HPH Chair’s Blog and HOTM for February

February was a short month, but not short on nominations or achievements for you lot out there, storming trails, fells and roads in an army of red and white! Well done to everyone for cramming so many great things into only 28 days – you’re all fantastic. Highlights for me this month included Dewsbury 10km, with LOADS of HPH out there running PBs on the most perfect day. We then saw a number of HPH run the slightly less flat Liversedge Half in a round up of this years’ Road champs. In the middle of the month, Ed and Caitlin did a stirling job of organising PECO #4 at Middleton Park. Thanks so much to all of you that helped make this event a HUGE success.

In March, we look forward to PECO Awards, PECO relays, the closing out of our Fell and Off Road champs, and the committee get to look forward to getting to decide our Chair’s President’s, Ain’t No Barriers, Sue Smith Funny Story Award and the Rolf Neugebauer Photography award in prep for our Awards Do on 14th April.

As I’ve already said: a great number of nominations this month; thank you to everyone who took the time to nominate a fellow Harrier. Keep them coming in so we can celebrate you and your club mates! Any HPH of the Month nominations, as well as nominations for other successes for the Awards Do on the 14th April, can be submitted at any time of the month/year at this link.

Without further ado, here’s our winners: Ed & Caitlin (PECO Organisers Extraodinaires!) and Sam Tecwyn!

Caitlin and Ed: for the most impressive organisation of a race I’ve ever witnessed and for the clearest race brief I’ve ever heard from Ed. Honestly, the amount of effort that went into organising PECO #4 is absolutely huge,. Ed and Caitlin worked together with a larger group of willing HPH volunteers to work under the radar to spend months in the park creating a route and ensuring that park permits were obtained, organising over 50 volunteers on the day and beforehand, It’s really clear from how successful the event was on the day by how smooth everything went. A massive thank you to Ed and Caitlin and all those who volunteered to help for this. Not only does it give HPH the friendly and fantastic name we deserve, but it also brings in some well-earned income for the club, allowing us to put on other fab events for you all as members.

Sam Tecwyn was nominated for a storming run at Roundhay PECO and being the first ever female HPH to WIN A PECO! Sam’s performance at the recent PECO Cross Country events has been absolutely inspiring, and she rounded off her season with the best performance from a HPH female to date. Something to shout about, for sure!

Our other nominees this month were:

• Anne Akers: for doing her bit at Roundhay PECO for the ladies vets team. It was a really tough race, but Anne gritted her teeth and did us all proud. Well done Anne!
• Ben Douglas: For coming first in the overall standings across the season for PECO.
• Dan Donnelly: for spending hours collating and organising the age graded championships. Thank you Dan!
• George Anderson: George has singlehandedly kept Group 8 going over the last few months, and his performance at Middleton PECO was outstanding!
• Joseph Elmes: for really stepping up his training recently, and now being a regular runner with group 8. Well done Joseph!
• Liz Jones and Xeni Perry: Liz and Xeni have both supported the new Group 1 short lap sessions by running informal interval/drill sessions within them, which participants have the option to follow up within the sessions. The feedback from them has been very positive and they’ve maintained the momentum on these throughout the February sessions.
• Karly Stringer: who is in superb form at the minute, achieving bew PBs at 10km and half marathon. Karly has also made a step up to Group 5 in progression sessions currently. It’s not her nature to make a fuss about these things – so I am instead!
• The PECO Captains: for another brilliant PECO season. Hudekudos to our captains for organising and getting everyone involved and organised. Well done also, to evert single person who turned up to run, making us the biggest, best supported club at every event. Proud that so many of us stick around to cheer in every single runner through that finish line – we wouldn’t have that ethos without our fab captains.
• Sarah Underwood: Sarah has been consistent and putting a lot of effort into her training smashing her targets, most recently with a 5 minute PB at Snake Lane 10. Well done Sarah, we can’t wait to see what you do next!
• Steve Worthington: for a 14 minute PB at Liversedge and a 5 minute PB at Dewsbury 10km.

As always, keep an eye out on the weekly bulletin emails and in the Facebook group for more information about races, discounts, sessions and club activity. If you have any ideas for sessions, any feedback or want to organise a social or event, please get in touch with the committee by emailing us at hello@hydeparkharriers.co.uk or messaging one of us directly on Facebook – hopefully you know who we are! If you don’t, you can find out here.

Our next committee meeting is on Sunday 19th March 2023 – make sure you send us anything for discussion before then, or if you need anything before then, you know where to find us!