The New Year begins with sad news. Frank Dolan, a club stalwart in the 1980s and Ken Harding, an outstanding race walker across the second half of the 20th century both died recently. Frank raced in the famous 1979 Ewhurst 100 Miles, where a record UK 100 Miles field of 107 started, of which 78 finished, 37 being new Centurions. He clocked 21:33.14 to be presented with badge No. 656. Ken, at the age of 96, passed away on Christmas Day. He won the inaugural AAA Junior One Mile track championship in 1947. Almost 30 years later, representing Great Britain in a French Invitation 100 kilometres race he was an exceptional third, clocking 9:43:40 for the distance. Fuller tributes to follow.

---

Quite some time ago Ron Wallwork put together the following results of the races held under the banner of the Stretford Track and Field League from 1967-1974. I wanted to provide some context to this revealing data and at first I was confident I would track down the history of this significant initiative. Alas, this has not been the case. Even the website of the Trafford Athletic Club, successor to the original 1964 Stretford AC, in its historical section, mentions the League only in passing. Although it does recognise the innovative contribution of Roger Colson, who was working as civil engineer for Stretford Borough Council and running for Manchester AC as one of their top middle-distance runners.

In 1964 Roger was approached by Alderman Armitage of Stretford Borough Council for support in setting up an athletics club based at the newly-built Longford Park Stadium. Roger became the club secretary, initially sharing the role with another local runner, Ken Owen.

Roger displayed an insatiable appetite for new ideas, which far outlasted his Stretford AC years. It is perhaps significant that he seemed to value innovative projects in their own right rather than just as devices for raising funds for the club or its public profile. At various times he instigated the Club press cuttings files (assiduously maintained for over 15 years), paarlauf sessions at Longford Park, the Stretford Track and Field League (which eventually became a role model for promoters, with Roger writing a “how-to” guide on the subject), the Club Newsletter (which Roger wrote and printed at home on an old duplicator in his outhouse), sales of affordable athletics kit at the track (for which he set up his own sports goods business).

My scratchy memory is that the League took place on Tuesday evenings during the summer, roughly 4-6 times. The first event was the walk, starting around 6.30 p.m. according to the distance. The final event, a 3 miles or 5,000 metres race took place at the latest by 9.00 p.m. The League did attract high quality fields, especially in the middle distances with the British Milers Club of the time to the fore.

Ron comments: I found the research into the Stretford League so interesting as its span; 1967 to 1973 was a period of a thriving club; Healthy turnouts, performing at a good standard (albeit without the complication of the A rule) national senior and junior success and new talent, the likes of Tony Malone, Eric Crompton and Chris Harvey.

I hope the results attached bring back memories which for the most part are of great times.

The elephant in the room is that 1973 saw a group of us, Ron, myself, Julian Hopkins, Chris and Warren Bolton, together with Fred Pearce and Guy Goodair join Blackburn Harriers. In retrospect it was a huge mistake. However the principal reason for our departure, our desire to emphasise race walking as a discrete discipline within athletics as a whole was not without its merit. Given this post is focused on the Stretford AC Track and Field League the reader might well wonder why we didn’t consider a move to Stretford rather than Blackburn. As it was, within only a few years all of us had returned to Lancashire’s colours, apart from Ron, who had embarked on a new career, moving to Leicestershire and East Anglia. One of these days I will offer a fuller account of this short-lived dramatic interlude in our club’s history.

Returning to our subject, the Stretford League, it continued for a good few years and drawing on Tony Malone’s diaries I will provide further evidence of its impact on our club’s members.

To close, on an indulgent note, one of my specific memories from May, 1974 is of going under thirteen minutes for 3,000 metres at around 7.00 p.m and being challenged at 9.00 to run the final 3 miles race under fifteen minutes. I didn’t manage it, failing by 10 seconds but gave it a crack. Looking back it is sobering to reflect that I thought I was motoring, doing around 75 second laps!!!