We had 17 runners out contesting the February event. No newbies but 4 (Ric Pike, Harry Rosen, Christian Brookes and Stephen Lowy) runners were making their first appearance of the year.
Once again conditions were near perfect and on a tough night for the handicapper some 70% of the runners were able to meet or beat their handicap. The sweet spot for the blanket finish was again around 10secs below par and 10 runners were in the mix and able to enjoy that particular pleasure. The real fun of handicap racing is it’s inclusiveness and last night our low handicapper (Gill, off 54secs) and our high handicapper (Ryan, off 6min31secs) were genuinely racing head to head to the line in that blanket finish. Ryan did catch and pass Gill to prevail by a single second but neither actually won the race.
Our winner was Kevin Frisby back from various ailments and injuries to storm round 48 secs under handicap. Second was Pete Sansome (25secs under) also coming back from injury and showing fine pace to catch and pass Ric Pike (3rd, 22secs under) in that charge to the line. Special mention here for Jack Sansome who didn’t make the podium tonight but who was for the first time carrying a higher handicap than his Dad….move over old man!
Fastest on the night overall was Ryan Gresty (6’18 and improving to #28 on the honours board) with Pete Sansome (6’30) and Harry Rosen (6’32, improving to #53) the other sub-7 speedsters. Sarah Witt (7’47, running well and back within 3secs of her 2020 event PB) and Liz Marshall (7’53) were our sub-8 females.
The overall standings are still just an indication at this stage since there are 12 events and 4 discards in the series. It really is still all to play for but that said Ryan Gresty, James Bailey and Jack Sansome sit top of the current standings. In any case each event is a standalone bit of fun in itself so please feel free to come along and get yourself into the mix next month.
After only 2 events we’re already down to only 13 people in the whole world who still have a chance of achieving the mythical 12 out of 12 in 2025.
New to this and wondering what it is all about? A monthly handicap race (on the first Thursday of the month) around an urban 1.14-mile loop in the Harestock area of Winchester. That means that the next race in the 2025 series will be on 6th March. More info here: Harestock Handicap