NS Poly Grand Prix, 5th March 2024

The penultimate grand prix race of the season took place this Tuesday night, and the last one on the ‘normal’ route before the extended lighthouse finale in 3 weeks time. Chilly temperatures aside, the weather has generally been kinder to us than in the last couple of years, and on this occasion it was very favourable for running, with only a light, very manageable headwind on the way out. Fortunate indeed, as other aspects of the race descended quickly into chaos.

This was actually our poorest turnout of the season so far, with 2 runners missing from of each of the 3 Claremont teams. Those present did themselves proud however, Nina Jensen being first over the line in an impressive 12^th place. Something about this race has really been bringing out the best in people recently, and tonight there was yet another smattering of course PB’s and Strava 5k PR’s. Chief amongst these was Mark Anderson, fastest Claremonter on the night, taking over 30 seconds off his previous best. We’ll give a cursory mention to Mark’s shiny new super shoes, though they were surely only partially responsible for such a massive improvement!

At the mercy of the handicappers as ever, I was ‘punished’ for last month’s performance with a handicap increase of over a minute. It was therefore unsurprising that the other two runners in my group had pulled ahead of me by about 20 metres as we rounded Spanish City, a gap that only widened further. Of course, I was happy enough with taking a few seconds off my own course time.

More of our number dropped places in the individual runners table than usual, but Holly Porter has maintained 7^th position, with myself, Alex Harding and Izzy Neatrour all also staying put in the top 20. With one fixture remaining, The 3^rd Wheelers have what looks like an unassailable lead in the team competition, barring a catastrophic outbreak of norovirus before the end of the month. Not far behind the ‘Chatty Runners’, Rock’s Stars remain in the bronze position.

The Full Claremonty, as it stands, have dropped from 2^nd to 9^th. However, the veracity of this, and indeed of all the results this month, is at best questionable, which brings us to the aforementioned chaos. Following the race the organisers from North Shields Poly issued an apologetic (a-Poly-getic?) statement:

“Thank you to all for your patience in the funnels this evening and with the launch. It was a challenging evening and we are going to have a further look at how we can improve control over the evening of run launch and finishing processes.

Specifically tonight, some people were launched slightly out of sequence, but most notably about 30 runners ran behind the tape and went into the wrong funnel, meaning they’ll be credited with a higher finish position than actually achieved.

We know this was a completely honest mistake and there is absolutely nothing at all that I can do about this as the pace of the finish meant that actual numbers were lost in the stampede. Therefore, I must apologise to you all for the errors this will introduce to the results of GP7.”

It is not the first time that there have been issues with the finish funnel this year, and while it is not necessarily clear why, it must be acknowledged that those involved in putting on this event make an herculean effort every month, volunteers giving up their time in usually freezing conditions, without the aid of hi-tech timing or chip systems. I imagine most of us are understanding of the enormity of the task they face.

As for how our teams have been affected by the resulting melee, Tom and Dave, both Full Claremonty members, have no recorded result, and have therefore been penalised with the maximum amount of points for (incorrectly) being ‘no-shows’. I have inserted them into the below results as a rough estimate to where they might have finished, based on their handicaps and Strava times.

By my calculation, this would put The Full Claremonty in 4^th or 5^th, rather than 9^th. Roberto eventually had the correct amount of points retrospectively applied after the same thing happened to him last month, hopefully the same will occur this time.

Only six of us made the post-race journey to Toby Carvery, there will probably be a few more attending the end of season buffet in Cullercoats, following our run to and from St Mary’s Lighthouse. Looking forward to the mixture of flimsy paper plates, curry, sausages, chips and rice, raffles, creaky banter, local art prizes, and Lena toasting her January victory by collecting yet another snazzy Poly jacket.

Position	Team	Runner	Race Time	Actual Time
12	RS	Nina Jensen	39:42	26:32
31	T3W	Janet Palmer	40:16	30:46
41	RS	Mark Anderson	40:27	19:37
50	RS	Paul Robinson	40:34	21:24
59	T3W	Roberto Marzo	40:43	20:33
TBC	TFC	Tom Tinsley	40:46	22:36
78	TFC	Julie Cross	40:54	25:44
TBC	TFC	Dave Roberts	40:58	23:08
89	T3W	Izzy Neatrour	40:59	22:09
90	T3W	Holly Porter	40:59	23:49
105	J&TH	Aoífe Monaghan	41:07	25:57
116	RS	Laurie Johnson	41:13	20:03
133	TFC	Tara Hipwood	41:31	28:01
143	T3W	Alex Harding	41:41	26:11
148	RS	Luke Woodend	41:47	30:17
154	RS	Rachel Hurdman	41:57	28:07
155	T3W	Aaron Mansell	41:58	25:28
179	TFC	Lena Lou	43:14	37:44
183	TFC	Rose Hawkswood	43:35	37:05