Tuff Fitty’s Track Power Hour
Tuff’s weekly track sessions are extremely popular throughout the year, but in order to keep the sessions fresh, Track Power Hour was devised and led by Barry Davids. Barry deserves a huge amount of credit, particularly in organising the event, not once but twice. Once the previous week when an incoming storm forced postponement and again for this week as the team sheets needed to be revamped. He also had a motivational playlist to energise the teams. It is appropriate to ‘hand the baton’ to Barry to recount the story of a very successful event below-
Master of Ceremony – Barry Davids
“The inaugural Tuff Fitty Track Power Hour took place at the Track on the evening of Wednesday 27th September. Re-arranged after the storm the week before, 24 brave Tuffs signed up and turned up for what turned out to be a fantastic team event. 8 teams of 3 with imaginative names were pre-picked, the idea for them to run a constant 400m relay for 1 hour, the winning team being the team with the most laps at the end of the hour”.
“The evening started off with an expertly led warm up by Leah who got the teams ready for the gruelling hour ahead. After the warm up we had a baton awarding ceremony where the pre-picked teams were called up, awarded their own coloured baton and had team photos taken, it was all incredibly exciting!. After a brief run through of the rules and safety talk, the teams were batons in hand, ready to go at 7pm!”
Cadence Counters – Verity Lacey, Mark Walford & Kate Cooper
Quads of Fury – Simon Thistlethwaite, Wendy Frost & Mark Sole
Smokin’ Laces – Spencer Scott, Leah Simms & Adrian Oliver
“Watching the first laps it was clear pacing may have been an issue or we had more potential Olympian Tuffs than we realised! The competitive spirit had taken hold, the Tuffs were going for glory, that was for sure and it was fantastic to see. Lap by lap the race started to take shape and it was emerging as a great race at the front between Speedilicious, Raise the Bar and Laziness Be Gone, half way through there was little between them. There was an equally fascinating battle at the back for the Wooden Spoon between Quads of Fury and Cadence Counters. This was going down to the wire, you could not look away!”
“Into the 2nd half of the race the weather hit. Battling high wind and driving rain the brave Tuffs battled on, everyone one of them showing the true spirit of what it means to be a Tuff. Through gritted teeth and beaming smiles they were absorbed into the event, determined to do their best and not let their team down. Fortunately it was only a passing squall, and the conditions faired for the exciting final laps.”
Baton Rogues – Katie Young, Phil Scales & Emma Hinton
Been There Run That – Carey Woods, Dom Amey & Dominique Noiret
Laziness Be Gone – Clare Worgan, Gareth Coombes & Will King
“As the countdown to the end started, every Tuff gave it their all for their last laps, determination etched into their faces. To hear the encouragement the teams were shouting to each other was inspiring, there was some true team spirit on display”.
“At the end, once the whistle went (much to the relief of the runners) the laps were counted and the results finalised. Speedilicious had managed to pull clear at the end, they had paced their race fantastically to win with 40.90 laps, the new club record and nearly breaking the now to be iconic 41 lap mark!. Raise the Bar came in 2nd less than a ¼ of a lap behind with Laziness be Gone coming in 3rd on the same lap further back. The Wooden Spoon was won (lost!) by Cadence Counters coming in a brave 8th but still managing to run a mighty impressive 36.75 laps (that’s nearly 9 ½ miles!).”
Raise The Bar – 2nd Team – Alex Webb, Nikki Gatland & Andy Gomm
Speedilicious – 1st Team – Liane Davids, Paul Martin & Olivia Morey
“A special thanks must go to the lap counters (Clive, Debbie, Jenny, Sheila, Tiff and Vicki) who were fantastic, braving the conditions and encouraging the runners and they managed to get the results together in record time as well. Also big thanks to Sue for being the event photographer. Without these people we could not have held the event”. Sue’s Photo’s are on the Tuff Flickr album – opened by clicking on the bottom photo.
“We also need to mention Malcolm who turned up as a super sub, just in case someone dropped out. Fortunately for them (unfortunately for him) we had a full attendance so he managed to run his own 5K as the event went on around him. Well done.
The final results are as follows:
And some interesting facts from the event:
- 313.15 total laps of the track run
- That is approximately 78.3 miles total run
- Plus 3.1 miles run by Malcolm
- Total of 81.4 miles
- Which equates to running from the track to Bournemouth Pier!
Keep your eyes peeled for another one of these in the Spring 🙂
Barry
