Welcome to the Official Weston A.C. Website

Unfortunately Hutton Moor field will be out of action for some time so we will meet at the following revised locations

Tuesday 30th June - Meet 6:50 for 7:00pm at Ashcombe Park on Bristol Rd Upper by cafe entrance

Saturday 4th July - Meet 8:00am - Drove Rd Rec. The car park adjoining now charges so park on the road around the corner if you wish to avoid payment

Following the cancelation of the final 3 races of our Weston AC 5 Mile Prom Race series we have decided to award the series prizes based on the best performance of 4 races from the 6 races that took place. Trophies and prizes will soon be on their way to the winners of each category and top 3 overall..

The top 3 positions in each category are shown here. Congratulations to all the winners:

1st Overall Chris McMillan Weston AC
2nd Overall David Eagon Bristol & West AC
3rd Overall Andy Cooke Bristol & West

1st Overall Female Chloe Williams Great Western Runners
2nd Overall Susan Duncan Weston AC
3rd Overall Francesca Rawlings Clevedon AC

1st MV40 Andy Cooke Bristol & West
2nd MV40 Matt Ellis Westbury Harriers
3rd MV40 Kieron Summers Weston AC

1st FV40 Francesca Rawlings Clevedon AC
2nd FV40 Helen Clark Bitton Road Runners
3rd FV40 Laura Croker Clevedon AC

1st MV50 Matt Wheeler Weston AC
2nd MV50 Paul Deaton Southville Running club
3rd MV50 Colin Pemble Westbury Harriers

1st FV50 Sam Mumford Great Western Runners
2nd FV50 Helen Ball Clevedon AC
3rd FV50 Helen Diamond Weston AC

1st MV60 Jonathan Goodland Great Western Runners
2nd MV60 Dave Wintle Great Western Runners
3rd MV60 John Mallone Nailsea Running Club

1st FV60 Felicity Russell Bristol & West AC
2nd FV60 Diana Pease Southville Running Club
3rd FV60 Karen Shears Wells City Harriers

Thank you to all runners that took part in the 6 races of this series. Further news about the 2020/2021 series will be posted as soon as Government guidelines permit.

Malcolm Gammon Weston AC

The car park at HM is out of action so meet 6:50 for 7:00 along Bristol Rd Upper by cafe entrance in Ashcombe park. You will be quickly split into groups of 6 (1 Coach/Leader +5)

We have now set up the first of the summers series relay events, the 5 mile road run.

Our challenge is to complete a 5 mile relay to support the 2.6 campaign arranged to support the charities affected by the postponement of the London marathon and many other events.

The challenge is free for all WAC members to take part in with a suggested minimum donation of £2 for the series to Weston Hospicecare, our chosen charity.

Run 5 miles on a course chosen by you any time between 30/5/20 and 20:00 on the 7/6/20.

Your run should be completed solo and take notice of the applicable government restrictions. Please make sure that you maintain social distancing and give priority to pedestrians and members of the public.

Please choose a course for your safety considering: location, road crossings, surface etc. and consider the time of day that you intend to run to limit disruption to others.

Please choose a course with the start and finish as close together as possible - max 4 loops. You can do it as either a loop or out and back course.

Results will be issued on team basis of combined times.

Please enter the race as described below. The coaching team will then allocate runners to teams to try to ensure a fair competition for all. If you are not yet ready to enter please drop a note to Sheryl Selway or Jim Wotton letting us know that you intend to enter the relay series.

Please submit your 5 mile Garmin or Strava segment record to the Opentrack system by 20:59 on 7/6. Detailed instructions on how to submit your result are on the Open Track site. Please set your Strava to event type 'Race' before submitting.

To register for the event go to www.Opentrack.run. You will need to look under Virtual and Competitions where you will find the WAC Relay Series 5 mile dated 30 May to 7 June 2020. You will need to register with Open Track before entering if you have not already done this.

We have now set up the second virtual challenge using the Open Track platform.

Our challenge is to complete a 1 mile run to support the 2.6 campaign that you will have seen announced in connection with the London marathon postponement recently.

The challenge is free for all WAC members to take part in with a suggested minimum donation of £2 to Weston Hospicecare, our chosen charity.

Run 1 mile on a course chosen by you any time between 13/5/20 and 20:00 on the 24/5/20.

Your run should be completed solo and take notice of the applicable government restrictions. Please make sure that you maintain social distancing and give priority to pedestrians and members of the public.

Please choose a course for your safety considering: location, road crossings, surface etc. and consider the time of day that you intend to run to limit disruption to others.

Please choose a course with the start and finish close together if possible - max 2 loops. If you choose a point to point course please try to make sure that the start and finish are at the same elevation. If you do choose a point to point course a penalty may be applied for any elevation drop or favourable wind conditions.

Results will be issued on an outright time basis. The result will also go towards a team challenge with the times of the first 4 members of a team being added together.

Please enter the race as described below. Please can the captain from each team let me know the 4 (or more) members of your team so that we can add to your entry.

Please submit your 1 mile Garmin or Strava segment record to the Open Track system by 20:59 on 24/5. Detailed instructions on how to submit your result are on the Open Track site.

To register for the event go to www.Opentrack.run. You will need to look under Virtual and Competitions where you will find the WAC 1 mile Challenge dated 12 to 24 May 2020. You will need to register with Open Track before entering if you have not already done this.

During these troubled times you would like to think everyone would be looking out for each other but unfortunately at the weekend a lady runner was subjected to harassment and verbal abuse whilst running in a country lane in the Weston area.

A vehicle with 3 males slowed down and followed the runner for a time, after verbally harassing her they stopped in front blocking the route. Luckily thanks to taking a calm approach and running round the back of the vehicle and quickly reaching a more populated area no physical harm was done but it must have been a very unnerving episode to experience.

The runner in question is fine but has asked me to warn you that unfortunately there are these people around and about the advice received from the police office that the incident was reported to.

The officer advised that, if you are nervous or concerned about running alone when taking your daily exercise, it would be a completely acceptable reason for running with one other person (not of your household) as long as current social distancing rules are observed.

You should not need to but unfortunately you also need to think about: where you are going to run, what time of day, who knows where you are going and when you expect to be back. You should also take a fully charged phone with you.

Jim Wotton

Please note the end date for this challenge has been extended to 10th May

We promised to set up a virtual challenge using the Open Track platform that has been made available to affiliated clubs by England Athletics.

Our challenge is to complete a 2.6 mile run to support the 2.6 campaign that you may have seen announced last week. £7m has already been raised through events taking place.

The challenge is free for all WAC members to take part in with a suggested minimum donation of £5 to Weston Hospicecare our chosen charity.

Run 2.6 miles on a course chosen by you any time between 30/4/20 and 20:00 on the 3/5/20.

Your run should be completed solo and take notice of the applicable government restrictions. Please make sure that you maintain social distancing and give priority to pedestrians and members of the public.

Please choose a course for your safety considering: location, road crossings, surface etc. and consider the time of day that you intend to run to limit disruption to others.

Please choose a course with the start and finish close together if possible - max 4 loops. If you choose a point to point course please try to make sure that the start and finish are at the same elevation. If you do choose a point to point course a penalty may be applied for any elevation drop or favourable wind conditions.

Results will be issued on an outright time and age graded basis.

Please submit your 2.6 mile Garmin or Strava segment record to the Open Track system by 20:59 on 3/5. Detailed instructions on how to submit your result are on the Open Track site.

To register for the event go to www.Opentrack.run. You will need to look under Virtual and Competitions where you will find the WAC 2.6 Challenge dated 30/4 to 3/5. You will need to register with Open Track before entering.

I mentioned in my mail on Sunday that the coaching team want to provide as much support as we can in these difficult times. We know that all EA activity is suspended until 31/5 at least, having seen yesterday that the Berlin marathon has been postponed again from 27/9, I don't see any changes happening quickly for us.

I know that many members have been enjoying their running recently and a bit of R & R from continual racing etc has certainly seemed to help. At the same time we have seen people taking on their own challenges and structured sessions. For those people who would like a bit of support and some session ideas, to help improve or maintain their distance/speed etc. we will post some sessions for you to consider. You can do these on a suitable circuit near to you and at anytime or day to suit you.

Jason has been posting detail of a virtual Saturday session and you will see from the welcome page training section that this has now been posted together with a suggestion of a Fartlek hill circuit for Thursday.

Sheryl has posted detail of our plans on the Weston facebook page and we also will post on there detail of suggested challenges that you may wish to take on too. The first challenge mentioned is tackling your pr on the KDH hill in Weston Woods or Rochester Close climb up Totterdown.

The England Athletics site has a lot of information and ideas that some members may find useful. There are a number of webinars and athlete interviews taking place each week and a club night quiz at 7:00pm for those missing their club meetings.

For any members who are home schooling youngsters EA have made the Athletics 365 information available free to everybody (coaches/leaders/members) until May 2021. This is an ideal guide that takes children through all aspects of running, jumping, throwing. It has a series of different levels that children can achieve on many topics that work towards a balanced development. Seeing some of the exercises and the different levels that need to be shown at each topic may really help you with ideas.

There will be more on facebook regularly but hopefully this message gives you some idea of the support the coaching team are trying to provide.

With regret due to the ongoing Corvid19 situation there will be no Beacon Batch Race this year - hope to see you in 2021

Club memberships for 2020/2021 are now due for renewal. Your committee have taken the decision that in this unprecedented period and with the current suspension of all athletic activity the £20 WAC fee will be waived for this year. We will require you to update your record on the membership system in due course and renew your EA affiliation if appropriate plus paying the EA fee. You may have seen yesterday that EA have decided to hold the annual figure at £15 for 2020/2021.

We will need to make amendments to the system to remove the £20 WAC renewal fee for this year so please do not try to update your records at this point. Until we have updated the system and know when the suspension of all activity will end we will provide an extension of all current memberships. EA have confirmed today that the date by which you need to pay to renew your membership is extended this year until 31/08/2020, hopefully we will have more news on this situation well before then.

A mail to this effect has been sent out to all members via the membership system tonight. We have also confirmed the postponement of the AGM and detail of the Sodbury ballot postponement.

If you do not see the mail in your inbox please check the mail address on your membership profile or look in your spam folder.


Jim Wotton