Weekly Update - 9th July 2025

Pen y Big y Pen y Fan y Big Fell Race, Brecon Beacons (Sat. 5th July)

For many years the Brecon Fans races have been a permanent fixture in the club's fell running calendar: two races in one weekend, Pen y Fan on one day and Fan y Big on the other, reports Clem Dixon. This year things were different; a one off special combining the routes of the two races and throwing in a bit extra to link them taking in five peaks two of which you visit twice making a total of 18.75 miles and over 6000 feet of ascent. Epic!

Challenging enough but we also had to contend with thick mist ('clag' in fell running parlance), strong winds and driving rain. On races like this the course is not marked and although there are marshals at the check points navigating between them is your responsibility, and it has to be old school navigation: map and compass, GPS is cheating (sadly there did seem to be quite a bit of cheating going on). 

In good visibility this isn't too hard but in the clag it becomes more tricky and in spite of all their experience and familiarity with the area, two of the four of us who made the trip had issues; Mark Newell became 'temporarily misplaced' soon after the start as a result of which he arrived at the first check point after the cut-off time so was forced to retire; and post race analysis in the pub revealed that Christian Poulton had made suboptimal route choices no fewer than three times. In spite of all this the verdict on the new race was very positive, perhaps not every year though! It felt strange not to be racing again on the Sunday, but in truth I don't think that any of us could have.

Results: 44 Clem Dixon 4:42:32; 47 Christian Poulton 4:54:31; 50 James Floyd 5:10:35.

UK Youth Development League - Upper, Gillingham (Sun. 6th July)

Another solid second place in this fixture meant second place overall in the Division and unfortunately no promotion back to the Southern Premier, writes Mick Bond. The strength of this division however can be gauged by the YDL’s National rankings, which recently placed us as the 8th strongest U20/U17 club in the country, with Woodford our nemesis this season in 6th place and other teams in the Division - Medway, Croydon and Crawley also in the top 30. 

Individually a number of our juniors were fine tuning their preparation for next weekend's English Schools Championships and amongst those there was another club record, league record and P of 10 number one for Elijah Olaleye, with a time of 52.76s for the Under 17 men's 400 hurdles. Training partner Hans Nmaju won the 100 hurdles in style in 13.18s whilst Daniel Obike comfortably cleared a PB of 2.01m in the high Jump.

Jack Jones made a welcome return from injury to win the U20 long jump in 6.62m whilst Orin Vitalis and Josiah Payne got maximum points with A and B string wins in the U20 110 and 400 hurdles.

On the girls’ side there were a number of double wins on the track and in the field across both age groups. Emily Cadman won the A and Danielle Agyemang-Talbot the B string 200m, Tess Hepple and Nia Thomas , took first in both long and sprint hurdles whilst Tess’s older sister Ellie won triple jump for U20W with Keziah Olaleye (pictured) winning the B string after earlier wins in both the short and long hurdles.

Kiki Olaigbe and Brenda Adetunji did most of the throws shot, discus and hammer to secure team points with track athletes covering Javelin. 

Emer Tynan stormed away from the field on the last lap of the 1500m to win in a PB of 4:47.66s improving her season’s best by 6 seconds!

An excellent set of relays finished the day and the season for the YDL upper age group.

UK top Ten U20/U17 clubs (based on performances in the YDL):

1. Blackheath and Bromley Harriers; 2. Rugby and Northampton; 3. Team Avon (Composite team); 4. City of York AC; 5. Harrow and Dacorum (Composite team); 6. Woodford Green with Essex Ladies; 7. Windsor Slough Eton and Hounslow AC; 8. Cambridge Harriers; 9. Shaftsbury Barnet; 10. Portsmouth and Winchester (Composite team). (Composite teams are where two or more clubs combine to put a team in the YDL)

Preview - English Schools Championships, Birmingham (11th & 12th July)

In 2023 we had a record 15 of our juniors qualify for the English Schools championships, in 2024 we beat this record with 17 getting selected, this year it is an amazing 19 plus two from Kent AC who are also second claimers with us!

London: Junior Girls: Charlotte Foster (1500m), Miya Cook (Shot); Inter-Girls: Emily Cadman (200m), Nia Thomas (80m hurdles), Phoebe Folarin (2nd claim - high jump); Senior Girls: Amelia Lawrence (1500m); Junior Boys: Jovani Lindsey (200m); Inter-Boys: Elijah Olaleye (400m hurdles), Ekene Ogbonna (100m hurdles); Michael Bridge (Shot), Joshua Wellings (400m); Senior Boys: Michael Somade Makinde (100m).

Kent: Junior Boys: Kendrick Onolememen (Discus), Obinna Aniebo (Discus), Stanley Trofimczuk (Hammer); Inter-Boys: Hand Nmaju (100m hurdles), Daniel Obike (High jump), Freddie Luckett (Javelin); Inter-Girls: Tess Hepple (2nd claim - 80m hurdles); Senior Girls: Lily Gayle (80m hurdles), Keziah Olaleye (400m hurdles).