Annual General Meeting.
The AGM of the County Association was held on 25 February at Frodsham and it is pleasing to report a significant increase in turnout from Cheshire clubs compared to recent years.
Officers of the Association elected were :
President : George Bunner MBE;
Chairperson : John Driscoll;
Vice Chairperson : vacant;
Secretary : Brian Warren
Treasurer : Bill Smith.
Other elections and nominations were :
Championship Secretaries : John Ashton (Track & Field and details of Multi-events), Sportshall athletics : Margaret Webster (NOTE : vacancies exist for Cross Country Championships and for Road Relays).
Permit Secretary (all disciplines) : Adrian Thiemicke (please note his new e-mail address : roadracegp@cheshireaa.com
Officials Secretary ; Joe Shellhorn
Coaching Representative ; Eddie Gore
Nominations : to NoEAA General Committee : B Warren, R Lynch, J Driscoll
To NoEAA Cross Country Committee : M Lamb plus one vacancy.
To NoEAA Road Running Committee : A Thiemicke.
All clubs are invited to send one representative to County committee meetings (next one is March 10th, 7:30pm at Frodsham Community Centre, Fluin Lane).
Offers (to the Secretary) are requested from persons willing to fill the vacancies indicated above.
Indoor Successes.
The NoEAA Senior Indoor Championships at Sheffield provided success and disappointment for two Cheshire athletes in the same event. Darren Scott (Trafford) won the mens 200m final after Allyn Condon (Sale) had set a world season’s best time in the semi-final but missed the final through illness. Misfortune dogged Allyn in subsequent events pulling up in the 200m semi-final with cramp in the AAA championships (also at Sheffield) and being unable to start through illness the same event at the Grand Prix at the NIA, Birmingham two weeks later.
John Nicholls (Sale) in the Shot and Clare Neeve (Trafford) in the PV both took silver medals at the North of England event.
Cross County Successes.
The North of England championships at Sherdley Park, St Helens at the end of January provided a number of successes for Cheshire clubs and athletes.
Individual champions (all from Warrington AC) were Karrie Hawitt (Under 20 Ladies); Lawrence Walker (Under 15 Boys) and Matt Jackson (Under 13 Boys). The Warrington Under 13 Boys team also placed 2nd (Daniel Cliffe) and 4th (Matt O’Neill) to easily take the team title. In the Under 20 Ladies race, Vale Royal were 2nd team, while in the Under 17 Ladies event the Vale Royal ladies took bronze medals with Becky Ellis first counter in 11th position. Other good placings were Matt Barnes (Altrincham) 15th in the Senior mens race, Andy ellis (Vale Royal 12th in the U20 Mens event, Jason McGonigle (Warrington) 11th in the Under 15 Boys with Vale Royal 8th team, Stevie Stockton (Vale Royal) 7th, Heather Timmins (Warrington) 13th, Laura Lambert (Vale Royal) 14th and Lucy Gemmel(Warrington) 15th in the Under 15 Girls where the Vale Royal team were 4th. Louise Sullivan was 20th in the Under 13 Girls race.
Attention then moved to the English National Championships held in the magnificent surroundings of Temple Newsam House and Park, Leeds. The Warrington AC duo of Matt Jackson and Daniel Cliffe ran a superb race with only a few seconds separating them all of the way to finish 1st and 2nd respectively, but with 2 additional runners to count for the team had to settle for third team medals on the day. Karrie Hawitt (Warrington) last year’s Under 17 champion, gained third placed medal in the Under 20 Ladies race while Rob Birchall (Notts AC) was just outside the medals (4th) in the Mens race. Jennifer Heath (Sale) was 14th in the Senior Women’s race and two Vale Royal teams achieved top 10 placings : Under 17 Women 10th and Under 15 Girls 8th.
The Inter County Cross Country Championships take place at Nottingham on March 6th and we wish all of our teams a good day of cross country running.
Inter-County Fell Running Championships.
These are being held on 3rd July in Langdale (Lake District). Tony Hulme is the County contact for Fell Running (Tel : 01625 529874, e-mail: running@bearsports.freeserve.co.uk )
Cheshire Road Running Grand Prix.
The first two events in the 8 race 2004 GP series for Cheshire clubs have already taken place. The next is the Wilmslow ½ marathon on 21 March (entries now closed) followed by the West Cheshire Chester Spring 5 mile (April 6th). A request from the GP co-ordinator is to ensure you all put your club names clearly on your entries - several athletes from Cheshire clubs were down as “unattached” in the results from the Alsager 5 mile. Also WAC can mean different clubs, that is Warrington AC or Wirral AC. Also Warrington can be taken as Warrington AC or Warrington Road Runners.
Details of these events are on the CheshireAA web site The co-ordinator is Adrian Thiemicke (e-mail : roadracegp@cheshireaa.com Tel : 01270 569012)
County Championship dates for the 2004 Track & Field Season are :
Track & Field Championships : 15/16 May confirmed as at Warrington.
County Track Relays : 11 July at Stanney Oaks, Ellesmere Port
Junior Multi-events : 12 September, at Macclesfield.
North West Counties Road Relays
It is Cheshire’s turn to host this event in 2004 and the provisional date is Saturday, 18 September. We are still looking for a person to act as Championship Secretary and also a local club to host the event on a suitable course
Dates for 2004/5 cross country season :
UK Athletics have issued suggested dates for Championships and leagues for the next cross country season which will produce some changes to “traditional” weekends for particular events. These are given in Athletics Weekly for 18 Feb 2004, page 12.
We discussed these briefly at the County AGM with particular reference to the proposed County Championship dates of 15/16 January (preferred to the earlier dates of 11/12 Dec). We agreed to go for the January dates PROVIDED it is confirmed that the County Schools are confirmed as 5/6 February as indicated in AW as we do not wish to clash with the schools.
We require offers of a venue and a Championship Secretary for this event.
Health & Safety Workshop for Track and Field
In conjunction with the Cheshire Schools AA we are organising a workshop at Victoria Park, Warrington on Monday March 29th 4:30-6:30pm. In addition to teachers, track & field officials, coaches and facility staff are welcome to attend. Persons intending attending MUST notify Bob Lynch (Tel : 01625 829229) by 19 March so that we can get appropriate paperwork from UK Athletics.
UKA Coaching Courses :
The local courses are :
Level 2 (Event Specific) :
24/25 April 04 at Sportscity (Manchester)
Please contact Tony Airnes for an application form on 01253 358168 or tairnes@ukathletics.org.uk. It is essential to book as early as possible as courses will be cancelled if there are insufficient bookings. That is, do not leave it to the last moment as though you were entering an athletics event!!
Hopefully we will get notice of future courses!!
A Concern
At the AGM, Bob Lynch raised his concerns over the “Gender Recognition Bill” which is currently before parliament. He feels that in its apparent present form it could have significant implications for athletics and most other sports for particular reasons and wishes to see safeguards in the Bill to prevent “unfair” competition in sport. Problems have arisen in one sport already - cycling. Coincidentally some of the sporting implications of this Bill were discussed on BBC Radio 2 on Friday February 27th. Bob has taken up the issue with a number of organisations, his MP and the Government Department concerned (Constitutional Affairs). Bob is willing to discuss with anyone who wishes to contact him (Tel : 01625 829229). Details can also be seen on www.dca.gov.uk/constitution/transsex
Response to - “A Question” :
At last the answer - I received one comment after the last newsletter expressing disappointment that the answer had not been revealed then!. I have now had several responses, all except one are correct. The incorrect one arose from misreading the question.
So the answer to :Who was the first person to run the mile in exactly 4 minutes? is Derek Ibbotson
The time was achieved on 3rd September 1958 at the White City, London in a race won by Herb Elliott in the second fastest ever time of 3m55.4s. Interestingly immediately behind Derek (who was 4th) was Mike Blagrove who was also given the same time. I wonder what the photofinish (not photoelectronic, which was not in use then) times were. This would have produced times readable from photographic film to possibly 1/1000th of a second? It was not until 1972 that times to 1/100th of a second were accepted officially in place of manual timing, although top class conventional (analogue) stop watches could be read to 1/100th of a second before digital (electronic) watches became available. Although it is now standard practice in manual time keeping with digital watches to round up a time of say 10.01 to 10.1 seconds, the AAA Rule book for 1978/79 (the oldest one I have) suggests that a time of 10.04 would be recorded as 10.0 while 10.05 as 10.1. So if the watches on Derek gave 4:00.04 it would have been recorded as 4:00.0 and not 4:00.1. Was he therefore the first person to run 1 mile in exactly 4 minutes?
Please ensure the County Secretary, Brian Warren is informed of any changes of Secretary for your club (Contact details : Brian Warren, 51 Fairways, Frodsham WA6 7RY, Tel No : 01928 732529, e-mail : brian@brianwarren.fsnet.co.uk).
Communications
We would ask those who do receive the Newsletter electronically to “send” it on to their contacts in their club and/or put a paper copy on your Club notice board.
The next County committee meeting is on the 10th March 2004 at the Community Centre, Fluin Lane, Frodsham at 7:30pm - hopefully we will see your club represented at this and future meetings.
Editor - John Driscoll (0151 339 5341 or, preferably, jld@sunnyfield.co.uk).
Any views expressed in this Newsletter are not necessarily those of the Cheshire County AA.
Remember to look at the Cheshire County AA web-site for latest news and information :
www.cheshireaa.com