Article Seven of the Tilsley Times, written by Radley Athletics Club
Radley AC continues to go from strength to strength.
During 2025, we had a great year and have once again seen some excellent individual and Club performances, on and off the track, across a range of disciplines and age groups.
We had three athletes selected to compete for England or Great Britain this year: Divine Iheme (U17 100m/200m), who was also ranked No. 1 in the UK and won the English Schools and England Championships; Quinn Miell-Ingram (U20 Cross Country), including competing at the recent European Cross Country Championships in Portugal; and Oliver Conway (U23 World Triathlon Champion in Australia). In addition, Janice Ellacott won a gold 4 × 400m medal and achieved a world record at the European Masters Athletics Championships in Madeira and was awarded a European team accolade for Best European Relay 2025. Teammate Ana Villeverde-Ramos also won a bronze medal in the W50 steeplechase in Madeira. We are very proud of them all.
Aside from our elite athletes, 30 Club records were broken across a range of age groups and events, demonstrating the improvements our athletes are making.
Our teams were equally impressive. Our junior (U13) boys won the Oxfordshire Junior League and came 3rd out of 26 teams in the Wessex Junior League. Our senior team, who compete in the Southern Athletics League, came 3rd, narrowly missing promotion (two teams are promoted to the top division). Our Masters women’s team just missed out on the Southern Regional Final, finishing second in the Masters League, while the men’s team came a creditable fourth. These are impressive performances for a small Club.
As a Club, we have achieved 7/7 of the England Athletics Club Standards, which demonstrate good governance, management, and safeguarding. We also reviewed and updated a number of policies throughout the year.
We have run taster sessions to introduce athletes to some of the more technical events and have been considering retention strategies, especially for teenage athletes, where dropout is high nationally.
As a purely volunteer-run Club, we have successfully increased the number of officials by running training and development sessions such as Level 1 courses and training in the use and setup of technology (such as EDM), as well as providing mentoring. We are also reviewing our coaching structure and have encouraged and recruited some of our teenage athletes to help coach younger members. We always need volunteers to ensure the Club runs as effectively and smoothly as possible.
One of our volunteers, Annalise Dobson, won the 2025 England Athletics South East Region Volunteer of the Year award for all the support and administration she provides for the Club, local leagues, and the county. We are very grateful for her contribution.
Looking ahead to 2026, we begin the outdoor track and field season with our annual pre-season open meeting on 11 April, before moving on to league and championship events. This is a great way for athletes to kick-start the track and field season and assess how their winter training has progressed.
There is a national change to age groups, with restructuring from U13, U15, etc., to U14, U16, etc., in line with world age groups. We hope this transition will be straightforward for the Club, but we will manage and monitor the changes to ensure our junior athletes transition smoothly.
We will be running a volunteer recruitment event in early 2026 and again organising an officials’ course and development opportunities to recruit more officials to support the Club; this will also be open to the wider athletics community.
We are always looking for potential new athletes, especially in the U17, U20, senior, and Masters age groups. If you are interested in joining us, please contact us at: [email protected]
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