June News letter

Forthcoming Social Events

Lake District Camping Weekend

Lake District Weekend Camping Fr.23rd.,Sat.24th. & Sun 2Sth.June, at Great Langdale N.T. campsite.

See Dick Johnson to ensure travelling arrangements are organised, & also if you need any camping gear

See Dick's handouts for details of what you need to take & directions on how to get there.

Potteries Marathon Sun. 18th. June

For the record ,this will be Dick Johnson's 15th. Potteries attempt, with Ian Hill only 1 behind at 14 (just in case the maths. passed you by). Both have run 34 marathons so far, with no doubt, more to follow.

Committee Meetings

Committee meetings have been advance-scheduled for the first Tues. of each month, so that there is less confusion about dates. The organising of the Pudding Run may require additional meetings, & these will be announced as necessary. A change in the committee has taken place,& Ian Hill will now be looking after race entries instead of Lesley Roberts.

Sunday Morning Runs

There is a possibility that we may be able to organise Sun. morning runs from Bloxwich Stafford Rd. Sports Club (Rugby Club), but only if there are enough of us interested. The facilities are good (i.e. changing rooms & showers), plus the advantage of the bar, which opens at 12 mid-day A start time of about 9:30 - 10:00am is envisaged.

Will all members please inform us about there feelings on this idea. See Stan,Bob,Dave.

Club Kit

Simon Kimberley can now take orders for club kit. He also has some white sweat shirts (with our blue logo ), for sale - going cheap - on a first come first serve basis. There's a new sportswear discount warehouse recently opened up in Wednesfield. They are open during the week, & on Sundays (loam - 5pm.). Called SPORTS MANIA, they are at Fernside Rd. off Planetary Rd., off Neachells Ln., W/field. I don't know of anyone who's been yet, if you go let us know what it's like.

Events Results

Tewkesbury 1/2 Marathon

Gail Fortes-Mayer was again (for the 2nd. year in succession) awarded the 1st. lady home trophy (after a bit of confusion) with a time of about 1:30 (no official results available at time of going to press, I'm afraid). Great achievement, Gail. You did us proud, well done. I'm informed that Pete Horton was the 1st. man in, followed by Trevor Simms, Glyn Marston, & Simon Kimberley. Well done, lads. (Apologies if I've missed anyone out, give me some feed-back & I'll get you in next time).

It was an enjoyable day with only a few mishaps. First, Mac Mills damaged the bus by head-butting the top of the doorway as he got in. Fortunately he was wearing a form of head protection that minimised the damage to both the bus, & more importantly, his (almost) hairless pate.lt was a baseball cap, I'm told, which meant (he protests) that he couldn't properly see where he was going - nothing new there then. Some members have expressed their amazement that he actually remembered to take his cap, but added that, surely he must have forgotten something else. He now has a slightly injured head to balance out his achilles tendon injury, which was aggravated by doing the 5m1. run. Get well soon,Mac.

Secondly, the bus that Ian Hill was driving refused to start at one point, but after attracting the attention of Stan, driving the bus in front (no surpise there), help was summoned & apush by our hefty heroes saved the day and they continued on their way to Upton-on-Severn for their Sunday lunch, a few pints & a well deserved spot of relaxation

Grand Prix Update (runs this month)

Potteries Marathon

Castle Vale 10K

An Heroic Effort

Congratulations to Glyn Marston

Glyn attempted the GRAND UNION CANAL 145 ml. RACE over the weekend of 27th. & 28th. May. The start was in Gas St. Basin,B/ham at 6am. on the Sat., the 145 miles route winding its way along the canal tow-paths to the finish at Little Venice, London, not later than 3am.on Mon. 29th.May. Glyn was featured on local TV (Midlands Today, etc.) several times during the week preceeding the event, especially on the Friday, resplendent in his club vest (great free advertising). Only 50 runners were selected (or were daft enough) to enter the event, so this makes it very special , mostly for Glyn (now a member of an elite few), but also for the club since we had a club member in there with the best.

Unfortunately, the weekend weather turned out to be some of the wettest & coldest for this time of the year, and this played a major part in Glyn being unable to complete the event. Despite both parties having mobile phones, his support crew had trouble finding & arriving at the pre-arranged rendevous points at the right times, which meant that Glyn was left dehydrated, hungry, cold & wet (they also had his wet-weather gear in the car with them). He battled on to complete 62 miles, but his support crew had to make the tough decision to pull him out for his own safety (a decision that Glyn was initially not too pleased about, cince he had not been consulted, but on reflection accepted that things were not going according to plan).

Happily, Glyn is undaunted, and takes consolation in the fact that 62 miles is now the longest distance he has run in one go. An achievement he has a right to be proud of. He intends to have another go at it next year, in which case I'm sure the club can offer to provide more comprehensive logistic organisation & support. WELL DONE, GLYN !!!

Sneyd Strider on International Duty

Congratulations to Simon Kimberley

who, as a member of Black Country Triathletes Club, will be off to Nice, in the south of France, with 6 other club members, to represent Great Britain in the World Long-course Triathlon Championships on the 18th. June (it must have been a struggle for him deciding whether to do this or the Potteries Marathon). They will bike ride 86 miles through the Alps, run 18 miles, & then sea-swim 2.5 miles (bet he's glad its nothing serious then). GOOD LUCK, SIMON, hope you do well (wear your Sneyd vest sometime, though). If you are interested in this type of event the Wton Olympic Distance Triathlon event takes place at Gailey Reservoir ( near Junction 12 MG/AS) on Sun. 4th. June. It might be too late to enter, but you could go & watch - if there's nothing on the tele.

Millenium Fund

Our application was returned due to the club name not being on all the paperwork.This sets us back a few weeks, which we can ill afford with the Pudding Run coming up but we will endeavour to resubmit a.s.a.p.

Members Handbook

The Members Handbook was discussed at the last committee meeting and a few changes proposed -notably a description of that other coveted trophy the Comedy Cup. This prestigeous award is presented once a year at the Presentation Evening. A printed version of the Handbook will be issued to each member in addition to publishing on this site