Houston Road Relay 2009

It seemed like most of the Harriers were suffering from the club cold today judging by the number of huskier than usual voices on the start line. However, at least the sun was shining and we still had 3 complete teams of 4 and a full compliment of supporters. Overall the field seemed smaller than usual too; probably also a result of the colds and flu going about just now.

Our vets A team was led off by me. Considerably slower now than when I last ran a first leg here, I nevertheless set off like I used to and went with the leaders. Big mistake! The Garmin GPS confirms that I averaged 5:08 for the first mile, dipping sub-5 at the steeper downhill parts. The GPS also confirms my collapse in the second half, averaging about 5:45 and dropping to just over 6 minutes per mile on the final climb. Overall time was 14:39 for the 2.7 mile course and a position just outside the top 10. Leg 2 saw the welcome return of Charlie McDougall to short, sharp racing. I can guarantee that there would not be another M60 anywhere near Charlie's time of 15:28 and not that many M40's either. Eddie Reid took over on the 3rd leg and paced it well to finish in 15:44, 3 seconds faster than last year. The 4th leg was trusted to Alan Cullie (the only member of the team without a sore throat) who improved by 21 seconds compared to last year to finish in 16:03, bringing the team home in 15th and 3rd vets team.

Graham Allan has made massive steps forward in the last 6 months and is heading towards the

pace that used to be the norm for him. Although we had some problems reading the time on Graham's analogue watch, the official results eventually confirmed that his first leg time was 17:59, a 3 minute improvement on last year. Jim Holmes' training is interrupted just now but even so his time of 16:40 was only 5 seconds down on last year.

David Herbertson is also on the comeback trail and his time of 17:11 was about half a minute down on last year but we know that David will improve with every race. On the last leg, the experience of Andy Henderson was put to good effect, running 16:49, only slightly slower than his last outing here in 2005.

The third team was a mixed team, Frances Maxwell being dropped in it by taking

the first leg (as I now know, not her favourite relay leg!). Frances ran her own race and did not get carried away with the fast start, finishing in 19:12, only around 30 seconds down on her pb set last year. Making his relay debut for the club, David Wardrope ran a solid 18:25,

the fastest time in the team. Colin Banks demonstrated his recent sprinting form in the home straight, getting into one of those head to head situations that is best avoided after a 2.7 mile blast. Colin finished in 19:17. Finally, Russell Couper took the final leg to finish in 22:57.

Thanks to Brian McDougall for taking the photos and hopefully he will get over his recent injury quickly to join the fun. Well done to all.

David Herbertson takes an early lead in the men's Grand Prix and Frances leads the women. The positions can be viewed using the Grand Prix menu item on the left. The newly introduced Club Championship positions are also there for men and women.