Kendal Winter League - Birkrigg Common -28th January

Dallam Running Tribe wins 2 races at Birkrigg reports Ray Gill

where 12 Dallam racers competed on the day including one new recruit Neil Harvey – Reannes dad. The conditions were breezy but dry without any bogs. At the time of writing I am without the official results.

Helm Hill Runners did another cracking job and this reporter for one is keen that Dallam should recognise their contribution to the sport with a gift of a couple of crates of wine to enjoy around their totem pole.
Dale Sutton gave the day an electric start with a 1st for Dallam in the under 12 race. The opposition simply faded away in the presence of Dale’s strong finish which was at least a rapidly increasing 20 metres ahead of the competition.
Dale Sutton at the finish.

The under 14s race was well attended with six Dallam runners. Sam Till came in 2nd and only shortly behind the leader. Dean Sutton showed another spirited performance and was up with the leaders.
Dean Sutton, followed by Melanie and Sam in the background

Sam Till a close 2nd

Melanie Hyder for the girls was 1st with what looked like a Sunday jog in the park. Melanie was followed by Robin Goodfellow in 3rd place, whilst Jane Gill lolloped into 4th place. Reanne Harvey continues to improve and ran a competent race inspiring her father in the process to join the club.
Robin Goodfellow

Jane Gill

Reanne Harvey

The Under 17 race was represented by Alex Till and Catherine Gill. Alex put up a strong fight to come in second place, whilst Catherine showed an improving performance with no sign of her recent knee injury.
Alex Till
Catherine Gill



The Seniors race was represented by Ray Gill, Dawn Gill and our new recruit, Neil Harvey, who was the fastest Dallam runner up the first hill. Dawn Gill continued to show the same cool consistency of position as Melanie. Dawn’s race is usually somewhat tougher than other competitors and this week was no exception with closed gates turning the race into a fell running steeple chase. Last week it was rampant cows invading the course.
Neil Harvey at the finish

Dawn Gill a consistent runner

Ray Gill - Cub Reporter

From the Message Board -Steve Jeffs

Running from Grange this week? Need directions?

Go through Grange towards Allithwaite, as you start to go up Risedale hill (u see the big red building lit up) there is a road that shhots down to the left. This is Cart Lane and has a BLUE PROMENADE sign on it. Go down here and at the bottom of the hill swing left to park by the bollards. We're at No 1 Sedgwick court. Bring a beer, I'll do some snap.

Kendal Winter League - Whitestones

John Hodgson writes that the juniors were out in force again on Sunday, supporting Helm Hill who do a marvellous job organising these races.He thinks that we should give Helm a donation! (steady there Paul C)



Under 12s Dale Sutton and Ben Till battled it out for 2nd place ,with Ben pouncing just at the finish with a well timed sprint.


Under 14s highlights ..Melanie Hyder breaking her own record again...Dean Sutton showing a vast improvement in only his third race to finish 4th,one place ahead of Sam Till...
Melanie was followed home by Robin Goodfellow 2nd,Jane Gill 4th and new recruit Reanne Harvey 7th(L to R in the photo).



Under 17s with Alex Till running one of his best ever races to win without the 2nd runner in sight... a class performance!
Not to be outdone Cathy Gill's performances in the u17 girls have improved so much.From being minutes behind her rivals she is now up with them.

Finally well done to Dawn Gill in the seniors (Ed: have also spotted Messrs J.Hodgson and R.Gill in the results)

All our runners put in so much effort.They are a credit to the Club.

Full results http://www.ukresults.net/2007/whitestone.html

Juniors at Lancaster Uni Cross Country

John Hodgson writes that the Mid Lancs cross country at Lancaster University attracted a big number of runners on Saturday,including some of our juniors.

Dallam had two U11 boys ,Ben Till and Wilf Goodfellow who acquitted themselves with distinction.Ben was 9th and Wilf 37th in his first cross country race.
Next to go in the u13 girls were Robin Goodfellow and Catherine Procter who had two energy sapping laps of the hilly course to do.They came through with determined efforts to finish 19th and 23rd respectively.Both girls had qualified to run for Cumbria Schools earlier in the week at Sedbergh.Congratulations.
Photos L to R of Wilf,Robin and Catherine.

Noel was pleased to see Dallam's participation at last in this series of races!
He ran in the senior race.

Juniors at Firbank - Kendal Winter League

John Hodgson writes "Eleven juniors from the Club turned out for the 2nd of the WL series at Firbank on Sunday

Three of them were making their Dallam debuts;Catherine Procter U12 girls;Dale Sutton U12 boys and Ben Taylor U14 boys.
It was windy and muddy but no rain!


Top performances came from Alex Till who was one metre(1 second) off winning his first U17 race;Melanie Hyder who lowered her own record by a further 17 seconds;this was her 22nd consecutive win in three years of competing in the series;Robin Goodfellow and Dale Sutton who were 2nd and 3rd respectively in their races.
WELL DONE TO ALL ELEVEN"

Update from the 2006 AGM

See the sidebar link for an update from the AGM about London Marathon places,new training sessions for juniors etc

Loughrigg-Silver How Fell Race 25/2/07

One that does'nt get itself into the FRA Calendar

9 miles/2700 feet
Sunday 25th February 2007
12:00 start from Millans Park
Registration is at Ambleside Rugby Club
John Broxap (of Pete Bland Sports) is the organiser

FRA/UK Athletics issues

Dowy has asked me to post this on the site for people to look at.Despite some of the comments on their Forum I'd like to think that the FRA are continuing to get things sorted out......

The FRA and UK Athletics.Why it matters !!
from Dave Jones

Most fellrunners really don’t give a damn about UK Athletics, Sport England, England Athletics, NoEAA or any of their various Committees, sub-Committees or anything else. All they want to do is get out on the fells, go to races and perhaps have a crack at the English/British Championship. That is a perfectly healthy attitude to have BUT, if it had been left to UK Athletics, we wouldn’t have had a Calendar of races for either 2005 or 2007. On both occasions and without any consultation or prior warning they altered the conditions governing either race insurance or the qualifications of race officials in such a way as to make it impossible for races to be registered without falling foul of their conditions. In other words, their actions would have effectively wrecked the competitive side of fellrunning for two years out of the last three. That’s why it matters and why I think that it is well past the time when the FRA needs, for the sake of the sport, to leave the interference of UK Athletics behind and run our sport ourselves for the sole benefit of fellrunners.

Had it not been for some frantic, last-minute scrabbling negotiations and dubious compromises then the appalling situation depicted above would have come to pass but why it should be necessary for the FRA to be placed in this demeaning position time and time again and be left with far from satisfactory solutions just waiting for the next UK Athletics cock-up is beyond me. I suspect it is also beyond a lot of other FRA Members.
I resigned from the FRA Committee in November because, for the first time in over nineteen years, I was convinced that the FRA Committee was not acting as the Members would wish it to act, nor in the best interests of fellrunning. I don’t seem to be alone in this – at the AGM a Motion was put forward for the FRA to secede from UK Athletics and hence return the management of fellrunning to fellrunners. The Chairman refused to let the Motion go forward as it had missed the deadline for submission but he agreed that the issue should be discussed at the end of the meeting. This discussion was quite lengthy and detailed and at its conclusion a vote was taken of all the members present at the AGM to see how people felt – this vote was “overwhelmingly” (quoted from the AGM Minutes) in favour of seceding from UK Athletics.
The response to this obvious mandate I would have thought ought to be to immediately ballot the membership and then act according to the result. However, all that has happened is that the sub-Committee formed after the October Committee meeting has been asked to continue looking at the issue yet again !! This sub-Committee has indicated that it probably won’t be able to come to any conclusions before the end of March and the next scheduled FRA Committee meeting when the findings can be discussed is in the middle of April, so it may well be that nothing will be done before the June “Fellrunner” is published and therefore the whole sorry mess will just roll on and on to the next AGM without any resolution. This is what I suspect some present members of the FRA Committee would prefer, although in fairness Tony Varley, as the new Chairman did say that a postal ballot ballot of all members would be held when the sub-committee reported back but that could be an awful long time away.

I really don’t want to re-iterate all the dreadful things that UK Athletics have done over the last few years, although I have kept a record of them all. Apart from admitting that our sport is a “low priority” in their concerns they have consistently failed to communicate with us. They have made decisions affecting the sport without consultation. They have given us misleading statements and they have generally proved that they neither care about fellrunning nor are competent to manage it. Despite their many protestations that the relationship would improve it has actually got worse. Why the FRA Committee insists on remaining attached to their coat-tails is a very disturbing mystery. At the AGM a question was asked, following the torrent of criticism of UKA, which sought to find out what the advantages of remaining with them might be – apart from Tony Varley mentioning free race insurance, the usefulness of which has been proven twice already to be extremely suspect, and some financial assistance for the England International Team there was no response from anyone, which is hardly a ringing endorsement !!

I fear very much that this issue, which does affect the structure of our sport in so many ways, may well be swept under the carpet and so I would like to requisition an Extraordinary General Meeting to discuss this single matter and make a decision which reflects the feelings of the Membership. To do this I need the agreement of at least 5% of the Membership – this is not necessarily an agreement with the proposal but an agreement that we need a meeting. I will be circulating race organisers and Club Secretaries about this and provided I get the necessary support, which is 300+ signatures, then I will ask the Secretary to call a meeting. It would be nice if this could be sooner rather than later, so if you’re reading this and feel as strongly as I do about the issue then please drop me an email at djonesfra@aol.com stating that you would like such a meeting to be called.

I have been approached by quite a few people enquiring about what would happen if we did secede from UK Athletics and I put the points below on the FRA Forum as a response. However, as the Forum is only read by a relatively small proportion of the membership I thought it would be best to repeat it here – and apologies to those who will therefore have read it twice but I think its arguments are valid.

1. Fellrunning would once again be a sport governed by fellrunners for fellrunners without any of the intrusive interference we have suffered over the last few years and we would hence avoid the constant worry about what UK Athletics might spring on us next.

2. Our race insurance would be based purely on our own Rules & Safety Requirements and not on the vagaries of UK Athletics’ ever-changing conditions. It could be paid for by an increase of £2 per annum on the subs, which would probably still leave enough over to continue to allow FRA race organisers to register their races for nothing and it would still leave the FRA subscription as one of the best deals around !!

3. The FRA would be able to register races anywhere in the UK, which, if race registration were free, would doubtless be a big draw and which would also be a big step towards re-unifying our sport. Remember there is no “English” in the FRA’s title and before we threw in our lot with UK Athletics’ predecessors it was THE body for fellrunning throughout the country, with representatives from all the Home Countries on its Committee and it all ran like clockwork.

4. Assuming a solid response to 3. above, the FRA Calendar would become a more comprehensive publication and hopefully, in time, the ridiculous plethora of Calendars (no fewer than SIX at present if my maths is right !!) would decrease.

5. English Championships – Senior & Junior. As these are presently funded completely by the FRA then there would be no change.

6. British Championships – Senior & Junior. At present all that UK Athletics contributes towards these Championships are the medals and (occasionally) a small grant for race promotion. The organisation of the whole thing is largely down to the FRA with co-operation from the individual race organisers in the other Home Countries – in fact the UK Athletics’ British Fell & Hill Running Relays are still universally referred to as “the FRA Relays”.
Either the FRA could approach UK Athletics and offer to continue to organise the British Championships for them, with appropriate support, or, if that were refused, just go ahead and organise them anyway – let’s face it, no-one else would take on the job – and finance the medals either from central FRA funds or from a separate fund contributed to by the organisers of the constituent Championship races.

7. Scottish, Welsh and Irish Championships – would continue to be organised by the respective committees of those countries as they are now.

8. Internationals. Apart from the fact that a tiny, tiny, tiny percentage of fellrunners have any interest at all in International competition I would like to refer to the situation in Orienteering where ALL of their International programme (Start/Potential/Performance at both Senior and Junior levels) is funded externally from either Sport England or UK Sport. If it works for them then why not for us – we would, after all, be a UK-wide body if we seceded from UK Athletics.

9. Juniors. A large proportion of the finance for Junior affairs comes either from FRA funding, which would presumably continue, or from Grant Funding from a variety of bodies, most of which would still be accessible whether we were part of UK Athletics or not.

10. Clubs. Since the advent of UK Athletics the Club situation has become utterly laughable – thanks to their “just tick the box” method of registering Clubs for different disciplines we now have no fewer than 365 Clubs registered for fellrunning (including the charmingly named “Coffin Dodgers Running Club”, based in Dorset !!). This is clearly a nonsense; of those 365 there are probably about 70 or 80 who have a genuine interest in fellrunning. If we were to revert to the system the FRA applied pre-UK Athletics then Clubs wishing to participate in the team section of the English (or, for that matter, British) Championship could affiliate to the FRA for a nominal sum (£3/£5 ??) and these affiliated Clubs would then once again be a true reflection of the participants in the sport – if the other 290 or so didn’t bother then what would have been lost ??

I have heard it said from some people on the FRA Committee that it would be a shame if we were to leave the “athletics family”. If such a family exists then it must be one of the most dysfunctional ones imaginable where the UKA parental attitude seems to consist of lack of communication, arrogance, selfishness, dissimulation, neglect and abuse towards its struggling children.
Maybe it’s time for fellrunning to realise that the parental shortcomings are permanent and not temporary, fly the nest and set up a happy home on its own.
I hope some of the points above are helpful. I called my posting on the Forum “A Vision of the Future” and while it is an ideal it is all nevertheless eminently feasible and practical and would, I submit, not only get our sport out of the increasing difficulties our reliance on UK Athletics has caused us but would set us on an altogether healthier course for the future.

If you agree, or think we need a meeting to follow up the feeling expressed so strongly at the AGM, then please drop me that email – djonesfra@aol.com

P.S. Since this article was submitted I understand from Tony Varley, FRA Chairman, that the FRA Committee Meeting on 13th January 2007 was asked to approve of a ballot of the membership on the UK Athletics issue. Details of this no doubt appear elsewhere in the magazine but, as a ballot is obviously the fairest and most democratic way of resolving the matter I’m quite content to happily accept that and not call for an EGM. However, just in case the ballot does not take place – which I’m sure it will – the list of requisition supporters will temporarily stay on my computer. I would like to take this opportunity to thank the many, many members who expressed their support for pursuing this issue – let’s hope our views are reflected in the ballot result !!

Dallam runners best 10K times

Noel Hakeman writes "here are the results of the Dallam challenge for last year
DALLAM 10k CHALLENGE

RESULTS 2006

2006 Best 2005 Best
Mike McKenna V55 37m02 Lancaster 3Bridges 37m35 Ulvrstn 
Aaron Crewe J 40m30 Dallam Dash 39m25 Levens 
Feleena Taylor L 40m31 Dallam Dash
Hazel Jones L 41m03 Hawkshead 40m36 Dall 
Mark Davey 41m09 Ulverston S 42m28 Lancstr 
Nick Feben J 43m07 Dallam Dash 41m48 Dall 
Tony McNaughton V45 41m28 Ulverston S
Paul Sewell V55 44m53 Dallam Dash 44m17 Dall 
Ken Nicholls V50 44m54 Dallam Dash 43m09 Morecmb 
Duncan Hurtley 45m15 Lancaster
John Hodgson V55 45m18 Bendrigg 46m46 Burtn 
Dave Hodges 45m52 Dallam Dash 47m40 Lancstr 
Dave Deason V40 46m04 Lancaster 56m19 Dall 
John Leech V45 48m06 Dallam Dash
Helen Deason L 49m41 Lancaster 3Bridges 56m10 Dall 
Jane Ryan LV40 49m44 (New Club Rec) Dallam Dash 51m06 Burton 
Mike Pearcy 50m42 Burton
Chris Till V40 51m07 Dallam Dash 50m23 Dall 
Guy Kirkley 53m02 Dallam Dash
Noel Hakeman V65 53m24 Telford 49m53 Kendal 
Mathew Noble 54m10 Burton 55m30 Burton 
Julie Pearcy L 56m20 Burton
Carole Hayes LV45 61m27 Dallam Dash
Elise Watson LV35 62m11 Ulverson S 63m21Dallam D 

No 2006 Results found for:-
Paula Holland 44m48 Burtn
Paul Crewe 43m02 Dall
Dave Crayson 37m39 Rvnstnd
Grace Leedham 49m41 Burtn
Steve Watson 39m38 Ulv
Jackie Crewe 54m27 Levens
Greg Tagney 46m31 Burtn
Derek Pye 54m11 More

24 Runners found (2005 – 24)
9 runners improved their time 7 did not

Mike McKenna retained the challenge -but look out Alex Till will be old enough to run in Senior races in 2007 the Ladies have another year before Melanie is old enough.
Helen Deason was the most improved runner


LADIES ONLY
Feleena Taylor L 40m31 Dallam Dash
Hazel Jones L 41m03 Hawkshead 40m36 Dall 
Jane Ryan LV40 49m44 (Club Record) Dallam Dash 51m06 Burton 
Carole Hayes LV45 61m27 Dallam Dash
Elise Watson LV35 62m11 Ulverson S 63m21Dallam D"

Dallam juniors at Scout Scar race

John Hodgson writes

"Here are a few photos of our juniors in action at the first of the Kendal Winter League races at Scout Scar on Sunday 7th January.In the photos (click on them to full size and then use the Back button)reading from the top left to right.

Wilf Goodfellow aged 10 making his debut for Dallam leading some rivals to the finish of the U12s race.
Ben Till sprinting to finish 2nd in the U12s.
Melanie Hyder setting the pace at the start of the U14s.
Melanie finishing 3rd overall in the race (ie including boys),where the first four girls were all Dallam.Melanie beat her own record by 5 seconds set last year.

Sam Till sprinting to finish 3rd boy and 4th overall in the U14s.
Dean Sutton making his Dallam debut finished a creditable 7th boy/17 in the U14s.
Eleanor Peach ran well to finish 4th girl in the U14s.Apologies to Robin Goodfellow and Jane Gill who finished 2nd and 3rd respectively in this race,they were moving so fast their pictures came out fuzzy.
Alex Till running in to finish 3rd in the U17 boys.

Congratulations to the Gill family who turned up "en bloc" for the event.
Ray and Dawn (her first race!) in the seniors and Jane and Catherine 4th in the U17 girls."

Thanks from Pete

Pete Burrow says thank you to everyone who contributed towards The Runners Centre Lancaster voucher which the Club presented to him on his 60th Birthday.
He has bought a pair of Inov8 trail shoes.

Badger series 10K Trail Races

News of some trail races through Cuerden Valley Park,south of Preston

Click on on image to expand.

See Calendar updates

for Wednesday night venues through to the middle of February

The Really Wild Boar Fell Race

A new race for us to do,that's not far from home

"Here are some details of a new race to be held on the 3rd March that is not in the 2007 FRA calendar, please can you pass them on to your members.
Many thanks
Gary and Debbie Devine"

MaryTowneleyLoop Relay 2007 Update

Gary Dowthwaite is our team captain.Please let him know asap if you want to be considered for a place (5 legs run in pairs)
01524 822216

http://www.penninebridlewayrelay.co.uk/