Week Ending - 2024/10/13

MATT’S MASTERCLASS AT LEICESTER 10K

Badgers star Matt Scarsbrook was in scintillating form at the weekend as he took on a big city 10K, namely the Leicester 10K, part of the Run Leicester event which included the half marathon distance too with over 4,000 athletes taking part across the two races. The race also formed the Leicestershire County Championships for all residents of the county, so a high calibre field assembled for the rapid route from Victoria Park out of the city northwards and back. From the off, there was simply no catching Scarsbrook as he blasted through the first mile in 4:37, incredibly quick even allowing for the mild downhill gradient. When he emerged back in the park, his nearest challenger, Aldershot’s Caleb Stephenson, was over a minute behind. Taking the tape in a sensational 31:21, the Baddesley man beat off over 1300 others to earn a deserved win at the high-profile city event. 

It was possibly the only time that he and his close rival Mo Hussein from Roadhoggs toed the start line together and both emerged winners on the same day, as the Leicester man took the spoils in the half marathon race which ran concurrently. The duo have dominated running in the county over recent seasons, winning every single one of the ten Leicestershire Road Running League races of 2024 between them. 

Also in the half marathon, Chris Horton made the top ten in a field approaching 3,000 athletes, the 49-year-old taking an impressive two and a half minutes off his personal best, set on the very same course three years prior. His time of 74:56 broke his own vets' club record for the distance, his seventh club record in the last ten weeks, a real purple patch for him. 

He was not the only Badger reaching new heights in the race as Paul Cooper blitzed his way to a PB of his own with a super effort of 1:49:20, a marked improvement from when he first set out on his running journey. Liz Peel has done one or two half marathons over the years and here she recorded a wonderful time of 1:59:43, still breaking two hours a few weeks shy of her 50th birthday, great going. Serena Baker was another in good form as she raced to her fastest time in five years, the former club secretary crossing the line in a fine 2:08:25 and the hardest Badger of all-time, former kickboxer Karen Thompson, full of cold, got round in 2:11:23. Steph Nickless ran 58:45 and Anna Savin-Baden 67:45 in the 10K on a day which saw former shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth amongst others, competing. 

At the Shelton Striders 10K near Derby, ladies captain fantastic Megan Griffiths continued her super season with yet another personal best time. The fast flat course allied to near-optimal weather conditions enabled the pacy deputy head to speed home in a brilliant 43:56, good enough for ninth place in the ladies' race. Glyn Broadhurst was in action, pacing 44 minutes, or just under, to absolute perfection, while Maggi Savin-Baden ran a gold standard time of 59:11, a super effort. Kate Rathbone ran a three-minute personal best at the Manchester 10K in 2:38:13, Cameron Barnes ran 83:49 for the ten-mile trail race the ColyTEN to place inside the top forty and Yvonne Faulkner-Grant completed four laps (circa ten miles) of the alliterative Rasselbock Rosliston Rumble in south Derbyshire. 

Once again, parkrun produced a number of super showings, perhaps none more so than the return to winning ways at Kingsbury Water Park by Dave Jackson. “Big Dee” as he is affectionately known, has been a stalwart of the club for many years and his long list of wins at Kingsbury parkrun already ran into double figures prior to the weekend. In his pomp, he recorded sub-18 times for fun, including his fabled PB of 17:27 (at Kingsbury no less) in the Spring of 2016. The self-styled “Jackal of Jean” is a veteran of 236 parkruns and held a handful of club records before a chronic ankle injury robbed him of his peak years. Fast forward to 2024 and a new streamline “Deesus” as he often refers to himself, is back in the game, scoring readily for the league-winning men’s and vet men’s teams in the LRRL, as well as reaching new heights in terms of wava ratings. His win in 19:08 at the weekend came in some treacherous underfoot conditions (it says here) and included an epic burst up the infamous ‘KWP hill’, twice. 170 other runners were left eating Jackson’s somewhat muddy dust as the V45 star dominated the race from start to finish, not just in terms of time but wava rating also. Nobody got within a minute of the speedster who has aptly put his newfound form down to the three Dees - dedication, diet and desire. It was his best water-park-based parkrun of the last five weeks. Janey Barrett, Liz Peel and Sharon Jackson also made the top ten. 

At Walsall Arborectum, another Badgers stalwart was following in the footsteps of his one-time Baddesley neighbour. Adrian Payne finally matched Jackson’s 5K PB with a dazzling run of 17:27 on the fast three-lap course, to set a new personal best for the distance after 90 attempts (372 if you count the times where he failed to hand his barcode in)! It gave Payne, who, unlike Jackson at the time, was wearing carbon-plated footwear, 5th place in the event, a fabulous achievement to be running personal best times on the wrong side of 40. Chris Young travelled over too, doubling the Villa contingent at the Arboretum, the improving star helping himself to a big new personal best time of 20:38, a remarkable turnaround from his parkrun debut some time ago, making it very much a case of Walsall or bust as they say.

Megan Griffiths ran 23:50 to take first place at Henley Wood Oswestry with her coach and mentor, the genial Glyn Broadhurst, taking a valiant second place in the men’s side of the draw in 19:57. Chris Tweed produced the joint fastest Badgers 5K of the morning with his 19:08 at Tamworth (5th position) with Matt Smith running a PB of 27:15 and the ever-popular Sarah O’Donoghue making a welcome return to action. Pip Weston travelled to the University of Northampton to take 5th lady in 26:52 and a wava rating well in excess of 75%, showing just what a class athlete she still is.