The West District cross country championships took place on Saturday, 10 December at Irvine. Thankfully for both runners and supporters conditions were better than earlier in the week. Although there was a cold breeze, it was quite pleasant for running in, less so for standing around. The course had altered from previous years, nearly a reversal in direction. The ground conditions were fairly good, a couple of areas of softish ground though nothing like Rouken Glen so it made for fast running. While we were short for a full ladies team the three ladies who made it along (Julia Harris, Romy Beard and Jane Wild) gave an excellent performance and were rewarded with silver vets team prize. Well done to them. In the men’s event, where eight Bellas took to the course, we were 11th placed team overall out of 17 and our vets team came in 5th of 21 teams. Our finishers were: Greig Glendinning, Bruce Carse, Craig Reid, Scott Kennedy, Gerry Scullion, Tomy O’Connell and Rankin Lawther with Keiran Docherty pulling out during the race. We were a bit jealous of the various clubs tents on display where runners could take some shelter before and after running and in particular we noticed that Inverclyde had room for flasks, food and whatever else – now that would have been very welcome. Still I think we all enjoyed the trip to Irvine. Full results available from the Scottish Athletics website. Report from Gerry
Monthly archives: December 2011
Dawsholm Park was the venue for the Glasgow Uni 5 miler on Saturday, 3 December. Things weren’t looking too good, as after registering and getting changed I found the entrance foyer of the sports complex jam packed with apprehensive looking runners sheltering from the cold, wet and windy conditions. Luckily the rain stopped for long enough to get out for a quick warm up before heading to the start line. I had been warned before the race to get a fast start as there was a bottleneck at a gate near the start, but it seemed that this year they managed to get the gates open fully and slapped some wood over the cattle grid, so no problems there. After a steady climb for the first 500m we got a nice downhill section which led us through the forecourt of a car was (where we had to dodge some hosepipes!), then it flattened out a bit til we descended into Dawsholm park. Things got a bit muddy through here, and we were then faced with a beast of a hill to climb back out to Maryhill Road, back into the sports complex and then had to do it all again for lap 2, at which point the rain decided to start lashing down again. This was a pretty tough race, so there weren’t many PBs, but it gave us all a good workout. Good spread of cakes afterwards too. The race was won by Thomas Fay of Shettleston Harriers in an impressive 25.14. First Bella home was Kieran Docherty. Full results using link below: http://www.haresandhounds.com/roadrace.php Thanks to Bruce for providing this report.