June HPH Chair’s Update and Harrier of the Month

Yet another month of Lockdown, yet another month of awesome challenges set virtually by our fantastic members and some incredible achievements from Hyde Park Harriers. It seems we don’t have to run together to maintain how friendly and awesome we are, and that fact is true every month when the Committee review the nominations for Harrier of the Month.

It gives me great pleasure to announce that the winners of the Hyde Park Harrier of the month for June are Sam Dooley, Zeni Bellwood and Lizzie Coombes.

It was a draw on our female winners this month, with the award going to both Lizzie Coombes and Zeni Bellwood. Lizzie and Zeni have both kept us running (or at least out and about) by organising awesome challenges: the 19km in 19 days challenge, and the ‘Beauty in the Ordinary’ photography challenge. We have loved seeing all of your entries and hope you’ve enjoyed getting to know your local more as a result of these challenges. Zeni was also nominated for her contribution to the weekly roundup: managing and writing the content and keeping a really valuable communication channel running whilst we aren’t. Thanks to you both!

Our male winner this month is the one and only Sam Dooley. Sam’s been nominated for his fantastic progress with his running and fitness over the last few months and his commitment to his plan. I know he’s had a bit of an injury the past few weeks, so we all wish you a speedy recovery Sam!

Here is a list of everyone that was nominated this month. Thanks, and well done to all of you for everything you have done and achieved.

• Matt Armstrong – for his incredible 107 mile run around Woodhouse Moor and all the other miles he’s covered as part of his Virtual Race Across Tennessee
• Richard Garratt – for being the first participant to complete his 19km in 19 days and has encouraged so many others to complete it, too
• Louise Gardham – for overcoming the hurdles of being in a running slump and finding ways to enjoy running again and also for all her help working on finding a good app to help us register for sessions in the future
• Farhad Hamad – for his strength sessions over Facebook which have been enjoyed (well, maybe afterwards) by lots of our members and friends
• Robyn Johnson – replacing cancelled ultras with local ultra distance runs
• Naomi Kellett – for having such sheer determination to stick to training, work hard and achieve results
• Laura Garratt – for organising and keeping the COVID-19 task force group ship shape, and contributing so brilliantly to a really complicated task.

Finally, keep an eye out on the weekly bulletins and in the Facebook Group for more information about the virtual events that we are running, as well as for information about sessions restarting, hopefully in August – but in a very different guise.

Just a reminder that the date of the next HPH Committee meeting is July 26^th. Don’t forget to get in touch ahead of this date if you have anything for discussion.