Road season ends with records and PB's
You might need a comfortable chair and a cuppa to read this week's report - quite a lot going on and more pictures than usual.
Club road championships FINALE
Congratulations to Charlotte Wilton and Rich Allen respectively who have won this year’s ladies and men's club championships. The last race in the club series was the Cirencester HM, reported on below, which Rich used to leapfrog from 3rd to 1st. Charlotte had already done enough to clinch the Ladies champs, and was in action elsewhere in the finale of the County road series (also below).
The final top 3, with points vs maximum 120 (6 x 20), were
Charlotte Wilton 117
Kate Kilby 108
Pam Wheeler 103
Rich Allen 112
Brian Harris 104
Aaron Willis 96
Some selected stats from this year's champs :-
Two races amongst the club fixtures for 2026 stood out for club participation – the Fairford 10k (17 ran) and this weekend’s Cirencester Half-marathon (18 ran).
Those individuals running the most events were Pam Wheeler, Charlotte Wilton and Brian Harris, all running 7 - one more than the 6 maximum to score.
The fastest ladies and men’s marathons of the season were respectively
· Storm Trow 3.06.55 at London - 6th on the club’s ladies all-time list
· Stuart Fitzgerald 2.48.15 in Amsterdam last month – a new V40 record
Strava Segment challenge - October's winner
Congratulations to Jack Bonnick (31s), who held on to the top spot on the leaderboard in the face of a strong last-minute challenge from Luke Campbell (33s), who just pipped Rich Allen (34s) to 2nd place, and also mopped up the Local Legend accolade with 25 efforts.
Next month’s segment is a bit longer (see club whatsapp for details, and please be very careful on the road crossings).
Saturday 31st October – Hallowe’en
Parkruns
At Cirencester, club runners were the fastest age-graded man and lady on the day – Dave Wright was only 4 seconds off his PB, and Karen Higuera was the first lady to finish – well done to both of them. Karen put in a sprint finish despite it “only being a leg loosener for the Guy Fawkes race tomorrow”.....
Another runner was also close to their PB - Amanda Naylor was only 6s slower.
Clare Tapley continues to improve, with her best time at Cirencester for over 3 years.
Otherwise, no PB’s or milestones spotted – total numbers were smaller than usual in a busy weekend for racing.
Cirencester: 6 Dave Wright 20.49, 31 Karen Higuera (1st lady) 23.51, 102 Amanda Naylor 28.36, 104 Alan McAdam 28.44, 128 Rachel McAdam 29.43, 129 Jonathan Higgs 29.46,183 Clare Tapley 38.52, 226 finished.
Swindon, Seven Fields: 20 David Moss 23.00, 229 finished.
Witney: 13 Martin Croucher 21.34, 261 finished.
Osterley, Isleworth: 207 Samantha Timms 29.49, 401 finished.
Bridport, St Mary’s: 122 Richard Edwards 29.10, 226 finished.
Hastings High School: 9 Colin Tapley 22.08, 112 finished.
Glos cross-country – Cirencester Park
Whilst the 2nd race of 4 in the series meant less travelling for most, the date chosen to put it on was triply unfortunate – during the half-term break AND clashing again with the last race in the county road series (see below), as well as the local half marathon the next day. [We’ve complained unsuccessfully about the road series clashing with XC for several years to Glos AAA.]
Sadly, we only had 10 juniors/teens and 4 seniors racing – full results below.
Here’s 3 of the 4 seniors, who enjoyed beautifully sunny conditions – sorry we didn’t get a pic for Stuart Fitzgerald, but it was great to see a new member competing, and not long after his recent epic marathon in Amsterdam.
Congratulations to both Rachel Ranger 2nd FV55 and Kate Kilby 2nd V65.
Dorian Matts has just published a full report on the junior/teen results, but he wanted to highlight the great running form that William Richards showed in his fast finish.
Men (9.6km)
1 Jacob Pickering (Cheltenham & County Harriers) 30.26
46 Stuart Fitzgerald (Cirencester AC) 36.47
147 finished
Ladies and Men V65+ (6km)
1 Eleanor Jamieson (University of Bath) 21.13
60 Rachel Ranger (Cirencester AC) 28.08
70 Kate Kilby 28.49
118 Dorian Matts 32.28
130 finished
U12 Boys (2km)
21 William Richards 9.03, 38 Ted Ralling 9.40, 41 Stanley Woodfine 9.43, 42 Brecon Musk 9.50
U14 Boys (3km)
19 James Richards 14.00
U14 Girls (3km)
22 Sophi Mason 16.22
U16 Boys (4.5km)
8 Toby Conway 17.55, 12 Henry Woodfine 18.54, 13 Wilfred Williams 18.58
U16 Girls (4.5km)
12 Holly Stewart-Hodges 22.16
Madeira Ultra X, Portugal
Storm Trow completed this “long chatty run” aka a 60km trail ultra with almost 11,000 feet elevation (with (new) friend Jemima) and some great scenery in 13.21.38 to finish 44th/102 and 8th lady.
1 Oystein Helgesen (Norway) 8.33.00
50 Storm Trow (Cirencester AC) 13.21.38
123 finished ultra-x.co
Black Beacon Ultra Back, Black Mountains, Wales, 50km trail
Dave Musgrove travelled to the DM Bannau Brycheiniog National Park, and crammed in almost 7,000 feet in this 50km trail race.
{No feedback from DM available at the time of publishing.}
1 Harry Jones (unknown) 4.38.02
48 David Musgrove (Cirencester AC) 8.00.36
103 finished runwalkcrawl.co.uk
Sunday 1st November
Guy Fawkes 5 miles – COUNTY ROAD RACE FINALE
As per usual, the last race of 12 in the Gloucestershire AAA road race series was hosted by Tewkesbury AC.
The club had a good showing of 8 runners,
The best performance on the day coming from club captain Aaron Willis
“Got into a nice group and pulled each other along but they peeled away from me towards the end. Good effort throughout. Nice racing.”
Nice racing indeed again from Aaron, whose 27.13 time and 7th place earned him not only the 1st V45 prize but a new club age-group record and a PB. Aaron smashed Bill Leggate’s record of 27.58 from 2022.
[Ed. for statistics fans, he was only just ahead of David Wright’s remarkable pre-carbon V50 2009 record of 27.20].
Many congratulations Aaron!
It was good to see Chris Fox racing for the club again. Congratulations also to two of our ladies who won age-group prizes
· New LV50 Charlotte Wilton had a very strong run, and was relieved to be “ slowly getting faster again” – she was a full minute ahead of the 2nd LV50.
· Karen Higuera was pleased her hamstring held out.
Pam Wheeler kindly sent a few words of feedback in
“Lovely club-organised race. New course - out and back so great to pass faster members on the way back as I was on the way out! Lovely atmosphere. Good club turnout. On a personal note, really pleased with my race (for once!).”
Pam also complimented the medal
1 November 2026, Guy Fawkes ‘5’, Tewkesbury, 5 miles road
1 Jacob Pickering (Cheltenham & County Harriers) 25.04
7 Aaron Willis (Cirencester AC) 27.13 – 1st V45, club V45 record
71 Chris Fox 33.39
83 Charlotte Wilton 34.08 – 1st FV50
149 Karen Higuera 38.06 – 1st FV60
300 Pam Wheeler 48.21
359 Rachel Jones 54.15
367 Gordon Jones 55.06
377 Ruth Fulford 58.15
401 finished tewkesburyrunningclub.com
AAA road race series provisional results for 2026
Whilst the official results have not yet been released, most of the club medal-winners are clear.
Congratulations to three of our ladies
· Kate Kilby has won the gold in her LV65 category.
· Both Pam Wheeler (LV70) and Ruth Fulford (LV75) win silver medals – with both golds going to RSE runners.
In addition, Rich Allen provisionally looks to have secured bronze in MV45.
Two other road racers were just outside the medals
· Charlotte Wilton looks to have finished 4th – she was just one race short of the county bronze after a late season push.
· In his last season as MV60, Brian Harris only completed 6 races to come 4th, the first time he’s not finished in the top 3 since winning V60 in 2022.
Cirencester Half Marathon
The 2nd edition of this commercial race saw almost 1,500 runners complete the undulating course, more than 1% of them being from our club. Here are a lot of them
There was a very strong showing from our ladies, despite some of our fastest being injured or racing elsewhere.
Helena Sexton, Kate Jacobs and Annie Campbell all finished in the top 10.
Helena made the podium in 2nd, despite the fact she hadn’t been focusing her training on this event, was only aiming was to feel comfortable running a sub-90. She felt great and loved the route.
Annie produced the goods on the day to run a huge PB – congrats!!
Our first man home was Rich Allen (pictured at the top of this report)
“Legs weren’t overly happy to be racing again, still fatigued after Abingdon Marathon two weeks ago. Spurred on by the amazing support around my home town. Great event, and what a medal 😍“
New V50 member Blair Thomson also ran well to just break 1.25 in one of his first outings for the club – welcome again and great run Blair.
Relieved to be recovered from his summer injury, Ian Barrett (photo below) was happy with his result – in summary he took it steady to halfway then pushed on a bit, but he kindly sent in this fuller feedback
“First, it is a well-run event on closed roads, criticise event organisers for their pricing but they have done a good job and seemingly got the town behind the event.
As for my run, really wasn't sure where I was at, after a rather disrupted summer. When the 1h30 pacer group swept past as we started the climb out of Daglingworth I figured 1h30 to 1h40 was about right. I had no intention of pushing hard on the long drag out of Daglingworth, and just let the pacer pull away. I was picking off a few who believed the pre-race course description of flat, and once we crested the top I gave myself permission to push on. Maybe a bit too much, km 13 was my quickest of the race. But I caught the 1h30 pacer and figured if I could keep them behind then sub 1h30 would be a good result. In the end, sub 1h28 and an over 2-minute negative split, although significantly gravity assisted!”
Scott Mould was very happy with getting under 2 hours.
Rob Tuttle – “Wow! What a well organised and fabulously supported run! Great course, tough up Longhill Lane out of Daglingworth, but lovely bringing it home through the park!”
12 Rich Allen (Cirencester AC) 1.19.48 (1.19.46)
36 Blair Thomson 1.24.52 (1.24.43)
53 Helena Sexton 1.26.41 (1.26.32) – 2nd lady
64 Ian Barrett 1.27.44 (1.27.39)
67 Kate Jacobs 1.28.15 (1.28.11) – 4th lady
88 Annie Campbell 1.30.10 (1.30.02) – 8th lady, PB
150 Leo Crawford 1.34.52 (1.34.38)
154 Andy Fellows 1.35.10 (1.34.39)
155 Clare Stickney 1.35.20 (1.35.16)
171 Tommy Payne 1.36.13 (1.36.01)
273 Corinne Clark 1.41.27 (1.41.16)
325 Richard Read 1.44.11 (1.43.56)
702 Rob Tuttle 1.57.19 (1.56 32)
783 Scott Mould 2.00.04 (1.58.56)
813 Brendan McCarthy 2.00.57 (2.00.04)
1094 Jocelyn Randall 2.13.09 (2.12.25)
1466 finished futuresportsevents.com
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