BRAT Round-up (WC 26th May 2025)
So its another sunny week and well done to all BRAT’s at the B’ham Uni track event last Wednesday. Some PB’s and much improvement was seen by all. Really pleased to see the training paying off during race season. Please can I request you to fill in the below form so we can shout about all the BRAT’s and your magnificent achievements. https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeu1afWfAugDKe908HTPe11nk-J-5sCnHrF3PFL43rFpITBSA/viewform Many of you are completing long rides and runs at the weekends and the nice weather is really helping. Bittell on Thursday evenings is now attracting approx 20 swimmers per week! Please support the session as we always need volunteers to support. This session is now open to members £6 and also non-BRAT members at £8 per session. Link is below https://clubspark.net/BirminghamRunningAthleticsTriathlonClub/Coaching/Summary/e8bb4836-8cc4-49cd-a0fa-33ae9e4bb60f Sunday morning BRAT rides: BRAT Coach Simon Pearson wrote…. After a delayed start, due to a technical fault with the ride leaders alarm clock, six…
Heart of England League – Results are in!
Huge thanks to everyone for your amazing effort! Special mentions: Matty, Alba & Robert – GCSEs + 2 days competing 👏 Amerai & Gabrielle – U15 girls stepping up to U17 with brilliant performances! Club records broken today:Muayyad – 300m (U15 boys)Jaya – High Jump (U13 girls)Austin – Equalled U15 boys High JumpAlisia – Equalled U15 girls 75m HurdlesU15 Girls Relay – smashed the old record by ~3 seconds! 🔥Hope I haven’t missed anyone!Massive shout-out to all the officials who put in a shift 💪And a big thank you to all the parents for bringing the kids and making it such a great day. 📅 Next match: 22nd June in Banbury – please save the date! Overall, an amazing performance from everyone. Wish me luck picking the next team with such a talented squad! 😅🙌 Results are here: https://hofe-league.org.uk/results-division-1/
BRAT Round-up (WC 12th May 2025)
Well, Super BRAT Claire Keene, 1st Place Roadford Lake Tri! Super BRAT’s John McKeon (5:19:34) and Leonie Goodwin (5:31:18) and Super BRAT Abbie Saker comes 7th 4:46:53………Wow you guys excelled at Outlaw Half yesterday….Amazing BRAT performance Super BRAT’s Paul Cannon and Helen Pike raced at 51 Fiver Triathlon. Helen finished 4th in Age group (2:52:41) It wouldn’t be a BRAT week without Ron Cattle competing Veterans Athletic Club 5 mile champs Battersea Park. 34:55 And Super BRAT Mark Ince setting another V50 record this weekend…..He did!!! James c Colclough M45 200m, Simon Pearce M40 PV, Karen Bailey W40 DT, Louise Robinson SW 400H, Alba Smith Pena 2000m S/C and Jenny Scott W35 HJ. What a BRAT team we have. Super BRAT Joseph Tuffin 2nd in the 3000m Loughborough International. Oh and what a day we had at Banbury Triathlon yesterday. BRAT Cleaned up the awards with the announcers stating…….”BRAT seem…
Warwickshire & Worcestershire County XC Champs- Solihull Riding Club Saturday 14th December
Write-up by: Nick Price (Junior XC Team Manager & Endurance Lead Coach) Some excellent performances by the juniors at the County XC Champs at the new testing course at the Solihull Riding Club. It was good for the juniors to experience racing on pasture / farm land rather than parks! The Champs is one of the qualifying races for the Inter Counties XC Champs at Nottingham on 8th March with 8 athletes from Warwickshire and Worcestershire being selected! Overall we achieved 4 podium medals and 3 team medals during the day which was a great team effort! U11G – Nya ran away with the race and looked comfortable winning her 2nd County XC Champs in a row! Isabelle 21, Veronica 25. Team 4th U11B- Another excellent performance by the U11s with a great 2nd team place again!! George 5, Thomas 11, Zachary 13, Jeevan 19, William 20, Walter 21, Sebastian…
BRAT Awards 2024
It was great to see over 200 of you at our sell-out awards night back in November at our new venue of Moseley Rugby Club. A big thanks to everyone involved in making this happen and a huge congratulations to all of the awards winners. With such a massive number of athletes competing at the moment, gaining a nomination is an achievement in itself! Regardless of if you won an award, you are all a part of the big BRAT family and we look forward to what 2025 has in store. The awards winners from 2024 and all previous years can be found here. It’s well worth a look at who has been awarded the various trophies throughout the history of the club, there are some big names on there. Thanks to Toby Gosnall who captured the night on his camera, you can view all the photos here.
Action Heart Tuff ‘Un 2024
The Action Heart ‘Tuff-Un’ returned again this year with another muddy challenge
BRAT again had a strong showing.
Sportshall Is Back!
Sportshall Athletics. If there was ever a form of organized chaos in athletics. This is it. The degree to which it is organized or chaotic varies from match to match and from club to club, but I’d like to think that BRAT veer slightly towards the organized side of things. It’s somewhat surprising, given the number of new faces we see taking part, not knowing quite what to expect. In Matt’s absence, I had the please of giving out the numbers. This gave a me a great opportunity to assess the general feeling of our athletes. I’d say that there were a lot of nerves on show, so congratulations to all of you that felt nervous at the start but conquered those nerves to put in some great performances. Our u15g team won overall and our u15b were pipped to first place by a handful of points. Out of our…
Junior Cross-Country League Is Back!
Write-up by: Andy Knight If the colours are starting to change at Walsall Arboretum, that can only mean one thing: the cross country season is about to begin! The first race in the prestigious West Midlands Young Athletes Cross Country League is always one of the many highlights of the BRAT year, and this was no different. I’m sure it’s not just me, but with every passing year there is a greater buzz around the BRAT tent, more athletes and parents staying for the entire programme to cheer on teammates and more under 11s than ever! There were countless standout performances, including many by athletes who have never run in a cross country race or even represented BRAT before; the hard work of athletes and coaches is paying off! Well done all! There was great drama in the under 11 girls’ race, with Nya Williams involved in a titanic tussle…
We are the Champions!
The BRAT senior track and field team have been crowned champions of the MidlandsAthletics League for 2024, some 35 years since we last achieved that feat!After a very encouraging 2023 in which we finished second in the top flight, we weredetermined this season to go one better – but I don’t think anyone thought that we wouldwin all four matches. After the disappointment of the May meeting at Nottingham being cancelled, the firstoccasion that all division one clubs met was at Nuneaton for the ‘Technical’ Match in earlyJune. All the Midlands clubs from all six divisions meet up and compete over the 8 mosttechnically challenging events (pole vault, steeplechase, hammer etc..). You competeagainst all six divisions and only at the end are points awarded against clubs from yourindividual division. It if sounds complicated then that’s because it is! However, it’s great funand as a result of our efforts we picked…
Heart of England League – Banbury – 23rd June 2024
the Heart of England league. Rewind back to this time 2 years ago and we were in division 3. Since then, we have had 2 consecutive seasons of promotion. My expectation was that we would hold our own and finish comfortably around the middle of the division.
County Champs 2024
There was fierce competition last weekend at the Athletics County Championships (both Warwickshire and Worcestershire). The competition for the most sunburnt spectator was marginally less intense than the competition for the most vociferous! Yes, we were blessed with an uncharacteristically hot weekend which was tempered slightly by a cool swirling breeze. I’m not sure if it was just me, but it did seem as though there was a headwind on both the home straight and the back straight, but we really shouldn’t complain given how unseasonably warm it was! As junior team manager, I take great pleasure in seeing our athletes apply what they have learnt in training to competition. I know that all the coaches share this view. Training and competition are different. You can not replicate the adrenaline rush you feel in a race when someone creeps on to your shoulder or the euphoria you feel when you…
Elliot strikes gold in Midland 5k champs
A strong team of BRAT juniors headed to Sutton Park on 23rd March for the Midland 5K Championships. Many of the junior endurance runners have trained with the seniors on Tuesday evenings throughout the winter, with some good cross country results coming as a consequence. This was another opportunity to see what they could do against strong opposition from across the length and breadth of the Midlands. Star performers of the day were the U15 boys. Team gold was secured with great performances from Diego Dalmedo (12th), Evan Tomlinson (6th), Josh Taylor (5th) and a magnificent individual gold medal by Elliot Dawlatly! The U13 boys also had a great day, taking team silver – missing out on gold by one place! Ollie Knight (3rd), Ben Eden (11th) and Joseph Baker (13th) were all delighted with their performances on the undulating course. There were also strong results in the U15 girls…