Dangle the chance to do a run and The Wheelers grab it.
5k was the challenge, either by walking or running, and a number of different ways of doing that were on show. Running the cold streets of Gill to Stur and lots of places in between, the Wheelers found those flat routes. Then the world opened up and for a second challenge on the bounce an entry came from New Zealand, but from a different Wheeler (Rob Gale) and then Australia (Innes Wright) and finally the mystical Watopia (Shawn Gray). But the most popular was the parkrun at Blandford on a nasty Saturday morning where the fastest time was run – Rich White breaking 17 minutes to be, not only the first Wheeler home, but the first in the parkrun. Outstanding.
Melanie Birch retains her grip on the female race, but her time would have got her bonus points in the Open category.
In the Open category, Rich White took the big points but Shawn Gray is starting to look like a duathlete. His 18 minute run showed that he could do well in a race requiring a change of shoes. We saw this last year with the emergence of Michael Sleeman as a runner and his 19 minutes rounded off the podium. (Chris Giles also dipped under 20 minutes, whilst Henry Harris’ “practice run” under 24 minutes made for a quality set of results). It appears that we have a couple of speedy walkers too (James Little and Mark Harvey).
There is now a 3-way tie at the top of the Open category but with the 8-day Festive 500 (starting 24 December) to come, the uber cyclists might change things up a bit. Full results can be found here (from row 55) https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1xObuEB3punf3SXStfRJ0YH_nUdgBMlL6CGpRbg90qIY/edit?usp=sharing
Its not too late to give it a go – the next one is the 8-day Festive 500 for the 8 days commencing 24 December. Good luck
