NEWS AND NOTICES
Interclub 10-Sunday 4th January
Our 10-mile race and competition with Harwich Runners returns at the start of 2026. Information about the race is on our website. In summary it is a fast course and a great morning of GBRC fun, so please come along if you can.
Great Bentley Half Marathon-Sunday 1st February
Please remember to mark this one in your diaries as we will need lots of volunteers to help with the race.
Parkrun socials
The next planned parkrun social is on 20th December at Mersea Island. Hopefully we will see many of you there spreading Christmas cheer.
NESS Cross Country – Next fixture 16th November
The next NESS fixture in on 16th November hosted by Springfield Striders. Information is available on the NESS website here: https://www.nessxc.org.uk/fixtures.php
And has been emailed to members. The new venue looks very exciting. One note from the organisers is that we must not attempt (climb on, play with etc) any of the obstacles.
NESS Cross Country – Our fixture 30th November
Thank you to all who have volunteered to help at or event so far. Rodger and I are busy making plans, and a list of jobs will be circulated in the week before the race. We hope that once again GBRC can host a fabulous XC.
Cross County other events
As well as having plenty of races to go at this cross country season there is also,
- Saturday 13th December 2025- Veterans (40+) Cross country Championship at Epping Forest. Details have been emailed for entry.
- Saturday 3rd January- Essex County XC Championships at Glouster Park, Basildon. Details about entry will be emailed nearer the time.
Fish and Chips
The annual fish and chips run will be on 17th of December. This will be the usual run around Bentley finishing at the chip van, collecting supper and enjoying this together in the hall. Orders for the van (so they can prepare) will be collected in the weeks before the event.
Club kit
A reminder to contact Barbara if you need any club kit. Prices and information can be seen on the website:
Official Kit | Great Bentley Running Club
And Barbara can be contacted using the new whatsapp group in the GBRC community.
Awards night Saturday 17th January
The annual awards night is when we get together and celebrate the various achievements of our members. There will be awards, a buffet and a disco to enjoy.
You can still sign up to attend – details of how to RSVP have been emailed.
Awards Voting
Voting for awards has also opened, and we encourage you to vote in as many categories as possible. There are various categories to vote for, and you don’t have to vote in all if there are some you don’t know about.
Details of how to vote are in the same email send by Magdalena.
Club champs
Linked to awards, don’t forget we have our club champs. These are explained here: https://gbrc.org.uk/our-races/club-champs/
There is a variety of distances to be claimed across all the age categories. The new club champs year has just started (by the time this has been published) so why not try for something in the new year?
Performance standards
We are happy to reintroduce real-life certificates for performance standards. The first of these were given out on Wednesday 5th and I hope you will agree they look rather fine.
Information about the performance standards is here:
https://gbrc.org.uk/about/club-performance-standards/
WHAT THE LADIES DID
I can’t believe how much the ladies have done during October!
Parkruns have been enjoyed by many and all over: Mary Ann ran both close to home in Harwich as well as across the channel in Amsterdam. At a trip to Roding, Mary Ann was joined by Helene. Sarah E was making light work of Sizewell, whilst Caroline was in Birkenhead. Another Sarah and another Caroline were in Poland parkrunning there. I am sure there were more ladies at parkrun… don’t forget to post on the facebook pinned-pose so that we might celebrate your achievements in this newsletter!
There were a couple of local 5-mile races where our blue-vested ladies powered round. At the Wix 5, Donna and Daniella both bagged PB times. At Capel there was a strong performance from Claudia, and we must congratulate Sarah E on her 1st place finish.
The Tiptree 10 was popular and yielded PBs for Magdalena, Donna and Rosie. It was also Daniella’s first attempt at the distance and Helen also enjoyed the distance.
At the Great South run, Donna and Lorraine were our representation, whilst Bev and Lou enjoyed the Royal Parks half (a PB for Lou!) and Mary Ann ran her half in Amsterdam.
Claudia was at the Tarmac Twister – a narrative trail around pavements that can confuse even the best navigators.
Katie ran the Clacton 10k and Vicky the Wildwood Trail half marathon.
On something a bit different, Sarah and Caroline took on another Hyrox, which yielded a PB for Carolne and another wonderful tea towel to take home.
October is traditionally a marathon month (being half a year after the other marathon month of April) and by golly you ladies were out doing the miles. Completing marathons this month were: Kelly Hayhow (Chester, PB), Kathy Bishop (Eryri), Magdalena (Night Sham), Larina (Lisbon) and Donna (Dublin, PB).
Finally, we celebrated the start of the XC season with the XC relays in Chelmsford, an Essex League event and the first NESS fixture where the Blues came in third (whoo-hoo!).
RUNNER OF THE MONTH – ladies
With such a big month of running it was tough for Lisa and me to select our ROM. This month we have selected Mary Ann Taylor, to celebrate her consistent participation at races and club events throughout the year as well as her performance at Amsterdam half marathon and various parkruns throughout October.
WHAT THE MEN DID
As usual, it was another tough choice for Runner of the Month, with lots of our men putting in strong performances across various distances and events.
October saw parkrunners taking on courses both close to home and further afield, from Gdańsk parkrun in Poland to Prospect parkrun in Reading, and Christchurch Park in Ipswich for our monthly parkrun tourism trip.
There were plenty of new PBs, including fantastic times from Dean Pepper (38:04) at Capel 5, Steve Bullen (1:04:04) at Tiptree 10, Dan Palmer (1:15:12) at the Great South Run, and Paul Brazier (1:33:27) at the Chelmsford Half Marathon.
Flynn Eyre was first runner home at the Clacton Seafront 10k, while Jon Mann and Steve Bullen both finished in the top 10 at the Wix 5.
The XC season kicked off with the Essex AA Cross Country Relays in Chelmsford, followed by the first fixture of the NESS XC League at Ipswich High School, where our men ran strongly to secure third place.
We also saw plenty of you taking on the big 26.2, including Justin Hayhoe at the Chester Marathon, David Balfour at the Blackwater Marathon, and Stephan Hogan-Steele at the Frankfurt Marathon. Finally, Tim Clifton ran the Chicago Marathon before upping the distance to complete this year’s Stort 30.
RUNNER OF THE MONTH – men
Despite all these brilliant performances, there can only be one ROM (let’s forget that time James Eyre and Matt Illsley shared the accolade…), and this month, that man is Billy Hamilton for his fantastic run at the Chelmsford Marathon, where he finished in 3:01:03, knocking a huge five minutes off his previous PB.
Anyone who’s been following his training will know that Billy has been putting in the miles and clocking some brilliant results in shorter races throughout the year and it all came together in a superb performance at Chelmsford.
Congratulations, Billy, you are our Men’s Runner of the Month for October!
Great Bentley Running Club 