AMMAN ROAD RUNNERS

AMMAN ROAD RUNNERS

PREVIOUSLY KNOWN AS AMMAN AIRPORT ROAD RUNNERS

Brief History 1989 - 1995

The author, Austin Hutcheon, was based in Amman, Jordan from 1989 till 1995 working on the national Soil map and land Use Project. Whilst there the main relaxations involved running with the Hashemite Hash House Harriers and the Amman Road Runners.

After a few weeks running on the Hash an introduction was made to one Harry Mildenhall, the site engineer for the El Jafr to Azraq road being built by Major General Khandal and all his little Indians - they really did a superb curry. Harry was, still is, a serious runner and came in the few odd hundred kilometres virtually every Thursday night for a bit of R&R. That usually meant a big group of the Rugby Club (Ross Calder et al), The Hash (Harry, Austin, Cecil etc) and other layabouts getting together at the British Embassy Amenities Club at the Embassy for "Happy Hour" then hitting one of the favourite restaurants in town. On leaving this restaurant all were normally well dined and somewhat well wined.

Now Harry had this iron constitution and at 7.00am on Friday morning persuaded people like David, Gerhard and Austin to join him on the 11 km dash on the Airport Road from Seventh Circle to the Naur turnoff and back. Shall we say that Gerhard and Austin persevered but the morning after effects really did not help in trying to keep up with, or in sight of, Harry. This was the start of the Amman Airport Road Runners.

As time went on the route had to change as the fumes were too much on the airport road and, after Harry left, the run was changed to a Thursday night as a celebration of ending the week's work. Eventually things got silly and we set up a series of Half Marathons - Madaba to Jiza, first we tried Jiza to Madaba but discovered that the route was all uphill. Next Gerhard had the brilliant idea of the Dead Sea Ultra run and so training increased and planning got underway and the first run took place in April 1993. Results sheets appended below. Austin then also did the run in 1994 and organised the run in 1995 but failed to run as he ended up in hospital with a carbuncle on his leg. The Dead Sea Marathon / Ultra run continues with individuals and relay teams competing, and now it has an international flavour - try contacting Pascal (aiec@go.com.jo) for details. Details of the run can be found on the Dead Sea Marathon Home Page.

	AMMAN ROAD RUNNERS
ULTRA RUN	Run No 1
53Km	AMMAN TO THE DEAD SEA					30^th April	1993

POSITION	NAME	AGE	TARGET TIME	ACTUAL	DISTANCE	TIME FOR	ULTRA
		GROUP	for ULTRA *	TIME	ACHIEVED	MARATHON	Min/Km
ULTRA FINISHERS
1	Philippe Ospital	Senior	5 hr 2 min	4 hr 55 min	53	3 hr 55 min	5.57
2	Gerhard Bechtold	40-44	5 hr 9 min	5 hr 35 min	53	4 hr 25 min	6.32
3	Austin Hutcheon	50-54	5 hr 28 min	5 hr 42 min	53	4 hr 35 min	6.45
4	Pascal Hoyez	Senior	5 hr 2 min	5 hr 47 min	53	4 hr 25 min	6.55
5	Samir Farkouh	Senior	5 hr 2 min	6 hr 20 min	53	5 hr 3 min	7.17
5	Aboud Jardaneh	Senior	5 hr 2 min	6 hr 20 min	53	5 hr 3 min	7.17
7	Osama Zeyadeh	Senior	5 hr 2 min	6 hr 30 min	53	5 hr 11 min	7.36
8	Fadi Haddad	Senior	5 hr 2 min	7 hr 40 min	53	6 hr 6 min	8.68
9	Jamil	Senior	5 hr 2 min	void	53	Void	void
OTHER ULTRA RUNNERS			MARATHON TARGET	ACTUAL	DISTANCE	TIME FOR
			(BRONZE TIME)	TIME	ACHIEVED	MARATHON	Min/Km
					Km
	Pamela Vokey	Senior	4 hr 30 min	nd	48.0	4 hr 45min	6.75
	Steve Forster	Senior	4 hr 00 min	nd	44.0	4 hr 20min	6.16
	Scott Lyon	Senior	4 hr 00 min	nd	44.0	5 hr (guess)	7.11
	Uve Hauter	Senior	4 hr 00 min	4 hr 0min	42.2	4 hrs 0 min	5.68
	Alan Steele	Senior	4 hr 00 min	nd	42.2	Nd	nd
	Oriel Willock	Senior	4 hr 00 min	nd	35.0	Nd	nd

Other runs? Well there was the Peak of Madness, a wee relay run from Amman to the beach at Aqaba, only 344 km. Want to see the results and the team? In the picture we have, left to right, Samir - Patrick - Gerhard - Rob - Osama - Nidal - Wayne - Austin. Whilst he was overworked the runners then went out without your author and did the Dead to Red - Dead Sea to the Red Sea. Relay run.

			AMMAN ROAD RUNNERS
ULTRA RUN ( 53Km )			RUN	No. 2			22 April 1994
			AMMAN TO THE DEAD SEA
POSITION	NAME		AGE	TARGET TIME	ACTUAL ULTRA	ULTRA	TIME FOR
				for ULTRA *	TIME	Min/Km	MARATHON
	ULTRA FINISHERS	FROM
1	Paul MacParland	Riyadh	40-45	5 hr 9 min	4 hr 02 min 50 sec	4.58	3 hr 00 min
2	Laurent Delafosse	Amman	25-30	5 hr 2 min	4 hr 36 min 47 sec	5.22	3 hr 25 min
3	Samir Farkouh	Amman	30-35	5 hr 2 min	4 hr 52 min 05 sec	5.51	3 hr 50 min
4	Hubert Hartl	Riyadh	50-54	5 hr 28 min	4 hr 57 min 40 sec	5.62	3 hr 51 min
5	Austin Hutcheon	Amman	50-54	5 hr 28 min	5 hr 09 min 11 sec	5.83	3 hr 54 min
6	Osama Zeyadeh	Amman	30-35	5 hr 2 min	5 hr 12 min 20 sec	5.89	3 hr 58 min
7	Omar Halaseh	Amman	30-35	5 hr 2 min	5 hr 18 min 09 sec	6.00	4 hr 05 min
8	Pascal Hoyez	Amman	35-40	5 hr 5 min	5 hr 56 min 00 sec	6.72	4 hr 08 min
9	Aboud Jardaneh	Amman	35-40	5 hr 2 min	6 hr 30 min 00 sec	7.36	Nr
				MARATHON TARGET
	MARATHON ACHIEVERS			(BRONZE) TIME	ACTUAL TIME	Min /Km
1	Steve Forster	Riyadh	35-40	4 hr 03 min	3 hr 48 min 00 sec	5.40
2	Bill Richardson	Amman	40-45	4 hr 06 min	4 hr 04 min30 sec	5.77
3	Scott Lyon	Amman	30-35	4 hr	4 hr 05 min 00 sec	5.78
*	TARGET TIMES, based on Amateur Athletic Association achievement tables.				MARATHON
				Male	Target	Times
			Age	Bronze	Silver		Gold
	Age Groups (Years) :		Senior <35	4 hr	3 hr 24 min		2 hr 52 min
			35-40	4 hr 3 min	3 hr 30 min		2 hr 58 min
			40-44	4 hr 6 min	3 hr 36 min		3 hr 4 min
			45-49	4 hr 12 min	3 hr 42 min		3 hr 8 min
			50-54	4 hr 21 min	3 hr 51 min		3 hr 14 min
			55 -59	4 hr 30 min	4 hr 00 min		3 hr 22 min
			60 -64	4 hr 42 min	4 hr 12 min		3 hr 32 min
In total 43 people participated in this event.
The weather was good to us, dropped from over 40 degrees centigrade the previous day to cool and cloudy for most of the run.

ON ON With the HASHEMITE HASH HOUSE HARRIERS and AMMAN ROAD RUNNERS