RANELAGH HARRIERS E-NEWS #596 26 NOVEMBER 2021
Editor: Steve Rowland
mailto:sandsrowland@btinternet.com
Web site: https://ranelagh-harriers.co.uk
🔷🔶 RANELAGH HARRIERS RICHMOND 10k Sunday 28th November 🔷🔶
Our own 10k takes place this Sunday at 9am, starting at Ham. Current weather forecast is for a bright day, but very cold. There are close to 500 entries, of which an astonishing 91 are representing Ranelagh. Good luck to all those racing and thanks to all those helping. Next year we hope to revert to our traditional mid-June date.
🔷🔶 SURREY CC LEAGUE- DIVISION 1 🔷🔶
WOMEN – 13th November 2021 Wimbledon Common
After years of rebuffing each other’s advances, the men’s and women’s Surrey Cross-Country Leagues have finally linked up. Congratulations! The result is a long afternoon of cross country running including up to six separate races. Here we had six junior events – namely under 15 and under 17 races for boys, under 13 for boys, under 17, Under 15 and Under 13 for girls; also senior women divisions 1 & 2 together and senior men division 1. This arrangement covered everything bar senior men divisions 2, 3 & 4 which took place at Denbies in Dorking. This is quite an undertaking for the organising clubs but all seemed to go well here on Wimbledon Common, just as it had last month for the first fixture organised by us in Richmond Park. This format makes travelling easier to organise and allows more mutual support from the teams.
The head count at the women’s Division 1 start was not far short of 300, which makes Cordy Parker’s run in 7th place all the more impressive – probably the run of the day. Cordy’s first-claim club is Abingdon, where her coach is Bernie Wilkins – himself a Ranelagh Harrier some years ago when he lived in Kingston. Bernie writes: “It was an excellent run, one of her best ever over the country. She tells me it was a torrid battle over the last 100m with a Clapham Chaser and she had to find another gear to get in front of her. Not for the first time, she could barely stand at the finish.” Cordy finished 7th, less than a minute behind the winner.
Sarah Palmer also enjoyed a great run in 19th place, and she was pursued to close in the team of five by Steph Tindall, Cecily Day and Suzy Whatmough. They finished in sixth place, echoing their result in the first League race. And not surprisingly they hold sixth overall, but not far behind South London and Herne Hill. Our ‘B’ team of Natalie Haarer, Bonnie Morgan, Clare Fowler, Wiebke Kortum and Claire Warner finished 11th.
Pos Name Club Time Cat.
1 Olivia Matthews C/C 22.19 SL
2 Ruby Woolfe THH 22.31 SL
3 Carolyne Baxter G&G 22.36 SL
7 Cordelia Parker RAN 23.12 SL
19 Sarah Palmer 24.01 SL
37 Stephanie Tindall 24.57 SL
53 Cecily Day 25.42 SL
56 Suzy Whatmough 25.44 SL
98 Natalie Haarer 27.17 SL
118 Bonnie Morgan 28.02 L45+
132 Clare Fowler 28.26 L40+
166 Wiebke Kortum 29.40 L50+
221 Claire Warner 32.28 L35+
236 Carol Aikin 33.29 L55+
238 Clare Day 33.33 L50+
243 Sally Bamford 34.37 L60+
262 Colette Doran 36.45 L45+
MATCH RESULT LEAGUE RESULT
1 C/C 49 1 BEL 150
2 BEL 84 2 THH 302
3 STR 152 3 C/C 266
4 SLH 166 4 SLH 344
3 G&G 171 5 HHH 360
6 RAN 172 6 RAN 379
7 FUL 175 7 FUL 492
8 HHH 186 8 H/W 509
9 THH 200 9 G&G 529
10 KEN 231 10 STR 552
11 H/W 254 11 E&E 644
12 E&E 316 12 KEN 715
13 W/W 496 13 W/W 817
14 W4H 572 14 W4H 1102
15 WOK 860 15 WOK 1103
MEN 13th November 2021 Wimbledon Common
Pheidippides reports:
Wimbledon Common, site of the birth of cross country running (as one club has modestly been reminding EVERYBODY for the last 153 years), an epic venue with mud, mud, and mud occasionally enlivened with driving rain and even thunder and lightning… ‘the butts’, grave of a thousand lost shoes…. Saturday 13 November 2021 and it’s warm (double digits), windless, not raining, and the surface is almost a tartan running track. Alas, I missed the après race, but I feel confident that all the talk was on the hot topic of the day, namely whether a worn twelve mill spike would have been better than a sharp nine mill, or whether those fools who favoured GRIP would have prospered more in flats or claws.
There were absences due to injury, and we hope that the limbs of those affected will soon be out of the garage and back in action (we missed you!) but we had a decent turnout. Everyone clearly put in a gutsy performance and no one can ask for more. Woe for the lack of royal blue in the top hundred, but a twelve-spike salute to James Hall for leading the team home in an amazing tenth and for newly crowned club champion Nick Impey following up in 37th and Ben Anderson in 80th. Jonathan, Thomas, Marc and Ross showed good packing in the next twenty-five, but of their derring-do I can write little, being but a distant spec well back from our top seven scorers. By the time I had crossed the line the battle to move out of the relegation zone had been well and truly lost for this match, but a very different contest was in progress to make the scoring team, and those of us in contention had FUN: what else is cross-country for?
We all had the same steady start and the same slowdown as the broad path narrowed to half its width (hadn’t I just had enough of this sort of thing on the M25?). That steady start was a wise move as the first segment of the course was a long drag uphill (and thanks to Fulham for posting the hypsographic profile). At the ‘Alps’ things started to get more interesting and, as we turned some sharp corners and hurtled down the hills, the truth of the mystery was revealed as to whether flats or spikes had been the right choice (“Twelve is too long, but none is wrong, so mix and match your twelve and nine and your man you’ll catch,” said the oracle claret which I had consulted). I’m not so sure that there was so much to choose between shoes at the various bogs pungent, or indeed on the ascent up the notorious butts which were disappointingly unpuddled – but there, at the top, we discovered our relative positions from a handy huddle of supporters, and it became immediately clear that there would be quite a tussle for tenth.
David Ready had set himself up well for contention with a nicely-paced start, and we had changed positions relative to each other several times over the first lap. He may have dropped back on this occasion but I am sure that he will return. On to the second lap, and I adopted a “silent assassin” approach to put me into an attack position behind Carl Assmundson and David Lawley; I then clung on for dear life (in part in fear of a resurgent Ready). Finally, before the last descent, some nifty cornering put me in front of both. “Eighth, ninth, tenth, eleventh!” yelled the Ranelagh contingent at the butts as we passed for the second time. So… it was time to use the advantage of having run the course n times before and to open the throttle and discover what still worked (and what did not). It was a revelation to hurtle down towards the finish at great speed and not pass out, and Messrs Assmundson and Lawley were held off.
Would I therefore finish as eighth scorer? Not a chance! If there is such a thing as a silent rocket then it is Joe Gomes who had obviously been lurking in the shadows before getting in touch with his killer instinct and sprinting to produce a two-second margin by the finishing funnel. It is rumoured that he has been fretting about whether it is entirely gentlemanly to burn off an ancient antique in the last two hundred yards. “Absolutely,” say I, and if I still had the legs for it I would repay that sprint with interest!
Our endeavours in the ‘A’-team may not have ended as we wished but we have the consolation of a good performance in the ‘B’-team competition – all credit to those involved. Thanks again, too, to the various supporters, whether retired team members, the women of Ranelagh who stayed on after their own race to cheer us, or conscripted friends and relatives.
Post scriptum: Pheidippides has been enjoying Thame Side ‘Gang of Four’ (purely as a muscle relaxant, of course).
Overall we packed well but a little too far down the field. Eighth place was our allotted result, quite some way behind seventh and a long way ahead of Fulham in ninth and last place. With two clubs bound for relegation I’m afraid it already looks as if we will be one of them. Never mind, it’s happened before and it gives us a chance to enjoy a year at the sharp end of the division 2 field. Our strength is our numbers and today we had 26 runners, enabling our B team to finish 6th. In the individual reckoning Marc Leyshon and Peter Haarer are both in 5th place in the Over 40 and Over 50 categories while John Shaw is 2nd in the Over 60s. Anchor Man awards for the last finisher in our A and B teams went to Carl Assmundson and Neil Rae.
After a steady start in the junior race, Henry Fagan moved through strongly for a very creditable 14th.
Pos Name Club Time Cat.
1 Andy Coley-Maud G&G 26.20 SM
2 Dylan Evans 2C BEL 26.27 SM
3 Dan Cliffe 2C H/W 26.42 SM
10 James Hall 2C RAN 27.10 SM
37 Nick Impey 28.35 SM
80 Ben Anderson 29.49 SM
102 Jonathan Smith 30.28 SM
107 Thomas Lahille 30.45 SM
111 Marc Leyshon 30.50 M40+
117 Ross Macdonald 31.01 SM
125 Joe Gomes 31.16 SM
127 Peter Haarer 31.18 M50+
128 Carl Assmundson 31.18 SM
131 David Lawley 31.25 M40+
148 James Riley 32.08 M40+
152 David Ready 32.06 SM
155 Rich Kimber 32.11 SM
160 Mark Herbert 32.21 SM
165 Gareth Williams 32.29 M50+
167 Philip Collins 32.32 M50+
173 Chris Lepine 32.56 M50+
184 James Whistler 33.24 SM
205 Neil Rae 34.15 M50+
217 Andy Starr 35.05 M45+
227 Michael Thomas 35.58 M50+
243 Marc Snaith 37.03 M40+
245 Mick Lane 37.10 M60+
249 Richard Willoughby 37.23 M50+
270 James Ritchie 41.17 M45+
BEL FUL G&G H/W HHH KEN RAN SLH THH
1 2 27 1 3 13 11 10 23 17
2 15 79 4 5 24 16 34 30 25
3 21 80 9 6 38 29 67 32 40
4 31 82 14 7 46 35 71 36 43
5 33 84 22 8 48 39 73 44 51
6 41 85 28 12 54 42 74 45 68
7 47 86 37 18 55 50 75 56 73
8 49 88 66 19 57 52 76 60 81
9 61 89 69 20 59 53 77 64 83
10 62 90 70 26 63 58 78 65 87
TOTAL 362 790 320 124 457 385 635 455 567
MATCH POS 2 9 5 1 7 3 8 6 4
B/FWD 319 896 444 164 553 345 617 465 382
LGE TOTAL 681 1686 764 288 1010 730 1252 920 949
LGE POS 2 9 4 1 7 3 8 5 6
YOUNG ATHLETES (Div 1 Fixture)
1 Oscar Curry REI 15.18 U17
14 Henry Fagan RAN 16.19 U17
🔷🔶 SOUTH OF THE THAMES 5 miles Team Race Saturday 21st November 🔷🔶
There wasn’t much interest in the South of the Thames race this year. First finishers for Ranelagh were Jonathan Smith and Suzy Whatmough.
MEN
Pos Name Club Time Cat.
1 Andy Coley-Maud Guildford & God. 26.02 SM
26 Jonathan Smith Ranelagh H 30.01 SM
64 Michael Morris 37.24 M50+
68 James Russell 38.01 M45+
72 Marcus Atkins 38.21 M55+
73 Ciaran O’Donnell 38.23 M50+
MEN’S TEAMS: ( 4 to Score )
1 Guildford & God. 24
13 Ranelagh H 230
WOMEN
Pos Name Club Time Cat.
1 Emily Wicks Aldershot F&D 30.11 SL
9 Suzy Whatmough Ranelagh H 35.01 SL
21 Clare Fowler 38.09 L40+
🔷🔶 LONDON CROSS-COUNTRY CHAMPIONSHIPS Sunday 22nd November at Parliament Hill 🔷🔶
Men 10.5k
112 Mark Herbert 41.36
116 Richard Kimber 41.51
147 Gareth Williams 43.05
167 Chris Lepine 43.22
227 Neil Rae 45.10
312 Richard Willoughby 49.05
380 James Ritchie 52.54
Women 5.9k
39 Suzy Whatmough 24.44
146 Rebecca Bissell 28.37
186 Ann Kearey 30.28
🔷🔶 LONDON YOUTH GAMES Saturday 21st November at Parliament Hill 🔷🔶
There were good performances by three of our juniors all representing Richmond.
In the Boys Under 17 event Henry Fagan finished 21st as the first finisher for the 5th-placed team.
In the Girls Under 15 event Siena Lepine was 39th , 2nd for the 6th-placed team.
In the Girls Under 11 event Maya Lepine was part of the winning team, finishing 6th.
🔷🔶 OTHER RESULTS 🔷🔶
ULTRAS
Mike Thomas seems to have been the only member of the Ranelagh Ultra Crew in action this week, completing a 50k race in less than 10 hours.
AND THE REST
Ross Macdonald enjoyed the mud bath that is the Orion 15 miles in Epping Forest, finishing 8thin 1:44.09… Eirin McDaid won the unlikely-sounding Lobster Lob… Sam Dalgleish finished 14thin the Sodbury Slog 10 miles in 68.45… Michael Morris finished 8th in 36.08 and Marie Synnott-Wells 37th in 44.04 in the Second Sunday 5 miles on Wimbledon Common…in the Remembrance Day Half Marathon Rebecca Bissell finished 3rd in her age group in l:45.22… Shaun Griffith finished 44th in 40.30 in the Hampton Court Palace 10k, followed by Fiona Jones in 69.08 and Louise Wapshott in 74.13.
🔷🔶 RANELAGH HARRIERS WEB SITE 🔷🔶
If you haven’t yet looked at our new web site, please do so: it’s here: https://ranelagh-harriers.co.uk. All comments and suggestions welcome.
GUIDE RUNNERS REQUIRED
Roger Wallis writes:
As you may know, I am a visually impaired runner who regularly partakes in training sessions with intermediate two. I’m very keen to widen my pool of Guide Runners and therefore would invite anybody who fancies giving this a go to get in touch with me via email – roger_wallace@sky.com – or my WhatsApp group.
In advance, thank you.
TEAMER
Teamer is the app we use to confirm attendance at races. It’s pretty self-explanatory once you sign up. Join the group and see what it’s all about.
Men: Men’s Teamer Group Women: Women’s Teamer group.
🔷🔶 KEEP IN TOUCH 🔷🔶
- Join the Strava group: https://www.strava.com/clubs/ranelagh-harriers
2. Log your run and give it a catchy title.
3. Give our segments a shot!
4. Check back every week for highlights
5. Note that Activity and Profile Privacy settings will need to be set to Everyone if you want the rundown team to be able to see your individual runs
Follow us elsewhere on social:
Twitter: @ranelaghharrier
FB: Ranelagh Harriers
Insta: @ranelaghharriers
🔷🔶 FINALLY 🔷🔶
The magazine The Athlete for 1869 must have been the 19th century equivalent of Athletics Weekly. It carries results for athletics meetings throughout England, including this one on 7th July at Aldershot Camp. It features more or less standard “Flat Races” – 100 yards, 200 yards, 500 yards, 200 yards hurdles, half mile and mile. Then come the more challenging events: 200 yards Sack Race, Wheelbarrow Race (blindfold), 100 yards Three-Legged race, 50 yards Bucket Race, Putting the Shot (24lb) with a follow, Putting the Shot (24lb) without a follow and Throwing the Cricket Ball
