Madams wins Luton Half, and Heathside Senior Men come 2nd in Liddiard Trophy/North of the Thames XC Champs

A hugely successful weekend of racing was completed despite wild weather and torrential rain in many places – with Dan Madams coming in first place in the Luton half marathon, and the Senior men’s team coming a great second place in the Liddiard trophy/North of the Thames XC Champs on Saturday. Elsewhere there was a wide selection of successes in road races, mountain marathons, duathlons, cross country  and parkruns.

There was such a range of races this weekend it is impossible to neatly categorise anything so here is a taster of pretty much everything that happened.

One piece of big news is Dan Madam's win at the Luton Half marathon in an amazing time of 1.19.04!

For many the big event of the weekend was the North of the Thames and Liddiard Trophy XC Champs in Fryent Park, Kingsbury on Saturday  – Chris sent the following report in:

"A small but rather useful bunch of Heathsiders braved the wind and rain of Saturday afternoon to savour the delights of the somewhat overlooked North of the Thames Champs and Liddiard Trophy at Fryent Park, in the shadow of Wembley Stadium. We went there to win something, and did. Sadly for us, so did H*ghgate. But more of that anon.

Fryent Park ('good for dogging,' according to Google maps) made a great course - undulating open fields and woodland, and not too muddy. Ideal for dogging and cross country then, but not both at the same time. Trust me on this one. The women ran a short 3 miles and the men a short 5 miles. First out from the shelter of the treeline to brave the wind and rain was Sarah Swinhoe, our only representative in the Senior Women's race (where were you, ladies? We could have come away with a medal of some sort). Sarah ran her usual tidy race to finish 5th overall, and first Vet. Congratulations, Sarah, and sorry you had a rather lonely run.

On the Junior side, we had one Under-17 Men's entrant, Jacob Phillips, in a field of... one. So, racing at the same time as the Senior Women, Jacob won! Hurrah! You can only beat the competition you find, Jacob. In your case, it was none. Congratulations all the same! For what it's worth, Jacob's time of 18m 45s placed him 11th finisher from 40 in the Women's race.

Nine Heathsiders donned the coveted blue, red, and gold vest to take part in the Senior Men's race (132 finishers). Gavin Evans, despite putting in a cheeky request, was not granted permission by the team manager to wear a t-shirt under his club vest. Quite right, too. For future reference T-shirts are only permissible when the temperature is below freezing, and even then it shows weakness to the competition. This is cross-country, Gavin!

Anyway, sartorial issues aside, Tom Aldred shot to a fantastic second place finish behind a dude who was, frankly, a ringer - by which I mean second claim for Queens Park. Consequently, Tom was the first amongst the first-claim runners and is therefore de facto North of the Thames and Liddiard Trophy Individual Champion. Congratulations, Tom! Tom was followed by Rob O'Grady, who had a great run to finish 8th overall, and George Stewart, who finished 18th. The Heathside 6 to score was completed by Dan McKeown, Andrew Brooker, and Chris Hartley. The 8-to-score team was augmented by Gavin Evans (avec vest mais sans t-shirt) and John Flahive. I think we can be proud of what we achieved, with some excellent performances throughout.
The team results are as follows (with individual results listed at the end)

Senior Women:     Champions, Liddiard Trophy (3 to score) - H*ghgate. Champions, North of the Thames Trophy (4 to score)....*stifles a yawn*... H*ghgate.

Senior Men:   Champions Liddiard Trophy (6 to score) - H*ghgate. Second - London Heathside, Third - TVH.
Champions North of the Thames (4 to score)... *cough*... H*ghgate. Second - London Heathside, Third, TVH.

Something of a walkover for H*ghgate then. Nonetheless, second was a fantastic team effort from Heathside, so well done, men."

On Sunday there was more cross country with the first race of the season in the Sunday League Cross Country # 1 in Cheshunt Park. Gavin Parrish kindly provided a report:

"The first race of the season for the Met League’s poorer cousin took place on a bright and breezy morning at Cheshunt Park. A big thank you to all Heathsiders who turned out to run this 3-lap course, mainly on grass featuring long up- and down-hill sections and a couple of bottlenecks that had all but the speediest queuing to get through on the first lap.

A certain Mr Tremaine, ex- of this parish was playfully (I’m sure?) hissed and booed when he showed his new colours before the start of the race – namely the green and white of his new club Trent Park. As many will know, Robin captained the Sunday League squad for a number of years and was often one of our highest placed finishers, so it is a loss to see him running for another side. And well done Paul Mercer for beating him …!

It was a good first appearance from Paul who was first Heathside man home in 47th for the men’s competition, followed by Eddie Bayne in 60th. First home in the women’s competition was Barbara Tomaszczyk in 53rd with newcomer Victoria Pound in 70th, and rounding off the women’s team, a special mention to Laura Boothman who was delayed getting to the event and ran straight from the taxi to the immediate commencement of the race, complete with nifty new club banner in tow.

The good news is we managed to field a complete men’s A team (just!), though unfortunately the ladies were slightly under-represented with only three of the five places needed, and were penalised accordingly in the scoring. Heathside therefore starts the season 15th in the League for the women and 14th for the men, out of the 18 teams taking part this season. The only way is up?

Accepting that the club’s cross-country priority is the Met League, it really would be fantastic to see some more Heathsiders at these Sunday League events so that we can help the club get a respectable place on the Leaderboard. The next race is at Grovelands Park on 24 November with a 10:30am start, so a bit closer to home too… "

Other Sunday races include the following:

Clare and Dan took part in the Hyde Park Hallowe’en Duathlon on Sunday – Dan wrote: "I had the privilege of seeing Clare Miller in action on the bike yesterday at the Hallowe'en-themed Jekyll and Hyde Park Duathlon. It proved a fleeting glimpse, however, as she hoovered off into the distance and I saw no more of her until after the finish line. Humble pie for McKeown but pumpkin pie for the redoubtable Miller, who collected a carved jack o'lantern as second female finisher."
David Hellard popped a longer than usual training run in on Saturday and "jogged" round the Beachy Head Marathon, one of the biggest off-road marathons in the UK, pacing a friend. Despite sausage rolls en route and many hills, he finished in a very respectable 4.10.49.

John Driscoll took part in the Original Mountain Marathon (OMM) in Brecon this weekend, completed 41K course in 14.58.38 , and sent this short report: "Anyone who thought the Brecon Beacons were full of sheep would have got a surprise this weekend as our woolly friends had seen the weather forecast and scarpered, and instead the hills were covered with over 1500 runners competing in the two day Original Mountain Marathon (OMM). Teams of two were banned from using any form of electronic navigation aids relying instead of map and compass to find the check points with routes ranging from 40km to 65km in total with between 2,500m and 4,000m of climbing. No surprises to report conditions were horrendously foul - 60mph gusts, sleeting rain, visibility often down to sub 50m and the boggy tussocky grass made a Met League course seem like a bimble around Regents Park! As the alternative to staying cheerful and focussed was to go down with hypothermia, morale remained high and the sense of all being in it together pervaded the weekend with plenty of banter either en route or in the campsite. Highly recommended if you don't mind soggy feet, carrying a tent and can read a map."
Andy Welshman was delighted to have run his best half marathon time in five years, running 2nd claim for Newark AC he completed the the Worksop Half in 1.20.31

Phil Wright ran in the Poland Spring Marathon Kick-Off 5m in New York – in his own words “a five mile lap of the surprisingly undulating Central Park on a beautiful autumn morning, with over 5000 runners on the starting line. I made a mistake on the application form and ended up being assigned to the second-to-last starting corral with around 4000 runners ahead of me. After a rather frustrating first mile and a half trying to dodge around my fellow runners I managed to get into a good rhythm and finished with a chip time of 30:26 which put me in 49th place.”
Some excellent runs in the Parkruns on Saturday - of particular note were Max Robertson who came first in the Hampstead Heath Parkrun in a fantastic 18:39 and Rebecca Bunting came first woman in the Richmond Park parkrun in a great time of 19.16!

Some missed results from earlier in the month:  4 Heathsiders took part in the London Fields Aquathlon on 6 October (full results below) and on the 13th October, Luca Melon came 6th in the Sport Pursuit Splash 3000m
And THAT is just about THAT.

Full weekend results
Love Luton Half marathon, Luton, 27/10/131st Dan Madams 1.19.04

North of the Thames & Liddiard Trophy X/C Champs, Fryent Park, Wembly 26/10/13
Individual Results:

Under 17 Men (1 finisher) (3 miles)1. Jacob Phillips            18m 45s

Senior Women (40 finishers) (3 miles)5. Sarah Swinhoe            17m 46s

Senior Men (132 finishers) (5 miles)2. Tom Aldred             25m 05s
8. Rob O' Grady         26m 30s
18. George Stewart      27m 50s
24. Dan McKeown       28m 35s
32. Andrew Brooker     29m 24s
36. Chris Hartley          29m 36s
38. John Flahive            29m 45s
48. Gavin Evans            30m 26s
73. Nick De Sausmarez  32m 42s

Sunday League Race #1, Cheshunt Park, 27/10/13
(5.1 miles)(gender position in brackets)
48. Paul Mercer   33m 15s  (47th)
63. Eddie Bayne   34m 04s  (60th) 
172. Gavin Parish   38m 43s  (147th)
183. Robert Bowler   39m 07s  (157th)
217. Ollie Pound   40m 42s  (180th)
227. Ken Townson   41m 03s  (185th)
256. Barbara Tomaszczyk   42m 32s  (53rd)
265. Bernard Bhlaitis   42m 59s  (206th)
287. Victoria Pound   44m 21s  (70th)
346. Laura Boothman   48m 03s  (108th)
349. Steve Woolf   48m 37s  (238th)
384 finishers (250 men, 134 women)

Beachy Head Marathon, Eastbourne, 26/10/13191st David Hellard 4.10.49

Poland Spring Marathon Kick-Off  5m, New York, 27/10/1349th Phil Wright 30:26

Jekyll and Hyde Park Hallowe’en Duathlon, Hyde Park, London 27/10/13(run 4.2k, bike 20.8k, run 7.6k)
23 Clare Miller 1:22:14.7 (splits: 15:34.7, 34:19.8, 30:46.4) (2nd lady)
29 Daniel Mckeown 1:23:20.3 (splits: 14:56.8, 36:29.3, 29:31.2)

Original Mountain marathon, Brecon Beacons, 26 – 27/10/13Class D Course -  41km
John Driscoll 14:58:38

Fleet 10k, Fleet Hampshire, 27/10/1332nd Rebecca Bunting 39.14 (2nd lady)

Worksop Half Marathon, Worksop,  27/10/1325th Andy Welshman 1:20:31 (4th V45)

London Fields Winter Aquathlon -  sprint aquathlon 6/10/13(400m swim, 5 kilometre run)30th Luka Melon M senior  00:28:44   
77th  Paul McCrossin M Vets  00:29:20   
76 Charlotte McCrossin F senior  00:33:43   
75 Alison Harrow  F vets  00:40:26

Sport Pursuit Splash 3000m 13/10/136th Luka Melon  43:50

Park Runs
Ally Pally parkrun, 26/10/2013.21 Oliver POUND 00:24:58
31 Jess FOGARTY 00:26:51
36 Alice PARISH 00:28:17

Brabrand parkrun, 26/10/2013.18 Jesper LYCKE 00:24:05

Bradford parkrun, 26/10/2013.8 Asa CUSACK 00:20:00

Finsbury parkrun, 26/10/2013.13 Russell WESTON 00:21:01
56 James PARKER 00:24:11
80 Sarah ILLINGWORTH 00:25:54

Hackney Marshes parkrun, 26/10/2013.9 Mark GEORGE 00:19:49

Hampstead Heath parkrun, 26/10/2013.1 Max ROBERTSON 00:18:39
49 Andrew Simon CONWAY 00:23:54
67 Emilia VYNNYCKY 00:25:14
85 Bob GOULD 00:26:12
91 Andrew SULSTON 00:26:49

Highbury Fields parkrun, 26/10/2013.2 Roger BRAYBROOKS 00:17:09
14 Tim MARSHALL 00:19:33
72 Claire THORNHILL 00:25:21

Richmond Park parkrun, 26/10/2013.12 Rebecca BUNTING 00:19:16 (first lady)