The standard junior annual membership fee is £39, but this includes at least £17 of race entry fees paid by the club, namely 5 Peco XC races, the Peco Relays, the Meanwood Trail Junior Race from Leos in May, the Pudsey junior race in June, the Eccup junior races from Adel in July and the Golden Acre junior relay in July. These races have been chosen because they are (a) open to age groups starting school year 2 (which is our minimum age), (b) are suitable for all abilities, and (c) have confirmed that they accept bulk entries.

Some juniors have other commitments on Tuesdays so can only attend a limited number of training sessions. There will be a membership fee of £29 to cover a maximum of 10 training sessions, this to include the race fees as listed above.

Please click here for how to pay membership fees

These fees do not include England Athetics affiliation fees, which are needed when taking part in any competition at county level and above. We will ask for these fees at the time of entry to the first race at that level in that year. The England Athletics year runs from 1 April to 31 March and the fee is currently £15. NB under-11s do not need to affiliate. More details further down this page

JUNIOR TRAINING SESSIONS

Valley Striders juniors train every Tuesday evening 6pm. Most weeks we are at Leodiensian Club ("Leos") on Crag Lane, off King Lane, LS17 5PR. In the summer, usually on the second and fourth Tuesday in the month, we train at the running track at Grammar School at Leeds.

Occasionally there are other events that replace the junior session e.g. on three Tuesdays we have a mile race at Eccup Reservoir. Check the website homepage for venues.

For most sessions we split into 3 or 4 groups: One group is experienced junior runners (mostly school year 7 and above). Other groups will be created on the night.

Sessions consist of a warm up and then 3 different repetitions or skills training, followed by cool down and stretches. Sometimes the "experienced" group will go for an intense endurance session rather than the reps.

Click here and here and here for sample session plans

MEMBERSHIP / TERMS AND CONDITIONS

The official minimum age for joining is 8, but younger runners who have brothers and sisters or friends in the club may try the sessions and the coaches will then discuss the situation with the parents.

Parents(/guardians) MUST stay at the club for the duration of the session, initially watching (or joining in if this will help the child). When the child is used to the session and the parent is satisfied that the child is being safely supervised, the parent may then if they wish join the beginners/improvers session that trains in parallel.

If parents aren't able to run, they are encouraged to generally help at the session (not necessarily in the group where their child is training), e.g. supervising turn-round points, accompanying children for pit-stops, timing laps, etc.

If a parent leaves the site, they must nominate another adult to be responsible for their child.

We intend to appoint Welfare Officers to oversee all aspects of safety.

THE OBJECTIVES OF OUR JUNIOR TRAINING

Our primary aims are

• for your children to enjoy their running / athletics.
• to give opportunities for your children to improve – via the training sessions and supporting them into competition

We encourage you to take your children to various races throughout the year.

• One event organised by Valley Striders - the Meanwood Trail Junior Races held at Leos in May
• We also recommend the Peco Cross-country league and a number of junior fun runs organised by local clubs e.g. Eccup, Pudsey, Hyde Park, Wetherby and Kirkstall.
• We also recommend running in junior parkruns (2km). There are 5 locations in Leeds, the most local being at Roundhay and Adel. Running once a month is useful as a guide to progress.
• Adult parkrun (5km) is recommended for the over-12's.
• Not forgetting our own junior 1 mile races run 4 times a year.
• We also have some 400m time trials and some 100m races while on the track at GSAL.
• Since 2016 we have competed in Track & Field meetings in the West Yorkshire and City of York leagues. The youngest age for most of these is school year 4 but York has some meetings suitable for yesr 3 and one meeting for year 2 and above.
• Our more experienced juniors take part in the West Yorkshire Cross Country league (school year 5 and above), and the Yorkshire, Northern Counties and English National Cross Country championships (year 7 and above)

AWARDS

We used to have annual awards at the Xmas party

• Junior Grand Prix - for competition at races and rewards the best performing child in each school year, and other children who run regularly in races.
• Performance Certificates - measure performance at races against some standards, there are 12 levels of these and children earn a certificate for 5 races at a particular level – this encourages improvement in performance (a bit like belts in judo!)
• Maybe we'll reintroduce these some time!

• Participation awards - to qualify, members must have attended at least 13 training sessions and have taken part in at least 13 races in the previous 6 months
  • Spring/Summer 2017 - Darcey Mollitt & Ben Williams-Dustan
  • Autumn/Winter 2017/18 - Lily Sadler & Marcus Johnstone
  • Spring/Summer 2018 - Tally Diamond & Toby Walker
  • Autumn/Winter 2018/19 - to be announced
• Performance awards - for the best age-graded percentage at parkruns in the previous 6 months
  • Spring/Summer 2017 - Leon Jones (78.1%) & Jessica Baxter (76.7%)
  • Autumn/Winter 2017/18 - Josie Pawley (78.1%) & Luke Mackreth (76.7%)
  • Spring/Summer 2018 - Flo Pell (77.4%) & Jamie Walker (76.6%)
  • Autumn/Winter 2018/19 - to be announced

COACHES AND THEIR QUALIFICATIONS (NB all named coaches have up-to-date CRB/DBS checks)

Richard Irvine and Emma Steel lead and a number of our club members help with the session too.

• Richard has a full Athletic Coach qualification which also means he is fully insured to lead junior athletes.
• Emma has been on a 2 day Coaching Assistant course that specialises in children's athletics. (Richard has already been on this course)
• Bob Jackson, Mary Egan and Pete Twigg lead groups at most junior sessions, they have Leader in Running Fitness (LiRF) qualification and are insured to lead groups of runners aged 12 and above.
• John Hussey leads the adults session that runs in parallel and has the LiRF qualification.
• Holly Williams occasionally helps - she has a Coach in Running Fitness course which is the equivalent of Athletics Coach but only for ages 12 and above.
• We welcome assistance from other V S members and/or parents and will encourage (but not insist) that they take a qualification and are CRB/DBS checked.

ENGLAND ATHLETICS AFFILIATION / MEMBERSHIP

Older juniors who run in England Athletics affiliated races need to be registered with England Athletics which costs an additional £15. Examples of affiliated races that require E A membership are Hyde Park mile, Canal Run 5k, Run for All 10k, Abbey Dash 10k, West Yorks XC league. However most junior races are classified as fun runs so do not require E A affiliation (juniors should still sign up for the race as a "Valley Striders" and are encouraged to wear a V S vest). The Peco XC league does not require affiliation.

CLUB VESTS & T-SHIRTS

We have two suppliers for Valley Striders club vests, both in Ilkley.

• Complete Runner (Fastrax), on the left hand side of the Leeds road about half a mile before the town centre (they have a selection of styles)
• Dobson and Robinson (Intersport) at 46 The Grove (near Betty's Cafe) (some of the women prefer their style).
• For both of these, printing is done individually (the Fastrax is a flock print which is ironed on). You will need to go in and try for size, then probably best to have it mailed on to you (they may make a small charge for this). NB Ask for the lettering to be set fairly high up otherwise it will be obscured when you pin on your race number!
• We now hold a stock of club vests and club running T-shirts printed with the Valley Striders name. Try for size and then you can take it away and pay by bank transfer