The month’s shortlist was dominated by runners who took part in two races that took place on the same day – the Stamford 30K and the rescheduled Keyworth Turkey Trot. The East Midlands 10K saw some fine performances, with personal bests from Emma Weighill, Claire Fritz and Melanie Taylor but it was Russell Maksymiw who was shortlisted after knocking two minutes off his PB at Holme Pierrepont.
The Stamford 30K saw some fine performances all around – Holly Durham, Dean Riggall, Andrew Pask, and Matthew Williamson were all put forward for consideration having clocked personal bests. Matt Kidd had a great debut run for GRC, who was second home for the club on his 30K debut. Joe Clarke, who was first GRC runner home at Stamford, clocking a 20 minute + PB, drew special praise in the deliberation process. Hopefully it is the first of many big performances to come in 2018 for Joe.
Over at Keyworth: Rob Howbrook was commended for his fine 77.93% age graded effort; Matthew Kingston-Lee was mentioned for finishing sixth overall, winner of his age category, and the first GRC runner to break 80% age grade in a race in 2018; and Christopher Toon, who sliced over five minutes from his previous half marathon PB, was likewise considered for the prize.
There was though a clear winner of February Member of the Month. Armed with a belt stuffed full of gels in only his second ever race, Craig Drury improved his half marathon PB at Keyworth by a huge amount – just shy of 15 minutes. As if this wasn’t enough to justify his award, Craig improved on his parkrun PB by 36 seconds at the close of the month.
Craig is indisputably one of our most improved runners at the club. It is a little known fact that had our Biggest Improver Award at our recent Club Awards Evening considered parkruns (and there is plenty to debate whether or not they should 😉) Craig would have claimed the prize with a 9% improvement during the time frame the award considered.
Hopefully his fantastic run at Keyworth is the first of many great race performances through 2018.
Congratulations Craig on being February 2018 Member of the Month!