (12 trail miles) attracted ten club entries, who between them turned in some excellent results. The course was leg-sapping muddy, and included Stinchcombe Hill (219m according to summit bag).
Headline news is that we won all three team events – hopefully not too upsetting for the home team Dursley .
Furthermore, Rob Forbes got a podium finish in 2nd place and 1st V45, with Bill Leggate and Karen Higuera also earning age category prizes.
With 5 men in the top 30, the men’s team win was reasonably comfortable. Alex Banks and Tim Francis worked together the whole way round whereas
We had no “spare” ladies and so every position counted in what turned out to be a close run thing with Dursley.
Common words in feedback from the runners includes…. muddy, hilly, struggled, absolutely brutal, but great fun! {...plus my favourite "new race vest was brilliant, thanks for organising them"}.
16 February 2025, Dursley Dozen, 12 miles trail
1 Charles Worsfold (Gloucester AC) 1.23.57 (chip 1.23.57)
2 Rob Forbes (Cirencester AC) 1.26.54 (1.26.54) – 1st V40
7 Aaron Willis 1.30.28 (1.30.35)13 Bill Leggate 1.32.52 (1.32.50) – 1st V45
27 Alex Banks 1.38.54 (1.38.50)
29 Tim Francis 1.39.05 (1.39.02)
97 Holly Willis 1.52.58 (1.52.54) – 7th lady
124 Elysia Harrison 1.57.09 (1.56.57)
137 Andy Fellows 1.59.01 (1.58.54)
189 Andy Hindson 2.06.09 (2.05.53)
240 Karen Higuera 2.13.25 (2.13.09) – 1st FV60
Teams:
Men (4 to score) 1 Cirencester AC 49pts, 2 Stroud & District AC 105pts
Women (3 to score) 1 Cirencester AC 461pts, 2 Dursley RC 483pts
Mixed (2 men, 2 women to score) 1 Cirencester AC 230pts, 2 Dursley RC 296pt
The day before saw the last of the Gloucestershire county XC series at Pittville Park in Cheltenham, which are also the (only) races that count for the club championships. As usual there were a series of races of varying lengths. The only adult runner for the club was Dorian Matts, now V65. Although he admits he took rather a long time to complete the muddy course, he enjoyed the last half mile as he reeled in another male vet and then held him off in a final sprint finish. Who’d have thought Dorian’s sprinting experience would have combined so neatly with XC!
Dorian was one of only two club seniors who ran as many as 3 of the 4 races in the series. The other was Alex Banks, who had been the only senior to run in the third race at Bath, but who was saving himself for the next day’s Dursley Dozen (just as well- see above).
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Alex therefore wins the men’s club XC championship for 2024, and the ladies winner is Corinne Clarke, our own lady to run an of the races.
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Do you, our members, have any suggestions about whether we should and if so how to improve next season on the very low turnout across the series this year?
Are the courses too boring?
Do the race weekends clash with more attractive events (at least 2 of the 4 did this season)?
Locations too difficult to get to / park at?
Please have a think and let one of our team captains know – a topic for conversation at the 17th March curry awards night perhaps {Ed. – hint, I’ve not had replies yet from lots of you who came and seemed to enjoy yourselves last year. Also Alex and Corinne if you’re reading this, you now know there’s some bling coming your way ;-)}
There were also the following juniors in action at Pittville, results provisional.
U11 Boys & Girls (2.2km) 5 Edward Knight 9.24,
39 Annabel Campbell 10.47,
51 Alice Averies 11.03,67 Alex Willis 11.50
U13 Boys & Girls (2.9km) 30 Toby Conway 12.03,
49 Georgia Hills 13.11
Look out for more details of the juniors in a separate post from Dorian when the AAA has finalised the standings for the overall series.
And finally off-road, you won’t find the “Cranham Cake Run” mentioned in the results tab on our website, but a motley bunch of members enjoyed a friendly group run of up to 10 miles, organised as ever by Liza and Rupert. Just as much mud and hills as Dursley, but including that cheese rolling hill. And cakes afterwards off course.
Road racing
Continuing a pattern of racing marathons every other year, Joyce Matthews chose a Half Marathon in Barcelona on Sunday as part of her training for Boston on Monday 21st April (well done for even qualifying!). What a race to pick, as a new world record was set by Jacob Kiplimo (Uganda) in 56.41 !! Thats just inside 4:20 pace per mile (2:41/km) - astonishing.
Joyce reports
“the run was really good, most of the route was around the outskirts of the city. The start and finish was at Arc de Triomfi - spectacular. Very easy for family and friends to spectate....was busy over 32,000 runners so you can imagine the crowds. But well organised. Will definitely do it again 😉…”
Unbeknownst to Joyce, amongst the other 32,000 were also club members Angela And Benjamin Hilditch. Angela reports back
"My brother and Benjamin and I took on the Barcelona Half Marathon this Sunday, swapping the chilly Cotswolds for the sunny Spanish seaside. It was a brilliant flat course with great sights along the way, and we both picked up a PB to show for it! Definitely a race to recommend to any club runner looking for a fast, flat race, with a change of scenery at the same time."
1 Jacob Kiplimo (Uganda) 56.42 (chip 56.38) – WORLD RECORD
6282 Joyce Matthews (Cirencester AC) 1.40.20 (1.40.02)
9884 Ben Hilditch 1.47.53 (1.45.09) PB
19728 Angela Hilditch 2.06.45 (2.05.55) PB
PARKRUNS
From various Strava comments it seems like the weather was pretty awful in all parts of the country for Saturday morning’s parkrunners.
Tourists included
Luke Campbell who dropped off in Northwich en route to Edinburgh,
McAdams in Abingdon en-route to Cambridge and
Phil Davey in Wellingborough (possibly en-route to something steam train related).
Despite the weather, two of our juniors, both with running parents to encourage them, were still doing their best, literally.
In a wet and muddy Tetbury, Brecon Musk (J10) knocked over 40 seconds off last year's PB to clock 22.48, and only just short of 75% age-graded - he had every reason to look pleased.
In Cirencester, Heath Forbes also set a new PB of 20.43 (JM11-14) which placed him 2nd behind only Rich Allen (over a minute off his best given the awful conditions). Proud dad Rob followed closely behind Heath to make a club 1-2-3 (again!), and Heath’s younger brother Otis was the next Ciren runner home in 23.38.
Cirencester:
1 Rich Allen 19.30, 2 Heath Forbes (J) 20.43, 3 Rob Forbes 20.47,
14 Otis Forbes (J) 23.38, 58 Isabella Stickney (J) 28.34, 71 Gordon Jones 30.06,80 Amanda Naylor 30.24, 81 Jocelyn Randall 30.38, 111 Kirsty Leggate 33.36, 167 finished.Tetbury: 12 Brecon Musk (J) 22.48, 13 Jo Musk 22.50, 21 Paul Timms 24.01,58 Samantha Timms 30.31, 102 finished.
Swindon, Lydiard Park: 11 Ian Barrett 19.53, 334 finished.
Gloucester, Kingsway: 11 David Moss 24.12, 147 finished.
Oxford, University Parks: 53 Martin Croucher 20.16, 642 finished.
Abingdon: 108 Alan McAdam 26.10, 148 Rachel McAdam 28.32, 324 finished.
Irchester Country Park, Wellingborough: 48 Phil Davey 26.01, 234 finished.
Northwich: 46 Luke Campbell 24.04, 268 finished
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