Stroud and District AC Newsletter

Stroud & District Athletic Club Monthly Newsletter

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Stroud & District Athletic Club Newsletter

Chairman's Message

Dear <<First Name>>,

April has been an amazing month for our endurance runners. The marathon season kicked off in Manchester where the Club was well represented and Stroud vests featured proudly at marathons in Llanelli (Great Welsh), Brighton, Worcester (Bunny Hop!), London and Krakow. Congratulations to everyone who put in the long hours of training to achieve their personal goals!

The green tide of Stroud success also flowed through half marathons at Manchester, White Horse, Florence and Westonbirt, 10Ks at Ashleworth (Angels), Derby and Westonbirt, off-road races at Sudeley Castle and Chedworth and 5K at Bristol (Pomphrey). It is fantastic to see so many of our members in action at races around the world and many also turning out at weekends to support their local Parkrun. I hear there is one due to start in Stroud very soon. Look out for breaking news!

Our triathletes have also been in action as their season starts to get underway, Gwen Kinsey setting an early marker by winning the Silver Medal in her age category (3^rd overall) in the Sprint Duathlon World Championships. Mike Stevenson, Lewis Saunders and Adam Tavner are also heading to the World Championships in Pontevedra, Spain to compete in a variety of events including the Aquathon and long distance triathlon.

One other fantastic endurance achievement to mention for April was club member James Best riding his horse "Walk in the Mill" to 4^th place in the Grand National. Congratulations James!

Our summer is shaping up to look slightly different from previous years. We have already had the disappointing news that we have not qualified for the Welsh Castles Relay this year, and our Cotswold Way Relay entry has been restricted to three teams (senior men, senior ladies and mixed) due to the race being oversubscribed. The mixed team will be drawn 50:50 men/ladies at random from those who have registered their interest. We are still optimistic that our Summer 10K at Cherington will go ahead as usual but the Race Committee is investigating an alternative venue for the race HQ as the cricket field is not available.
We have decided to rest the Club Sports Day this year but there is an exciting new “Go Tri” course/ event in prospect for the Summer at Archway! Our Tri-team is working hard on the plans – look out for more details very soon!

Volunteers needed
Our Club races are fast approaching and the new Roger Briers series with its unique medals has already attracted plenty of interest with entries well ahead of last year. If you don’t plan to run these races we do need plenty of volunteers to ensure that the races run smoothly and safely. The first race is the Beer Race on Minchinhampton Common on Monday 3 June at 7 pm. If you can help please volunteer to marshal the event by email (chairman@stroudathleticclub.co.uk). Volunteers will also be needed for Frampton 10k on Monday 1 July.

Club Kit evenings
Club kit is selling well (hoodies and beanies are now available too). Please see Helen Hurn if you would like to buy a Club vest or T-shirt or Batemans for a club hoodie. A club member has suggested that we all wear club kit to training sessions from Archway at least once a month, so from 4 June please wear your Club colours on the first Tuesday of each month and set the green tide flowing round the town to help raise our Club profile.

Feedback
Please send me your feedback or Newsletter contributions to share your enthusiasm for running, ideas for races and running routes. If you have any favourites that you think others would enjoy, please let us all know!

Keep on running,

Jim

Club Race Reports and Volunteers

We would love to see some more contributions to the newsletter and website from club members, especially race reports that you have taken part in. If you would like to contribute please just write a short report on your race and email it to websitefeedback@stroudac.co.uk. if you can include a few photos that would be great.
We are also actively looking for people to help out with the newsletter. If you are interested in finding out more get in contact.

Club Logo - Do any of you have design skills - we need to create a high resolution version of our club logo as we only have low resolution images at present. Can anyone help out? If so please get in touch.

Last Chance for Cotswold Relay place

Cotswold Way Relay - The draw for the Mixed team at the Cotswold Way Relay will take place next week so if you would like to try to get into the team please let us know. EMAIL us here to register your interest.

ALSO we will be providing a water station at this years race, hopefully on Leg 5 at the Edgemoor Inn, if you would like to help out with this please let us know.

Sharing Success - Runner of the Month Award

Congratulations to Mark Dyer who won the vote for last month Runner of the Month.

Mark put a fantastic performance in at the Dursley Dozen and is always a supporter of the club and a great lad to run with.

Runner of the Month Roll of Honour

2017
March - Ryan Major
April - Tom Mortimer
May - Jan Chinnick
June - Jo Fifield
July - Jo Stevenson
August - Sabrina Pace-Humphries
September - Richard Crampton
October - Alan Pitt
November - Jim Adams
December - Alastair Campbell

2018
January - Darren Jewell
February - Sharon Stevenson
March - Annie Testar
April - Sabrina Pace-Humphries
May - Lee Stopford
June - Helen Hurn
July - Mario Mcnamara
August - Bill Chandler
September - Hayley Stockwell
October - Jack Turner
November - Peter Law
December - Adam Tavner

2019
January - Alison Robinson
February - Jane Townsend
March - Mark Dyer
April -??

Runner of the Month

Don't forget to email Jim with names for next months Runner of the Month.

The winner of this month's award will be selected by a vote in this email.

In order to vote, read the nominations and then click the relevant vote button at the bottom of this section for the runner you would like to win the virtual award.

Please note you will only be able to vote once, no matter how many times you click the button.
Also if you are sharing an email address with another member of the club you can only vote once. You can contact our membership secretary to get these updated if you would like your own copy of the newsletter.

In no particular order the nominations are:

Kirsty Woodward-Owen - VOTE 1

I would like to nominate Kirsty Woodward-Owen in recognition of her fantastic marathon journey. Kirsty joined our beginners group in Nov 17 and has been a cheerful, enthusiastic and supportive club member ever since. She progressed through Minch 10k onto Stroud Half Marathon and then won the Club's ballot place at VMLM 2019. In her excitement she turned an ankle which set her training back 6 weeks, but stayed positive, didn't panic and worked hard to achieve her dream. She is a great role model and inspiration to all prospective runners!

John Tierney - VOTE 2

I would like to nominate John Tierney for the hard work and effort he has put in this winter not only leading a new marathon training group to considerable success. but also in his training to succeed with a fantastic time at the London Marathon.

So if you would like to take part in the voting for this month's Runner of the Month please click your choice below.

Kirsty Woodward-Owen - Vote 1
John Tierney - Vote 2

To nominate someone for next month's Runner of the Month all you have to do is email Jim the details or let him know at Club.

Stroud AC - Stonehouse Junior parkrun takeover

Stroud & District AC have been invited to "takeover" (help with the volunteering) of Stonehouse Junior parkrun on Sunday July 28th. If you are free and would like to help out please contact Darren Jewell or let us know and we can pass on your details.

Club Races, Relays and Events

Our Race schedule is set out below. All club members will have received an email giving details of how to get early entry access to this years Frampton 10k. Our other club races open on Wednesday 30th @ 19:30

Monday June 3rd - Stroud Beer Race - Race 1 in the Roger Briers Series
Weekend of June 8th / 9th - Welsh Castles relay
Saturday June 29th - Cotswold Relay
Monday July 1st - Frampton 10k - SOLD OUT
Saturday in June / July (TBC) - Summer Sports Day
Thursday July 11th - Cherrington Road Race (TBC)
Sunday August 11th - Standish Woodland Chase - Race 2 in the Roger Briers Series
Sunday September 8th - Woodchester Park - Race 3 in the Roger Briers Series
Saturday September 21st - Midlands Road Relay
Saturday October (TBC) - National Road Relays
Sunday October 27th - Stroud Half Marathon

Don't forget we have medals this year for the Roger Briers Race series as well as a Trophy for the 1st placed Male and Female Runner across all 3 races.
You can sign up to register your interest in any of the club relays here.

2019 Club Race League

The club race league is now well underway with 4 races so far completed.
With 7 races now completed in this years race league we have 133 club runners who have completed at least 1 race so far.

After the number of club runners who have taken part in Marathons this year, it has been decided that we will be adding in the best time that any club runner posts in a marathon event whilst the league is running up to and including August 31st.

Helen Hurn is still leading the Ladies league with Jim Adams topping the Mens table. (having competed in at least 4 events).

The next races in the club series is the Berkely 10k.

Full details are on the Race league page here.

For the detailed results click here.

As part of the fund raising for this years Charities of the year, we provided the option of a £2 donation when entering our races. So far this has raised £206. We will be looking at other ways to raise money through our events as we progress through the year.