HPH Chair’s Blog and HOTM for May

With another busy month passing us by, it comes the time to share with you our favourite memories of May, which started with our new committee members Grace Roberts and Danny Clayton being voted in as Ordinary Committee members. We sadly said goodbye to 3-year committee member Naomi Adkins, and cannot thank her enough for all her hard work on the committee since 2019. We also celebrated by awarding our Chair’s, President’s, Ain’t No Barriers and Rolf Neugebauer Photography and Sue Smith Silly Story Award. I hope you’ll agree that a great night was had all round (once the AGM was over!) and I’d really like to thank Danni Bryant for all her hard work behind the scenes getting the venue, projector and the logistics all set up, and to Jonny Spain for being the master pizza-orderer-extraordinaire!

A summary of the winners and their achievements is found within this slide folder – which also includes the amazing ‘alternative’ and PECO awards presentations thanks to Anne Akers, Toby Adkins and Richard Garratt.

What else has happened this month, I hear you ask…? Well here’s just a small list:

• Around the Park, Around the Clock 2022
• Leeds Half Marathon
• Bluebell Trail
• Cookridge 10km
• Jack Bloor Fell Race
• Continuation of HPH 5km PB plan intervals sessions
• Edinburgh Half Marathon
• PBs at the Leeds 5km series
• Summer Mile Prep
• Kirkstall Vets Race
• WHM HPH parkrun takeover
• Calderdale Way Relay
• Kettlewell Half Marathon
• British Masters Vets champs
• …many more

As you can imagine, we weren’t short on nominations this month, given the abundance of activity. Our winners this month are Michelle Dickson and Richard Edwards.

Michelle was nominated not only for running the Lap but also for all of her hard work a training leading up to it! The race itself was 47 miles and 2500m of elevation around Windermere. Wow!! Michelle has trained so hard for this as well as smashing parkrun and other distances along the way. Amazing job!

Richard Edwards. Richard, sadly, is a bit injured at the minute. Instead of being sat at home feeling sorry for himself he has turned into a pro cheer leader. He has turned up to literally every race and been a great cheerleader and really given us all a lift. He really is an embodiment of the spirit of the club.

Once again, please make sure you find time to read all of the nominations below, as there are some amazing things happening in HPH world every month, and it’s great to see all these people being recognised for their achievements and their contributions to our lovely club.

• Claire Hougham – Despite significant health challenges, Claire smashed it at parkrun and got her first sub-30 in quite some time!
• Richard Garratt – For doing the 3 peaks fell race followed by around the park around the clock. The man is just sick!
• Naomi Adkins – Her commitment and enthusiasm into the weekly roundup with her last hurrah now having gone out
• John Pratt – Pulling out significant PB’s in both 5 & 10k distances within a week! Fantastic achievements.
• Toby Adkins – For devising and running a fantastic event of endurance running. Around the Park, around the clock provided people with the opportunity to run as much or as little as they wanted inline with their personal goals in an inclusive and celebratory environment. From those who turned up to support to those running every lap there was so much positivity around the event which has become a genuine fixture on the club calendar and will undoubtedly grow in popularity year on year!
• Julie Haddon – A PB at Birmingham half to add to her other fab performances this year including regular group 6 runs! Well done Julie
• Tim Lindley – For generally for supporting HPH in every way. Picnics, supporting his fellow runners, championing the club, running in 7, some amazing PBs at parkrun as well as regular volunteer shifts. Thanks Tim
• Abdhu Ahmed – For hitting his sub 20 5km target only 2 weeks into the intervals plan! What’s next???
  Showing some real grit and determination to finish every lap of ATPATC despite not being quite on form for distance lately.
• Lizzie Coombes – For doing a Garratt by completing the fat lad at the back cycle event and smashing Leeds half marathon the day after…all with her wonderful smile throughout!
• Lucy Rider – For continuing to lead the runandtalk sessions offering support and raising awareness of mental health with her thoughtful, well written from the heart blogs during Mental Health Week 2022
• Eleanor Bredin – As a new member, Eleanor has got stuck straight in and led quite a few Group 2 sessions, sometimes at the last minute
• Rosie Dang – for her commitment to improvement through regular attendance at the hills and intervals sessions, leading to cutting an incredible 8 minutes off her half marathon time at Leeds in May, then going on to cut a further 9 minutes for a new sub 2 hr PB at Edinburgh this weekend, all with a massive smile on her face!
• George Anderson – George has stepped in to run group 8 solidly for the last 2 months or so. We really wouldn’t have a group 8 without him. He does it all without seeking the limelight and he is just a great team player. He is a real asset to the club

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 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 meeting is on Sunday 19th June, when we welcome our new committee members Grace and Danny officially – make sure you send us anything for discussion before then.

Don’t forget you can submit any future HPH of the Month nominations as well as nominations for other successes for next year’s Awards Do at any time of the month/year at this link.