Severn Athletic Club members David Clarke, Imran Hassanjee, Farook Mota & Victor Marques travelled to Wales this past Sunday to compete in the Newport Marathon. 1st home for the club was David Clarke (v45) who finished in 377th place with a time of 3:30:52, David was aiming for around 3 hours and 15 minutes and was on course to achieve this achieving a PB at 15 miles but eased up around mile 17 due to pain in his knee. Next home was Farook Mota (v45) who was competing in his 2nd marathon within 3 weeks after competing at this years Brighton Marathon, Farook finished in 620th place with a time of 3:44:54 (4 minutes and 2 seconds faster than the time he set earlier in the month). Farook who many people will know from volunteering at the Gloucester City Parkrun also unselfishly helped another local runner finish the race rather than sprinting for the line. Victor Marques (v45) who was racing at this distance for the 1st time in 18 months followed closely behind finishing in 755th place with a time of 3:53:15. Imran Hassanjee who set off at a good pace after competing in last months London Marathon (pacer) and at this years Manchester Marathon was aiming for under 3 hours but unfortunately was unable to finish the race due to illness.

Severn Athletics other club members produced good performances at the local 5k parkruns. A welcome return to action from injury came from Pete Stephens who finished 2nd at the Cheltenham Parkrun with a time of 17:29. Prolific over 50 vet David Howells was 1st home in his age category at the Kingsway event finishing in 10th place with a time of 19:17.

Other Severn finishers:
Kingsway 

Andy Monro (v45) – 19:35, 20th Victor Marques (v45) – 21:21, 27th Marc Edgeworth – 21:50, 48th Greg Leyshon (v65) 22:51, 55th Kevin Probyn (v50) 23:34, 76th George Scully (v65) 24:57, John James (v65) 36:06

Plock Court

9th Neil Taylor (v45) 22:11, 70th David Blackburn (v75) – 32:25 (pb)

Gloucester Park

2nd Alex Rawlings (u17) – 16:56, 4th Ben Hope -18:40, 66th Emma Rawlings (lv45) – 26:35, 92nd Pratik Pradhan (v45) – 27:06, 128th Megan Partridge – 30:56