Press Report 20th January 2015  

Ilford AC fielded 2 runners in the 25th running of the Benfleet 15 held at Hadleigh Downs on Sunday. On a very challenging multi terrain course comprising hard sections of sea wall contrasting with very boggy marshland and thick mud Bradley Brown was first home for the Club in a respectable time of 2 hours 5 mins 45 seconds for 129th place. The mud was so severe in places that at one point it claimed the running shoes of Peter Spelman who enlisted the help of a marshal to retrieve them. Undeterred by this Spelman still battled on to finish over 30 minutes quicker than last year’s time to dip under the 3 hour mark in 2 hours 56 minutes 58 seconds. This gave him 509th place out of a large field of nearly 600 runners.
The race was won by Woodford Green’s Thomas Beedell in 1hr 31 minutes 31 seconds with St Edmund Pacers Odette Robson narrowly getting the better of Havering AC’s Debbie Appleton to take top spot in the women’s race clocking 1hour 46 minutes 23 seconds with Appleton just over 2 minutes behind.
The overall race record is still held by Ilford’s Amin KoiKai who clocked 1.22.17 in the 6th running of the race back in 1996, a time that no runner has recently been able to even approach.

The previous day Ilford’s Terry Knightley made his parkrun debut when finishing in 10th place out of 221 runners in freezing and windy conditions along the Southend seafront. Over a 3 lap course Knightley also placed first in the 50-54 category age group recording 19 minutes 59 seconds. He was accompanied by his partner Kim Baxter.