Author: Running Carl

What a Relay good week for CRC.

It started with the Lacock Relay on Tuesday. Dan Harman was in the 2nd placed team and Lauren Edwards was in the 5th placed team.

Thursday Evening was the latest club championship event, the Great Chalfield 10K, where 15 members ran on a hot evening. Big congratulations to both Ade Hurren and Laura Midwinter who won their age category prizes.

Also winning prizes was Damian Hall, who came first overall on his latest bimble at the Lakeland Trails 55k. I’d love to see what he could do when not bimbling.

Angie Aplin and Jo Motto travelled to Windsor on Sunday for the Beat the Boat 10K trail race. As they do their 10K race, there are spectator/pacing boats on the river also trying to get a target time.

Stewart Unsworth doesn’t like to do things the easy way. Despite having some niggly injuries recently, he assisted a road crossing at the Cotswold Way Relay (more on that later), then went to Tewkesbury parkrun nearby before heading off for his leg of the CWR. He then joined us in the evening for a couple of drinks and on Sunday morning had to travel to Woolacombe for the North Devon marathon – PHEW!

And finally, going back to relays. Saturday saw CRC at the Cotswold Way Relay for the 17th time and continuously since 2004. We’ve had 38 teams in total.

This year we were only allowed to enter 3 teams so we had 30 runners raring to go throughout Saturday. The weather forecast was looking ridiculously hot for a second consecutive year and the order of the day was just to get everyone to their finish lines safely.

We achieved this, which was great news and while our times were not as good as previous years, our placings in each of the categories were marginally better than many previous years, so it shows that the heat really was oppressive.

We didn’t have anybody who broke any of the Corsham records and Dan Harman was the only person whose time was in the top 10 for a Corsham runner on his leg (10th on leg 1).

I like to keep track of all of our records and we did have 2 records for current members. Marie Vinolo-Young on leg 5 and Lauren Edwards on leg 7.

And I can’t mention Lauren’s time without mentioning that she was given a time credit for assisting a runner who had taken a tumble. A credit to the good name of Corsham Running Club.

Our teams contained 2 runners who were born in the 1950s and if the teams had worked out differently we could have had 4 runners born in that decade. And at the other end of the scale, John Hible became our first runner born in a year beginning with 2.

Congratulations to everybody who ran, and thank you to everybody who volunteered or supported or was driver for the day or patched up our injured runners, it takes a full team for everybody to run.

It’s a great time of year to get out and enjoy the countryside and our members have certainly been doing that as we didn’t have many racers but lots of other things going on.

We did have 6 members in Chippenham for the Longest Day 10K. A Wednesday evening race using the increased daylight hours around this time of year. Shelley Genery was the first runner back in just under 50 minutes with all 6 back in under an hour.

On Saturday, Dan Harman had a great performance at the Giant’s Head Marathon finishing 6th in 3:53 and only 2 minutes from an age-grade victory. Anyone that knows White Star Running, knows that this will be a hilly race and will not be accurately measured but you’ll definitely do 26.2 miles. I recommend trying to find a picture of the medal when you can too.

On Sunday Mark Cortaville completed his second half marathon of the year, this time in Swansea, only 2 minutes slower than his PB in a time of 1:35.

That was it for racers this week, but there were members out over the weekend, doing recces on the Cotswold Way ready for the relay next weekend and some doing recces of leg 4 of the Avon Valley Relay for the weekend afterwards. Good luck to our 30 runners on the Cotswold Way this Saturday, have great fun and do Corsham proud.

Thursday evening saw the annual For Fox Sake run in memory of Tom Fox, a member of Corsham Running Club who sadly passed away during a race. Tom was a keen runner and absolutely loved the social aspect and running with other runners. So every year, we are joined by some of our friends from Chippenham Harriers and Avon Valley Runners for a social 4-6 mile run, which is also attended by Tom’s wife Gill who is a very active member of club without ever lacing up her running trainers.

We used to start and finish at the Fox pub (so the name worked twice) and have a drink afterwards, but when it closed down we thought that the Corsham tradition of Prosecco and cake would be good so we return to the village hall, eat lots of cake, drink some prosecco and mix with old friends and new. It is a fitting tribute to Tom.

And on Friday it was the summer solstice, so for the second year, David Mackie organised two runs. One to watch the sunrise from Little Solsbury Hill, near Bath and the other to watch the sunset from Oliver’s Castle on the roundway between Devizes and Calne.

At 4:30am, 26 runners and 4 dogs set off from Batheaston for a 500 foot climb to be on the top of the hill for sunrise at 4:53. That is not a miscount, there really were that many of us willing to get up early. After the sunrise we dropped back into the valley where some headed straight back for a 3.5 mile run and some continued for a bit further for a 5.5 mile run. On returning to the car park, David had set up some bacon sandwiches for us all.

And in the evening 12 runners and 1 dog met in Heddington at the Ivy pub for 20:45, and again it was a long run up a big hill to start before running around the top ready for sunset at 21:30. And then back down to the pub for rehydration.

As with last year, David’s organisational skills extended to the weather as after an awfully wet week, we were treated to near perfect conditions and a fantastic sunrise and sunset.

I counted 6 runners and 1 dog that did the double, definitely the longest day for all of us. David Mackie, Susan Mackie (and Willow), Carl Zalek, Lee Davis, Danny Parker, Richard Biggs.

GO CORSHAM TEAM!

It has been the start of a few weeks of Corsham team events.

But first off, we had the 2nd in the series of the Heddington 5k event and after the disappointment of finishing in exactly 20 minutes at the first in the series last month, Dave Mackie managed to get his time to start with a 1, clocking a 19:45 PB.

We had 7 runners in total and everyone was finished within 22:06. Super speedy running from them all.

Our first team event of the summer was the Avon Valley Runners mob match. Run on the Over the Hills course (but backwards), this year was almost as muddy as the actual race usually is in November. There is a calculation involving your fastest runners placings and then taking off the total number of other runners.

With 31 runners from CRC we took home the trophy we’ve held almost exclusively since 2013 (it used to be separate male/female and Chippenham men won in 2015). Congratulations to everyone who ran as it is a real team effort. And special congratulations to Chris Hutton and Laura Midwinter who were first man and first lady.

Brian Atkins ran the Cheddar Gorge 10K with 2 friends, a good chance to get some serious climbing in.

Annika Davidson was also playing in hills, taking on the 16.5 miles of the Bristol Epic 3 peaks and finishing in a very good time just over 3 hours.

Saturday afternoon saw our latest club championship event, the Broad Town 5. Being over towards Swindon, it’s a good chance to pick up club championship points as only a small number of runners attend, and we had 5 there, led home by Mark Cortaville.

18 CRC members, a few friends and some supporters went on a camping and running trip at Endure 24.

On the Friday evening there is the childrens mini mile which the 3 children completed, Oscar Zalek in about 7:30, while Bonnie Zalek and Amber Fisher ran it together in around 9:30.

Endure 24 is a 24 hour continuous running race on a 5 mile loop, which can be done as anything from a solo runner (with a special t-shirt for those achieving 20 laps/100 miles) up to teams of 8. CRC had 3 mixed teams of 6 runners.

Susan Mackie teamed up with 3 friends to be in a team of 4 ladies, with an inflatable Jesus (who had some adventures) and they wore wimples and called themselves Sisters of Sin; which coincidentally can be sung to the tune of a popular Dire Straits song.

And as well as that we had Dan Inman running as a solo, his plan was to run at least 4 laps. He ended up doing 18 laps in just over 24 hours (as you get up to 25 hours as long as you start your last lap before 24 hours) for a total of 90 miles.

As we had 3 teams of 6, Carl Zalek tried to match the teams up to have a little bit of inter club competition. In the end, they were all pretty evenly matched so it was decided that in true CRC spirit, they’d run the last lap (lap 32) together and the other 15 (and 3 children) would join them for the last 100 metres and finish as a big group.

Officially each team did 32 laps in 24:34:57 to finish 39th – 41st of 247 large mixed teams.

Unofficially, and doing some manual adjustments based on what their actual times would have been, the competition was won by Cors’am Loving Heartbreak Hill (Paul Scotford, Kevin Sandall (Calne SmaRTT), Michael Fisher, Max Luff, Keith Burlison (Sue Mackie’s brother), Chris Hunt) in a time of 24:13; which would have been good enough for 34th.

2nd was Cors’am Going to Drink All the Tea (Jane Tunnicliffe, Michael Luff, Richard Biggs, Nick Maryon, Debra Kearsey, David Mackie) in a time of 24:35

And in bronze medal position just two minutes behind were Cors’am Going to Beat Last Year (Marie Vinolo-Young, Laura Midwinter, Stewart Unsworth, Wendy Scotford, Carl Zalek, Danny Parker)

It’s been a mix of racing and other things for our runners this week.

We’ll start with the racers and first up was the third race in the AVR Steeple Ashton 5k series attended by David Mackie, Stewart Unsworth and Chris Hunt. You’ll notice that we’ve still had no ladies (and only 4 men) run this event so it’s a great one to pick up those club championship points.

Andrew Wood has been in the mountains again taking on the Scafell Skyrace. The race was only 90% as long as last year, but Andrew still managed a 3 hour improvement.

Richard Biggs travelled all the way to Gloucestershire for the Fairford 10K, and was not far off his PB time set at Semington 3 weeks before.

Caroline Cozier ran the Lacock half marathon with Rachael Dark. Rachael had tried to sign up on the day only to discover that they don’t take cards. She still ran with Caroline though which we like to see.

Mark Cortaville took an incredible 27 minutes off of his marathon PB at Yeovil. He’s down to 3:47, but most impressively, he’s adamant that he has more to get.

In non racing news our beginners have set a new record by taking on Biggsy Hill in only their fourth week.

It’s been great to see people out and about doing recces of the Cotswold Way Relay. I’ve seen people out on legs 1, 4, 6, 8 and 9. It gives them a chance to enjoy the views this time.

James Lye was part of a team of cyclists from Corsham Cycling Club who spent Sunday completing a 184 mile cycle ride from Caernarfon in the north west of mainland Wales to Chepstow in the south east. They called this event Batter the Dragon and they certainly did.

This week also saw our latest away run and it was a new one, meeting in Monkton Farleigh and taking in some of the local sights including Brown’s Folly. Due to some interesting navigation, group C ended up completing more miles than group A on a magical mystery tour, but they loved it!

And finally, June is pride month and the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall riots and to commemorate this, Strava have added an interesting function. If you put the rainbow emoji 🌈 into your run name then it makes your run route look a little more colourful.

It’s been a festival of running as some of our members took the opportunity to attend RunFestRun at Bowood House.

After some trouble in the build-up, the RunFestRun weekend itself arrived and by all accounts everyone had a great time as there were running speakers, live music and celebrity spotting* in a festival atmosphere.

*Chris Evans, Vassos Alexander, Paula Radcliffe, Steve Cram, Colin Jackson.

Marie Vinolo-Young, Lucy Bright, Lauren Edward’s and Jo Gill certainly took on the running part as they did the Sunset Shuffle 5k on the Friday night, the Half marathon and 5K races on the Saturday and rounded off the weekend with Steve Cram’s Big Bug run 5K to collect pollen on the Sunday.

Also in attendance and doing some of the runs were Dave and Sue Mackie, Natalie Inman (and children), Jill Murphy (and child), Joanne Spry, Rob Bennett, Jan Forsyth (and child), Julian Thornhill and Joanne Hussey (and child).

In other running news, Caroline Cozier ran the Hogweed Trot 10K on Monday evening in a little over 56 minutes.

And I upset Richard Biggs by informing him that he hadn’t got a Half Marathon PB at Poole on Sunday as he thought. He still had a fantastic time though of 1:46:24.

And finally, I’d like to wish myself a happy anniversary as I’ve now been doing this Weekly Review for a year.

I started it as a way to keep the website active and a small record of what people in the club were up to.

In all honesty I thought I’d have given up long before now, but it is a real labour of love each week to trawl through Facebook and Strava and see what you’ve all been up to.

A big congratulations to each and every one of you too, whether you’re smashing PBs, running further all the time or happy to run a few miles a week for fun, it’s brilliant to see you all enjoying running.

Only a few races this week but some impressive performances from our CRC athletes.

Mark Cortaville set himself a new 10K PB again. This time at Dauntsey where he ran it in 41:07

Tuesday 21st saw the first of the hugely popular Lacock Relays. There were a number of runners there from Corsham, and Dave Mackie was in the second place team (of 39) and Max Luff was in the 3rd placed team.

Our beginners are on their second week and have been doing hills and lampposts, fantastic progression already.

Thursday saw us continuing our away run programme with a choice of routes from Bradford-on-Avon train station.

Dave Mackie has been on an adventure, spending a few days on the Isle of Jura, just off the west coast of Scotland. His adventure culminated in the Isle of Jura Fell Race. The race was around 15 miles but contains over 7,000 feet of climbing. He was treated to some spectacular views for his efforts and finished in just under 6 hours.

And Carl Zalek took on the Grand Union Canal Race, a monster 145 mile ‘run’ from Birmingham to London following the Grand Union Canal, so far less elevation than Jura. Finishing in just over 35 hours, it was a 4 hour PB on the KACR from last year and exactly 10 hours after the winner. Rumour has it, he even ran up Mount Sainsbury’s, a short hill 143 miles into the race.

It was a double club championship race week.

But more importantly than that, we had our latest batch of eager (and not so eager) beginners. Thanks to Richard Biggs, Christine Bott, Paul Scotford and Danny Parker for assisting. Don’t forget to volunteer for future weeks.

The first of the Heddington 5K summer series was on Tuesday, we had 11 runners there with 4 of them getting 20:00 or quicker and PBs for Tom Frost, Mark Cortaville, Andrew Wood, David Mackie, Marie Vinolo-Young and Lois Norcott.

As well as the Heddington 5K, Tuesday also had the start of our latest beginner’s group

Saturday saw the Semington Slog with 12 runners taking in the 10K. Again there were PBs set from Richard Biggs (by at least a minute), Rebecca Edwards (breaking 50 minutes for the first time) and Susan Mackie.

There was a great performance from Laura Midwinter, her first race in a Corsham vest and she was second female overall and took him the vet-40 prize.

Craig Rumble was also 3rd overall.

Chris Hunt broke 2 ribs and has been taking it easy so only did 2 races this week. As well as being at Heddington he did the Dusseldorf half marathon. The cakes in Germany are worth travelling for.

The Mackies cleaned up at Inaugural Conkwell 8, which includes the old Conkwell Killer hill. After finishing second vet-50 at Semington by just 6 seconds the day before, Dave went one better to win the prize at Conkwell. Of course, he gets overshadowed by Susan winning the vet-40 prize at the same race. Well done to both.

Jo Gill has had a couple of weeks off from marathons so she must have been climbing the walls before running the Worcester marathon this weekend in a little over 4 hours and 1st placed vet-45.

A huge well done to Mavis Rose who completed her first 10K this weekend in the Race for Life and ran it all. An achievement to be celebrated as much as any race win.

Lee Davis paced a friend of his around the Bognor Prom 10K, his friend’s first time at that distance.

Katharine Burrett is not afraid of a half marathon and completed the Chester one on Sunday.

Debra Kearsey was also in half marathon action. She completed Plymouth half marathon in just under 2 hours. 3 seconds under by the clock time.

Andrew Wood is not afraid of making us jealous with his pictures of races in superb locations and he didn’t let us down this week by doing the Keswick Mountain Festival 25K.

However, this week he’s been upstaged by Caroline Cozier who was in the far northwest of Scotland at the Cape Wrath Festival.

On Monday she raced the Loch Eriboll Half Marathon, Tuesday it was the Two Lochs 5.5 Mile, Wednesday was the Sandy Robbins Around Durness 5 Mile run and she rounded off the week by doing the beach run on Friday. A superb week.

I think this week might set a record for most number of races with fewest CRC runners. I count 15 runners across 10 races.

First up were Rachael Dark and Caroline Cozier enjoying the trees at the Westonbirt 10K, where Rachael finished under 50 minutes for the first time.

Marie Vinolo-Young joined with her friends from John Moore Sports (sponsor of the excellent Hazelbury Hurrah!) for the Rat Race Dirty Weekend Half Mucker. A 20 mile ‘run’ with 200 Obstacles. An obstacle every 160.9 metres. I remember watching something about it on channel 4 many years ago. It looked immense fun then and still does now.

The Luffs took the short journey to Marlborough for the 20 mile Marlborough Downs challenge. They had exactly the same time but on the results Max finished one place higher than Mike so it counts.

David and Susan Mackie travelled to Wales for one of their favourite races, the Preseli Beast. With 4,700 ft of climbing in 24 miles, it doesn’t undersell itself as the beast.

Richard Biggs was also in attendance taking on the slightly more sedate Beast Bach, which is ONLY 1,700 ft of climbing in a MERE 11 miles.

However, I think we can let Richard off as he day afterwards he did the Jan Younger Memorial 10K in Pembrokeshire with his daughter Caty. Results aren’t out yet so who knows which Biggs (or Brock) won.

Daniel Parker did the Stourhead 10K in under 50 minutes and unfortunately I’ve seen no photos as I’m sure it was stunning, taking place in the grounds of a National Trust property.

Mark Cortaville continued his recent run of mostly very impressive performances, shaking off the disappointment of Newport marathon with sub 35 minutes at the Commonweal 5 miler.

There were also hills this week for Becky Townsend, Helen Ashworth and John Ashworth as they did the Jack and Jill Challenge 10K. Hosted by fellow black and gold club Somer AC, it’s definitely not a PB course. As well as having many hills, one of them leads up to Kilmersdon primary school and lays claim to being the hill that Jack and Jill fell down. There are little stones on the side as you ascend which contain the words of the nursery rhyme and when you teach the top, there is a well.

Chris Hunt doesn’t know when to running. After breaking two ribs two weeks ago, he didn’t want to remove his races from the calendar, so this weekend he walked the inaugural Hullavington Half Marathon in what I suspect is a Personal Worst for him of 2:37:10. A very good time for someone walking.

So that’s our 15 racers, but last week also saw our latest away run and for the first time since the For Fox Sake run last summer, David Mackie failed to arrange the sunshine and everyone got very wet. As you can see from the photos though, it doesn’t appear to have dampened spirits.

After the excitement of last week, this week has been a little quieter and hardly any photos at all.

We had the second of the AVR Steeple Ashton 5K club championship event with Dave Mackie and Chris Hunt representing Corsham. Dave had a strong sixth place finish, whereas Chris held on the back despite two broken ribs.

If you’re looking for club championship points, this race is the one as we’ve only had 3 entrants over the 2 races so far.

We had 3 of our runners at the Newport Marathon. Tom Frost led the way with a 3:07, taking 18 minutes off his PB from the same event last year. Stewart Unsworth was unsure if he’d make the start line as he was suffering with injury but he did and finished in a good time of 4:44. Unfortunately, Mark Cortaville didn’t finish but I know he’ll be back stronger in future.

And going slightly off topic, Rachael Dark completed the Oldbury White Horse sprint triathlon, her first. A 400m swim, 20k bike ride and 5k run, in 1:31:04. Well done Rachael.

Remember if you’ve done anything worth writing about, or not even worth it as it’s never stopped me, then please consider writing an article for the newsletter. It doesn’t have to be an epic saga, it can if you want, but a few lines will be more than sufficient if that’s all you want to do.

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