News Archive

Please note the end date for this challenge has been extended to 10th May

We promised to set up a virtual challenge using the Open Track platform that has been made available to affiliated clubs by England Athletics.

Our challenge is to complete a 2.6 mile run to support the 2.6 campaign that you may have seen announced last week. £7m has already been raised through events taking place.

The challenge is free for all WAC members to take part in with a suggested minimum donation of £5 to Weston Hospicecare our chosen charity.

Run 2.6 miles on a course chosen by you any time between 30/4/20 and 20:00 on the 3/5/20.

Your run should be completed solo and take notice of the applicable government restrictions. Please make sure that you maintain social distancing and give priority to pedestrians and members of the public.

Please choose a course for your safety considering: location, road crossings, surface etc. and consider the time of day that you intend to run to limit disruption to others.

Please choose a course with the start and finish close together if possible - max 4 loops. If you choose a point to point course please try to make sure that the start and finish are at the same elevation. If you do choose a point to point course a penalty may be applied for any elevation drop or favourable wind conditions.

Results will be issued on an outright time and age graded basis.

Please submit your 2.6 mile Garmin or Strava segment record to the Open Track system by 20:59 on 3/5. Detailed instructions on how to submit your result are on the Open Track site.

To register for the event go to www.Opentrack.run. You will need to look under Virtual and Competitions where you will find the WAC 2.6 Challenge dated 30/4 to 3/5. You will need to register with Open Track before entering.

I mentioned in my mail on Sunday that the coaching team want to provide as much support as we can in these difficult times. We know that all EA activity is suspended until 31/5 at least, having seen yesterday that the Berlin marathon has been postponed again from 27/9, I don't see any changes happening quickly for us.

I know that many members have been enjoying their running recently and a bit of R & R from continual racing etc has certainly seemed to help. At the same time we have seen people taking on their own challenges and structured sessions. For those people who would like a bit of support and some session ideas, to help improve or maintain their distance/speed etc. we will post some sessions for you to consider. You can do these on a suitable circuit near to you and at anytime or day to suit you.

Jason has been posting detail of a virtual Saturday session and you will see from the welcome page training section that this has now been posted together with a suggestion of a Fartlek hill circuit for Thursday.

Sheryl has posted detail of our plans on the Weston facebook page and we also will post on there detail of suggested challenges that you may wish to take on too. The first challenge mentioned is tackling your pr on the KDH hill in Weston Woods or Rochester Close climb up Totterdown.

The England Athletics site has a lot of information and ideas that some members may find useful. There are a number of webinars and athlete interviews taking place each week and a club night quiz at 7:00pm for those missing their club meetings.

For any members who are home schooling youngsters EA have made the Athletics 365 information available free to everybody (coaches/leaders/members) until May 2021. This is an ideal guide that takes children through all aspects of running, jumping, throwing. It has a series of different levels that children can achieve on many topics that work towards a balanced development. Seeing some of the exercises and the different levels that need to be shown at each topic may really help you with ideas.

There will be more on facebook regularly but hopefully this message gives you some idea of the support the coaching team are trying to provide.