Bellahouston 4k Cross Country

31st January 2010

Results | Men's race photos | Women's race photos

A bright sunny afternoon for the Scottish Athletics 4k Cross Country at Bellahouston Park. The men's race was won by Dan Mulhare of Inverclyde, followed by the trio of Shettleston Eritrean athletes: Tewoldeberhan Mengisteab, Tsegezab Woldemichael and Tsegai Tewelde.

The women's race was battled out by Elspeth Curran (Kilbarchan) and Sarah Inglis (Lothian) on Lap 1, but Elspeth pulled clear on Lap 2 to prove a clear winner. Sarah faded in the final kilometre to finish 5th, whilst Jennifer MacLean (Edinburgh AC) paced herself well to finish 2nd, just ahead of Rosie Smith (HBT) in 3rd place.

West District Cross Country

5th December 2009

Photos: men's race | women's race

Men's results | Women's results

It's been several weeks I've felt ill with sinusitis, so I missed running the West Districts at Irvine Moor, electing instead to take a few photos.

Both senior races went right down to the wire. In the women's event the early group of 5 or 6 runners was whittled down to 2 by halfway around the 2nd lap with Springburn's Danielle Brown poised on the shoulder of Glasgow AC's Nicola Hood patiently waiting to make her move until the finishing straight, and clinching the win by a single second.

The men's race was even closer with less than a second separating the first 2 athletes. Shettleston's Eritrean duo of Tsegai Tewelde and Teweldeberhan Mengisteab both crossed the line in an equal time of 30:24 for the 9.8km route. The 2 athletes had run the final lap pace for pace with less than a stride length separating them, and neither athlete altered their step as they appeared to jog into the finishing funnel, making it all look very easy!

Dunbartonshire Cross Country

Here are a few photos from today's Dunbartonshire AAA Cross Country Championships at Maryhill Park in Glasgow. I didn't feel well enough to run, but quite enjoyed watching the race.

Results: Senior Women | Senior Men

Link to photos

National Cross Country Relays

24th October 2009

Full Results | Senior men's results compiled into one list
Photos: Senior ladies | Senior men

My first national relays at Cumbernauld since 2005, and I was pleased to run 23 seconds faster than last time, finishing the 1st leg of the 4km course in 14:52 for 37th position.

I set out pretty steadily during the initial cavalry charge and first climb, then pretty much spent the rest of the stage catching and passing folk, so quite satisfying in that respect.

I managed to nip past Alastair McLeod (Bellahouston) and Jed Bartlett (Stirling Uni) in the finishing straight, and just failed to catch Raymond Jaffray (Teviotdale) on the line.

I handed over to John Denovan who had a solid enough run. We had then had Steffen on the 3rd leg who just held off Garscube's David Dickson and Shettleston's Marc McColl, then David Riach on the anchor leg managed to catch around 5 runners, including one of the many Bellahouston teams.

We also had Johnston and Dave Calder running in a men's B-Team, and in the ladies competition Pauline, Pat and Cat made up a team, whilst Ellie ran a solo leg with a funny felt pen race number!

Shettleston's Eritrean team won the men's race by 1 minute 19 seconds, with Tsegai Tewelde clocking the fastest time of 12:43. Second place went to Central AC after an exciting sprint finish where Alastair Hay overhauled Paul Leck of Kilbarchan in the final few metres.

Central AC took the ladies' title after Morag MacLarty established a healthy lead on leg 1 with the fastest ladies time of 14:47.

West District Relays

10th October 2009
Results

The West District Relays mark the official opening of the cross country season.

Over recent years, these relays have been held at Irvine Academy, so it was a nice change to have them much closer to Glasgow at the Strathclyde Uni Sports Ground at Stepps.

On a warm sunny afternoon we managed to field 2 teams, with Ellie, Christine and Deborah running for the women, and David Riach, myself, Steven Grant and Don running for the men's team.

I clocked 13:41 for the 3.8km course on the 2nd Leg. I set off one place behind Stevie McLoone, but dropped a place to Bryan Lamb (not John Hagemeister!) of Bellahouston Harrier, and didn't really make any ground on Stevie.

The women's race was won by Springburn Harriers with (I think) Danielle Brown overhauling Leanne Hamilton of Kilbarchan on the 3rd Leg.

Shettleston won the men's race by some considerable margin with Paul Sorrie and the Eritreans.

Scottish National Cross Country

21st February 2009, Callendar Park, Falkirk
Results | Photos (women's race) | Photos (U20 men's race)

Good fine weather for my 4th Nationals at Falkirk. Annoyingly though I'd had a cold for the past 10 days starting with razor-blade throat and developing into sinus pressure, gluey ears and general dizzy feeling and loss of energy. So the idea of running in the Nationals was less than appealing, and would probably only make myself feel even worse, but I had lost patience with having a stupid cold so was going to run anyway.

At the start of the race somehow I ended up more or less on the front line, rubbing shoulders with an Eritrean. After a false start, the gun sounded and the stampede began. I got swept up the first hill with the masses, and gravity and momentum got me through the first kilometre in 3:22. In retrospect, this turned out to be a stupidly fast start, but it felt OK at the time. I just wasn't banking on the wheels coming off even before I'd finished the first lap. I felt weak and woozy with my head spinning and just wanted to step off the course. I tried to summon some resolve to keep going in the 2nd lap, but was flogging a dead horse, and felt like a car cruising to a standstill after it's run out of gas. No amount of banging your foot on the accelerator has any event. There is just this slow inevitable feeling of grinding to a halt.

By the 3rd lap, so many people had overtaken me I had really lost interest in the race and was only waiting for the point when it would all be over, and the helpless feeling of sliding backwards down the field would finally stop. I reckon I dropped around 40 to 50 places in the last 2 laps. In the end, I managed a sort of sprint finish to pass Phil Williams of Central AC in the home straight to finish 133rd rather than 134th! Phil was in fact the only person I passed in the entire race!

I will probably need another week off running now to hopefully recover properly, and then aim to get back to some marathon training...

The men's race was won by Alastair Hay in a time of 37:14, almost 8 minutes ahead of my time of 45:11. Thomas Russell finished 2nd by 1 second for the 2nd year in a row.

Before the men's race I watched the women's 2-lap race, which was won by an enormous margin by Freya Murray. Toni McIntosh was also well clear in 2nd place, but 3rd place was a 3-way battle between Lyn Wilson, Elke Schmidt and Edel Mooney, who were locked together after the first lap. During the 2nd lap Lyn eventually pulled away to finish 3rd, with Elke 4th and Edel 5th.