West Highland Way 2012 - Too Hot to Trot!

5:15am and already hot in Milngavie

A full report and photographic record of a fantastic weekend of running and tanning will follow at the weekend but for now I will tempt you with the beginning, middle and end of 13 hours, 53 minutes and 0 seconds of running over 96 miles, thousands of feet of ascent, several dozen degrees of centigrade and tens of litres of sweat, water and Irn Bru (and that was just the first, 4-mile leg!).

Well done to all and thanks for all the fun!
Alan

Kenny at the end of the 14 mile lochside leg

Eddie takes over from Scot to climb the Devil's Staircase

The End!

West Highland Way Relay Pick-Up Schedule

The minibus pick-up schedule for next Saturday morning 26th May is as follows:

Jim Holmes          4:00

Joanne McEvoy   4:03

Davie Watt           4:10

Stuart Gibson        4:10

Russell Couper      4:15

George Stewart     4:18

Frances Maxwell   4:20

Billy Buchanan       4:23

Kenny Leinster       4:23

Colin Banks           4:25

Alan Derrick          4:30

Hugh Simpson        4:30

David Wardrope     4:45

Just to be clear, these times are Saturday morning!

Unless otherwise advised by Eddie, he will pick you up at the same place as last year but please confirm with Eddie through the week.

Nevis Trail so-called Half Marathon

Only now, 2 days after the event have I regained my composure sufficiently to write a race report having been financially and mentally abused by the organisers of the above event! Quite a long report but I have to get this out my system!

Somehow I was convinced that this event (actual profile on the left) would be a good training race for the forthcoming Day in the Lakes Half Ironman Triathlon relay in 5 or 6 weeks for which I am again doing the run leg, a half marathon fell race with some thousand feet or so of ascent. Having been drained by a virus all week, I left it until after a test run on Saturday afternoon to pay my £20 on-line entry fee. On Sunday morning I set off from Callander towards Fort William. By Crianlarich the rain was torrential and the winds gale force. By Tyndrum I had decided I was going to turn around and go home. On pulling into the Green Welly Stop to turn, I spotted Genevieve and Colin's car parked there so went in to tell them of my decision. Typically, I was easily convinced by the assembled ATHelite team to carry on up anyway for a meal. As I returned to my car, there was a Tourettes Scotland charity van parked up nearby. Little did I know that a few hours later I would be taking the entrance exam for this charity! The trip up north was uneventful (unless you were driving a motor home or towing a trailer, in which case you were likely to be visiting the Caravan Club's latest ad-hoc site, lying on your side or roof on Rannoch Moor).

First effort of the day was getting the car door open in the Nevis Range car park where the conditions were mid-Atlantic in severity. As I had paid my money, I thought I might as well collect my number and any other goodies going and before I knew it, I had it pinned to my vest and there's no way back after that! A brief warm-up completely soaked me and proved that it was only possible to run in one direction; with the wind. The pre-race briefing was held in the cafe and I was surprised to hear the organiser say that there were no marshalls and we just had to follow arrows on the forest roads. Having plenty of experience of running in forests at home, I know how complicated these networks of forest roads can be, so this did not fill me with confidence (remember, I have been lost on a 5k parkrun before in the middle of a city!).

A few minutes later the 60 or 70 competitors huddled in the car park whilst the organiser tried to shout instructions over the wind and rain. Its never a good sign when steel, temporary fencing is blowing across the car park before a race. Then we were off, heading down the access road to the car park, expecting a turn-off into the forest on the left at some stage. I went with the first two at 5:30 mile pace into the wind and we seemed to break away from the field almost immediately. However, I wasn't seeing any roads or tracks off to the left and about a mile later we hit the A82 main road to Fort William/Inverness. I was about 20 m back from the two leaders at this stage who seemed to know what they were doing but as buses, cars and trucks squeezed past I knew this couldn't be right. After another mile I could see the front two exchanging comments and I accelerated to quickly close the gap and voice my concerns. A couple of cyclists passed us and they confirmed that there were "hundreds" of runners behind us so it seemed like the whole field had followed us. One of the guys was local and knew that the route should have passed through the North Face car park and we could get back to that by turning left at Torllundy, just before Fort William. So after about 3 miles on the road in this so-called trail race, we turned in at Torllundy and after another half mile saw an arrow (which we should have approached from the opposite  direction). Then, it was every man for himself again.

One of the guys took off too fast for me whilst I gradually dropped the early leader on the first big ascent. Soon after I lost sight of the leader and thought possibly that he had missed a hidden switchback junction where the arrow had blown down but I saw out the corner of my eye at the last second. To cut a very long story short, from there on in, I thought I was either in the lead or very lost as I never saw the other guy again (or anyone behind me). At points I was virtually blown off my feet, constantly blasted with torrential rain and in other places running for miles in a path that had become a fast flowing burn! All the time I had the nagging doubt about how much extra we had added on at the start and so when 13 miles clicked through on my Garmin, although I had no idea where I was, I knew for sure that I was nowhere near the finish as I was on a trail down by the A82 and the finish was back up at the Gondola station. The only option was to switch to survival mode, to slow down and conserve energy just in case I had another 3 or 4 miles and 1000 feet to go. All the time I was doing my Tourettes audition rehearsal and thinking about the others in the race moving slower than me and hence out in these freezing conditions for longer (if indeed they had managed to see get onto the course at all). A mile or so and a big climb later I popped up over a bank into the car park where a guy shouted to me to run round to the back of the cafe to finish.

A huge cheer went up as I opened the cafe door and revealed my number (first race I have done wearing a running jacket over my vest, first race I have finished by opening a door). Still thought I might have won at that point until the early leader appeared to shake my hand. 1 hour 41 minutes for 14.1 miles, 1050 feet of climbing, second overall, first vet. Must get a good prize for that. No, nothing, just a medal. FFS! Colin had an even worse experience than me as his pack did not know about the turn off the A82 at Torrlundy and ran to the first 30mph sign on the outskirts of Fort William where a van driver told him he had missed the turn! This meant that Colin ran 16 miles in total but did amazingly well to re-pass virtually the whole field to finish 5th overall and second vet. Genevieve, Don, Phil and Dawn all finished in good shape (but not happy having all run the same 14.1 mile variation of the course as me) whilst Liz was the only sensible one, opting out of the 21k at the last minute and doing the 5k instead.

Anyway I can't recommend the race or the event organisers (it would be a good place to train in your own free time though). I can recommend the Clachaig Inn where we retreated for dinner (so enjoyable that, on doing my daily weight check on Monday morning, I had actually put weight on!).
Alan
(ps the critical turn we missed was about 400m after the start. We did spot the arrow lying in a ditch on driving out of the car park).

Calderglen Harriers Trail Races

As you all should know our Trail races will take place on Fri 29th June.
Again as most will know it takes a lot of help on the day with many roles needing filled.
What i need now is volunteers to fill all these roles from marshalling, course set up, registration, finish area etc. I will be at the sports club from 1.30pm on the day and registration starts at 4pm with the first race at 6pm.
If you can leave a message on this Blog with the time you are available from it would be appreciated.
Again this year if we have enough volunteers we will give the opportunity to run the race by a random draw from the list of volunteers, but our first priority is to manage the event safely.
Again to make it easier nearer the time, when you put your name on this blog if you also indicate if you want the opportunity to run if the chance arises or not if your happy just to help.

TO MAKE IT CLEAR EVERYONE IS EXPECTED TO HELP

Russell

Auldhouse 5k Time Trial

Even more miserable conditions than Monday night if that is possible. Heavy rain, strong winds and 3 degrees C temperatures for the first of our "Summer" time trials and that perhaps made a dent in the numbers running tonight. However, the 12 who did so all performed well, particularly Joanne with a course best and Stephen Phimister with oh so nearly a course best. Surely big improvements will come if we get better weather.

All the times have been added to the spreadsheet which you can access from the menu on the left. Well done to all.
Alan

Edinburgh to North Berwick - A shorter race for David Searil!

Arriving in Portobello on Saturday morning I was daunted to be able to see the end of the Edinburgh to North Berwick road race so clearly, see below. Twenty miles never seemed so far!

Once again I was lucky with the weather - sunny, cool and with a slight tail/cross wind which I'm told is unusual for this race especially over the latter, more exposed, part of the route.

Photo courtesy Bob Marshall Photos

Some 200 runners set off with dire warnings from the organisers ringing in our ears about staying within their time limits, i.e. go through 5 and/or ten miles above a certain time and you were out.  As a consequence I started faster than for a long while, falling into a small pack with half a dozen members of the Edinburgh Running Network, also going faster than they really wanted to.  We kept each other going along the lovely seaside route through Joppa, Musselburgh, Prestonpans and past the not-so-scenic power station at Cockenzie. Passing half way still feeling ok (escaping the clutches of the time police despite having had to make my now customary pit-stop) I decided to keep the pace up and over the next few miles caught and passed the ERN runners who had got away from me while I was stationary. I was still running steadily through Aberlady but  slowed noticably on the long exposed climb out of Gullane towards Dirleton.
Despite that I managed to pick up the pace again and began moving through the field a little as some runners were wilting in the sunshine. Fortunately the rumour in the field that the finish had been moved to the top of the Law turned out to be false and I actually enjoyed the long downhill finish into North Berwick. I managed to avoid tripping over the huge tree roots distorting the pavements and raced past a girl from Dundee Road Runners just before the line in a time of 2.58.35.

Sub nine minute miling for twenty miles is pretty good for me these days, sadly, but nowhere near a pb. By way of a bonus I also got a slight suntan!

The race winner was Ross Milne from Corstorphine AAC in a time of 1.53.39 and leading lady was Joasia Zakrzewski of Dumfries RC in 2.06.05, in an impressive 7th place overall.

I haven't heard any club members speak of having run this race in the past - can I claim to be the first Calderglen harrier to take part or does someone out there know different?

Well done David (and you still made Chatelherault tonight!). I've feeling there is a certain Mr McParland who may have done this one; Gerry, can you confirm?
Alan

Auldhouse 5k Time Trial 2012

Our first, monthly Auldhouse 5k Time Trial is this Thursday 10th May as part of our normal training. Please turn up at the club in good time so that I can record all the names of those participating in advance of the warm up. This event provides a good marker of fitness improvements through the summer. Select Auldhouse Time Trial Times from the menu in the left to see all previous times and check progress through this year.

The full schedule is on the Calderglen Events Calendar but just to be sure here are the dates (all Thursdays):
10th May, 7th June, 5th July, 9th August and 6th September. The final one will be a little bit different from the rest.
Alan

SVHC Snowball Race

Drumpellier Park provided the venue for the Scottish Veteran Harriers Club annual Snowball Race (named after the prizes.... chocolate snowballs for all). Three Harriers took part in the 4.8 mile circuit of the park. First Harrier home was Scot Hill in 31:32, slightly down on last year but a good effort with the London Marathon still in his legs. Next was Jim Holmes in 32:27, also down on last year with a bit of the Highland Fling still in his legs. Graham Lindsay, however, didn't need to rely on excuses and delivered a personal best over the course of 32:52.