Week Ending - 2021/12/26

FESTIVE FUN AT PARKRUN

With Christmas Day falling on a Saturday this year, there was a far smaller amount of festive running to report on this week, much to the relief of this reporter who is tired enough after back-to-back 60+ mile training weeks!

Babbs Mill saw the biggest Badger turnout with ten members making the journey over to Chelmsley Wood on Christmas morning. First back in 3^rd place was Cameron Barnes in 20:28. Barnes has bounced back remarkably in his running career after being falsely accused of being an Aston Villa supporter on a number of occasions on these pages. The outrageous slur may have finished many a man but not Barnes who has turned adversity into triumph with a podium finish here to go with a first ever FA Cup win for his beloved Leicester City. In fifth place was veteran Colin Lees, a minute and four seconds back with Ashley T-Dogg Taylor earning the highest positional finish of his career with sixth place in 21:55, a terrific effort. The wily Adrian Parkes ran 25:02 to bag 13^th spot with the mesmeric Merv Jones also going well in 25:51. Liz Peel ran 30:36 with Adam & Eileen McElhone managing a smidgeon under 36 minutes, Leesa Dennis and Lisa Barnes following through soon afterwards.

Badgers key man Glyn Broadhurst is a regular top ten finisher at these events and on Saturday he had a crack at Coventry parkrun hoping for more success. He was met with a swathe of fast folk and really had his work cut out on the day, with the race being won by a 15-minute merchant, however, Broadhurst battled hard and ran 18:10, a course best to grab 9^th place and with it the best wava rating of the weekend in 78.07% as well as the quickest Badger time.

Big Stuart Youngs ran 30:16 at Braunstone parkrun and Wayne Repton managed 23:31 at Brueton Park, Solihull. Lil Souter and Rachael Shelton both featured at Sutton Park and Ivana Babicova got round safely at Beeston. Lovebirds David Grant and Yvonne Faulkner both turned out at the speedy Cannon Hill Park in Birmingham while Nivette Chester (26:15) and Steve Perry (26:31) both starred at Conkers.

Finally, Chris Tweed made his parkrun debut last week at Kingsbury and did superbly, running 20:42 and with it earning himself a magnificent 5^th place finish overall, an excellent effort from him.