Smells Like Team Spirit !

Above : Rich Shephard on his way to winning the Compton Verney half marathon by 4 minutes. Below : Team Stratford at Compton Verney Smells Like Team Spirit And what a team spirit. The morning after the night before. Last night close to 50 club members were either competing, officiating or volunteering as we hosted a Vet's T&F league fixture at our own High School track for the very first time. It was a magnificent occasion blessed by glorious weather. The feedback I had at the end of the night from visiting team members was wholly positive. It was a night when both junior and senior sections of the club rose to the occasion and helped put on great show. Planning and organising this fixture was absolutely a joint effort by both myself and Andy List and I think it's fair to say we both found it to be a pretty steep learning curve and something that we could not have done without the support of so many other club members. The team's performance will be the subject of a proper report by Andy Reeves when the official results are published. A quick look at the provisional results this morning indicate that, having been run very close by us at the last fixture, Worcester AC raised their game considerably, increasing their points total from 239 at Redditch to 278 last night. We once again did the club proud by finishing in 2nd place with 246 points, 32 behind Worcester, a wider gap than in the last fixture but still a big improvement on the first fixture. Both of our teams finished in 2nd place with the men just 14 points behind Worcester and the ladies 18 points behind. Simply superb. I must stress that these are provisional results. There were so many club members officiating or volunteering and I'm going to attempt to thank them all. A massive thank you to Paul Bearman and Sandy Green who put up with my continual whining about the cage markings and who were so generous with their time, advice and help. On the night they were ably assisted by Carolyne Johnstone and Michael Lane. Thank you both. Senior members who officiated and to who thanks are due were Tony Jackson, Anthony Carus, Danny Tolhurst, Chris Belcher, John Turner, Daf Hawkins, Amanda van der Schyff, Alison Gravelsons, Dave Battersby and Dave Wolstencroft. Without you guys the fixture just would not have happened. Thank you. Sarah Bland was superb and unflappable in collating the results, signing in the officials, administering team changes, doing the PA etc. etc. Andy List was doing everything from raking the sand pit, to helping Sarah, to shooting back home to pick up extra leads, weighing the implements etc. etc. A genuine Jack of All Trades. Thanks also to Cindy and Emily for putting on the refreshments. I'm loathe to single out individual members but I must praise the efforts of the 4 junior members who helped out on the night.…