Southville RC Newsletter Christmas 2023
Hi Everyone,
Christmas Party and 2023 Volunteer Awards
A massive thank you to Sophie Patten, Ed Dening, Melissa Houston, Susan Boyle and Hayley Fox for organising the Christmas party. And a special thank you to Rich Pearce who was on his feet all night DJing and keeping the party going.
At the party we held our 2023 Volunteer Awards, recognising those who've put in the extra effort to make our club the special place that it is. This year's awards were as follows:
Sam Lewis, for consistently leading groups and for helping out behind the scenes with moving the club's kit and caboodle in and out of storage.
Kayleigh Doherty and Clara von Eye, for giving up weekends to answer the question "who marshals the marshals?" and make sure everyone knew where they needed to be for the Nightingale Nightmare.
Dave Liddament for all the planning that went into the summer Unicorn Challenge, as well as consistent group leading.
Laura Pease for stepping up as Club co-Captain and co-ordinating numerous races and social events throughout the year.
All our Volunteer Award winners will have their England Athletics and SRC membership fees paid for them for 2024/25, as a token of our thanks.
Annual General Meeting
The reconvened AGM will be held on Tuesday 9th January at 8pm in the upstairs room of the Hen & Chicken. If you missed our email covering the agenda and the officer election, you can read it here.
Keep an eye on your inbox, because there is likely to be an update to the Officer Election status in the weeks before the main event.
Bristol Frontrunners are looking for group leaders
SRC member Matt Austin is looking for run leaders to lead a multi-ability running session for Bristol Frontrunners, a social running group for LGBTQ+ people and friends.
They currently have a regular Wednesday evening run of up to 7.5km, ad-hoc longer runs on Sunday and parkruns of the month. The group is part of England Athletics' RunTogether programme and aims to overcome barriers that LGBTQ+ people may perceive or experience in getting into running.
If you can help them out, please get in touch.
Christmas break
The last Tuesday and Thursday running nights of 2023 will be 19th and 21st December. Fancy dress and tinsel is encouraged!
We'll then be on Christmas break, but you won't have long to wait - we're back on Tuesday 2nd January.
Everyone is welcome to organise informal runs in the Christmas break via our Facebook group, but bear in mind that the Southbank will be closed. There's also a special Christmas Day parkrun at Blaise Estate to yuletide you over. (Ashton Court, Eastville and Pomphrey are not doing Christmas Day parkruns at time of writing.)
And there's already a "save the date" for 2024; our Skittles Social is pencilled in for Friday 9th February.
If you're a group leader who hasn't taken a group out in a while, please consider putting your name on the board for 2nd January; we're likely to have the usual influx of New Years Resolutes.
Parkrun news
As always, the first Saturday of the month will see a big SRC turnout at Ashton Court. The first one of 2024 will be on Saturday 6th January.
There's not one but two tourism days in January: on the weekend of Saturday 13th January we'll be heading to Zuiderpark at the Hague, Netherlands. A number of us already have accommodation booked at Hotel Ibis den Haag, and there's a few flight options that weekend with KLM. Head to the Facebook event for more info on what others are doing.
And if you're looking for staycation Parkrun tourism, the week after that we'll be heading to Sharpham Fields in Cheddar on Saturday 20th January, replacing December's parkrun tourism.
Finally, in February we'll be staging another takeover of Ashton Court parkrun on the 24th. This is when we'll be filling out the whole volunteer roster as a club (and potentially adding some pacers) to give back to the parkrun community.
SRC group runs
Jim Plunkett-Cole will be leading the traditional New Year's Eve run round the Green Man - all 45 miles of it in one big lap of Bristol. (And if that's a bit of a stretch, you can always catch the train in Keynsham around 16 miles in, or at Parkway at 30 miles.) All are welcome - groups of similar paced runners tend to form naturally. It may not have the logistics of the official Green Man ultras - but it's free!
Dates for your Diary - Special 2024 Expanded Edition
🧡Sat January 6 - SRC @ Ashton Court parkrun
💚Tue January 9 - SRC Annual General Meeting
🌷Sat January 13 - SRC bezoeken Zuiderpark parkrun
🏁Thu January 18 - Weston Prom Run
🧡Sat January 20 - Cheddar Parkrun tourism
🏁Sun January 28 - Longleat 10k
🥳Fri February 9 - SRC Skittles Social
🏁Thu February 15 - Weston Prom Run
💚Sat February 24 - Ashton Court parkrun takeover
🏁Sat March 2 - Green Man Ultra
🏁Sat March 16 - 20/Half Fission
🏁Thu April 4 - Weston Prom Run
🏁Thu April 18 - Weston Prom Run
🏁Thu May 16 - Weston Prom Run
🏁Sun May 19 - Great Bristol Half/10k
🏁Fri May 24 - Towpath Mobmatch 10k
🚌Sat May 25 - Classic Quarter 2024
🏁Fri June 21 - Towpath 10k
🚌Sat June 22 - Breakheart Backyard Ultra, Gloucester
🚌Sat July 6 - Cotswold Way Relay
🏁Fri July 26 - Towpath 10k
🚌July 6-9 - Love Trails, Gower
🏁Fri August 23 - Towpath 5k
All the best,
Southville Running Club
info@southvillerunningclub.co.uk
