The club celebrated its 20th anniversary on Saturday, with a packed day of events for members. A few pictures from the day’s events below. The day kicked off with an exclusive booking of the prestigious Emirates arena indoor running track. This was the first time many members had ever run on this fantastic resource. The focus of the morning was a series of 1 mile race heats, enabling members to challenge themselves at a short but tough race distance. There were great performances and a good few personal bests right across the club. The session concluded with a fun relay event, with team members each running a 200m lap: huge fun, if a little chaotic! A brilliant and delicious home-made Birthday cake was the centrepiece of the post-race lunch spread put nearby. Formally cut by club founders Jimmy and Sandra Irvine, and a marked by a few words of thanks to everybody who helped make the day happen, and to everybody who has been involved with the club over the years by current club President Richard Leyton. The afternoon then had a full itinerary of training talks with a detailed training overview and Q&A with our coaching convenor Gerry Scullion, a presentation from Glasgow Triathlon Club’s lead coach Vicky Begg on sport psychology and mental preparation for training and racing, and a presentation and Q&A on training plans and approaches from coaches Louise Ross and Henry Merriweather. Many thanks to everybody involved in making the event happen, with special note of thanks to Kevin Queenan, Gerry Scullion and Michael Lancaster for overseeing the overall arrangements. A bit more detail about the day on the club forum for members, our Birthday news post, and loads more pictures on our membership Facebook group. Thanks for the pictures used here from Gordon Goldie, Kevin Queenan, Cormac Smith and others.
Racing
Saturday saw a couple of brilliant results for Bellas. At the Scottish Athletics Inter-District XC, Catriona MacDonald finished 7th overall, and as 3rd team counter, helped the West District secure team silver in the Scottish Athletics Inter-District XC. 🥈 Ciaran Dougherty was also in action, winning the Great Stirling Castle run a 7.3k multi-terrain race taking place earlier in the day, in an impressive 28:29 🥇 Well done to both Catriona and Ciaran!
Congratulations to all our runners today and a big thank you to all the very many volunteers who gave up their time to make the event possible. We hope you all enjoyed the day as much as we did. There are lots of pictures to come which we will post in due course. For now, here are the provisional results: JI2019Results(Provisional) Thanks again to Katie, Bryan and the team at achilles heel for sponsoring the event. We hope to see you all back at next year’s Jimmy Irvine Bella 10k! 2019 Prize Winners: 1st Female – Lorna Young (Leeds City) 2nd Female – Sheena Logan (Fife Athletic Club) 3rd Female – Kristina Greig (Bellahouston Harriers) 1st Male – Alasdair Campbell (Cambuslang Harriers) 2nd Male – Gregor Yates (Bellahouston Harriers) 3rd Male – Robbie Ferguson (Kilbarchan AAC) Female V40 – Jane McNeilly (Bellahouston Road Runners) Female V50 – Maria Doherty (Glasgow South Road Runners) Female V60 – Sandra Aitken – (Fife Athletic Club) Male V40 – Iain Carroll (Giffnock North) Male V50 – Mark King (Kirkintilloch Olympians) Male V60 – Bryce Aitken (Fife Athletic Club) Female Team – Bellahouston Harriers Male Team – Bellahouston Harriers
Well done to everybody who took part at the 2019 National XC Relays in Cumbernauld yesterday! We had a cracking turnout from the club, lovely weather on the whole, and conditions were ideal for the familiar, but always challenging 4k XC circuit around Cumbernauld House Park. The club fielded a total of 10 teams (4 from the Ladies, and 6 from the Men). Some superb performances throughout! We’re delighted to report that our Ladies Masters team of Ann Robin, Louise Ross, and Jane McNeilly secured the Women’s Masters Gold Medal, making it three straight years on the podium in this team competition! Cat Macdonald ran an impressive individual leg in 14:48, 10th fastest on her leg. For the gents, our V50 team worked to take a solid 8th overall in that competition, with excellent runs by Tony McParland, Liam Conway and Gerry Scullion. Some standout individual runs from the gents included a brilliant 14:01 by Andy Campbell anchoring our men’s A team, and an excellent 14:57 from Craig Ross, returning to XC after a 9 years! Great support out on the course for our runners, and of course everybody taking part. Everybody was delighted to watch some brilliant racing in all the events, but a highlight for everybody was of course seeing Olympian Callum Hawkins tear by chasing Central AC in the senior men’s event. Scottish Athletics race report is available, with a link to the provisional results. We’re very grateful for the work by Scottish Athletics, all the volunteers and marshals for making the event another great success. Many thanks too to the Bellas who helped with setup, home baking, cleanup, team management and support on the day. The trombone was an interesting innovation from Henry too. We’ll pass on any feedback to him 🙂 A few pics below, plenty more on our club social media groups too. Thanks to Kevin Queenan, Alan Digweed, Elle Tea and others for the pics.
Thanks to everyone who made today a great afternoon out at Netherpollok!! From everyone who took pictures for us, marshalled, cheered us on, helped set up/dismantle and contribute to our fab cake table!! Great running performances all round…. andddd it just wouldn’t be the same if we didn’t bring home the bling!!! 🥈🥈🥈 A huge well done to our fabulous ladies team of Cat, Ann and Mhairi picking up Silver for 2nd Ladies team. 🥈🥈🥈 Well done everyone 💜💜💜💜 More pictures and stories over on our members facebook group. Big thanks to hosts Bellahouston Harriers!
What a great wee day at Kilmarnock for the start of the Cross Country season! Congratulations to Ann, Claire and Emer for winning the silver vets team medals, to Cat who had the 6th overall fastest split, and to everyone else who raced. Loads of pics over on our members-only facebook group. Thanks to Leanne and Bryan for organising the teams, Mhairi and Leanne for the home baking and chocolates, and to everyone else who helped set up and take down the tents and flags! Huge thanks to our hosts Kilmarnock Harriers, and to everybody who made the event happen. Provisional results have been posted on Scottish Athletics website.
For the third straight year, we’re delighted to report that Scottish Athletics have just announced that the Bellahouston Road Runner Ladies team secured the Scottish Half Marathon Team Gold at this year’s Great Scottish Run. A huge congratulations to Cat MacDonald, Ann Robin and Katie Mathieson! Well done to Edinburgh AC who were just in 2nd place for Silver, with Garscube Harriers taking Bronze. We’re delighted for our Ladies, who’ve won this prestigious prize for the third straight year, and bringing it to an amazing five years on the podium. Congratulations too to Ann Robin, who also secured Silver in the W40! Well done to everybody who took part on the day. The club had an amazing 60 members complete the Half marathon, and 6 taking part in the 10k. On top of that, 40 club members volunteered over the course of the weekend to help make the event a huge success.
This year’s Jimmy Irvine Bella 10k race will be held on Sunday 17 November starting at midday. It promises to be another popular event with entries already going quickly. We pride ourselves on our unique finisher’s t-shirt and our talented t-shirt designers have been busy again this year. Here is a sneak preview of the distinctive long-sleeved t-shirt that will be awaiting you at the finish. All runners and their supports are invited to our famous Bella post-race buffet for refreshments and a chat after the race. You can sign up now at https://www.entrycentral.com/bella10k. Full details of the race can be found at Bellahouston Road Runners Jimmy Irvine Bella 10K. Please get in touch if you have any questions. #seeyouattheJimmy
Well done to the 48 Bella members who competed in the second club 3k track race on Wednesday 24 April. Even though many of us are busy preparing for Spring marathons right now, there were some fantastic performances on the track in windy conditions. The runners were enthusiastically cheered on by fellow Bellas before everyone went inside for a post-race debrief over sandwiches and cake. We were delighted to welcome Jimmy Irvine at the event who, together with his wife Sandra, were awarded honorary life membership of the club. Jimmy remains as enthusiastic about running and generous in his support for the club as ever. Congratulations to all the runners who took part and a big thank you to everyone who helped with the organisation. Please let us know if you have any ideas for future club race evenings.
Around 50 Bellas turned up at last weekend’s (10th March, 2019) Balloch to Clydebank Half Marathon, in pretty grim weather. As always, our ladies team won lots of medals with Louise Ross and Ann Robin finishing 2nd and 5th overall. Shona Donnelly and Emer Campbell placed 1st and 3rd in the V40 category with our ladies team of Louise, Ann and Shona finishing in 1st place overall. Congratulations everyone and well done to all who took part! Particularly if you managed to secure a PB in those conditions! We’ve loads of photographs over on our public Facebook page! There’s a specific album here too. Many thanks as ever to Gordon Goldie for turning out to take so many!
Bellahouston Mob Match 2019 – Road Runners triumph for the 3rd year in a row 🏆 Both clubs had a fantastic morning at Pollok parkrun with a magnificent 60 Bellahouston Road Runners and 56 Bellahouston Harriers taking part. It was the closest contest yet, with one runner making all the difference. Thanks to all who came along to run, volunteer and support both clubs, and also to everyone at Pollok parkrun for making us feel so welcome 💜💙 The full results for Pollok parkrun event #521 are available. You can read more about the rules and organisation of the Mob match on our post “Organising the Bellahouston Mob Match“, which has now been updated with the stats from the 2019 incarnation! The breakdown: 60 Road Runners v 56 Harriers, so a total of 116 members. So the Road Runners ‘won’ attendance. 1st, 2nd and 3rd males were Harriers, so the Harriers won the mens on a 3-to-count basis (Harriers 6pts vs RR 30pts). (This is using positions from the published parkrun results at 2.30pm) 1st female was visiting Jennifer Wetton from Central AC (who won the 2018 Jimmy Irvine 10k), The Harriers first female was 3rd overall female. The Road runner ladies were closely packed thereafter, so the Road runners won the ladies on a 3-to-count basis (Harriers 25pts vs RR 20pts, using Ladies finish positions). Ditto published results. Based on overall finishing position scoring for smallest club attendance (Harriers had 56, so 53 counting positions), the Road Runners ‘won’ (defended) bragging rights, and the main trophy. However it was by any measure the closest result yet, with just 24 point difference, which is really just a one runner difference in terms of points.
An amazing turnout of 60 Bellas raced at today’s Renfrewshire AAA 5 mile Champs in Greenock and again we were in amongst the medals. Emer Campbell and Andy Campbell both won Gold in the V40 category while Shona Donnelly and Gerry Scullion won Gold and Silver respectively for the V50s. The ladies senior team of Emer, Shona and Claire Wharton also won the Bronze team medals. Congratulations to all our medal winners and the several members who earned a shiny new PB 👏👏
The club was delighted to hear that members Romy Beard and Louise Ross were recently selected to represent Scotland at the British and Irish Masters XC International, in Swansea on 17th November. A fantastic achievement in itself, they returned from the event with bronze team medals in the W35 (Romy) and W40 (Louise) categories. A huge congratulations to them both, from everybody at the club! Well done to everybody who took part, at what sounds like a great event. Romy also sent in a great race report, which we’re delighted to share here: The team bus leaves Glasgow at 9am. Everybody is chatting. The journey is fine until we go cross-country through the Welsh mountains. In the dark. The bus becomes quiet. One lady is very sick. By the time we arrive it’s nearly 8pm. We wonder how Swansea can be so far away. We have dinner at the hotel with some other ladies including our rivals from Giffnock North. We decide to be friends for the weekend. Not much sleep much because they’re working right outside the hotel and in the morning the seagulls are loud. Some people report music and shouting, which I missed, so I must have slept after all. We put our Scotland shorts and vest on, and tie the tartan ribbons in our hair. The excitement begins! Short bus ride to Singleton park. The sun comes out just in time for the Scotland team photo. We do an easy jog of the course. It’s 3 laps of 2k. The second part of the lap is up and down one big slope. It doesn’t seem too bad. Photos. More warm up stuff. Getting very, very excited now. Lining up with all the other Scottish, Irish, Northern Irish, English and Welsh runners in our race (ladies plus the 65+ men). I feel fantastic on the first lap. I am running for Scotland. Hurrah! I can’t stop smiling. I’m also going too fast. I can see Mary McCutcheon from Giffnock North in front and know that I am too close to her. Fuck it. I am running for Scotland! It’s only 3 laps. The hill is worse than I thought. I get a stitch at the start of the second lap. I pull back a little. Only two laps to go. The hill is a killer on the second lap. I’m just looking at the piece of grass in front of me and keep putting one foot in front of the other. Whenever someone shouts Scotland I smile. I tell myself that I am strong and that I can do this. Third lap. I don’t care what race this is I just want it to end. Louise goes past just before the hill. I have nothing left to chase her. I lap a lady in the 70+ group and shout a well done to her. She is amazing. I feel a bit sick when I get over the hill for the last time. Down the hill and then around […]
The 2018 Jimmy Irvine Bella 10k took place on 11 November 2018. The event was a sell out again! Many thanks to everybody who took part, to our amazing marshals and race team, our sponsors Achilles Heel, plus Tunnocks, Sainsbury’s for the bananas and water, and Glasgow City Council staff (Pollok park for the cones, Bellahouston park for the course and support), and Craigton Primary School for the race HQ venue. An amazing effort by everybody, for which we’re really very grateful. Thanks too to the donations for our Prince and Princess of Wales Hospice: We’ll update you on the total raised very soon. Final results from stuweb, our race timing provider, are available here, and a full race report for the day will follow in the next day or two. Congratulations to our winners: First Male: Stuart McGeachy (Cambeltown Running Club) in 33:23, 2nd Male: Gordon Robertson (Cambuslang Harriers) in 33:31, 3rd Male: Jonathan Roebuck (unattached), in 33:45 First Female: Jennifer Wetton (Central AC), in 37:03, 2nd Kirstian Macruary (Corstorphine AAC) in 38:11. 3rd: Emer Campbell (Bellahouston Road Runners) in 40:26 In the age category prizes, firstly sincere apologies for not having the Ladies results available at the awards ceremony: The explanation for this is the club decided some time back to equalise the age categories (ie. same age ranges for men and women), but the Ladies provisional results we were given were for V35, V45, V55 (ie. not correct). This also appeared on the timing slips and website for a while. We felt it was better to award them later when we were certain and they had been update. Prizes will be posted to the winners soon. First Male V40: Andy Campbell (Bellahouston Road Runners), in 35:24. First Ladies V40: Jennifer Macfarlane (East Fife Triathlon Club) in 42:31 First Male V50, and Peter Cunningham cup winner: Wattie Mackay (Strathearn Harriers), in 37:24 First Ladies V50: Pamela McCrossan (Clydesdale Harriers) in 42:23 First Male V60: Graham McGrattan (Greenock Glenpark Harriers) in 42:25 First Ladies V60: Erica Christie (Achilles Heel Run Club) in 43:29 In the very-important-to-local-clubs team prizes, the first Men’s team was Bellahouston Road Runners, and the first Female team was Bellahouston Harriers. Thanks again to everybody for making today a great success.
We’ll shortly be sending final instructions to participants email addresses. If you don’t receive your copy this evening, please check your spam folders, and mark any email from bellahoustonroadrunners.co.uk you find there as not spam, to help our emails reach you, and others, in future. Note too if you registered two people with the same email address, you will only receive one copy of the instructions. Please review the entrycentral.com/bella10k entry list or get in touch with us if you’re unsure. Please do also follow us on social media for any last minute announcements or changes relating to the race. We’re at facebook.com/bellahoustonroadrunner and twitter @bellaroadrunner