Cyprus International 4-Day Challenge: Day 1

I believe it may be a little snowy back home so here is some sunshine to warm you all up! So here I am in another hot place lining up for day 1 of the four race Cyprus International Challenge. After a few days of acclimatisation in 25 degrees sunshine, it was time for former Harrier and extreme event veteran Jimmy Stewart and I to take our places in the beach front queue outside the 5 star Coral Beach Hotel for the start of event 1, the 6km individual time trial. Anyone with any sense would have stayed on the loungers by the pools but as the hotel is the regular pre-Olympic warm weather base for the British Olympic Team, various Olympic plaques and top-notch sports facilities provided enough inspiration to get out and run. Truth be told, if we had hung about on the loungers too long, there was a risk of being press-ganged by the large squad of French Foreign Legion soldiers enjoying a few days R&R at the hotel on their way back from a 6-month tour of duty in Afghanistan.

It’s the first time I have queued up rather than lined up for the start of a race, this being a time trial where each runner was set off at 10 second intervals in race number order.  With me at number 44 and Jimmy at 168, it was likely that I would be finished before Jimmy had even started. Injury-free for a change, I was however loaded with the heaviest cold for years, which started the day before Brampton. Being a runner, common sense has no part to play in the decision process and so when my number came up, all thoughts of just getting through this first race easily soon disappeared and off I set in pursuit of the 43 runners ahead of me.


The race started from the beach, skirted around the hotel and emerged through the hotel main gate onto the main road. Within that first 500m I  had already caught and passed 4 or 5 runners and narrowly avoided being mown down by a local motorist in the hotel car park! However, once out the gate I could finally release the large snot build up in my nose (no spitting or such like allowed within the carefully manicured hotel grounds) and take off on the flat road to the finish 6km up the coast. The long line of runners stretched out in front provided plenty of targets to aim for and soon we were half way in the midst of a banana plantation. A glance at the watch showed 3k in around 10:15; too fast with three more days of racing to come and so on with the brakes. The slightest hint of a climb brought us to km number 5 and then the crowd was in sight on the cliffs ahead. Through the finish line in 21:08, a bottle of water downed and then a seat in the shade of a truck. Some time later Jimmy crossed the line in 29:41 and very relaxed.

Later on at the evening pasta party the results were revealed. After day-1 I am 7^th overall, 1:10 down on the leader and 3^rd vet, the first 4 vets being quite close. Jimmy is 3^rd M60. Tomorrow is a 11km hill race, starting at sea level and finishing at 2000 feet. I have also managed to get myself poached and am now a member of a German team sponsored by one of the large German breweries! More news tomorrow.

Alan