Athletics in Beckenham, 1881

The last race of this year's Assembly League will be hosted as usual by Beckenham Running Club this week. While the 5k road race takes place on local streets, runners meet up and change at the cricket club ground on Foxgrove Road where the club is based, and most of the runners do a circuit or two of the cricket ground to warm up before racing.

Beckenham Cricket Club has been based at Foxgrove Road since 1867, and has been associated with other sports too since the early days. It gave birth to a tennis club in 1879, and judging by the following report, athletics was also part of its early activities.

 

In June 1881, Beckenham Cricket Club held its 'annual athletic meeting',  an event that featured both running and cycling races, as well as  entertainment from 'The band of the 11th Hussars (Prince Albert's Own'). The running races ranged from the 'hundred yards' to the Mile.

The 120 Yard Hurdles featured competitors from clubs including Beckenham Cricket Club, Private Banks Cricket Club, London Athletic Club, Arundel Athletic Club and Crystal Palace School of Engineering. Interesting that while clubs dedicated to particular sports existed by this time, the exclusive specialisation of athletes was not as developed as it later became - as is shown by a cricket club organising a running and cycling event, with cricket, football, running and cycling club members taking part.

The Mile Race (Open) featured 22 runners, with T. Shore of London Athletic Club acting as the Handicapper. Races were routinely handicapped in this period, with runners being given a head start according to their form and ability.  So the winner, J.E. Dixon (Spartan Harriers), had a 130 yard start while H.B. Burrows, South London Harriers was given a 50 yard start. It was 'A well contested-race, though the  winner led throughout, and won by ten yards'. Third placed H.D. Thomas (Blackheath Harriers) finished three  yards behind 2nd place, having  started at scratch (i.e with no head start). The winning time was given as 'four minutes, 24 and one-fifth seconds'.

The Challenge Cup 'was presented by His Highness the late Rajah of  Kolapore' to 'Mr A M Inglis, who had gained the highest number of marks in the club events', including winning the half-mile and the high jump. Other prizes were awarded by Lady Inglis (his mother) - Julia, Lady Inglis (born Julia Thesiger), lived in Beckenham after returning from India and wrote a book about her experiences in the Siege of Lucknow. Her son Alfred later played cricket for MCC and, on one occasion, Kent.

The cycling race included cyclists from clubs including Brixton Ramblers, LAC, Dewsbury BC, Crichton BC, London BC and Wanderers BC (in that period it seems that clubs were generally known as Bicycling Clubs - hence BC- rather than Cycling Clubs as they soon became known).

It was announced by Mr Percy Bicknell at the end that the rumour that  the club was about to give up the ground was untrue - in fact 'the ground had been secured for a period of 10 years'. Thanks to the efforts of these Victorian sporting pioneers, cricketers, footballers, tennis players, runners and others are still using these facilities more than a century later.

Source: The Beckenham Journal, 1st July 1881

(there are bound copies of this journal in Bromley reference library)

Running on Screen (11): Running to David Bowie

Woke up this morning and shed a tear or ten on hearing the news about the death of David Bowie. Others have spoken very elequently about Bowie today - I particularly liked Robert Elms' contribution when talking to Vanessa Feltz on BBC Radio London. I often think about Bowie when I'm running around the parts of South London where he lived earlier in his life, in particular in Beckenham (he once lived in Foxgrove Road, near the home of Beckenham Running Club)

I guess his most direct contribution to athletics was in the 2012 London Olympics where Team GB marched in the opening ceremony athletes parade to 'Heroes'. But there are a couple of very memorable running scenes in movies, both set to his 'Modern Love'.

The first is in Leos Carax's 1986 French movie 'Mauvais Sang' (Bad Blood - released in English as 'The Night is Young'), in which there is an amazing acrobatic dance/running sequence featuring Denis Lavant.

Denis Lavant goes for a run in Mauvais Sang

The scene starts with the lovers listening to the radio - Bowie comes in at around 2:28:

Incidentally there is another running sequence at the end of the film with Juliette Binoche sprinting across an airfield.

Juliette Binoche runs at close of Mauvais Sang

Mauvais Sang was presumably an influence on Noah Baumbach's 2012 movie Frances Ha, as the director chose to again use Bowie's Modern Love to soundtrack for an equally joyous run, this time featuring Greta Gerwig on the streets on New York

Greta Gerwig in Frances Ha

David Bowie, Let's Dance
'if you say run, I'll run with you'

Previously in the Running on Screen series:

Stick Man's Christmas Running Adventure

Run Lola Run and running Berlin

Walford Half Marathon (Eastenders)

Race Strategy in The (US) Office
Top of the Lake and The Fall
The Running Man (1987)
Muybridge's Runner, 1887

The Casual Vacancy

From Darkness

London Spy

Crystal Palace Dinosaur Dash Relay

The inaugural Crystal Palace Dinosaur Dash Relay this week was a great success, with a sold out field of 82 teams of three (246 runners) taking part. The 15k relay on Wednesday 17th June, organised by Crystal Palace Fun Runners, involved each runner doing a single lap of this great London park.

An inscrutable sphinx watches the runners go past, no doubt pondering the Riddle of the Sphinx: 'What is the creature that walks on four legs in the morning, two legs at noon and three in the evening?'  The statue has been in the park since 1854, and is a copy of an Egyptian original now located in the Louvre in Paris.

. Starting on the terraces at the top of the sloping park, where the glass building that gave the area its name once stood, the route wound down to the bottom of the hill... and all the way back up again. Of course it included a circuit of the lake and its famous Victorian dinosaur models, hence the 'Dino Dash Relay', and indeed proceeds from the race will be donated to the preservation of these  fine creatures, one of whom was represented on the event's medal.

source: wikipedia

There was a strong presence from local clubs, in particular Striders of Croydon, Beckenham Running Club, Dulwich Runners, Orpington Road Runners and Windrush Triathlon, as well as unattached runners. Many teams entered into the Jurassic theme with dinosaur-related names, and indeed the winning team in 51:47 was Striders of Croydon Velociraptor, followed by Dulwich Runners Malosaurs (full results here). I thought the best team name though was 'I thought you said RUM in the park'.

Kev Chadwick of Dulwich Runners, with the iconic Crystal Palace TV transmitter in the background

Save Athletics at Crystal Palace: update

The run showed yet again how important Crystal Palace is to the South London running community. As discussed here before, the park's athletics stadium, outdoor track, and indoor track are all under threat under proposals from the Greater London Authority. Crystal Palace Sports Partnership, which is spearheading the campaign to save athletics at the Crystal Palace National Sports Centre, has warned that 'in July the GLA are looking to grant approval for funding which could decimate athletics in South London, despite a huge groundswell of public opinion'.  Under these plans, the outdoor running track could be saved as a community facility (though even this is not guaranteed)  with the loss of the indoor track and other facilities (despite the support of UK Athletics for retaining and improving current provision).

The use of the wider park for running events like the Dino Dash and the weekly Crystal Palace parkrun could also be compromised by longer term proposals to build on the site of the old Crystal Palace building, which burnt down in 1935 - near to the start and finish point for this week's race. Fortunately for now the latest folly, which would have entailed a Chinese developer backed by the Mayor of London taking over a third of the park, seems to have bitten the dust

Dinosaurs in the park AND a rainbow - it was like being in The Land Before Time!

'Hilly Fields Hardcore' - 23rd place - top third placing not bad for these dinosaurs

The start and finish point for the race was also the same place in the park where The Chemical Brothers 'Setting Sun' video was filmed in 1996. The race was pretty wild, but not this wild...

See also Save Crystal Palace for Athletics... and Popular Culture

Save Athletics at Crystal Palace

Staying Out for the Summer - Start of 2015 Assembly League

It felt like the start of the summer season proper last week (April 9th) with a warm Thursday evening for the first fixture of the Assembly League in Beckenham. The League involves 13 London/Kent clubs in a series of six 3 to 3.5 mile road races between April and September. 2015 marks the 40th year of the competition (for a bit more history see here).

(see route at Map My Run)

After meeting up at Beckenham Cricket Club (the home of Beckenham Running Club), 237 men and women runners headed from the start in Foxgrove Avenue on a course that circumnavigates Beckenham Place Park on surrounding roads/pavements. The three mile route heads up and over Crab Hill in the first mile, then remains fairly flat until near the end. After the two mile point at Downham McDonalds on Bromley Road it turns back westwards, entering Beckenham Place Park from the Beckenham Hill Road entrance with the last third of a mile a long upward slope towards the finish by the old Beckenham Place mansion. On this occasion the final stretch was accompanied by a magnificent sunset.

The Mansion in 1805 - the 2015 finish line is near to those cows!

The race was won by Pete Tucker (Ravensbourne) in 15:18, with Kent AC's Amy Clements coming first among the women runners in 16:41 (Amy won three of last season's six races in the winning Kent AC team). It was a good start for Kent AC all round, coming first in both the men's A & B teams, and the women's A team. Overall we had 40 runners taking part, a great turn out. In addition the club's oldest member, Ron Hale, was on hand to buy drinks in the bar afterwards to mark his recent 90th birthday.

Next stop in the Assembly League is Victoria Park on May 7th.

Full results here

See previously: The Assembly League 2014 Finale in Beckenham

The Assembly League 2014 finale in Beckenham

The final race of the summer's Assembly League was hosted by Beckenham Running Club on Thursday September 4th, with 212 runners from 15 clubs taking part in a 3 mile road run starting out by Beckenham Cricket Club (in whose bar we celebrated the end of the season afterwards). First finisher for the men was Paul Martelletti of Victoria Park Harriers (15:01), with Amy Clements of Kent Athletic Club coming in first amongst the women in 17:10. Paul and Amy also won their respective senior competitions for the 2014 season, which consisted of six runs between April and September - three in Beckenham, two in East London's Victoria Park, and one in Battersea Park.

It was a similar result in the club competition, with Victoria Park Harriers winning the league for the men and Kent Athletic Club for the women - the latter for the first time, a sign of the growing strength of the South East London club whose men's team came third overall.

Kent AC women smiling  after their victory, with coach Adrian Musson
(photo form @ronnie_haydon on twitter)

Looking at the shield it seems that the women's competition has been won 17 out of 20 times by Dulwich Runners.

According to the Cambridge Harriers site, the Assembly League was 'set up in the mid 1970s as competition between the London Business houses, such as the banks, stock-exchange, Post Office and major local employers (many since closed) such as Molins and Johnson & Phillips at Deptford', the latter two engineering firms who at one time had big factories in South London. As industries have vanished from London along with their sports clubs, the League has shifted to consisting largely of established running clubs from the London/Kent area. Teams from Stock Exchange Athletics Club and Lloyds keep up the workplace running tradition, with other teams taking part including Cambridge Harriers, Kent AC, Eton Manor, Dulwich Runners,  Serpentine Running Club, Dartford Road Runners, Victoria Park Harriers, Petts Wood Runners, Beckenham Running Club, Eton Manor Athletics Club, Ravensbourne School, Ravens City of London Running Club and Aquila.

This was my first race since joining Kent AC, and while I don't think my time/position made any difference to the overall result it was a good run, even if the long hill leading up to the finish line in Beckenham Place Park seemed to go on forever. Good too to explore the Beckenham streets of Enid Blyton and David Bowie! (the latter once lived more or less opposite Beckenham Cricket Club on Foxgrove Road)

Assembly League 2014 overall results here