Club co-founder Judy Farr recently celebrated her 80^th birthday.

Encouraged by her brother, John, into race walking and joining Trowbridge Athletic Club as a young teenager, Judy soon excelled at racing in various distances on track and road. In 1960, at the age of 18, Judy won the 1.5 mile national title on the track at White City in 12m 31s. She went on to win a total of 10 national championships, 9 of them consecutively. She is especially proud of her 1 mile world record set at Chiswick in 1965 in a time of 7m36.2s, and of representing England and Great Britain in many international events.

Judy had always run cross country as part of her training and then also in time, turned more of her focus to road running. She took part in the first ever Women’s National Marathon Championship on the Isle of Wight in 1978 finishing in 4^th place in 3:27.57. She was then picked for England, much to her surprise, for the Milton Keynes International Marathon finishing 5^th in 3:23.39 in the same year.

Judy met her late husband, Stan, at Trowbridge AC where he encouraged and supported her. As road and distance running was becoming more popular in the late 1970s and 1980s there was felt to be an increasing need for a club specialising in that area. Ten members of the club decided on a break-away and on January 1^st, 1986, Avon Valley Runners was officially born, first of all running regularly from Stan and Judy’s house and then from the Judo Club on Innox Rd (there is an in-depth piece about these early days on the website written by the late Tim Northwood).

The rest is history! Stan and Judy drove the club in its early days and saw its rapid growth. They travelled far and wide competing and encouraging others. Judy still holds the AVR V40 record for 5 miles, 30m 47s set in 1988, and still holds the ladies record for most wins in the annual Boxing Day Run (now the Stan Farr 5K) with 17 wins!

Judy is hugely proud to have played a part in founding Avon Valley Runners and happy that such a large number of people love and enjoy running as much as she has.

19/03/2025 | Avon Valley Runners |