Kevin Newell  

For obvious reasons this is not the usual format for our ‘Who’s Who’ series, but if the club is going to have a record of our runners for future generations to read about then the records will be very incomplete without recording KEVIN NEWELL.

Kevin was one of our top runners, and as you can see from the PB’s below competed in absolutely everything at the top level.

Sadly on January 8th 2015 Kevin suffered a serious injury at work which means he will always need round the clock care and will never run again, but his presence and enthusiasm at races and training will always be missed by those of us who were around at the time.

Event            PB

100m            16.6s

200m            33.8s

400m            66.28s

800m            02:23.0

1500m          04:44.1

Mile             05:12.1

3000m         09:47.5

5000m         17:11.1

10000m       35:43.4

1M              05:16

5K              17:31

parkrun      17:26

5M            28:26:00

10K          35:27:00

10M         57:31:00

HM         78:19:00

20M        02:07:22

Mar        02:48:57

I invited people to share some recollections of Kevin, which are included below :- 

Things that I remember are being a spurs fan, always loved a cake and could put away quite a lot of it. Always knew his stats! Like every stat and run he had ever done and also that everyone else had done! – Jenni

 

It was Friday 8th January 2015 that he had the accident.

People were asking where he was on the Saturday at Orion as he did have previous form of being late for a race, sadly this was the reason this time 

My memories of Kevin are being a real team player and giving 100% at the races, at which he was quite prolific whether it be road, cross country or track

 To me the most notable race was at the Bournemouth Festival of Running in 2013. The picture is below of the IAC contingent who went for the weekend. The weather was glorious and we all had very good runs especially Kev who was 3rd overall. There was a presentation to him in the bandstand to much ovation!! We even went for a dip in the sea!!

 Kev was always watching the watch when running and would always keep the pace a bit quicker than agreed!!

 He knew his times off the back of his hand and in some cases that of his fellow runners.

 Oh and don’t forget his beer he did like his bitters at the Eva Hart and would quite often have one of their “special” meals with a beer.

 Kev was also a prolific quizzer and was a member of a team at a pub in Romford. – – Neil 

As for my recollection I will always remember the last race we did together and in fact Kevin’s last ever race at The Essex Cross-Country Championships on Saturday 3rd January 2015 which was only a few days before his accident.

The race was held over at Claybury in Pouring cold rain in filthy, swamp-like muddy conditions.

A few of us from Ilford AC, including Kevin, were standing sheltering from the rain under a tree while shivering and standing in ankle deep mud waiting for the race to start.

However we were all joking and having the usual banter at how we must be mad to do this !

I think a little while later we dispersed and the race started and Kevin had a great run and came 67th out of 200 runners in 47-30

Also, remember when we did the Sidcup 10 Miles together on Sunday 14th February 2010 and photo from the Ilford Recorder attached. – Terry

 

Kev was a bit of a numbers guy, often quoting his training runs averaged 6:40 pace.
He applied his numeracy when down the pub, producing his trusty 50 pence CAMRA vouchers in the Chadwell Heath Wetherspoons thus getting us 25% off a pint off some fruity guest ale.  Same vouchers were once produced at The Hung Drawn and Quartered pub in the City. Unfortunately, a 50p voucher here equated to a lesser percentage discount, I guess prime real estate in the square-mile goes for more dough than the hallowed turf of the Eva Hart.
That evening, Kev and I decided on an ale that was a whopping 8.5% abv.  As we sipped our rocket fuel, Kev went on to explain that the difference between a 4% and a 5% strength alcohol is not 1% but 25%, I did some mental gymnastics and realised he was right,  I asked, “so what’s the difference between 5% and 8.5%?”  Before answering my poser, we both landed on Jupiter as the effects of our pint kicked in.
I’m not sure Kev ran 6:40 pace the following morning...Dan Cogan

My fondest memory of Kevin is when we did the 2014 Dublin marathon. After a straightforward journey to Dublin we got the coach from the airport, the fun started after we got off at our stop to find that Kevin had picked up the wrong bag!! Just by chance the bag Kevin picked up was for someone else also doing the marathon, we spent the next 2hrs frantically calling hotels to locate Kevin’s bag, in the end the bags (which were identical) we’re exchanged and Kevin went on to achieve a big PB, 2:48! 

I had many races with Kevin over the years, I never got anywhere near him at XC, but the roads we were much closer. We trained together, running and swimming but more importantly won together too (Harlow 10 2014) Sam Rahman

 

I can remember when myself, Kevin, Paul Emery and Declan Cullen went to a German Beer Festival in the City. After about 15 minutes of non-existent service I had an argument with security and by mutual consent (!) We were refunded and left the venue.

I thought I had ruined the evening for us all but Kevin insisted that wasn’t the end of the evening and we went on a bit of a City pub crawl with Kevin introducing us all to his favourite craft beers. I couldn’t even get up the next morning but Kevin ran a cross country race in a great time.

I recall he always used to run to training from his home off of Whalebone Lane South to Cricklefields as a warm up and run back after.
I always used to pass him in my car at the bottom of Whalebone Lane and nine times out of 10 I would get there and he was already on the track doing his 4 laps warm up. Granted the traffic in Chadwell Heath is never great, but even so he must have been doing 6-7 min miles to get there before me…as a warm up!

One time robbo had one of his handicap 5k’s in Valentines and Kevin said he would run round with me as he was injured. He chatted and gave me encouragement all of the way round without any response from me (as I could hardly breath).

I almost collapsed on the line as we came through in just over 21 minutes…FIRST PLACE – over 90 seconds quicker than I have ever done it on any other occasion before or since.

My joy was very short-lived though. Once I got up robbo told me he was disqualifying me for running with a pacer !!!

Kevin was impossible to dislike. He never got political, kept his opinions to himself and never rubbed it in on the many occasions Tottenham would beat my team, The Hammers. He had a good word for everyone and was always encouraging everyone at the track and was the most enthusiastic of all of us at Cross Country.
His favourite race was the clubs 10M Cross Country race, so it is only fitting that every year since his accident the race has been run in his name with a percentage of the profits going to his care home. – Billy Green