made by Tony Sheridan assisted by Michael MacClancy 

Welcome everybody to the Windle Valley Runners Dinner and Dance and the Presentation of our annual awards.

Before we proceed to the presentations themselves I’d like to thank our President, Bob Webb, and Vice President, Jean Heywood, for attending this evening and agreeing to present our trophies.

I would also like to thank everybody who has worked so hard arranging our party this evening and the Golf Club for feeding us so well.

2003 was a very busy year for our club. Our club statistician tells me that our members have run in so many different races that he lost count sometime back in June. It’s good to see that our club vests are getting out and about.

We had entries in most of the local events and a staggering 19 finishers in the Wokingham Half Marathon alone.

The London Marathon was, as ever, a highlight in the club’s calendar and most people will remember it because of Paula Radcliffe’s superb performance. But we had 9 finishers in the race last year and we should applaud the excellent performances of Michael Waine who finished in 2 hours and 41 minutes and Jenny Peppiatt, last year’s winner of the Peter Dimmock Trophy, who set a personal best of 3 hours 24 minutes.

Another reason for remembering the London Marathon this year is the fact that the club was also active in its organisation. A group of us was responsible for laying out the timing mats before the start of the race and packing them away at the end. It was a hard day’s work but very enjoyable and well rewarded by the organisers who made a contribution to club funds. Thanks are due to Pam Berriman for setting this up for us and we hope to be able to do it again.

Whilst on the subject of marathons this is an opportune moment to make mention of one of our members who doesn’t seem to run anything that is shorter than a marathon. This is Richard Gurd, who probably runs more marathons than I run 10k’s. In fact, this year he ran so many of them that he didn’t even have time to run the 10k, 10 mile and half marathon events necessary to qualify for the club championship. Those of you who have taken the time to read the latest newsletter will have enjoyed his account of the London to Brighton race, a mere 54 miles. It took him seven and three-quarter hours. He’s trying to recruit a team for this year’s event – any volunteers in the audience?

Moving towards the Summer our annual three day event was a great success with 27 runners completing all three stages. Unfortunately our best man only came 7th but our ladies claimed first and second positions. We were pretty well represented in all the local Spring and Summer races with Mary MacClancy winning a trophy in the Yateley 10k series and some of us travelled as far as Stratford to run in the Shakespeare Marathon and Half Marathon.

Our other traditional event of the year, the Brickmakers relay marathon, took place on a scorching Summer’s day and our Ladies’ team scorched around the course to win the event. Unfortunately our men weren’t able to hold their own against the very strong competition and only came sixth. The relay marathon seems to be growing in popularity from year to year and becoming a regular feature in the local running calendar.

Another relay that we entered was the River Relay along the Thames Towpath, where A-team came 22nd and B-team 36th.

The year drew to a close with our members running in races as far flung as Gosport and Great Barford.

As you can see, all in all we had a great year.

Congratulations once again to all of our prize winners and I wish everyone all the best in this year’s competitions.