Yeovilton "Summer" 5k gets underway

Yeovil Town Road Runners have a case of trades descriptions to answer in regard to their use of the word "summer" in the title of the April - September 5k series, held at RNAS Yeovilton, as the weather that greeted runners on the first (April) round of the series was as far removed from summer as you could possibly get. Long tights and base layers were the order of the evening as 4 (and a guest) Exmouth Harriers made their way up the A303 to take on this competitive 5k race.

With the promise of a fast and flat course, us ranking-aware runners we were all seeking to post good times for the club championship and for our Power of Ten profiles. What greeted us were mid-winter temperatures, lashing rain and the stiffest easterly head wind possible. Did that deter us from making the 100+ mile round trip? NO! Yes, conditions were tough and not PB-friendly, but we figured that we would all put down individual markers to chase in subsequent rounds, which would give us a target to run faster next time.

The first Harrier home and first across the line outright was Ethiopian guest runner, Berihu Tesfay. With nobody to push him, the race turned into a bit of a time trial for Berihu and, with no shelter from the strong headwind on the home stretch, he did well to post a time of 15:32, putting him 18 seconds clear of the 2nd placed runner. With more clement conditions and some stiffer competition, it will surely be a matter of time before Berihu is dipping under the 15 minute mark here.

Adam Miller had never run a road 5k before; his only previous experiences of the distance being at the weekly parkrun, which, being multi-terrain, is a much slower track. So a PB was most certainly up for grabs for him, even though he was trying to take it fairly steady and not risk any injuries as he enters the final week of his London Marathon preparation. Given this, his time of 17:09, giving him 11th place overall, is very encouraging and shows that a sub 17 clocking if most definitely on the cards in subsequent rounds.

Using this race as my first competitive outing after my 8 week injury lay-off, following my achillies trouble and calf tear at the Plymouth Hoe 10 mile in February, my aim for this race was to get around pain free and put down a marker to chase in later rounds. Sensibly avoiding my usual 5k strategy of going off like a bat out of hell and watching the mile splits steadily fall from 5:40, to 5:55 to 6:15, I managed to keep an even pace this time. Luckily my achillies felt ok and aside from a massive drop in top end speed and leg cadence, I was pleasantly surprised to feel quite strong. I must have managed my pacing better than the other  ladies as I reeled 3 of them in over the latter part of the race, to finish as 2nd lady, just 6 seconds adrift of 1st, in 18:52.

Jon Garrity is likewise looking at completing the whole series at Yeovilton and aiming to preogress throughout the year. Not having done a scrap of speed work all winter to try and give his troublesome calf muscle a rest, he knew he was not as sharp as he could be, so he did extremely well to get around the course in a time of 19:16 for 27th place overall and a very commendable 2nd place in the MV40 section. He was just 1 second ahead of the next MV40 athlete, highlighting the importance of that final kick for the finish line! With a Killerton PB of 18:34, you can be sure that there is much much more to come from Jon once he gets back into structured training.

Carly Miller, like Jon and myself, was also approaching this first round at below full fitness: work, winter illness and the small matter of her wedding to organise have understandably gotten in the way of Carly's training! Not knowing what shape she was in, Carly was keen to just do her best and put a time up that she'll be able to chase in the next round once she returns to full training. That said, considering what she has been juggling over the past few months, her time of 23:39, for 14th female and 81st place overall, in Wednesday's horrendous conditions is very encouraging and gives her a target to aim for at the next outing in May.

Next round is Wednesday May 8th. Only £5 to enter and fast times are most certainly there for the taking if the weather complies! The 4 of us intend to go again and would love another car-load of Harriers to join us!

Obituary: George Lovegrove

GEORGE LOVEGROVE 1942 – 2013

The passing was announced last month of George Lovegrove. While in later years he had no longer competed, George was one of that rare breed, a pre-boom runner; that is he had been foot racing in the years before the London Marathons of the early 80s caught the public imagination. George’s running CV included events such as the Poly Marathon, which had begun in 1909. This meant that by the time the Exmouth Harriers club was re-launched at the end of 1981, George was already a mentor for a small group of local men who wanted to run a marathon themselves. This group included Martin Shepherd, John Alexander and Brian Costello, and a group of Exmouth Harriers did indeed complete the 1982 London Marathon. George and the others did not stop there though and went on to take part in many further events, which, in George’s case, included ultra-Marathons. He ran his marathons in a more than respectable 3 and-a-bit hours. Former training partner, Martin Shepherd, described him as “never a speed merchant” but that he was able to “[keep] going when others had long stopped". In the last 10 years running has become dominated by veterans in terms of numbers participating but George and his contemporaries missed out on the “veterans boom”, stopping running because of injury or illness. George often raised money for charity when he raced and he was very generous with his time when the track at Imperial Road  was repaired, more impressive when you realise that this was an old fashioned “cinder” type  track which needed digging at times and George’s day job was as a gardener at Rolle College. A picture of George would be recognised by many Exmouth residents because of his distinctive Old Dutch style beard which made him one of the more distinctive faces in the collage of people that make up the population of Exmouth. George played his part in making the very simple activity of running - along with its health and social benefits - accessible to more people than perhaps any other sporting pastimes.

George Lovegrove: 1942 - 2013

The attached group picture was taken after the 1986 Fulfords Five with George on the far left.

It's a Parisian PB for Lisa!

Marathon season is now underway with ladies captain Dawn Teed starting the ball rolling in the Falklands and clearly inspiring Lisa Hatchard to go out hard and nail a marathon PB in Paris.

Lisa headed to Paris with friend and fellow Harrier, Alison Milborrow, but unfortunately Alison was forced to withdraw beforehand due to an injury hampering her preparation. The ladies still went over together though for a girlie weekend in Paris and what better way to take in all the sites than to run past them all on foot for 26.2 miles?! The Paris Marathon course is one of the most awe-inspiring in the world in terms of the architecture it passes by. Long boulevards as straight as a dye, iconic structures such as the Eiffel Tower, Le Grand Palais and Les Invalides, and the two forest parks on the outskirts of Paris, known as the 'lungs' of Paris: the Bois de Boulogne and the Bois de Vincennes.

The race starts at the foot of the majestic Arc de Triomphe and offers runners a fast downhill start as they swoop down the full length of the Champs Elysées. From there the route twists and turns around the streets on either side of the Seine before finishing on Avenue Foch, not too far from the starting point at the Place Charles de Gaulle roundabout.

Lisa had had a brilliant few months of hard preparation and her training had gone well. A new sub 1:40 half-marathon PB at Bideford confirmed this. However, marathons are unpredictable beasts and things can be going superbly well and then, usually at around the 19/20 mile mark, the wheels can fall off, sometimes quite spectacularly. Luckily for Lisa, this didn't happen, and with her quality training to fall back on, she remained strong to the end, crossing the line in a time of 3:47:13 - a sub 4h marathon to add to her growing collection of impressive times. This placed her 10803 overall and 277th in her FV35 category. There were around 40'000 entered into the race, so Lisa did fantastically to be just outside the top 25% of them. Well done Lisa, ou, comme disent les Français, bravo!

EXEcellent to AXEceptable

From excellent to acceptable: this was the range of Harrier performances at the testing 20 mile Exe to Axe event on Sunday 7th. Some Harriers faired far better than they expected, whilst others reported having a bit of a shocker of a race and finding the going particularly tough this year in the inclement weather conditions.

The Exe to Axe race is so named as it sees runners follow the 20 mile stretch of coastal footpath from Exmouth, and the Exe estuary to Seaton, and the mouth of the River Axe. It is a very scenic route but not one for the feint hearted. With 4000ft of climb (well, 3999ft, according to the Power of 10 site), it is classed as a category B, Long fell race. In real terms, for the participants, this means a hell of a lot of ups and downs!

Never ones to back away from a hilly, multi-terrain challenge though, a merry band of nine hard-core Harriers were toeing the start line at Fox Holes car park on Sunday morning. This year there were almost 200 finishers, which shows the growing popularity of tough off-road events, such as this, the Four Trigs and the Grizzly. The fastest finisher, Tim Lenton from Axe Valley, took 2:46:58 to cover the 20 hilly miles; the slowest runner took over 5h40m.

The highest placed Harrier was Nicholas Brown in 44th place overall in a very respectable time of 3:46:12.

Scott Jordan feels his progress has been on a bit of a plateau recently after having several weeks off due to injury, so finishing here in the top third of runners (62nd) in 3:51:47 should be something of a confidence booster and reveals that he is well on his way back to fitness.

No stranger to these tough, muddy, hilly events, Jon Croome clocked 4:03:44 for 86th spot. Shortly after and running in together in 90th and 91st places, with times of 4:06:30 and 4:06:33 were brother and sister pairing, Chris and Emma Dupain. In fact Chris was just in front, no patronising chivalrous gestures from him!

While Diane Richards was speeding around on Somerset tarmac in the Taunton Half, husband Martin was on his feet for 4:09:28, to claim 95th spot.

Terry Oldham was 104th in 4:13:19. Ever the philosopher, Terry reflected afterwards on what a tough event this was for him this year, having gone into it with a few hamstring niggles: 'It is 48 hours now since I completed the Exe to Axe run, and I am still asking myself quite why I did that this year. As a Category B long fell race, it is going to be a challenge, and given that I have done it on a few occasions now I should be prepared. But it is one of the strange and attractive aspects of running that you never really know how it is going to turn out, regardless of training and preparation, until you are well underway. This year I discovered that a tight upper hamstring remains a tight upper hamstring regardless of whether you ignore it and or ingest a considerable number of anti inflammatory drugs. This discovery occurred on the way to West Down and hence with some 18 odd miles to go. Although tempted on multiple occasions to pack it in, my simple cussedness kept me going to the end in Seaton. A quick chat, a look at the medal, and off back to Exmouth in the car, as if none of it had actually happened. Why did I do it? Still not sure!'

Club Chair Bob Keast was 166th in 4:51:18 and explains that he too, like Terry, had a particularly bad day at the office: 'I had a truly awful run as well. Felt sick at Sidmouth, should have stopped as well, but kept going but I did not eat/drink anything as felt so bad, so got slower and slower, walked last few miles. But will it put us off? NO!!'

I think the above exchange gives you some idea of the sort of mentality needed to do well in these grueling off-road events!

Lorraine Croome rounded off the Harrier proceedings in 175th in 5:08:12. She may well have been slightly disappointed with this run too, like Terry and Bob, as it is well down on her usual high standards at these type of events; standards which saw her place 3rd female and 33rd overall at the equally tough 4 Trigs event in March. But that is indicative of this type of event: if you are not feeling 100%, they will find you out: no one to draft or slipstream up on the top of an exposed Devon cliff top with a  biting north-easterly wind howling in your face. So well done to all the Harriers for completing: not one Harrier registered a DNF! 

Tough times at Taunton in icy temperatures

We are all familiar with the expression “out of the frying pan and into the fire” but when it came to Exmouth Harrier Mike Keep’s recent running of the Taunton Marathon on Sunday 7th April it was more a case of “out of the frying pan and into”, well, “the fridge” I suppose. Mike, you see, has been working (and training) in tropical West Africa and he no doubt imagined he was going to have a breeze covering 26.2 miles of mildly undulating Somerset in refreshingly balmy conditions in contrast to the sapping heat and altitude he had been contending with 3000 miles south. Yes, it was 'a breeze', but of the artic, chills-you-to-the-bone easterly variety, no doubt leaving him to wonder if he could get a balaclava in club colours instead of a flimsy singlet! Enough of the meteorology though because in fact he had a pretty good race, finishing 2nd man over 65 in 4 hours 20 minutes and that is running a Marathon not just completing it. Overall he was 172nd of 199 finishers. Looks like Mike is set to extend still further the strength in depth of the Exmouth club’s veteran ranks and we are possibly looking at a crack team for the Erme Valley Relays!

Alongside the full marathon event there is also a Half Marathon (the full marathon is run over two laps of the half), which this year was contested by just under 1,000 runners, of which almost 400 were women and just over 600 men. The field also included four Exmouth Harriers. Mick Allen is 75 this year but ran in the men over 65 category. There are now so many veterans of Mick’s vintage that it is inevitable that races will catch up sooner or later and make sure there are sections for V70 and, even, V75 athletes, where runners like him can be competitive. On this occasion Mick was 13th in this category but of course he would have had opponents up to 10 years younger. 

Adrian Kearns was 46th and 6th man over 40 in 86:30, an impressive performance and over 3 minutes faster than on this same course last year: the cooler conditions of this year's event evidentally suited Adrian better. Adrian ran very close to this time (86:54) in finishing 71st overall and 19th man over 40 at the Bideford Half Marathon just last month, showing just how consistent he is.  

Julie Gellender was 214th overall, 7th woman over 40 and comfortably under 100 minutes with 98:37 while Diane Richards, stretching her legs in a last race as she enters the final stages of her London Marathon build up, was 558th, 18th woman over 45, and timed at 1:55:07. This was also a new PB for her, and an improvement of 12 minutes on her time set in the Bath half in March, which has to give her plenty of confidence that her training has gone well and she is in top shape as she prepares to head to London for double the distance.

Adam and Carly's double wedding joy!

Most people expect to only get married once in their life, but our Exmouth Harriers couple, Adam Miller and Carly Audritt, managed to have two weddings in two days!

Last Sunday, 31st March, Adam and Carly tied the proverbial knot at an official ceremony at Courtlands House in Lympstone. They were kind enough to open the invitation to the evening reception to the entire club and many of us took up the opportunity to be a part of their special day.

Before this, however, they had a less-official, impromptu wedding at Parkrun on the Saturday morning! Both Carly and Adam are regular faces at the event, having both completed well over 50 runs there. With Parkrun being such a friendly organisation, some of the regular organisers decided that it would be a nice idea to mark the special occasion with a pre-run ceremony.

John Caswell, run director, had prepared a few low-key costumes in advance, including a veil for Carly, a top-hat for Adam and a vicar's cassock for himself. Announcing that it is common for runners to indulge in large pasta meals before a big event he explained that he was the 'Parkrun Pastor' and that this was his 'Pastor Party'! Adam was then instructed to start at the back of the group of 100+ runners and Carly at the front and he was to take this last opportunity to chase and catch his girl! The horn sounded and off we all went, leaving Adam with a bit of work to do to catch up to the runaway bride, who had sped off the front. By the end of the first lap he had managed to catch her and just in time as when they passed by Pastor Caswell and the spectators at the finish funnel, they had confetti thrown over them.... well, actually it was bird seed as this is National Trust parkland, so only eco-friendly confetti allowed! The bride and groom then completed another 2 circuits arm in arm and Adam chivalrously stuck to the rule of 'ladies first' and did not try to out-sprint Carly to the finish! A small scale reception then followed in the form of tea and scones in the Killerton tearooms with several other stalwart Parkrunners in attendance.

If the permanent grins on their faces were anything to go by, it seemed that Adam and Carly had a terrific and very memorable two days before they departed to the North Devon coast for their honeymoon.

They are a great couple and a very welcome asset to the club, so on behalf of everyone at the Harriers, we would like to wish this happy couple all the very best for their exciting future together.

Bride and groom-to-be at their Parkrun ceremony!

Reunited after lap 1, they run the next 2 laps arm in arm!

(c) Adrian Midgley

And at their official ceremony on the Sunday, at Courtlands House, Lympstone

A county classic!

The Bampton-Tiverton road race is very much one of the classic events on the Devon racing calendar as it was first run in 1946, making it one of the oldest surviving and longest running road races in the country. It has managed to retain its 'no gimmicks' approach by offering exactly what it says on the tin: a race, on foot, from Bampton to Tiverton, covering a total distance of 7 miles 125 yards. With the growing popularity of the metric measured distance of 10k stealing the 7 miler's thunder, these classic distances are getting harder to find these days. Indeed, it was mooted this year that this would possibly be the last opportunity for runners to run on this same original course. Let's hope that it does appear on the calendar again next year.

It provides a fine opportunity for, now usually about 150, runners to blow away the cobwebs of a lazy Easter week-end. This year, with the increasingly popular Yeovilton Easter Bunny 10k attracting over 350 finishers, and with the extremely cold weather conditions, only 99 hardy souls made it across the finish line, which goes to show that unlike the race they don’t make runners like they used to! There were though three Exmouth Harriers seemingly cast from an older mould who were on the bus to Bampton and two of them finished in podium positions.

Ray Elston got the better of long-time rival John Perratt (formerly of Exmouth, now with Sidmouth running Club) in winning the men over 70 category. Ray was 63rd overall in 56:12 (an impressive 8mph on a far from easy course in chilly weather). Exmouth’s Jim Wyatt was 93rd in 64:30 (7 mph, which is not hanging around on foot either) and Jim was 3rd man over 70. In 42nd place was young Andrew Johnson (actually in the men age 45-49 group). Andrew’s time of 51:36, just far enough in front of them to no doubt have had time to be waiting with a cup of tea each for club-mates Ray and Jim on their arrivals!

Andy Johnson ploughs on through the cold conditions.

Ray Elston pulls away from a younger rival.

Super vet Jim Wyatt striding out.