The annualTrackMile took place on Tuesday 14th July when all parts of the Club come together for a really enjoyable fun event. As we approached the day there was lots of concern about how few entries we had but by race time we had enough to make it a good night. We of course would like to see more especially as it is such great event. We ended up consolidating some of the races to try and keep race numbers fairly balanced so we ended up with 6 races and no 800m for the younger Juniors.

The first race for those predicting greater than 8.30 minute per mile pace was won by Rachel Walker in an outstanding time of 7.38. The rest of the field was predominantly made up of Transformers who all performed superbly. The second race was for those predicting 7>30 to 8.30 times and ended up with a really tight race between Melissa O’Hare and Paul Brennan. I’m sure Paul will regret getting into a burn up as he is only just getting over knee surgery and Melissa just came out in front in a very close finish.

In the 3rd race which was for predicted times between 6.30 and 7.30 we had a nice mix of Juniors and Seniors. It was one of our more senior runners who came out on top with Rob Jones, who is a Vet 65 runner in 6.26. It is worth noting that Rob recently cycled from Lands End to John O’Groats for charity.

The fourth race again a good mix of Juniors and Seniors and was the only race which wasn’t made up of a consolidation of original races. The predicted times for this race were between 6.00 and 6.30 minutes per mile. This time it was the Juniors who came out on top with Joseph Hill followed by Lawrence Greenwood both with times under 6 minutes. Even Georgia Severn who finished 9th in a great 6.43 looked as if she might be leading girl for the evening.

The top girl actually took part in the fifth race which was for predicted times of 5.00 to 6.00 minutes. This was the biggest field of 15 runners of the highest quality which gave us the fastest Junior girl of the night with race winner Jagna Falkowska in 5>20. We also had the fastest lady with Kat Alpe in 4th place but only a few seconds behind Jagna in 5.26. Between Jagna and Kat we had Jim Arrowsmith and Matt Petch Cooper,

The final race of the evening was for the fastest runners predicting less than 5 minutes and early on looked as if it might be a tight race but slowle Robin Greenwood pulled away from the others and as had been expected Robin was left chasing a time. Robin finished in 4.38, an amazing time, especially as he is still only 15 but it may have been even better if he had some closer competition. Ben Allen was 2nd in 5.02 which made him Senior Man on the night. Ben was fairly closely followed by Dave Weir, Kevin Bagate and Charlie Bruce.

Following the last race we quickly fitted in the presentation before people rushed off for the World Cup game, We also took the chance to say a final farewell to Paul hart after a fantastic time taking charge of the Junior section of the Club.

The most important part of any event like this is the people who volunteer to make it happen. We had a great team for this brilliant event. Thank you to Peter Ley, Paul Hart, Kath Sinnott, Chris Prescott, Linda Grindall, Andrea Browne, Paul Brennan and Scott Aiken. Please have a look at the photos on The Club’s Photo Gallery, they show the effort that everyone put in.

Chas