RUNNER-WRITER Andy Atkinson has recently reported from Roadrunners’ trips to races in Germany, Spain and the USA. “Wherefore art thou?” now, Andy? The answer is Italy for the Romeo and Juliet Half Marathon in the beautiful northern city of Verona. Here’s his dispatch…

IN my view, different countries suit different seasons. England’s season is the autumn, with golden leaves, cooler nights and often brilliant days illuminated by a low-slung sun. 

Canada’s season is winter, with crisp snow, frozen lakes, skating and skiing. 

But for late winter and early spring, there is nothing to compare with Italy. Although sometimes variable, the climate is often ideal for running — cool, even cold, in the shade, with a bright blue sky overhead and enough heat in the sun to sip Chianti outside.

Thus it was when I arrived at Verona with my wife Liz to run the Guilietta and Romeo Half Marathon. Motives for the visit were mixed as romance was also very much in the air.

The Half is set over St Valentine’s weekend and the city was busy with tourists eager to live the Shakespearian dream. 

The city authorities have embraced Shakespeare with gusto, turning fictional locations to reality and charging for admission accordingly. We took up the spirit of the weekend and queued with the rest for a go on Juliet’s balcony. (Above: the star-cross’d lovers).

We were doing the half with friend and fellow Roadrunner Fiona Ross, but went out a day earlier than her on the Thursday. 

After an overnight stop at a Gatwick hotel, with two other Roadrunner friends, John and Lorraine Bailey (who also happened to be travelling to Verona, but on a skiing trip), we arrived in time for some sightseeing and food before sleep. 

Fiona’s trip was not so smooth, if a little more adventurous. Italian air traffic control decided to strike on the Friday of her journey, delaying arrival by a day and making all subsequent flights doubly busy. 

The best flight she could get was to Milan, with a train transfer to Verona. This, at least, gave her plenty of opportunities to practise her Italian, while we strove to minimise the delay by collecting her number at the expo.  

The delay was compensated on Saturday evening by more speaking practice with Fiona’s Italian connections — her sister, Italian husband and two delightful children live near Padua and travelled over to meet us. 

After some difficulty finding anywhere to eat on such a busy weekend, we settled down at a swish, but minimalist, restaurant. Liz, who is studying Italian, promptly dug out her homework and got both father and children to help her. I don’t know if you call that cheating or creative exploitation! 

Interestingly, the race pasta party was AFTER the run and thus not much help to us on that evening.

The half marathon is one of three races run on the day — a ‘fun’ 5k, the half itself and the ‘duo’. The last is a relay designed to be run by couples, presumably keeping to the Romeo and Juliet theme. One half of the couple runs the first half of the race and the other takes over at halfway (which is back at the starting point as the course is a two-lapper). 

This format conveniently keeps the couples apart except at the changeover — I suspect a very clever device to maintain harmony between lovers. Liz and I needed no separation and, more or less, stuck together from start to finish. 

Fiona, restrained by no such fettering, sped onwards to a near five-minute personal best. We later commented that, if Romeo was in pursuit, he would not have caught her!

Overall, this is a very good race. It is flat and fairly fast, provided you can negotiate some uneven cobbled streets. It is not too big at about six thousand runners, most runners are Italian and of a good standard and it is well organised.

Spectator support is enthusiastic and positive, the route takes in the best sights of the city and weaves through interesting streets in the old town. The finishing line commentary is excellent and, after reaching the 21k-mark still in harmony, Liz and I were greeted with our own special announcement. 

Verona is welcoming, well worth a visit and forms a beautiful backdrop to lively races. 

Pictures: Fiona Ross and Liz Atkinson.

Headline and caption: William Shakespeare.

TWO new Reading Roadrunners club records were set and three team trophies captured at the highly successful 25th anniversary Bramley 20/10 races.

Rob Corney demolished the club’s long-standing ten miles’ benchmark and Matthew Richards improved his own 20 miles record by exactly one minute.

There were team prizes at the longer distance for both our squads, Seb Briggs and Lance Nortcliff helping Richards take the men’s honours and Caroline Hoskins, Sarah McDade and Katherine Sergeant clinching the women’s award.

And, more than 24 hours after the event, the club collected a third trophy from our flagship event following a dispute over the men’s ten-mile team prize.

Newbury, ironically led by our second-claimer Matt Green, were originally announced as winners, but Roadrunners’ men’s team captain Phil Reay contested the award, claiming that the prize should go to our three scorers – Corney, Jack Gregory and Grant Hopkins – on aggregate times rather than positions. FR Systems, who organised the chip-timing and results, later confirmed that Roadrunners were the rightful champions.

The issue followed an amusing few days of kidology in the Roadrunners camp. Corney and Gregory calculated that they would have a good chance of the team prize if they could find a quick third finisher and they settled on Hopkins as the man to do the job. “No pressure,” they told him. “But…”

The bearded Welshman (left) showed he could take a massive step up with a stunning nine-minute PB, coming home 35th in a time of 62:44 and completing a brilliant weekend after a first-place finish at a parkrun on the previous day.

Corney, meanwhile, was celebrating his SIXTH club record, taking no less than two minutes and 42 seconds off the mark which had stood to Howard Grubb way back in 1995 and more than three minutes off his own PB.

“It’s always nice to break a club record,” said Rob, “and I was quietly confident I’d get it today. The original aim was to try to go as close to 51 minutes as possible, preferably under. It just turned out to be one of those races where you feel good on the day, so when the first mile came up at about 4:45 I just went with it.”

He went though the first 5k in 14:48, a time which would have slaughtered the club record at that distance, and from there the result was never in doubt.

In fact he won by almost five minutes and club chairman Carl Woffington, waiting at the finish, said: “ Rob was so far ahead we were starting to wonder if something had gone seriously wrong with the race.”

He now holds club records at parkrun, five miles, 10k, ten miles, half marathon and marathon.

Rob’s training partner Jack Gregory (54:38) was just pipped for second place by the Southampton runner Matthew Bennett.

Besides Corney and Hopkins there were personal bests for Chris and Gemma Buley (right) as well as Chloe Lloyd, Moira Allen, June Bilsby and Jenny Boxwell. 

But the real bragging rights of the day went to the club’s social secretary Hannah McPhee, who sliced an amazing 20 minutes off her previous best for the course.

Gemma, following up her successful Hampshire Cross Country League campaign, was third lady home behind the Reading AC speedster Naomi Mitchell, and her time of 63:22 represented an improvement of more than five minutes.

She was helped to second place in the team competition by birthday girl Julie Rainbow, the second FV50 to finish, and Chloe Lloyd (left), who benefited from some well-judged pacing by Stuart Jones to secure a six-minute PB.

Back out on the course, Matt Richards was showing the 20-milers the way home and his finishing time of 1:52:39 took exactly 60 seconds off the club record he set at the same event two years previously.

And while Corney will target an autumn marathon this year, Richards, who beat him at London last year, will head to Boston in April in winning form. “It was not as comfortable as I would have liked,” he said. “I probably went a bit too hard on the first lap but I’m definitely on track for Boston.”

The second Roadrunner under two hours was Seb Briggs, third vet home in 1:57.37, and the trophy was secured by Lance Nortcliff with 27th place in 2:08.28.

Lance’s comment “Matt and Seb were racing but I was on as training run” suggests he will be in good shape for the London Marathon.

In the women’s race our first finisher Caroline Hoskins (2:19.13) had no less than 12 minutes to spare over her nearest FV50 opponent and with Sarah McDade (2:21.26) and Katherine Sergeant (2:21.47) in close support they were convincing winners of the team bling.

PBs at the two-lapper were achieved by Sarah Dooley, Fleur Denton, David Walkley, Andrew Butler, Alice Carpenter and, by the little matter of 24 minutes, Ben Fasham.

As ever, the true heroes of the day were the behind-the-scenes back-up crew of committee members, marshals, volunteers and other helpers who made the event such a success.

Corney himself said: “Congratulations are in order to the race organisers and all the volunteers who put their time and effort into the race. They should be very proud of the result and are a huge credit to the club.”

Race director Adele Graham said: “Huge thanks to everyone. You are all awesome.”

Speaking as someone who plodded around towards the rear of the 20 miles race, I would like to add special thanks to some of our noisy, proactive marshals, like Peter Higgs, Simon Denton and Chris Cutting, who provide such great support on the course.

Particular gratitude must go to Sian James, who came straight to the race off a 12-hour flight from Hong Kong to marshal on the nasty incline at mile six, running down to pace runners up the climb while shouting encouragement. Priceless!

Pictures: Chris Drew, Mike Sankey and Melvyn Lovegrove

Results: http://results.sporthive.com/events/6502862085676377600

FASTEST postman in the west Brian Kirsopp is celebrating winning his first England vest but admits: “Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would ever do it.”

Brian earned his international call-up by finishing third MV55 in the fiercely-competitive Chichester Priory 10k in a new personal best time of 36 minutes 39 seconds.

His qualification was the culmination of a highly successful six weeks of racing in which he:

• Took second place in the Run Home Marathon in 3:14.05 (clinching a MV50 club championship and marathon championship double)

• Picked up the MV50 prize at the Gutbuster 10 mile race

• Scooped up another MV50 trophy at the Woodcote 10k

• Produced strong runs for Roadrunners’ Hampshire League and Thames Valley XC League teams  and at the South of England AA Championships on the fearsome Parliament Hill course.

Now he can look forward to representing the England Age Group Masters team at the Great Birmingham 10k on May 26th.

Brian and his Masters team-mates will line up at the front just behind the international elites in a race which usually attracts live television coverage.

But first he can proudly look back on what he thinks was a “massive achievement.”

“It all started back in December when I ran every day for at least three miles,” he said.

“That was in an event called Marcothon, a Facebook group that encourages runners to do three miles or 25 minutes every day for the month.

“Towards the end of the month I entered a marathon organised by Saturn Running and thought I’d completely fail given the extra mileage and tired legs. On the contrary I found that my endurance got me second place in a time that I had targeted with a few minutes to spare.

“That really increased my confidence for the Gutbuster, at which I also gave everything and found that I could still have a good finish.

“My main focus was to win my age category at the Woodcote 10k. I managed to do the first downhill 5k in under 18 minutes and held on up the climb to win in a course PB of 38:24.

“That showed me that if I trained harder I could run faster. It gave me the self-belief that I could achieve my goals if I changed my mental outlook to racing.”

By that stage Brian had received the England Athletics email announcing Age Group Masters representative opportunities, but considered they were “something the faster runners did and way out of my league.”

When he learned that the qualification target for his age group was 39 minutes, he thought: “That’ll be easy.”

But then he looked up last year’s results at Chichester, where the third-placed MV55 ran 35:57, and said: “My heart sank. Even if I ran my track 5k PB of 18.25 twice that would still leave short by quite a margin.

“But I entered anyway knowing I had nothing to lose and that the experience would do me good.

“Sandy Sheppard gave me a lot of encouragement, as did the club captains Phil Reay and Sam Whalley. I knew I was capable of running faster but I also knew I had to beat myself mentally as that’s where I fail in races.

“At the club dinner-dance Phil told me in no uncertain terms to “toughen up” and to “bite the bullet” and just go out and do it.”

Race day didn’t start well. After a late night at the dinner-dance he set his alarm for 6.15am, only to wake at 4.45am. “I suppose that’s quite normal for a postman,” he said, “but unhelpful before a race when sleep is important.” However, his customary double-strength coffee set him up well for the day.

“I left early because the roads were frozen,” he said. “When I started out my car temperature gauge said minus five. By the time I got to Odiham it had gone down to minus 11. Fortunately when I arrived at Goodwood it had gone up to minus one. Cold, but not uncomfortably so.

“Looking at the other runners in my pen (35-45 minutes) I could tell it was going to be fast-paced. They were nearly all Harriers or AC runners.

“There is a danger of setting off too quickly in that company, what with the adrenaline and atmosphere, and I did exactly that.

“My target pace was six-minute miles for the first half and then to see what I had left. But I shot off at the gun and did 5:37 for the first mile.

“It was slightly downhill so I forgave myself and tried to slow it down but still did 5:49 for the second mile.

“That actually felt comfortable, so I kept that pace and did the next mile in 5:51. But it was slightly uphill and took a lot out of me. Looking at my watch at the 5k point, I realised I smashed my PB for that distance with 17:58.

“The first 6k of the course is on mildly undulating roads and the last 4k is on the Goodwood motor racing circuit, with the end, fittingly enough, being on the Finishing Straight. On entering the track I’d developed a stitch and was worried that I was going to start being overtaken.

“I finished my fourth mile in 5:58 but held my position. The next mile was painful. I had slowed to 6:02 with a chasing pack closing me down, so it was time to put Phil’s words at the dance into action.

“I managed to get back to 5:56 for the last mile and pushed with everything I had left for the rest of the race at 5:32 pace to finish in 36:39, a PB by one minute and 19 seconds.

“I knew I’d run the fastest I’d ever run… but was it enough? I saw the results being pinned to a board near the finish and looked to see how many had beaten me. THIRD MV55! Beyond all expectations I’d done it and now I’ll be wearing the coveted England top. Onwards and, hopefully, upwards.”

Quick to congratulate the Roadrunners’ latest international, captain Phil Reay said: “I first met Brian at an awards ceremony four years ago where he was collecting several gongs. He’s been stockpiling age category awards ever since.

“He’s a regular scorer for the club at team events and I’m delighted all his hard work has resulted in an England vest.”

The first seven men home in the Chichester Priory 10k all broke 30 minutes, with William Mycroft, of the Enfield and Haringey club, taking the win in 29:32.

The women’s title went to former Olympian and regular Diamond League star Steph Twell in 33:17.

Brian will become the third Roadrunner to wear an England vest in the last year after Caroline Hoskins (above) represented her country at the 10k distance last May and Jane Davies (left) did so in the Chester Marathon in October.

Several more Roadrunners will be chasing England Age Group Masters honours in the Fleet Half Marathon on March 17th.