Oxford City AC Newsletter – April 2026 – Oxford City Athletic Club

Co-Chairs Introduction

As we head into a new month, there’s a real buzz around the club. Training sessions are thriving, it’s fantastic to see so many new young athletes joining and enjoying themselves, and that energy is spreading across all age groups.

With outdoor competitions now underway, the season is well and truly up and running. Our athletes are looking sharp, motivated, and ready to make their mark—whether that’s achieving personal bests, competing strongly, or continuing to develop.

We’ve recently celebrated success on the international stage. At the European Masters Indoor Championships in Torun, Popsie Wootten was part of the British W55 200m relay team that won gold and set a new European record (1:54.96). She also took silver in the 400m—outstanding achievements.

As the club continues to grow, we do need more coaches and officials to support our athletes and keep everything running smoothly. If you can help, it would make a real difference.

Thank you for your continued support—let’s make it a great season.

Cross Country Update

Thank you to everyone who came along to our Cross Country Awards on the 28th March.

It was a fitting end to a great winter season and good to see so many people taking part in Parkrun as volunteers, pacers or runners.

Congratulations to the following athletes who received the OCAC Cross Country Award for the 25/26 season:

Under 9 Boys – Leon Nowakowski
Under 9 Girls – Vika Hardy
Under 11 Girls – Alice Mumme-Young
Under 11 Boys – Rorke Rowlett
Under 13 Girls – Kitty Mumme-Young
Under 13 Boys – Zac Chamberlain
Under 15 Girls – Tacita Kentish
Under 15 Boys – Evan Timbs
Under 17 Women – Amélie Lorimer
Under 17 Men – Kuzey Isik
Under 20 Women – Isabella Haines-Gray
Under 20 Men – Harry Cann
Senior Women – Laura Fenwick
Senior Men – Jonathan Davies
Veteran Women – Martha Lloyd
Veteran Men – John Kentish

There were a fantastic 12 entries in the XC Family Cup. The top positions, based on number of races completed, were:

Michael and Jamie Garry (17 races)
Brian and Amber Mackenzie (17 races)
Adele, Evan and Antonia Timbs (30 races)
John, Sylvie, Tacita, Asher and Jesse Kentish (34 races)

Well done everyone!

Quad Kids

Well at long last we are back out on track and the Quadkids had the opportunity to see all the hard work this winter pay off on track. This lead to multiple PB’s in our first 2 events.

First up was the Wessex league, this only allows the older QK’s to compete so our younger members had to sit this one out. Which might have been a good thing considering the weather in the afternoon. The boys team finished 5th of 7 and the girls 3rd. As a combined team they ended 4th on the day.

Loads of great performances across the board, standing out for the Girls was Jesca Storey who finished 9th of 43 and for the boys Xavier Flood and Rorke Rowlett finishing 10 and 11th of 53.

Next we moved onto the Oxfordshire with all our athletes available to compete. Again countless PB’s and great effort by all athletes. Some stand out performances in the U10 age group were, Freya Kavanagh coming 1st and Vika Hardy coming 2nd of 17 . For the boys we had 3 in the top 10 of 29, Leon Nowakowski 3rd, Henry O’Donnell 4th and Jesse Kentish 6th.

In the U12 section the standouts were Maya Anane and Elizabeth Smith joint 8th of 52. For the Boys Xavier Flood finished 9th of 53. Both U12 teams finished 3rd and when combined with the U10’s we finished 2nd on the day.

We would like to thank all the officials and helpers who enabled this event to go ahead.

Road Relays and SAL

Southern Road Relays

Teams from Oxford City ran in both the men’s and women’s Southern 12 & 6 stage road relays at Milton Keynes on 29th March. Both teams performed really well, the women finished in 24th position and the men managed 23rd, an improvement of 8 places and more than four minutes on last year. Results here

The next road relays are in September for the Southern 6 stage competition,

In July, we have two teams entered for the OxBelt relay, an 8 leg relay race around the c. 50 mile Oxford Greenbelt route on 19th July. It’s organised by HRR and is a really enjoyable local race. Each team carries a sensor that can be tracked online, so you can follow the progress of your team throughout the day. Vlad Kralik is helping to organise, but please get in touch with Becca or Duncan if interested in running.

Southern Athletics League

Oxford City senior teams compete in Division 2W of the Southern Athletics League (SAL), comprising 4 matches across the summer months. The first SAL match is on the 16th May at Abingdon – sign up as per recent email instructions, please contact Duncan Lawrence or Katie Sutcliffe if you have any questions!

OCAC Academy

The summer season is finally here! What an amazing start to 2026 with two cracking opening events! I am very proud to report that the Academy squad has opened the season with some outstanding performances, with PBs coming thick and fast. Our athletes are happy to be back on track.

Academy squad PBs,

Mili Miles – 100m and Shot put (almost hitting the sub 13s 100m club!)
Xavi Flood – 600m (sub 2mins!) and 75m
Tacita Kentish – 1,500m, 800m (now sub 2m30s) and LJ
Lucy White – LJ
Holly Simpson – HJ
Grace McCulloch – HJ and Shot put
Eve Walker – Shot put and Javelin
Angelo Jones – 100m (special mention, Angelo ran a blistering season opener of 11.64s for the 100m)
George Coyle – 100mh
Tobias Packham – 100m and 200m

While we love to list our squad achievements and celebrate PBs, please remember that one race / event does not define you as a person or athlete. If we keep up the grind and work hard, I am confident your goals will come.

In Academy we have many mantras, but two of my favourites are, Trust the Process – this doesn’t mean don’t celebrate outcomes, but rather highlights the importance of sticking to the plan. Your coach knows your goals and has a plan of how to help you achieve them, just believe in where you’re going. Second, Passion + Perseverance. Ultimately this one is about Grit; staying the course and working through those tough challenges. These two sayings fit so well together we literally wear them on our sleeves, if you can build this approach into your training, you will be very well placed for success this season.

If you would like to try new events and require some extra training, or you would like to look at an alternative approach to training, please do reach out, the Academy is open to all club members. Once we have a chat with your existing coach to assess if Academy is right for you we can arrange a taster session. Keep grinding and good luck with your next comp.

Best regards,

Coach Walker

Director of Academy

Bryan.walker@oxfordcityac.com

Horspath ParkRun Report 28/3/26

195 finishers for Horspath parkrun number 195. Who managed to engineer that!?

Our parkrun started finally on August 7, 2021, more than a year later than the intended date of 21/3/20, thanks to Covid. Richard Hart liaised with Oxford’s ex-high Sheriff Richard Venables and five local GP practices and it finally took off.

Since then it has been popular with local people and visitors and it’s been used a lot by club members of all ages as a very useful training tool. Which is why we decided to incorporate it in our club presentation on the morning of March 28.

We put out pacers (bibs with the relevant times borrowed from Harcourt Hill parkrun with thanks) and the following did us proud –

20 mins Harry Cann: 22 mins Neil Pinnell (daughter Hester would’ve been a useful 27 minute pacer; she was bang on 27 minutes!): 25 mins Jamie Garry: 28 mins Michael Garry: 30 mins John Kentish: 35 mins Rowan Waller. (We also had a 40 min pacer bib which we didn’t use, but Asher and Ruth Kentish ran near to that mark. The 18 minute bib could’ve been used by first timervJonathan Davies, who ran 18min 19. )

Other club members volunteered: Stewart Thorp and Becca Frake marshalled. Hester and Neil Pinnell sorted the tokens. Apologies to those who also turned up who I haven’t mentioned.

It would be good to have another go at this kind of thing – we still have the bibs. Maybe we can use the club’s 80th anniversary celebrations as an excuse!

Results blast

And here is the new Club Power of 10 Link

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