Home and Away (parkruns)

13 minutes ago4 min read

{Ed. flying solo this week whilst our results co-ordinator David Wright takes a well-earned short break in Oman. There is no truth in the rumour he’s gone there to secretly compete in this Ironman event https://regom1.ironman.com/event/2025-ironman-703-muscat}

Parkruns

For the first time I can remember, Cirencester men finished 1-2-3 at the home course this week, with Rob Forbes getting the win ahead of Rich Allen. It was especially good news to see the return of Brecht Grieten, finishing in 3rd. Looking at their times, it may have been rather more sticky and/or slippery than usual?

Would be great to repeat a clean sweep on our 40th anniversary weekend in June!

Continuing his tour Down Under, this week in southernmost New Zealand, Steve Hale set a new parkrun PB by over a minute, finishing in 24.13. Sounds like all the conditions were spot on : 14C, tarmac surface and completely flat. Steve recommends it for a PB attempt, but unfortunately it’s not that convenient for the rest of us.

Off Road and trail races

After very generously buying two race entries for his brother Tom’s significant birthday, Alex Banks was in action (with Tom) in the Endurance Life Peak District ultra (50km) on Saturday.

This bagged them 3 named peaks ⛰️ Hollins Cross (1,280 ft) • ⛰️ Grindslow Knoll (1,972 ft) • ⛰️ Barker Bank (1,398 ft) and clocked up just under 9,000ft of ascent in total. Whilst Alex’s Strava activity provided the picture below, his brother’s gave this short account

“.. brutal but brilliant. Toughest 50km I've done! Very tough outing, with a fair ol' amount of climbing banked in the race. Technical and very tough underfoot at times. Frozen black ice at times to mud slides on the descents.”

Alex and brother Tom Banks, 080225 Peaks Ultra

Their time of 7:25.20 was less than an hour behind 2nd place, in 10th/11th place but amongst only 16 who managed to finish – the tally of 53 DNF’s gives a clue to how tough it was. Well done guys - and an inspirational present Alex.

{results at https://www.endurancelife.com/results/peak-district/2025/Ultra-Marathon}

Still on the trails, but by stark contrast with negligible elevation, at Westonbirt Arboretum there was a choice of two days to run in events organised by Relish Running. Firstly, on Saturday 8th early evening, a series of waves of runners could choose from either 5k or 10k. Our two club members both chose the more usual Sunday morning 10k option, with waves of runners going off between 10.00 and 11.00, leading to a total of 613 finishers

Dave Bell (still not quite a veteran, and so racing much younger runners) was happy enough to settle for second place in 34:01. He reports

“I was close to not running as very aware of left achilles during warm up and didn't feel like I could really get up on my toes comfortably. Decided to give it a go though, but not worry about watch/pace and just run by feel. Good consistency in the end at about half marathon pace but I think GPS a little off today. Was quite a twisty turny 2 lap course with some muddy/slippery corners to negotiate so pleased to have still managed a decent run without doing any further damage (apart from a little tumble just before 4k 😅). Hopefully get some good recovery in now before Bourton 10k in 2 weeks”

In his first 10k race in a year, Gareth James was thrilled with 49.45 (49.49 gun time), especially as his Garmin had predicted 57 mins. He didn’t have high expectations after a lacklustre winter’s training (his words), but reports he felt really strong on the uphills, and still had a bit spare at the end. “Bring on 2025 races!”

{In case readers are interested, a provisional multi-distance event by the same organisers is targeted for earlyish morning on 7th September 2025, with a 1-mile race and some 5k/10k/HM waves.}

1 Dominic Perry (unattached) 33.39

2 Dave Bell 34.01

138 Gareth James 49.49

631 finished

https://www.webscorer.com/racedetails?raceid=379947&did=499320

Road Races

{No road racing as far as I could see this week. The Wiltshire 10-mile race organised by Stampede Sports was over an undulating rural course starting in Melksham, heading out North to Lacock and then back. At the time of going to press the editor couldn’t find any results posted, but if you did run, please let him know.}

AND FINALLY......

In Cirencester Park, the editor had run past a lot of road surfacing trucks mid-week on the “corporate loop” across from the Polo clubhouse. Having been away for the weekend, his suspicions were confirmed courtesy of a photo posted on Strava by Ian Barratt. The former Cotswold stone and compacted mud track has indeed now been surfaced with tarmac, possible to service the smart new wedding venue, so for those Thursday runners familiar with Rupert Chesmore et al.'s former route description, its

“Goodbye to Yellow Brick Road”

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PARKRUN RESULTS (with apologies for poor layout)

Lydiard Park (342)

198

James HUNTON

Cirencester AC

00:30:12

Harcourt Hill (96)

Martin CROUCHER

Cirencester AC

00:23:26

Invercargill, New Zealand (342)

Stephen HALE

Cirencester AC

00:24:13

Cirencester (185)

Position	Gender Position	parkrunner	Club	Time
1	1	Rob FORBES	Cirencester AC	00:19:02
2	2	Rich ALLEN	Cirencester AC	00:19:43
3	3	Brecht GRIETEN	Cirencester AC	00:20:10
10	10	Heath FORBES	Cirencester AC	00:21:50
25	25	Otis FORBES	Cirencester AC	00:24:04
34	34	Neil BROADLEY	Cirencester AC	00:25:27
35	1	Liliana SOTO	Unattached	00:25:31
44	42	Rob TUTTLE	Cirencester AC	00:25:56
47	4	Rachel RANGER	Cirencester AC	00:26:02
60	8	Kate KILBY	Cirencester AC	00:27:22
87	70	Richard EDWARDS	Cirencester AC	00:29:45
119	32	Samantha TIMMS	Cirencester AC	00:31:47
129	37	Amanda NAYLOR	Cirencester AC	00:33:05
128	36	Kirsty LEGGATE	Cirencester AC	00:33:05