Six podium places for North Wales Road Runners at Bangor

Report by Don Hale

https://donhaleblog.blogspot.com

It was a very busy weekend of October 5-6 for the North Wales Road Runners with multiple races at Bangor, Chester and Cardiff, in addition to the first cross-country fixture of the season at Eirias Park, Colwyn Bay – and not forgetting Conwy Parkrun!

At the hilly Bangor 10k, six members all claimed podium places in their respective age categories.

Sion Thomas led the team home as 9th male and 2nd M40 in 43.31. He was followed by Dave Jones, 14th in 45.22 and 3rd M50.

Daniel Hennell placed 29th and 3rd M45 cat in 50.10, and it was good to see veteran Carol Moss back in action, as she finished 2nd F60 and 20th female in 54.55.

Master veteran Rob Fryer was 2nd M70 in 64th place in 59.13, with fellow master Mike Hayton 3rd in the same cat as Rob in 61.26 as the 73rd male. *There were 230 finishers.

Bangor Half Marathon

Nine NWRRC members tackled the Bangor Half Marathon with Stuart Culverhouse leading the pack as the 22nd male in 1.31.55.

Steve Bozier was in hot pursuit in 23rd place in 1.32.22, and 4th in his M45 cat. Adam Lemalle positioned 92nd in 1.52.21, with Phillip Moss 102nd in 1.56.36.

Hannah Griffith ran with her sister Siwan Kalatzi and they finished together in 2.05.53, with Siwan 40th female and Hannah was just one place behind.

Nia Lister had another improved performance in 55th place with a new PB in 2.12.22, whilst Helen Hannam was 60th in 2.13.34, and Gwen Charlton was 65th in 2.15.27, with Katie Johnston 82nd in 2.20.24. *There were 317 finishers.

Chester Marathon

Master veteran Sandy Johnston finished 3rd MV75 at the MBNA Chester Marathon following a tremendous run in a chip time of 3 hrs 57 mins and 13 secs, 1,782nd place out of 4,397 runners.

In the Chester Metric Marathon, Carla Green impressed again in 64th place overall, 10th female and 2nd FV50 in 2.01.46. Steve Roberts was 141st in 2.12.20 and 5th MV55 cat, and Rachel Morris recovered from her recent injury to enjoy a good run in 1022nd place, as the 512nd female in 3.25.09.

Cardiff Half Marathon

Cheryl Frost made the long trek to South Wales for the Cardiff Half Marathon, ending up 438th female and 20th within her FV55 age cat in 1.43.55. *The event attracted almost 10,000 finishers.

Liverpool

Steve Mason finished 29th and 1st VM50 at the Princes Park Parkrun in Liverpool on his course debut in 20.12.

Colwyn Bay

Four NWRRC members ran in the first North Wales Cross Country League fixture of the season at Eirias Park, Colwyn Bay, which included Karen Butler, Kay Hatton, Gwen Charlton and Helen Hannam.

Parkrun’s special anniversary celebrations at Conwy featured on ITV Wales

Report by Don Hale

https://donhaleblog.blogspot.com

Nearly 300 entrants competed in the October 5 Conwy Parkun.

This year is Parkrun’s 20th anniversary, Organisers at Conwy began their own journey a few years later, but this popular event has continued to flourish, with the weekly run from the RSPB Nature Reserve attracting over 200,000 finishers in total since the start.

And in this week they too celebrated their own 420th parkrun.

North Wales Road Runners had 17 members involved and Will Williams shook-off his recent injury problems to finish 5th overall and 1st VW50 in just 19 minutes and 15 seconds.

Adam Lemalle was 17th and 2nd VW40 in 21.59, Steve Roberts placed 18th and 1st VM55 in 22.04, while Paul Aubert finished 20th overall and 3rd VM45.

Richard Scamans positioned 22nd in 22.14 and youngster Joe Culverhouse topped his JM11-14 age cat in 25th place in 22.40.

Sion Thomas was 40th in 23.50 and 3rd VM40, James Singleton returning to parkrun with a good performance in 43rd place in 24.09.

Master veteran Barrie Wells won his VM70 age cat in 25.15 in 53rd place overall, whilst veteran Tony Gibson clinched 89th in 26.41.

Stuart Culverhouse guided partially-sighted clubmate Daniel Owens around this picturesque 5k course this week. Daniel knocked over a minute from his time from the previous week to finish 92nd in 26.45, with Stuart just one place and second behind.

Master vet Rob Fryer was 2nd VM70 and 129th overall in 29.02, and veteran John O’Shea was 148th in 30.12. Recovering mountain racer Mark Davies was another vast improver, recording a new course PB time of 36.08 – nearly 30 seconds better than last week – to finish 215th, after running with friend and club colleague Karl Morris. Karl finished just two places and one-second behind Mark in 36.09, whilst Elizabeth Driscoll was 255th in 53.06.

• There was also a welcome and surprise appearance by a young and prolific fundraiser Charlie Sheen, who made his parkrun debut and finished well in 39th place in 22.40, and was 2nd in his JM11-14. In July this year he raised thousands of pounds for Alder Hey Children’s Hospital Charity by running 75-miles during the summer, up and down the promenade from Colwyn Bay to Llandudno.

*Praise was given to the run director and to all the marshals and volunteers. This is the link to the provisional parkrun results at Conwy: https://www.parkrun.org.uk/conwy/results/latestresults/

First finisher overall at Conwy was SM20 athlete Giovanni Torri on his course debut in 17.21, with SM18 runner Cai Curtis-Roberts 2nd with a new PB in 17.28, whilst another debutant Gareth Griffith, VM40, claimed 3rd place in 18.29. *The first female finisher was Becky Sleath (Newcastle University & Tri Club), a SW25 athlete in 22.05, (19th overall), with SW30 athlete Alex Aldous 2nd (23rd overall) in 22.24 and Elin Cawley, SW20, finished as the 3rd female, (41st overall), in 23.57. *There were 267 runners in total.