If at first you don’t succeed… North Herts Road Runner Stewart Overton set a new Personal Best whilst representing the club in the Riga Marathon this weekend. A special and personal achievement made all the more significant as he suffered a loss in the family the Tuesday prior. Having trained all winter to run the Rotterdam Marathon and missing out on a personal target of finishing it in under 3 hours, it was the personal messages and support of his club mates, both in person through Dan Martin and through messages from the club, that enabled him to channel his emotion into running his first sub 3 hour marathon finishing in 2 hours and 59 minutes. Stewart said it was a difficult race with plenty of mental and physical challenges but felt truly emotional as he crossed the finish line. Elsewhere Darren Matussa, who continues to go from strength to strength, recovered from winning the Watford Open 800 metres in a time of 2 min 24 seconds to run the Hackney Half Marathon alongside fellow squirrels Chris Poole, Steve Foster and Jillian Boys. On a beautiful warm day both Chris and Steve finished in 1hr 45 minutes followed by Jillian’s new PB of 1hr 49 whilst Darren missed out on his own personal target but was more than happy with his time of 1hr 26 minutes. On crossing the finish line Darren bumped into Steve who appeared to have blood running down his face so it is fair to say that new member Steve has represented the club through ‘Blood, sweat and tears’. Lindsey Lucas couldn’t be happier having completed her first 10k at the Wimpole Hoohah. Having felt a cold coming on earlier in the week but not finding the excuses she needed via a quick google search it was time to get it over with. Running alongside her husband Viv and son George, Lindsey raised valuable funds for Addenbrookes Charitable Trust as a special thank you for the invaluable cancer treatment and care Viv received two years ago. Lindsey said, ‘It was lovely to be cheered over the finish line 1hr 20 later’ appreciating the increasingly familiar sight of the NHRR running vest and the support that comes with it when she spotted Brian Judkins and Lucy O’Connor finishing in 1 hr 7 minutes and 52 minutes respectively. Jo Kenlin and Monica Cullin ran the Colchester Zoo 10k starting next to the elephant enclosure. A reversal of a traditional stampede if ever there was one, whilst Nick Malpeli ran the Greater Manchester Half-Marathon finishing in 23rd place with an excellent time of 1hr 21 minutes. Nick remarked that the, ‘Afternoon was very pleasant watching Tirunesh Dibaba, Mo Farah and most importantly my youngest Will Noble complete in the 10k’. Rachel Annetts travelled to the Bedford Triathlon along with Andrew Robson. Andrew knocked 5 minutes of his PB due to the excellent training at North Herts whilst Rachel finished the winner of the V55 category stating, ‘Not only did I beat my time of 4 years ago by 3 minutes, I was first V55+ finishing in 1:32:27.’ Finally, Michelle and Andy Grudzinski eschewed the opportunities to take part in any local races and opted to fly out to Alberta, Canada to run the Red Deer Trail Marathon. Michelle commented, ‘ A great run, on a lovely 26.2 mile route in the parks of Red Deer city, in crazily warm weather, with excellent fellow runners, and the most amazing volunteers (not least because Andy joked about a cold beer at 27km and they handed Andy a Mimosa).’ Great to see North Herts Road Runners putting Letchworth and the surrounding areas on the international sports map once again. Comments are closed.
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October 2024
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