Leighton Buzzard Athletic Club

By Helen Crossland

Today was going to be tough. I had chickened out of a half marathon last week due to the weather and hadn't been out running since the zombie invasion run. To make things even more difficult I had not been taking my asthma meds for the last two weeks either. Basically I've been a complete lazy dog for two weeks.

So how did it go? Weather was very cold but very sunny. The car was parked as Cassiobury Park in Watford and I had paid for coach transport to the start in Uxbridge. At least I was warm for a little while whilst the coach took me to the start with lots of other runners. What to wear on that type of run? Arm warmers, calf compression, T-shirt and camalback – that's what I chose. Yup, I was shivering like crazy until the race started. read more

LBAC performance of the day at the second Chiltern League fixture certainly went to Sarah Plummer in the U13 girls race. She finished in 21^st place out of 94 runners in the race which was 17th in division one. The rest of the girls in the race also had a great team result with Megan Westrope and Emma Evans battling for 42^nd place and Penny Grimshaw completing the team in 52^nd.

The three girls who had run in the first race all improved their position and this gave them the best result for Leighton by an U13's girls team in a long time as they finished 8^th in the division. If the girls can keep turning out like this all season it will make a huge difference to the club read more

by Pete Mackrell

On Sunday I continued what appears to be a recent club trend of running a marathon. I picked Preston, which is in my home county of Lancashire and not too far from my parents' house in Burnley. This is the first time Preston has hosted a marathon, and there won't be another one for 20 years! It was arranged to coincide with the Preston Guild, a civic celebration held every 20 years. Preston's Guild dates back to 1179 and it is the only town in the UK that still celebrates its Guild. The marathon organisers have said they will not host another full marathon until the next Guild celebration in 2032, although the Half Marathon which took place on the same morning is set to be held each year. read more

When most of us left Oxford on Saturday, Nick was nowhere to be seen. He was out on the course searching in the mud for Jordan's lost spike. Together with Mandy and the boys – as ever – they were first to arrive at the course in Shotover Park and clearly the last to leave. They were involved in eight of the nine races and also brought along the gazebos for us to change in.

The first races to take on the mud at the bottom of Shotover hill were the U11's, with LBAC having 10 within the age group spread across the two races. There were around 80 youngsters in each race and Leighton had a number of cross-country debutants. For the girls, Ellie Rabbits had a great race to be first home in 40^th place as she led a team of six girls to 13^th out of 20 teams. Sadie Towell, Chloe May, Melissa Chapman, Elspeth Eley and Josie Young all finished just over one minute apart. In the boys race, Dominic Grimshaw was trying to emulate his parents' cross-country achievements and led the team of Scott Towell, Max Rose and Harrison Philpott to 15^th place as he finished in 46^th. read more