Saturday 26th January

Today saw a reduced Run England group (Fiona, Nina & Terry) out as the conditions were not good. The route was the standard 5k (Tytherington) and it was very icy. Hopefully normnal service will be resumed asap.

Neil

Saturday 19th January

Today's run was great fun with a skidding start of my friend's arrival Sam, who slid in rather nicely behind the rangers truck!!. Also as if by magic this high viz top was fastly approaching us - the Mud Queen - plenty of mileage on Dawns map my run due to excellent loop backs.

The run was very pretty and novel running in the snow, I was amazed too how quickly we arrived in Prestbury. I can now say I have ran through Prestbury, Heather was very good at spotting the celeb cars although my hubby was not impressed that I could no recite who they were!!! Heather did extremely well with her tippy tap and breathing lessons from Dawn and I. Not forgetting to remind her Neil's wise words 'Why do you have to walk, what is making you walk' The loopbacks were well inforced by our Number 1 Nina, Sam was very good at organising us for photos (ooops I called order on keep running or we will get cold - Nina soon had us all sorted). The banter was great fun too with with songs sung and quotes from Private Benjamin....

A great run thank you Nina and Mel for organising this. Thank you Wendy for re-orgnaising the Park Run due to cancellation too. Thankfully we all remained on two feet, no snow angels or snowball fights.
I believe we ran just over a 5k possible more if you did the loop backs, a few of us had problems with this. Calories burnt was approx 500 (cheers!)

Tuesday 15th January - mid-week run

A few of the Run England Group (Cheryl, Fiona, Mel, Wendy B & Nicola (friend of Cheryl)) met for a self-organised mid week run. The route started near Marlborough School and included the War Memorial Hill, along the Kerridge Cottages,  Redway, towards Adelphi Mill, Canal and Middlewood Way. 8.5k, 1h15m, 8m54s/mile.

Watch for e-mails and the forum about next week.

Neil

Saturday 12th January

The Start

Today was cold. Today was windy. When the weather is like this it is good to be well wrapped up with hats, gloves etc and well fed and watered.

We met at the small (and very full) car park on Jacksons Lane (near Hollin Hall) for a loop around Grimshaw Lane, Middlewood, Clarke Lane, Oak Lane and a few hill reps near the war memorial.  In total the run was a bit under 4 miles (hard to be exact as I did not run the hills).

Afterwards a hardy bunch went to the Waterside for a coffee & tea-cake/toast and lots of talk about planned runs in the spring.

19 people ran today - a great turnout and some good running.

See you in a couple of weeks,

Neil

So fast  - just a blur...

Loop-Back in action

Farm-Track towards Kerridge

Middlewood

Farm

Camera out = run up hills

Top of the hill

Hill Reps

Top of the hill

What Neil bought with his voucher

Thought for the day

Thursday 10th January - street orienteering

Tonight was something different - street orienteering!

MDOC (Manchester & District Orienteering Club) organised 'street orienteering' in Bollington. The aim of this event is to use the simple map of bollington to find clues (such as the number on a lamp-post) - each clue has a points value.

The event lasted 60mins and there were penalties for arriving back late.

Run England members Philip, Sarah & Jenny formed a team and did really well. It was BRILLIANT fun. There is another event in Macclesfield on Thursday 28th February - talk to Jenny, Sarah or Philip to hear their thoughts. Could be a good night out.

Find out more by clicking here ... STREET ORIENTEERING

Results (non-age dependent results):

Philip/Jenny/Sarah - 26th out of 59 with 370 points
Neil - 27th out of 59 with 368 points

More details of results at CLICK HERE

I am sure there will be debates about the results.  :-)

Neil

Map shown below - each control (checkpoint) has a number (eg 32, 48 etc..) The points value was 10 for anything in the 10s, 20 for anything in the 20s up to 50 for anything in the 50s. Checkpoints were things like lamp-posts, telegraph poles, footpath signs.

 

Saturday 5th January - Lyme Park

Before the start

Today we tried something different - orienteering!

Twelve of the Run England group headed off to Lyme Park for the annual John O'Goats charity orienteering event. Luckily the weather was kind - almost perfect conditions although underfoot was 'a bit muddy'. Several group members had all their new gear on (Christmas presents) so we were well turned out with trail shoes, new leggings, jackets, belts etc.

We split up into 4 groups that did the novice course, 3 groups that did the 'short' course and Neil did the 'Medium' course on his own.

Novice Course
Alison & Louise (29 mins - 8th & 9th)
Heather A, Heather C & Wendy B (25 mis, 13th)
Phil & Bev (34mins, 12th - not sure what happened to Phil!)
Oliver G (22mins - may have missed acontrol?)

Short Course
Sarah & Catherine (97mins , 18th)
Jenny & Gemma (64 mins - did not complete the course)
Nicky & Dave(75 mins, 15th)

Medium Course
Neil (61mins, 4th)

The full results are posted on the results section of the  MDOC website

We met for coffee/cake etc afterwards and everyone seemed to have enjoyed this new challenge (in different ways) - everyone was muddy (but that is lucky as the mud is our friend). There was a lot of discussion about running on rough terrain on steeper ground - very different from what we have done in the past!

Next week back to a 'normal group run'.,

The course organisers passed on their thanks to us for coming along and I have passed our thanks to them for hosting a friendly event.

Neil
ps Apologies to Nicky and Dave as I don't have a photo with them on - sorry

Louise at the finish

Alison

Heather C - new shoes?

Coffee and cake

Catherine & Sarah at the end of the short course

Well earned cake

Saturday 5th January - local run

Nina, Jo, Fudge

While some of the Run England group were doing the John O'Goats Orienteering in Lyme Park an intrepid quartet (Mel, Nina, Jo & Fudge) ran locally. A civilised start time of 10.00 was agreed in the Bollin Valley CP.  

According to Mel's 'MapmyRun' data the route was 2.87 miles in 34m24s - good 'chatting pace'.

Luckiliy the weather stayed good.

Mel & Nina

Nina

Mel

Survey Results

I sent out a survey about the group just before Christmas. I have had 14 responses so far and below is a summary of the results.

1. Would you like to do ParkRun:
Answer: 13 Yes (10 Congleton, 3 Bramhall). 1 No
Response: I propose that we will do ParkRun evry 4-6 weeks and do both Bramhall & Congleton

2. Do you want to do Off-Road running (eg Macc Forest):
Answer:14 Yes, 0 No
Response: We will do more off-road running (especially when the weather improves)

3.  Do you want 'track sessions':
Answer: 12 Yes, 2 No
Response: I will arrange periodic track sessions - the track costs £49.10/hr shared between us all

4. Do you want 'speedwork' sessions:
Answer: 12 Yes, 2 No (comments are that everybody understands the need for this!
Response: We will do speedwork either as part of a normal run or as a special session

5. Do you want 'hill' sessions:
Answer: 11 Yes, 3 No (comments are that everybody understands the need for this!
Response: We will do hill work either as part of a normal run or as a special session

6. Do you want the group to target a race in 2013:
Answer: 9 Yes, 3 No, 2 skipped this. Comments suggest a local 10K
Response: We will agree on a suitable 10K in the spring and autumn (maybe a Totton 10K and Gawsworth)

7. Would you like a session about running technique and are you prepared to pay:
Answer: 12 Yes (pay), 1 Yes (not pay), 1 No
Response: I am looking to find a coach from England Athletics to come along to help us - hopefully free or a modest charge - we would probably do this at the track

8.  Would you like a private discussion forum:
Answer: 12 Yes, 2 No
Response: Forum is already live and 6 group members have already joined and are using it - contact me for access. Click here for more

9. Do you like coffee afterwards:
Answer: 13 Yes, 1 No (no time)
Response: Where possible meet for coffee afterwards

10: Any other feedback:
Answers: The general feedback is that we have created a friendly and sociable group which is inclusive. The majority of people like the variety of different routes, different activities. Basically the feedback is to carry on pretty much as it is.


Thanks to those that filled the survey in!

Neil