parkrun
April saw 272 parkrun finishes across 79 parkruns. There was plenty of international tourism with the Atkin family visiting Quinns Rock and Carine Glades parkruns in Australia, Sara Johns visited Taupo and Whangarei parkruns in New Zealand, five Phoenix members at Hasenheide parkrun ahead of the Berlin Half Marathon whilst Satera James visited the nearby Mauerweg parkrun. Johnson’s Tours visited Chipping Norton School parkrun whilst there were also many London parkruns ahead of the Marathon.
On the speedy side, Angelo Nico Doria was first finisher at both Maesteg on the same day Angharad Croot was first female finisher. John Burridge picked up another first finisher token at Aberfields whilst Katie Plimmer was also first female at Maesteg during the month. Our parkrun times ranged from 18 minutes to 61 minutes.
Alison Allen nicely timed her 250th parkrun to coincide with her birthday with a plenty of Phoenix members joining her to celebrate at Maesteg parkrun. There were no other official parkrun milestones although there was another birthday celebration with the biggest turnout of OPR members at Maesteg so far this year for Jayne Bissmire’s birthday celebrations.
Races
April saw the return of the popular Severn Bridge 5 milers with a glorious evening for their sunset run. Alison Allen was our first runner back and along with Jo Jenkins, Jayne Bissmire and Jade B, they picked up first place in the ladies team competition! I was our only male runner at the event whilst for the ladies we also had Alice Jenkins, Rosie Plimmer and Abby O’Brien at the event. Further afield, Dave and Bev Sheard ran the Lincoln 10K. Aled Jenkins became our second fastest ever member at 10K with a 32;41 at Gorseinon 10K which I don’t think is known for being a PB course. Dawn Wright also ran at that event.
There were several Half Marathons with Phoenix finishers during the month with Sharon and Debbie taking on the Westbirt Half Marathon. We had a couple of international half marathons with 6 runners taking on the Berlin Half Marathon. Claire DB was our first runner in 1:47 followed by Peter Robinson who I believe becomes our first member to have already completed the Super Halves. Another Super Halves regular, Martin Beard was next up, followed by Sarah Davies, Lee DB and Dawn Hopkins. Our other international half was in Dubrovnik (Croatia) where Kaye Pedler, Paul Barrett, Melinda Thomas, Alexis Barrett and Sian Jenkins completed the course in hot conditions.
James Marsh and Heather Morgan completed the Brighton Marathon whilst Melanie Thomas and Danny Ridley completed the CANNUM 40 mile Ultra Marathon.
In other distances we saw the latest edition of the Vale Coastal races with 5 members taking on the 10 mile distance – well done to Sharon, Debbie, Natasha Pask, Claire Miles and Laura Worrall – and two taking on the 18.5 miler with Rhodri Thomas and James Littlewood completing that distance. I believe it’s the first year since it started in 2015 that we didn’t have anyone in the Ultra which I personally would still highly recommend if you fancy your first attempt beyond a marathon. We also had 9 runners at the Samtampa Memoria run in Porthcawl.
The trail championship fixture for April took our members to Pentyrch for their annual ‘Hill Race’. Myself and Nick Harris actually did this event 11 years ago in 2014 but whilst I only returned once (2015) until giving another go this year, Nick was on his 7th outing. We were joined by David Sheard who has previously completed the course in 2018 and also Katie Plimmer and James Littlewood who were newbies to the event. It’s a classified fell race which basically means its very steep in places, has lots of elevation and doesn’t always follow well trodden paths. There’s one section where unless you’re in the top 1% of mountain runners, you have to walk for a significant amount of time as it’s that steep and even walking it is really hard work! Both Katie and myself ranged from mile splits of 7 minute miles to 13 minute miles on our Strava uploads. I feel like I’m not selling this but it is actually a great event – nice community feel and only £10 to enter. The distance had been cut from 7 miles to just under 6 miles due to some storm damage in a forestry section from earlier in the year which hadn’t been cleared. I don’t think any of us were complaining about the cut in distance on what was probably the hottest evening so far this year. James Littlewood was our first runner back followed by Katie, myself, Dave and Nick.
Big Moose
20 OPR members were part of 6,069 people to sign up for the Big Moose Fun Run in Bute Park with distances ranging from 5K to 50K. Ria Ross, Sian Jenkins, Nic Miles and Claire Miles ran the 5K. We had 8 runners in the 10K lead home by Liam O’Sullivan and finishing with Laura Worrall. In the Half Marathon, Tom Mahoney managed to weave his way through the crowds to run 1:36 whilst Bethan Moor ran an impressive 1:43 in her first Half Marathon with the club. Half Marathon regular Peter Robinson was up next whilst Marina Konstantinova ran her fastest Half Marathon time of 1:54. Alison Allen completed our 5 Half Marathoners. Chris Pratt completed the Marathon, however, as it’s a ‘fun run’ and not officially measured then unfortunately it doesn’t count towards his 100 marathon quest but it does count towards something far more important – an OPR milestone t-shirt as we still count it! This has only occurred to me whilst writing this but me and Jo became the only married couple currently in the club to run an ultra on the same day as we both completed the 50K distance. Kudos to Jo who fell only 8 miles into it, cutting both legs, her hand and even her face but got back up and carried on – she also did an extra lap afterward to complete 55K and beat her previous longest distance of the Vale Ultra which she did back in 2023.
Newport races
On the same day as the Big Moose we also had 28 runners at Newport where they had races over 10K, HM and Marathon distances. The 10K was by far the most popular choice for our members with 19 of the 28 running that distance with some top performances throughout the field and no less than 10 PB’s. Well done to Paul Teesdale (34:51), Thomas Daly (37:56), Jonathan Matthews (40:29), Angharad Croot (44:32), Hattie James (46:35), Lee DB (50:19), Ashley Howells (51:59), John Batchelor (52:55), Rosie Plimmer (1:13:12) and Alice Jenkins (1:16:54). Awesome performances all round but special shout outs to Lee DB who smashed his PB by several minutes, Ashley Howells who beat a 10K time that had stood for 7 years and well done to Rosie Plimmer who might be the one to stop her sister Katie winning most improved female for a third year in a row! We had 5 runners in the Half Marathon with new member Hugh Prescott leading the way coming in just under 2 hours and Vickie Blake our final finisher who was a guide runner at the event. Of the 4 members who ran the marathon, Gareth Richards ran 3:06:25 for a new club age category record and a Good for Age qualifying time for London. A few days later they made the time required even faster at sub 3:07 for a 50-55 year old male. Considering Gareth is our fastest over 50 by some distance (and one of our fastest taking into account members of all ages), that does seem like an insane qualifying ask. With limited GFA places, we’ll have to wait and see if his time will be fast enough if he chooses to apply. Robert Green ran an impressive 3:34. As previously alluded to – Katie Plimmer is already staking a claim for a third most improved female with a 10K PB already under her belt this season and she added a huge marathon PB to that with a 3:49:40. Of current members, only Claire DB has run quicker which was also in Newport, back in 2018. Josh Parry completed our marathon runners on the day.
London and Manchester Marathons
Arguably the biggest day of marathon running in the UK with over 80,000 runners across the two events saw a dozen of our members split equally across the two events. Starting with London where despite a significantly hampered build up due to injury, Niki Puleio somehow managed to pull out a 2:55 clocking to add to his growing list of sub 3 marathon times. Scott Gray was agonisingly close for a second time in less than 6 months to getting a sub 3 but just faded towards the end finishing in a time of 3:01:37. Incredible how much emphasis we put on sub xxx times as clearly 3:01 is unbelievably quick and to be celebrated. Neil Ridley ran 3:43 whilst our only PB at London was for first time marathoner Hattie James who ran a 4:02 to join the top 10 list of fastest female marathoners in the club. Our marathon maestro Carl Walsh collected his 5th World Major medal with a 5:01 in a year that’s included limited running so far due to ongoing knee issues. Our final runner was Karl Johnson in 6:24 who raised an incredible amount for charity as part of his efforts.
Over to Manchester where incredibly, despite warm conditions on the day, we had a clean sweep of PB’s for our 6 runners. Connor and Dylan Panting followed up on impressive marathon times a few months back in Valencia to set new PB’s of 3:08 and 3:12 respectively – going on their half way splits, it looks like there might be more to come in better conditions as well. Matt Edwards ran 3:30 exactly. Jonathan Matthews continues to show why he was awarded Best Newcomer at Presentation Night as he continues to get better and better with a marathon debut of 3:40 to add to PB’s at 10K and Half Marathon already this year. Long standing member Sian Price ran an incredible 3:51 to beat her previous best of 3:55 set in London 2019. Sian joins Claire DB as the only current female members of the club to have run two sub 4 hour marathons. Our final runner and PB achiever was Deb Edwards in 4:54 in an incredibly successful day for our Phoenix runners in Manchester.
Coming up
May begins with the first BCRL fixture and another following just 3 weeks later. Teams are being confirmed for Rack Raid and Welsh Castles. Plus our first social event is now in the calendar thanks to the new social committee team. Exciting times ahead!