Thank you to everyone who ran and supported the road relays on Saturday. The women are keeping well up with the men with regard to going from strength to strength. Our six strong team put in fantastic performances to come in under 2hrs at 1:58:52 for the first time that I’m aware of, to come in 29th from 49 complete teams.

First out was Margaret, fresh from the Masters victory of the previous week. Knocking 30 seconds off her time from last year meant her finishing in 19:50 putting us in 45^th place from 57 starting teams. Sally took over to prove her strength advantage following marathon training to record our fastest time on the day of 18:35, and bumping us up to 37^th in the process. Marianne was out next, having requested 3^rd leg due to some old club rivalry from Long Eaton. Looking strong to the end, an excellent performance of 20minutes dead on knocked a second off three weeks ago and that we were now running 35^th. On her first road relay outing, and despite apparently a few doubts from the start, Tania put in a fantastic debut performance to record 21:18 and keep us up at 36^th. Our penultimate runner was Anna, who later revealed that this may be her last race in the mighty tealle due to her pursuing her career and moving down to Bedford in the very near future. We’ll miss you, but hopefully will see you at various race venues! Anyway, Anna knocked 6seconds off her Midlands time to finish in 19:57 and pull us into 33^rd. I should mention here that with no Rowheath team out, we weren’t sure quite how we were placed, or have any of the usual fun rivalry, so instead we tried to beat Marianne’s old team, Long Eaton (well I did, I don’t know about the rest of you....). I set out in my usual last position having warmed up and applied the power of deep heat (and yes, I did feel the need to do a cheesy he-man impression – by the power of deep heat, I have the power!!). Turns out I didn’t have as much power as last time and added 10seconds to my time. I’d like to justify this by the fact that running last, I was on my own for the first third of the course, which I find the hardest section anyway, and only really got into my stride when I’d got some people in my sights. I’d use the “I ran a marathon“ excuse, but Sally’s performance blew that out of the water!

Thanks to our reserve, and very able manager assistant Kat for allowing me to dump numbers on her, keeping track of everyone and generally keeping my stress levels down, everyone who ran, and everyone who supported. Maybe Sally’s Dad will share his photographic skills with us as some point.

Times:

Margaret Kenchington (45) 19:50

Sally Gray (37) 18:35

Marianne Hensman (35) 20:00

Tania Ugwu (36) 21:18

Anna-Louise Didier (33) 19:57

Linda Howell (29) 19:12

Full Results here

All-time BvH ladies times are here