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Screamapillar wrote (see)

wiggly worm wrote (see)

 It does increase your chances slightly if you bequeath. I missed out on the main ballot this year but got in on another draw for an extra 1000 places for those who had bequeathed the entry fee.

Very slight, your chances are about 42-1

Not sure how you're doing the maths on that one.  The odds of getting a place in the initial ballot are n/m where

n=number of ballot places available

m=number of people who entered the ballot

A thread here suggests that m=125000 entrants and n is roughly 25000 places.  I assume that n will vary depending on how many GFA applications they have, and various other factors (club places?), hence the (extended) delay in telling people if they've got a place.  Either way the suggested 1:5 or 1:6 chance of getting a place seems to be accepted?

Moving on to bequeathing, or entering the draw.  Here the odds are x/y , where x=1000 (the organisers have plainly stated there are 1000 draw places) , and y is the number of people who actually bequeathed (minus any who got a place in the ballot).  your 42-1 suggests you think that y is 42000; you think a third of the ballot entrants bequeathed?  That seems unlikely to me.  I think a lot of people are willing to enter the ballot - if you lose at least it doesn't cost you anything.  But bequeathing means a significant risk of not only not getting a place but losing the £35 for nothing as well (although of course it does go to charity).  Oh yeah, there's the jacket, but who wants a cheap VLM jacket if they don't even get to do the race?

wiggly worm wrote (see)

 It does increase your chances slightly if you bequeath. I missed out on the main ballot this year but got in on another draw for an extra 1000 places for those who had bequeathed the entry fee.

Good to hear from someone who did get a draw place.  There has been asuggestion that bequeathing makes it less likely to get a ballot place, which would be hugely unfair.  Has anyone bequeathed and still got a ballot place (instead of a secondary draw place)?

Shame it's not more transparent.   They should release all the figures.

Hi there.

Regarding Sweatshop, last week was a record - new year's resolutions I guess - 101 runners!  If you know the shop you can probably imagine that's quite a crowd.

There are two Tuesday night runs, 5k and 4-5 miles - the mixed units still niggle me - both starting at 7pm after meeting at 6:45ish.  Pacewise, people tend to go at what they're comfortable with so the crowd does split up but with that many runners there are always people to run alongside and chat to. 

The routes are described (in a slightly haphazard way) at the briefing, but there's always a back marker who is happy to go at the pace of the slowest runner, so if anyone does find themselves unsure of directions the advice is to wait.  Some people are very much beginner-runners, especially on the 5k route, so it's quite accessible.

Some of the usual routes are on here: https://maps.google.co.uk/maps/user?uid=214477322717381135786&hl=en&gl=uk&ptab=2

By all means come down when that achilles is better, and if you register and do 5 of them you get a t-shirt!

As alehouse said, it depends on your area, but as well as that I would suggest that other considerations might be how "serious" a runner you consider yourself to be, your budget, and how important it is to be in an affiliated club.

As a suggestion you might like to look at the parkrun results for a given week and see which clubs are popular in the results - try Heaton Park parkrun for North Manchester or South Manchester parkrun for, well, you get the idea.  Also there are other parkruns if you're further out.  Better still come along to a parkrun!

So for South Manchester, http://www.parkrun.org.uk/southmanchester/results/latestresults/ .  I'm a bit biased as I've found the Chorlton Runners to be a friendly bunch with a good variety of people training for different races at all levels.  The club isn't affiliated (although they are looking at getting affiliated), but they welcome anyone who wants to join in and there's no membership fee, so just turn up and run.

I also run with the Sweatshop group from the Arndale, which again is friendly, free and well attended.

Just google for more details of either.

Rod Wallace wrote (see)

What if every running club could apply for a number of places based on a percentage of member...

Isn't that what happens, except with far fewer places than you're indicating?  I was under the impression that clubs generally get a minimum of two places, and more for larger clubs.  All the English clubs and their memberships are listed here:

http://www.englandathletics.org/core/core_picker/download.asp?id=7284

I'm not in a club myself - I'd prefer a smaller more easy-going club and there aren't many very near me, and the nearest ones to my urban location are rather competitive affairs.  But I understand from friends that some clubs don't even need as many VLM places as they have (depending on the type of club), so I think your 1 place per 10 members is a bit optimistic.

I like the thinking outside the box Tenjiso!  Of course setting up a charity is hard work.  Might it be easier setting up an affiliated running club?  But as it happens I'm on the committee of a charity already...so I had a look at what "cost price" means.

Turns out there are two charity schemes.

Gold bonds - the charity gets 5 places per year for 5 years at £1500 pa.  So, £300 per place, but more places than required, and there's a waiting list for charities to get on board.

Silver bonds - one place every 5 years for £300.  No mention of a waiting list.  This could be an option?  Raise some money for my charity and get a VLM place?  Is that unethical? 

Even if I did seriously consider this I would pretty much have to shell out the £300, since I would want all sponsorship to go to the charity.  I hadn't realised these places are so expensive for the charity.  For instance, if you run for BHF you pay £75 and pledge to raise £2000 (plus gift aid).  So your £75 plus £225 of your sponsorship is actually being paid to VLM.  This seems a bit harsh on your sponsors who are giving money for the charity.  Bit like all these "challenges" where you get to do a bungee jump or cycle across the sahara or whatever while your sponsors pay for it.