We start this week’s round up with some very exciting news, Peel Road Runners have been shortlisted by England Athletics for a Regional Club of the Year Award. The Club has gone from strength to strength over the years, working hard to ensure compliance with Club Standards, creating a welcoming environment for new members and supporting the local community in numerous ways; Park Run volunteering, supporting the Tamworth Rotary Santa Sleigh, continuing to host the Gate Gallop in support of St Giles and fundraising for a defibrillator which is now located at The Wigginton Pub, to name a few. To be nominated is a tremendous accolade and testament to our wonderful members (past and present), volunteers and committee members all of whom invest time and energy to make it the successful club it is.
It would be great to win the award and really get Tamworth and the club on the map so we’d like to urge all members and the people of Tamworth to get behind the club and cast a vote for us through the link: https://www.englandathletics.org/about-us/volunteer-awards/regional-volunteer-awards-2024/club-of-the-year-2024/
Alternatively, simply type into Google England Athletics regional club of the year vote. Select the top web page it returns, scroll down to the voting section, select Club of the Year, West Midlands and Peel Road Runners.
Back to running news. With the summer holidays in full swing and the summer allegedly upon us, the racing calendar has slowed and so Park Run events saw the majority of the Peeler action. Starting in our hometown Jamie Abiss was 14th home at Tamworth (21:14), followed by Allen King (22:38), Chris Bennett (24:43) and Sophie Galloway (30:21). In Kingsbury Mike Shelton finished in 21:28, Alison Dolphin 59:24 and Wendy Bowyer 59:30. Park run tourists included Mark Boffey (24:56), Jackie Tierney (28:18) Sarah Boffey (31:25) at Kettering, Michael Hughes (37:38) and Ian Orton (1:04:41) at Belton House, Ben Dorkins (22:18) at University Parks and Garth Cox (25:57) at Sence Valley Forest. Meanwhile Joanne Sharman (51:59) pipped Steph Attenborough (52:00) to the post to finish in 132nd place at Dishley Park and Simon Gordon topped up his tan at Weymouth park run in a time of (26:49).
On Sunday Steph Attenborough achieved her 100th Park Run Volunteering Location at Uppermill Junior Park Run having supported 28 junior and 72 adult venues in over 10 countries!
In other sporting events club member Val Lawson undertook the Dovedale Dipper, an optional run / walk event taking in 27 miles and 3500ft of climbing around the panoramic Peak District. Hosted by Peak Running, the route starts in Hartington and runs through the hills and villages of the Dove and Manifold Valleys in an anti-clockwise direction before returning to Hartington. Conditions were favourable and Val crossed the line in 8:55:12.
From foot to fin, on Sunday Sarah French completed another epic swim this time at Rutland Water. With a choice of 2k, 4km and 8km available, Sarah of course chose the 8km event requiring an early alarm call of 4am. With a tropical water temperature of 20 degrees Sarah finished the two lap swim in 3:20:00.
Next Sunday sees the next race in the Burton and District Summer League with a number of Peelers undertaking the Burton 10k. Good luck to everyone running.
