What a washout!
It was angry sky overlooking our 11th Isle of Wight parkrun, but amazingly the knowledge of imminent heavy rain failed to deter either our runners or volunteers!
In fact, we had 41 brave runners today, including an incredible eight first-timers – our second biggest turn-out so far! Well done to you all.
The rain started quickly after the race began, and was lashing across the fields horizontally at some points, so you would think this would impede the progress of our runners and prohibit the likelihood of PBs (personal bests) “¦ not so”¦ read on!
Ray’s positive attitude kept us smiling
Race coordinator today was our lovely Ray Scovell, who scorned the weather and managed to stay cheerful throughout, and also had to take over the event photography task this week when the rain proved too much for my camera! Thanks for that, Ray! Our special thanks go to all the volunteers this week, including Natalie Lazenby and Paul Littler who both gave up the opportunity to run in order to help the running of the event.
It was not only wet for the marshalls today, but cold too standing about in it, so very well done all. My gratitude – on all the marshalls’ behalves – to all the runners who thanked us for standing in the rain. We all felt sorry for you guys in your t-shirts and shorts too! What a team we all are!
Newbie wins this week
Our winner this week, in his 1st ever appearance at parkrun, was Simon Randall (SM35-39), of the IW Road Runners, in a time of 18:52. Simon put on an excellent show despite an injury he was carrying and the awful weather, and I’m not just saying that because I’m married to him!
It was a close race though as he only fractionally beat our second place male, Adam Tuck (SM30-34), who was also taking part in his first parkrun and had lead the race throughout. Adam’s time is recorded as the same as Simon’s. You were robbed Adam! In third place today was last week’s winner Alan Rowe (VM45-49) in 20:14.
Winner eighth week in a row
In her 11th consecutive appearance at the Isle of Wight parkrun, it is still no surprise that our female winner today – for the 8th week running – was young Eden Crumplin (JW14) of the IW Athletics Club, in a time of 23:07 – an improvement on last week’s time despite the awful weather. In second place again this week was Kaya Simpson (JW14), also of the IW Athletics Club, in her PB time so far of 23:35.
This is two consecutive PBs so far for Kaya this month, and she is running extremely well. Our third lady today was first-timer Sharon Pyner (SW25-29) of the Headington RRC, in a time of 24:37. A soggy Sharon claimed to have enjoyed the experience, and hopes to repeat it again when she is next on the Island!
How the leaderboard looks
Congratulations to West Wight Road Runner, and parkrun first-timer, Ian Jolliffe (VM65-69) for winning today’s age graded performance with a score of 73.32%. This puts Ian straight in at number nine on the age graded performance table.
Our winner on Saturday – Simon Randall – also goes straight in at number 11 on the table with a score of 71.29%. Leading the board still is Graham Tuck though with his impressive score of 85.21%.
In the male points table Jay Tuck now has 994 points, and J Lewis is now in second place with 803. Alan Rowe is third with 792.
A ‘grand’ performance from Eden
In the female points table, Eden Crumplin is the first ever IW parkrunner to reach a thousand, and now has 1096 points, still ahead of Katie Patricia Lewis with 839. Elsie LEWIS remains in third place with 755 points.
My special congrats today to IW Road Runner (and pal) Steve Rumsey (VM40-44), who not only came 5th but achieved his PB time of 20:24. Steve was multi-tasking as he wanted to run AND do the barcode scanning, which may account for his speed in getting to the finish line! Despite my teasing he did manage to do both beautifully! Well done, Steve!
13 new personal bests
In spite of the strong winds and driving rain, Saturday saw a phenomenal 13 new personal bests, so it really was a surprising event. This brings the total number of PBs since the Medina IW parkrun started to 89. During these 11 weeks we have had 135 different runners – representing a total of 16 different clubs – running the equivalent of 360 parkruns and a total distance of 1800 kms!
The overall male course record holder is still the unregistered winner of our first ever parkrun on 7th May, in a time of 17:41, and the overall female course record holder is still Claire Kiely, who achieved an impressive 20:56 at the same event. Come on, everyone, I want to start writing some new things in this paragraph!
Join the “medina parkrun” Facebook group
Don’t forget you can keep up with all the latest news, and join in group discussions, by joining our “medina parkrun” group on Facebook. If you want to volunteer to help at one of the events, simply go to the “volunteer” tab on the Medina IW parkrun website, and let us know on which date you would like to assist, and if you have a particular role you would like to do. Please don’t just turn up hoping to help on the day as by then we have endeavoured to fill all the roles in order to go ahead with the event!
Reminder to new runners: please remember to register for your bar-code before you run, so that you can get it in time for the event. This way you don’t have to appear as “unknown” on the results board. Reminder to current runners: BRING YOUR BAR-CODE WITH YOU!!!!!
See you all at 8.45am at Medina next week, and let’s hope for some sunshine!
