The Turkey Trot Half Marathon is the traditional end point of Grantham Running Club’s racing year and this year 9 of the more ‘seasoned’ members toed the start line of this pre-Christmas tester. In an era of professional race organising companies, the race has a long and illustrious history of being well organised by volunteers and raising some well needed funds for the local Scout Group.
The course is a challenging one lap road race starting and finishing at the secondary school and taking in various local villages with some tough uphill sections. Conditions made it very much a race of two halves, with the promised rain coming down from about the hour mark which made for an interesting finish.
Andrew Pask was the first green vest across the line with a respectable 1:30:55, about 1min faster than where he thought is current fitness was.
Next was the determined Peter Bonner who always supports this race. Unwell at the start line, Peter wasn’t about to set any records. Getting around with his health intact with a time of 1:34:13.
First GRC lady and finishing 5th in the F50 age category was Catherine Payne with 1:40:54 and hitting a bumper 80.9%, the highest GP score of the day.
Next was the ever-consistent Robert McArdle who clocked 1:47:20 and sored a county standard 70.84%. Closely following was Peter Jennings with 1:48:14 in his 2nd fastest time over the distance this year.
Martin Rodell set a season’s best time of 1:50:21, beating his Worksop Half time by 1min 23secs.
Sarah High finished 2nd in her F60 age category with a solid time of 1:55:44 and claiming a score of 74.56%, the 2nd highest of the day.
Sarah was very closely followed by Tommy Napier who ran the only PB of the day, albeit only a very small one! Tommy’s time of 1:56:04 beats his time from the Retford Half in 2022 by just 2 seconds but Tommy will enjoy his Christmas knowing he’s still got good races in him.
Pictures c/o SnapHappy Chris’s Photos and Tony Jarrow