Pavilion Closed

As a result of vandalism, the Pavilion has been closed.

The Club had already decided to cancel our let as a result of increasing prices.  We will now meet in the old Grandstand near to the start finish line.

Linda or Gordon will be on hand as usual to assist with any enquiries.

Chris Bennett

Chris was taking part in the Reivers Development Competition in Tweedbank in the Borders on Saturday 22nd April.  He threw the 5kg hammer 58m 76cms which is a new personal best.

Chris followed this up on Sunday in the Hammer Grand Prix at Pitreavie where he threw 63.30m with the 4K hammer and 56.01m with the 5K.

His 5K effort was the second longest throw of the day with the 5K hammer.  Only one Senior athlete threw further.

Well done Chris.

London Marathon - 23rd April 2006

Two Victoria Park men completed the London Marathon on Sunday. 

Gerry Craig finished in a personal best time of 2:51:04 in 589th position and Mark Ashby finished in a time of 2:57:56 in 1005th position.

Martin Hayes represented Scotland in the Junior mini marathon and I'll post his result when I've got it.

CSSAL Meeting - Ayr - 23rd April

Kenny has organised a bus from Allander Travel to transport athletes and any interested parents to Ayr to compete in the CSSAL meeting.  The fare price has still to be decided.

The coach will leave from the car park at Scotstoun at 9am on Sunday morning.

It will be a long day, I would recommend a waterproof and a packed lunch.

Chris Baillie - Presentation

Victoria Park's Commonwealth Games Silver Medallist Chris Baillie returned to Scotstoun Stadium on Tuesday evening to meet with his team mates in the Pavilion. 

Loud applause was ringing around the old Stadium when Chris was presented with a new Club Tracksuit by our President, Graham Smith to mark his achievement in Melbourne.

Over 80 members of Victoria Park were waiting to welcome home the rising star of Scottish Athletics and his coach, Bob Sommerville.  Chris proudly displayed his Silver Medal to his team mates who ranged in age from 9 to 55 years.

Chris spent a lengthy period of time in a question and answer session with many of our younger members and budding journalists who wanted to know everything about his preparation for the Commonwealth Games.

Bob Sommerville explained how they had prepared for the games in Australia before joining Chris and some of our up and coming sprint hurdlers in a special training session on the track at Scotstoun.

The picture above shows Chris with his new posse and right, with his new track suit and Silver Medal.  Click on the images to see the bigger picture.

Chris informed his young audience that his journey to the top began when he joined Victoria Park when he was 10 years of age.

His next target will be the European Athletics Championships in Gothenburg in August.

Athletics Data

Ricky sent in this link to a new web site which should be useful over the next few seasons which records and allows you to search for results and rankings.

Chris Baillie - Sprint Hurdles - Training Session

Chris and his coach Bob Summerville will be coming along to training on Tuesday the 18th of April at Scotstoun.  Bob will organise a sprint hurdles training session for everyone who comes along  whether they are enthusiastic beginners, in pursuit of their first Scottish Vest or would just like to say that they trained with the guy off the telly.

Chris will be on hand to demonstrate the finer points and if asked will gladly show you his now famous Commonwealth Games Silver Medal.

We're hoping to take some pictures for the local press, so please if you can, wear your Victoria Park training kit.

We would appreciate it if everyone could meet within the Pavilion before 7pm.

Sports Coach UK Workshop Programme

Below is the Sports Coach UK Workshop Programme for March 2006 to April 2007. The programme for this year is split into four distinct areas

i.      Standard Topics - such as Good Practice and Child Protection, Coaching Children in Sport
ii.     Disability Awareness Courses - How to Coach Disabled People in Sport, Coaching Disabled Performers
iii.    Develop your Coaching Workshops - Five workshops to allow coaches to develop their coaching skills
iv.     Starting out in Coaching Series - Five workshops designed for beginner coaches.                        

Below is the application form and booking procedures for the workshops listed. If you require any further information regarding the workshop programme or coach education and training in general, then please do not hesitate to contact me on the number shown below.

Regards

James Tonner
Coaching Development Officer
Cultural and Leisure Services
Glasgow City Council
Sport and Recreation Section
20 Trongate
Glasgow
G1 5ES

Sports Coach UK Programme  -  Booking Form  -  Booking Procedure and Rules

CSSAL Match - 23rd April - Ayr

The Boys and Mens teams for the CSSAL match on Sunday 23rd of April has been picked and listed at this link.

If you have been listed and are unavailable on that date, please inform Kenny Gray (Team Manager) as soon as possible.  If you are available for selection and have not been included, please contact Kenny as there may well be cancellations.

Coaching Qualifications

Could all of our coaches who have attended courses in the last year please inform Gordon Innes of the details in order that our database is kept up to date.

Scottish Road Relay Championships - 1st April 2006

Victoria Park men were out in force at the Road Relay Championships at Livingston on Saturday the 1st of April.

The team of six finished in 27th place overall and they were also the 5th Vets team home.

The race was run over six legs with three of the athletes running the shorter 3.15 miles and the alternate athletes running the longer 5.8 mile leg.

Their individual split times were: Joe Doyle - 18:59, Phil Carter - 36:21, Derek Watson (Snr) - 17:39, Alan Hamilton - 37:22, Kenny McVey - 20:17 and Gerry Craig - 34:18.

Contact From An Old Member                                            

Hugh Barrow has been in touch to let us know that he had been browsing the web site and wanted to contribute a couple of old photographs for our collection.

Hugh first became a member of Victoria Park back in 1958.  He's pictured right running in front of a big crowd at Scotstoun in 1961.

The second picture is an invitation 3000 metres at White City London in 1968.  The other athletes are Gaston Roelants (Olympic Steeplechase Champion 1964) and Ian Macafferty (Commonwealth Silver medallist in the 5000m in 1970).

Hugh still features in three of our club records, the 4x400 yards relay time of 3:18.6 which was set in Glasgow on the 18th of May 1968, the 1600 metres medley time of 3:23.7 which was set in Glasgow on 24th May 1969 and the 1 mile medley time of 3:23.1 which was set in Liverpool on the 5th August 1967.

He was President of the club from 1972 till 1977 and again from 1986 till 1992.

He finally retired from running in 1993.

Hugh is currently the Club Secretary of Glasgow Hawks Rugby Club with the additional responsibility of maintaining their web site.

Calendar for April 2006

All of the junior athletes training venues are shown in Blue.  The sprint group training venues are shown in Red.

A reminder for our junior athletes, on Tuesday nights we will meet on the track at the Finish line.  Thursday nights we will meet in the Pavilion as usual.

Chris Baillie - Video

For those of you who were unable to see the race in Melbourne, I've uploaded a wmv file which you can save to your disk and play it in your Windows Media Player.  It is 1.7mb in size.

110m Hurdles Final, Melbourne, Australia - 2006.

UK School Games - Glasgow 2006

The Millennium Commission today announced that it will be funding the UK School Games with a grant of £1.5 million of National Lottery funding. This initiative was launched by Millennium Commissioner and marathon runner Floella Benjamin OBE.

The UK School Games will be run by the Youth Sport Trust and will provide a platform to inspire and motivate young people across the country to participate in school sport. This initiative is an excellent example of how National Lottery funding can make a real difference to children from across the UK.

The inaugural event will be staged between 7th - 10th September 2006 in Glasgow.

The sports to be included in the UK School Games for 2006 are athletics, fencing, gymnastics, swimming and table tennis. In each sport male and females will participate together in age groups selected by the sports.

Each sports representative Governing Body will use the Games as a catalyst to review and modernise their competitive structures for young people in sport.

UK Athletics has a dedicated performance structure, framework for development work and a competition structure that meets the needs of athletes at all levels.

The sport's broad participation base aims to continually attract new people into the sport regardless of age, background or ability. Coaches are key to development which are delivered through a thriving and well supported network.

An athlete-centred environment with clear, identifiable pathways and competition opportunities aims to ensure ambitions and potential are achieved. At the elite level the UK aims to be regarded as a leading European athletics nation and one that is consistently ranked within the top five in the world.

Structure 2006

Twelve teams will represent all regions of England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales in an U17 event taking place over two days of competition. A comprehensive timetable will include disability events and the majority of Olympic events in both track and field.

VPAAC - Winter Road Race Series 2005-06

The total points won over the three Winter Road Races is recorded below.

Three trophies have been won and will be presented to the winners at the AGM on Wednesday 5th April.  Athletes with a # next to their name will be presented with a medal on the same evening.  Medals are only awarded to the first three positions if they have completed at least two of the Road Races.

Well done to everyone who took part.

Just a couple of hours after Chris Baillie, a member of the Victoria Park AAC club in Glasgow, won a tremendous silver medal for Scotland in the 110m hurdles final at ‘The G’ in Melbourne today scottishathletics caught up with Bob Sommerville, who has coached the 25 year old Baillie since he was 14 years old.

“I am absolutely delighted with the way Chris ran in Melbourne” began Sommerville, “To win the silver medal and set a new Scottish record in the semi-final with all the pressure he has come under in recent times was fantastic.”

When asked what this will mean to Baillie and what it means to him as his coach Sommerville responded, “I am most proud to have taken Chris right through the age groups and to be part of what he has achieved. For his late brother Ross’ Scottish record to have fallen to Chris will mean such a lot to his parents Hugh and Sheila.”

Sommerville also paid tribute to the team that works to support Baillie, not least of all Kirstie Law, a member of the same training squad. Law, a former hurdler turned weight-lifter is also a qualified physiotherapist and provides a unique set of qualifications to devise and deliver Baillie’s strength conditioning programme. Credit was also paid to Baillie’s long-time training partner, Allan Scott. Scott, aged 23, has been with Sommerville since he was 17 and, prior to picking up a lower back niggle while out in Australia, was quite rightly being tipped for a medal.

“Although Allan narrowly failing to qualify for the final this morning, and will be disappointed in his own performance, I am sure he will have been the very first to congratulate Chris on his silver medal” said Sommerville. “ They are both very competitive in training and feed off each other in a very positive sense.”

Sommerville summed up with “Times and records are there to be broken but no-one can ever take away from Chris a wonderful Commonwealth Games silver medal.”

Gordon Innes, secretary of Victoria Park AAC, a club with whom the Baillie family have had a long association since the 1970’s, said “Well done Chris, what an inspiration to all of our young athletes, some of who have already started dreaming about the 2014 Games, some just want to be better athletes and some just wanted an excuse to stay up late!”

Nigel Hetherington, the new Scottish Athletics Sprints and Hurdles Manager said “What an experience for Chris in Australia. Four wins in four races culminating in a Scottish Record going into the final and topped off with an exceptionally competitive performance to claim the silver medal in the final. What an incentive for the sport and a credit to his coach, training partners, family and club.”
 

Congratulations to Chris Baillie for a magnificent achievement at the Melbourne Cricket Ground at 0750 hours GMT on Tuesday 21st March 2006.  Winning the Silver medal for Scotland in a time of 13.61.

His finishing time was just outside of the new Scottish National Record of 13.44 which he had set in winning his heat at 0145 hours GMT.

Chris provided a fantastic night of entertainment for those who could stay up to watch and I've no doubt the tension of the final put a few people off their breakfast.

I'm sure that Hugh and Sheila will tell him just how proud everyone connected to Victoria Park is this morning.

Chris said in his post race interview on the BBC, "It wasn't my greatest ever race but I'm sure my mum and dad are going to be proud of me and I'm really looking forward to seeing them in the stand afterwards".

Well done Chris, what an inspiration to all of our young athletes, some of who have already started dreaming about the 2014 games, some just want to be better athletes and some just wanted an excuse to stay up late.

Fantastic.

The 24th annual Alloa Half Marathon took place over a route between Alloa and Alva on Sunday 19th March.

Victoria Park were represented by Gerry Craig (right) who completed the course in a time of 79.43 mins in 19th place.

Mark Ashby finished in 42nd place in a time of 83.44 mins.

Victoria Park athletes were also involved in the Clydesdale Harriers 5K on Saturday 18th March. 

Drew Nicol finished the race in 71st place in a time of 17:36 although he was the 1st over 50 home.  Rab Daly was the 6th over 60 to finish in a time of 21:22. 

Gavin Murty turned out for the juniors and finished 4th junior in a time of 20:22.

Young Athletes Road Race

Victoria Park Athletes were competing in the National Young Athletes Road Race Championships around Falkirk Stadium on Sunday 19th March.

Paul MacFarlane finished in 41st place in a large field of U13's.

The U15 boys team finished in 6th place overall with Gregor Innes, Mathew Pollok and Gavin Murty finishing in 15th, 23rd and 37th places respectively.

The best place of the day went to Martin Hayes in the U17's race where he finished in 8th place.  Ross Gibson bravely finished in 24th place despite nursing a back injury.

Sadly that's the last of the Winter fixtures for the junior athletes, many of who must now move up to their next age group.

Don't worry though, the first of the summer fixtures will be along on Saturday the 15th of April.  The Dunbartonshire Track Relays will be held at Linwood Sports Complex in tandem with an open graded meeting.

Joanna Ross smashed Yvonne Murray's 19 year old National 800m indoor record with a time of 2 min 03.27 sec, while taking the bronze medal at the AAA Indoor Championships at Sheffield on Sunday the 12th of February.

Joanna was quoted in the Herald Newspaper as saying "That's more than a second quicker than I've run outdoors, and the best I have ever placed in the AAA Championships was seventh" and "It would have been nice to get the title".

Joanna has now set her sights on the European Championships this summer as long as there is no clash with the Club Championships at Scotstoun.

Congratulations Joanna.

A4 Poster

Scotstoun Leisure Centre have agreed to display a new poster advertising the Club Web Site.  Copies can be downloaded here if your local school, Sports Centre or other suitable location is agreeable to it's display.

Copies can also be obtained from Gordon or Linda.

Previous versions of the news page are archived below.

  Visitors since March 2005.