Running just a shade under 10 kilometres off road Spartan ADRIAN BUSOLINI finished under 40 minutes with 38 minutes 48 seconds (38:48) and was 14th out of about 300 in the race.
The Spartans needed eight for a men’s team and they were Adrian, GRANT RAMSAY 21st in 40:25; STUART ARCHER 54th in 43:32; NICK GILL 56th in 43:40; DANNY SCANLON 75th in 44:46; THOMAS SAUKA 129th in 49:18; STEVE MAYFIELD 133rd in 49:19; and ROBERT WRIGHT 239th in 59:28. Grant won the 50 plus category.
HARRIET SMITH says she started too fast but she was still fastest female from Fairlands with 51:35 and 155th overall. Five were needed for a women’s team and the others were SHARON CROWLEY 288th in 72:23; JANE WADEY 289th in 72:30; HAZEL SMITH 297th in 83:11 and CALLIE CHAPMAN 298th also in 83:11.
Six other men ran for the Spartans. They were MICHAEL O’KEEFE 240th in 59 minutes 34 seconds; JIM BROWN 255th in 61:31; MARK FREEMAN 257th in 61:49; TIM ROBINSON 262nd in 62:49; GRANT MURPHY 287th in 72:13 and PAUL HOLGATE 290th in 73:01.
Seville Marathon
YUKO GORDON was in Spain for the Seville Marathon and won her category, women 70 plus, in a fantastic time of 3 hours 27 minutes 18 seconds. That’s better than 5 minutes per kilometre. She was 3,014th overall out of the 8,283 finishers.
Nuclear Canicross Race
JANE WHITROW and her dog Rufus did the Tailrunners (South Essex Canicross) first event at Nuclear Races. This was a Canicross event including trail, woods and swamps Jane said it was great fun and well organised. The course was 5K and they did it in 39 minutes 40 seconds….Jane said she wasted a lot of time sitting down in the swamp.
Watford Half Marathon – 12th February
Fairlands Valley Spartans had a famous five at Sunday’s Watford Half Marathon. Known for its hills at least this year there was sunshine. ROBERT WRIGHT was first in with a time of 1 hour 39 minutes 6 seconds for 269th out of the 1,185 finishers.
New Spartan MOLLY CRIMMIN continued her preparation for the London Marathon with her first ever half marathon. She beat two hours with 1 hour 58 minutes 56 seconds for 786th.
MICHAEL O’KEEFE in 2:03:17; SHARON CROWLEY in 2:33:16 and PAUL HOLGATE 2:36:02 completed the line up from Fairlands Valley Spartans.
Adrian’s Arc of Attrition
ADRIAN BUSOLINI returned to the Arc of Attrition 100 for the second year running, this time seeking a sub 26 hour finish. He had his brother crewing for him, and favourable ground conditions; but an awkward race with many complicating factors left him merely on par with his 2022 performance at the last checkpoint, with only 35km to go. It took a determined effort to get himself in almost 90 minutes faster than the previous year’s performance, albeit some 45 minutes slower than target. With a finish time of 26 hours 47 minutes 4 seconds he was 40th out of the 330 that started the 100 mile race in Cornwall. Adrian said, “Arc – I will return, you bewitching botheration!”
Winter Run – 12th February
There were also five Spartans at the London Winter Run 10K. Out of 9,000 finishers PAUL SHELLEY was 790th in 44:11; STEVE DOBNER 792nd in 44:12; DAVID PATTMAN 997th in 45:14; MATT TUTTON 6,114th in 58:59 and CLAIRE HYDE 8,503 64:24.
Essendon 10K
DANNY SCANLON ran the Essendon 10K on Sunday 12th February at Essendon golf club.
On an undulating, twisting and turning two lap route through the golf club he finished fourth out of 94 runners with a chip time of 41:07.
Parkrun Highlights
Saturday 4th February 2023 – There was a record breaking performance by Spartan YUKO GORDON at Saturday’s Stevenage parkrun. She achieved an age grade of 98.98%, breaking the course record and was third woman overall with 22 minutes 52 seconds.
For the full consolidate results please click the following links: