having had a rehearsal under the watchful eyes (and ears) of Sir Thomas Beecham at 1.00pm the previous day. One of the 36 competitors in this race was the 50km champion of France, Claude Hubert, who in finishing 4th became the 3rd overseas athlete to join the ranks of the Centurions. In view of the success of the 1951 race, the “Sunday Dispatch” felt that nothing should be left undone to assist in building up, not only active participation in the sport of Road Walking, but also public interest. To provide as widespread an appeal as possible, it was thought that the best means of putting it before the public eye was to hold an annual 100 mile walk, using London as the hub, which the “Sunday Dispatch” would sponsor. Therefore, in 1952 the first of these epic events was arranged in conjunction with the R.W.A., the route chosen being Bath to London. Two main reasons lay behind this choice: first, the enthusiasm for road walking existent in the West Country, second, the historical setting going back to times when Roman Centurions marched the Road to London. It is fair to say that this was in every respect a tremendous success; 48 walkers set out in
front of considerable crowds at Bath and were cheered along the way well into the night. No one who saw the people in the towns of Chippenham and Calne could fail to be impressed, and indeed touched, by the enthusiasm with which they greeted the walkers as they went by. The favourite to win this race was Percy Reading, the winner of the 1946 track race; but serious competition was expected from the Whitlock brothers, Harold and Rex. Harold, the 1936 Olympic Games 50km gold medallist, failed to finish but brother Rex went on to win in 17 hours 44 minutes 40 seconds and was met by a good crowd at the finish at Chiswick. Percy Reading was the early leader but had a bad spell over the Wiltshire Downs when he dropped back from first to sixth place. It was due to the excellent attendance of Jill Shirley, who often attended the ‘Poly’ boys, that he overcame his problems to finish in second place. The one person she did not attend was her brother, Seymour. He was being looked after by his father, and was hoping to have something special to celebrate. As the clock turned midnight, Dad turned to Seymour and said, ‘Happy birthday son, time to call it a day. There’ll be another time’, and there was! Of the 48 starters, 38 completed, 27 of them, the highest number so far becoming new Centurions. In 1953 the Surrey Walking Club or to be more precise, Timber Woodcock C144, decided
that the time was right to give distance walkers another opportunity to attack records, and with the assistance of the “Sunday Dispatch” promoted a 24 hour track race at Motspur Park on July 3rd-4th. This was the fourth post war track race, and although there were some good men in the field, no records were broken. Of the 21 starters, 10 completed 100 miles with 4 going on for the full 24 hours. The winner was the Frenchman, Claude Hubert C156, who had aspirations of breaking the world record held by his fellow countryman, Henri Caron at 132 miles. In the end he had to settle for the fourth best distance in Britain – 125 miles 1591 yards, the 3 best being: T. Hammond C10 – 1908 – 131 miles 580 yards, P. Reading C121 – 1946 – 129 miles 749 yards, and T. Payne C18 – 1909 – 127 miles 542 yards. The race brought 4 new members into the hat-trick club, namely Ron Andrews C124, with 3 completions all on the track, Hew Neilson C145, Willy Watson C146 and Fred Plumb C151 all with 2 track and 1 road completions. The leader of the pack though was Tom Richardson C100 with 4 in the bag. One month later many of the competitors in the Motspur Park track race were on the road
again. This time the race was organised by the Midland Area R.W.A. and once again sponsored by the “Sunday Dispatch”.
Birmingham and finished at Wembley Stadium, a distance of 103 miles. 53 started, the greatest number to date in a 100 mile event, 29 finished with nobody retiring at the 100 mile mark. The race winner was Tom Richardson in 18 hours 56 minutes 36 seconds (18-18-07 at 100 miles), who finally managed to join Tom Hammond and Jack Wakeley in the very
The race started from the ring road, Yardley, 19
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