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Weekend Recap: The Battle of Manchester, Solihull Half

Manchester Marathon:
Green and Gold swarmed Old Trafford. No longer in protest at the Glaziers but in vests and short shorts. Knowle & Dorridge’s famous kit could be seen through the field of 20,000 runners. As with any marathon some people’s races went amazing, some went south. It’s the nature of the beast. But the grit and determination on show was exemplary from all. Marathon Season is officially OPEN for business.

First in the queue was the smooth as silk stride of Rob Michaelson-Yeats who continues to go from strength to strength and clocked an absurdly fast 2:40:14 PB for 71st Man. Behind him Steve Whatmore put his brand new K&D vest to good use PB’ing in 2:53:17.

The fantastic Mary Heald ran an absolute stormer to finish in 3:10:36 and 49th Woman overall. From then on the runners poured over the line. Johnny Bellman clocked a 2hr PB (His last marathon was a hilly trail one) in 3:13:40, Danny Malone ran 3:14:14 (PB), Jack Bristow finished his first marathon in 3:23:38 (PB), Max Gimson ran 3:26:03 (PB). Despite nutrition issues Flick showed superb inner strength to run 3:30:09 (PB), Hannah Gibson ran a stormer to clock 4:03:53 (PB), 1 second ahead of Paul O’Donnell in his first marathon (4:03:54). Peter Little came back from a torrid couple of years of injuries to run 4:11:59 in his 238,000th marathon, Paul Winwood bravely battled through cramping issues to run 4:43:29 and Catherine Sherlock stepped up to the marathon distance to set a first time best of a very respectable 5:03:51. Congratulations to everyone who ran so well, and even more so to those of you who had tough day’s but did the sensible thing and looked after yourselves first and foremost.

Solihull Half:
Firstly, the Solihull Half results seem to be missing club names SO if you’re name is missing from the list below please let us know and we’ll update the results accordingly. It’s going to take a while to search through all the results!

Doesn’t take long to find Gareth Wainwright who finished 2nd overall despite only signing up on the morning of the race. A superb 1:17:55 on a rolling course and into a decent headwind. He was given a real scare by Mr. PB Gary Polhill though who smashed his 2 week old PB to run 1:18:06. Third K&D man was Darren John who went out WAY too hard, blew to bits and endured a 1:26:32 after starting at 1:20 pace. Ouch. A bad 1:26 is better than a good 1:26 with three weeks until London though. Right? Chairman DJ had to fight off the attentions of K&D Legend Anthony Dutton in the last 2 miles.

Amanda O’Leary rolled back the injury plagued last couple of years. After being made to sit out the XC season to get her injuries sorted she came back with a bang, finishing 2nd woman in 1:31:03. A fantastic result. Claire Magee (1:40:35) and Nicky Evans (1:52:49) rounded out the K&D women’s podium. Nicky Evans’ dog also won the cutest canine supporter category.

Sadly the Solihull Half isn’t accredited to Power of 10/Runbritain/UKA/EA etc. so I can’t celebrate any PB’s without checking all your names one by one. And while I love you all dearly… there’s way too many of you now to do that! Please do use the space below the story on Facebook to let us know if you PB’d though and we’ll try to think up good puns to celebrate your achievements.

Full K&D Results:
Gareth Wainwright – 1:17:55 (2nd)
Gary Polhill – 1:18:06 (3rd)
Darren John – 1:26:32
Anthony Dutton – 1:26:36
Ainsley Wainwright – 1:28:30
Amanda O’Leary – 1:31:03
Josh Hartle – 1:33:57
Steve Armstrong – 1:35:44
Lloyd Barton – 1:37:33
Claire Magee – 1:40:35
Steve Pensom – 1:41:44
Martin Hancock – 1:46:57
Nicky Evans – 1:52:49
Caroline Park – 1:55:45
Keith Whitehead – 1:55:48
Kerry Whitehill – 1:57:30
Rob Stewart – 2:02:19
Samantha Edgington – 2:04:47
Karen Ratcliffe – 2:04:48)
Katie Price – 2:07:25
Rosie Vetter – 2:07:26
Linda Whitehead – 2:09:22
Sandra Boot – 2:14:59
Jerome Ment – 2:23:30
Smita Deshpande – 2:25:32
Carly Mitchell – 2:42:42

Special mention to friends of the club Mark Cordiner Barton (1:59:32) and Emma Donnelly (2:01:56) who turned out too.

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Rome with a Phew and Solihull Half Smashed

Continuing our week of results… 

Rome Marathon:

Congratulations to Smita Deshpande and Subhash Agarwalla who ran the Rome Marathon at the weekend. Running together, helping each other through… until Smita dipped Subhash on the line for the win. We’re all friends until the finish line! Well done Smita. 

Smita writes a rather lovely blog – her London post is particularly great:

London Marathon 2017: A dream we dared to dream

Hopefully Smita will share some of the stories from Rome! Well done to Smita and Subhash on running 5:25:16 and 5:25:18. Although you could have found a better location to take a picture with your medals. You’re right in front of some old ruin…

Solihull Half Marathon:

Less scenic. Although the country lane’s round here aren’t too shabby. 

Knowle and Dorridge dominated the 2nd Solihull Half. Taking in the lovely Blythe Valley Business Park (Souless…) but then going out into much nicer territory around Earlswood it proved a good day for the K&D Massive results wise.
Read more

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Weekend Recap: Manchester Marathon, Berlin & Solihull Half, Centurions GP6

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On a weekend of fantastic performances here are two that really stand out:

As many will know Claire Deeley has been dealing with with health issues for the last year. This weekend she took a big step forward at the Centurions GP and, in true K&D fashion, she did so with the support of her fantastic team mates. Well done to Claire and everyone involved yesterday. A proud moment for the club to see you all come together, to see Claire continue to make progress and to see you all smiling after 5 miles.

Secondly:


Although not a club member many of us are very fond of our Margaret from parkrun. At The Solihull Half Margaret took a tumble at 12 miles. Not that she’d let something as little as that stop her. Its rude to mention a ladies age so lets just say she’s between 82 and 84 years old. Margaret picked herself up, dusted herself off and finished in 3:39:04. Despite being bloodied and bruised Margaret was her usual cheery self and we’ll no doubt be seeing her back at parkrun with Luna her dog sooner rather than later. Margaret, we wish you a speedy recovery and admire your spirit!

Manchester Marathon:

The first big marathon of the UK spring season took place in Manchester. The Greater Manchester Marathon is fast and flat with the strongest domestic field outside of London.

K&D was represented by 4 men in conditions that got very warm in the second half as Manchester was bathed in sun:

Darren John – 2:54:21 (PB)
Steve McDonald – 3:10:15 (PB)
Ed Bower – 3:30:12 (PB)
Michael McDonald – 3:59:47

Solihull Half:

The inaugural Solihull Half Marathon took place this weekend just gone. On the winner’s trophy for the ladies goes the name of Jane Evans. A great result to have a K&D lady on top of the podium and officially the first ever winner of the event. Jane ran 1:24:10.

Seeing the club so well represented throughout the field was a great sight on a beautiful morning’s running.

Results:

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Jane Evans – 1:24:10
Rob Houlston – 1:30:16
Max Mladenovic – 1:31:38
Amanda O’Leary – 1:34:37
Kevin Boake – 1:35:40
Phillip Lindsey – 1:36:45
Nicholas Atkin – 1:37:00
Gary Welsh – 1:37:46
Steve Armstrong – 1:38:04
James Taylor – 1:38:58
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Ian Naisbitt – 1:41:29
Stephen Pensom – 1:41:36
Kathy Bailey – 1:45:37
Emma Donnelly – 1:46:43
Marc Bozdogan – 1:47:28
Peter Little – 1:48:09
Craig Campbell – 1:49:56
Keith Whitehead – 1:50:03
Sarah Cattell – 1:51:06
Paul O’Donnell – 1:52:44
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Kate Fokes – 1:53:55
Hala Atkin – 1:54:45
Ian Maidment – 1:56:12
Imogen Rowe – 1:57:57
Rob Stewart – 1:59:26
Linda Whitehead – 2:09:41
Amanda Crees – 2:12:01
Mark Cordiner-Barton – 2:17:45
Tanya Cronin – 2:25:14
Carly Mitchell – 2:37:28
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(If anyone has been missed from this list please let us know on the comments on Facebook – not all names had K&D next to them, especially newer members who signed up for the race last autumn – and we’ll update)

Berliner Halbmarathon

Three of our ladies adventured out to take in the sights of Berlin. Enjoy some Pretzels and currywurst and a run through the streets of one of the great European cities.

Our ladies did themselves proud with Isabel Collins taking the gold.  Isabel ran 1:58:55. She was just ahead of Louise Taylor who ran 2:16:27 and Penelope Garner who clocked 2:18:45. Congrats ladies. Go enjoy the beer halls!

Centurions GP #6

With runners here, there and everywhere on Sunday our usual strong contingent of K&D runners was a little depleted over at the last Centurions GP finale. 

Stephen Ray was first man home for the green and gold in 35:47 followed by Jane Hunt in 37:12 and Louise Bell in 38:34.

Full Results:
Stephen Ray – 35:47 (PB)
Jane Hunt – 37:12
Louise Bell – 38:34 (PB)
Geoff Lewis – 40:47 (SB)
Paul Winwood – 42:27 (SB)
Nigel Collins – 44:40
Jan Hornby – 45:19 (PB)
Claire Deeley – 50:53 (SB)
Ann Spencer-Dowdeswell – 50:54
Sue Wassell – 50:54
Siobhan O’Donnell – 50:54

parkrun results will follow soon.

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