Striders ladies rule the Vanguard Way Marathon!

Striders of Croydon did very well to have three of the first four female finishers in the Vanguard Way Marathon on Sunday, starting and finishing at Lloyd Park. They were led by Kara Boaks who was the second woman to finish, placing tenth overall in 4 hours 29 minutes 05. She was closely followed by Rachel Lindley (4:30:00) and Charlotte Nusca (4:30:02).

Striders’ men were led by Martin Filer who placed sixth of the 64 runners (4:13:12). Michael Davis was 18th (4:49:57) and was followed by Keith Murkin (5:23:17), Anna O’Sullivan running her first marathon (5:23:18), Stephen Siu (5:23:18) and Debra Bourne (5:34:14).

In the half-marathon held in conjunction, Claire Mitchell was the seventh woman to finish, placing 29th overall (2:34:53) while Hannah Luffman was the tenth woman to finish, placing 38th overall (2:49:42). Greg Ivings placed 21st (2:24:59).

Tatsuya Okamoto ran very well to place 19th out of 145 finishers in the North Downs Way 100-mile race, from Farnham in Surrey to Ashford in Kent. He recorded a personal best of 22 hours 30 minutes 54 seconds, which lifts him to second place in Striders’ all-time club rankings.

A day earlier, Andrew Aitken ran well to place first out of 129 finishers in the South Norwood parkrun (18:31). Phil Coales was second in the Maxima parkrun in Utrecht (17:33). Striders had a total of 107 finishers in the various weekly parkruns, including 33 at Squerryes Winery.

Niamh Vincent was the seventh woman to finish the RunThrough five-kilometre road race at Battersea Park on Wednesday evening. She recorded 20 minutes 37 seconds, placing 27th overall out of 168 finishers.

Darren Woods placed 19th out of 34 finishers in the Veterans AC five-mile road race at Battersea Park on Tuesday evening, recording 36 minutes 26.