PB’s galore for Team TRAC at Paddock Wood

Team TRAC turned up in force at the Paddock Wood Half Marathon today and went home happy with a bunch of personal best times and medals.

 

This race was the 3rd club championship event and was also a Kent Grand Prix event and the Kent Long Course championships for all age groups.

 

The early morning start didn’t put off our hardy club members and we were greeted with perfect race conditions; hardly any wind and cool temperatures.  

 

This race has a reputation for being one of the fastest half marathons in Kent and the quality of the field was evident as the front runners shot off at the start.  The course is mostly flat with a slight hill at mile 1 and a couple of railway bridges to break things up towards the end of the race.

 

For TRAC ladies, Asmaa Hatim led our team back in 1:33:20.  She was closely followed by Georgia Hughes and Claire Greenaway in 1:35:19 and 1:38:12 respectively.  Jo Kemp finished in 1:41:45 and Julie Williams was on her tail with a 1:42:49 which was good enough to clinch the Kent Championship Bronze medal for the V55 category.  Nikki Boyes finished in 1:46:06 which was her fastest time for two years and Gemma Barnes also finished in a great time of 1:47:21.

 

 

For TRAC men, Andy Stevens was delighted with a new PB and finished in 1:15:55.  This was good enough for the Kent Champs silver medal in the V50 category.  Then followed a whole bunch of TRAC men within a few minutes of each other – with a number of PBs being recorded.  Matt McCarthy came across the line in 1:21:43, closely followed by Chris Brenchley in 1:22:01.  There was hardly any time to breathe before Adam Foster finished in 1:22:34, Jay Bailey in 1:23:55 and Richard Allan in 1:24:47 who then had to dash off to the airport for a flight !.  Completing the “sub 1.30” club were Phil Stevens in a new PB of 1:26:09, James Figgins in 1:28:50 who was using it as a marathon pacing session, Arron Baldwin in 1:29:41, Dan Grech with a PB in 1:32:03, Simon Cowdrey in 1:33:52, Steve Suttle in 1:35:54, and Steve Hawkins and Mark Hadden in 1:42:44 and 2:02:53 respectively.  In the Kent Champs team prizes, TRAC V50 men (Andy, Chris, Phil) won the silver medals.  

  

 

The Paddock Wood is a very well organised, established race, with a huge number of runners and all the talk afterwards was of the great race conditions and PBs that had been grabbed.  

 

We will update the club champs scores over the coming days and post them on the website.  

 

The next club champs event is the Folkestone 10m race on 29th March (Good Friday) so make some room for the Easter Eggs and get a rare Friday race in !  

 

Jo and I would like to thank all our lovely club members who got up early and travelled to the other side of Kent to represent our club.  It is really appreciated.  

 

Andy