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The recent success of a number of our athletes over the Marathon has prompted our Chairman, Dave Parsons, to search his archives to rediscover some previous BAC successes at this distance and to reflect on the massive change in Marathon running over the years.
Dave joined BAC in August 1976 and, inspired by Club member John Hurt who was one of our first runners to make a name for himself in Veterans Running, Dave made his Marathon debut in May 1977 running 2:47:53 in the tough Isle of Wight Marathon. He subsequently invested the massive sum of 15p in purchasing the British Marathon Ranking List for 1977 which today makes for very interesting reading. There were a total of nine Bournemouth AC runners featuring in this list including the number one ranking British athlete of the year, Chris Stewart who clocked 2:13:57 in the New York City Marathon on 23rd October. The full list of BAC athletes was as follows:-
This was, of course, before the advent of the ‘running boom’ and the mass participation events such as the London Marathon. The list shows that there were just 1441 British athletes (male and female) who completed a marathon that year! The forward to the rankings shows that this was a record number as in 1976 there had been only 1224 and in 1975 just 868. There were also only 16 Marathons held in the UK in 1977. This meant that with so few races, County Championships had to be held outside of the County itself. E.g. The Isle of Wight marathon not only was host for the Hampshire Championships, it also included the Championships for Dorset and for Wiltshire. The introduction of the London was to change everything with literally thousands of runners of all ages taking to the streets and experiencing the magic of running and more importantly, completing the 26miles 385 yards and proudly clutching their medals and being wrapped in their foil blanket. In the 80’s and 90’s, BAC boasted a host of excellent performances from its athletes over the distance both locally and throughout the UK. The pick of these was local postman, John Boyes who was prolific over the distance and won the Glasgow Marathon and subsequently represented Great Britain in the European Marathon in Rome. Whilst he was to fall agonisingly short of beating Chris Stewart’s Club record, his PB of 2:13:20 in Holland was one of a whole host of superb times which must make him the most successful BAC runner over the Marathon. John was also an inspiration to many other runners from the Club with many of them being part of a training group which produced a string of excellent performances on the road and country for many years. It was in 1989 that the breakthrough for the Club as a team in the Marathon came with a tremendous 2nd place in London with the following scoring team:-
20th John Boyes 2:13:44 This placed them just behind the full might of Tipton AC, who were to prove a thorn in the flesh of Bournemouth again and again. It was the strength in depth of the BAC team which was so impressive though with the next three runners home also breaking 2 hours 30 minutes and becoming only the second club ever to achieve this feat. The next three in were as follows:-
Dave Parsons 2:25:06 We were not finished yet though as Harold Chadwick (2:38:31) and Ian Graham (2:49:29) made it eight finishing in under 2 hours 50 minutes! 1990 saw a repeat team silver medal for BAC with John Boyes, Larry Austin and Graham Moxham making up the scoring team (again behind Tipton). It was to be another four years (1994) before we tasted such success at London again and although nobody could quite match the superb times that John Boyes had achieved in 89 and 90, the strength in depth was arguably even greater. I believe that it was the first four team members to score at this time and they were:-
Mark Hargreaves 2:23:25 Yes, you’ve guessed it, Tipton were the winners again (they were beginning to annoy us!) but even they could not match the quality of the back up team with our next six finishers being:
Larry Austin 2:30:59 So we had ten runners in under 2 hours 40 minutes which is quite possibly a record. During the running boom, a whole host of new Marathons sprung up although sadly many of these were to disappear after just a few years e.g. Poole, Gosport, Gillingham etc. A look at the Club’s Marathon performances shows that 14 of the top 20 performers achieved their PB’s during this period. Our athletes also achieved a whole host of Marathon victories and it is excellent to see this trend continuing today with Jacek Cieluszecki’s recent victory in the Mauritius Marathon being the 5th BAC win in the last five years. It prompted the question ‘Can anyone recall a bigger winning margin by any BAC runner at any distance?’ I’m sure the answer to that is simple – no! However, Jacek joins a long list of BAC runners who have claimed victory over the ‘magic’ distance. I’ve compiled the following list of winners (in alphabetic order) that I know about and apologise if I have missed anyone out:-
Larry Austin – Poole & South Coast If anyone knows of any other winners, please let me know and I can amend the list! My search of my archives has revealed a number of names to be added to the all time BAC list and I shall send these to Ian White shortly for those records to be updated. My experience of my time with BAC has shown that when we have a good group of individual runners performing well, many others within the Club take up the challenge and improve. In view of the string of excellent times in recent years, the future for BAC marathon running looks bright. Good luck to all. Dave Parsons |
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