SVHC Road Relay - Strathclyde Park

Irrespective of the time of year, the weather at this race is always similar; grey and windy. So it was no surprise to the Harriers' three complete men's teams and one and two thirds complete ladies teams who represented the club well on a cold blustery day.

Each leg of the relay comprised one complete lap of Strathclyde Loch in a clockwise direction, totalling just below 6km per lap. This year both the start and changeover were on a little spur access road just off the main path, requiring a very tricky sharp left turn onto the main path 30 or 40m after the start. However, everyone negotiated the turn safely as far as I could see.

Our ladies first team were a very strong team indeed with Julie Beveridge on the first leg, Alison Lessells on the second leg and Karen Allen on the third leg. As with many people right now, Julie was loaded with a head cold but this did not hold her back much, bringing the Harriers home in 4th position in a time of 24:17, which was 8th fastest time of the day. Alison held 4th position finishing in a strong 26:31. On the final leg, Karen Allen closed the gap considerably on the third and second placed teams to provide one of the closest team finishes of the race but just ran out of road, maintaining 4th position in a time of 24:36 and 9th fastest time of the day. As Julie and Karen are in the midst of marathon training, they then continued to do another lap or two at an easier pace to get the miles in. Well done ladies. 

Julia Whittle was the lead runner in our incomplete team, "fresh" from a hockey match yesterday but still improving considerably on the July running of this event, finishing in 31:57. Frances Ferguson still has her skiing legs on and felt as though she was lacking a bit of zip but still ran a good time of 27:53 on leg 2.

Our M50 A team was also very strong, with Davie Watt, Martin Howell, Gerry Connelly and Stephen Phimister running in that order. As always, Davie got the club off to a very strong start, finishing in 22:06 in third M50 team position on leg 1. Noting that Davie is in fact an M60, it was particularly impressive that Davie was 11th in the M50 category overall. Martin would be feeling the pressure of being landed relatively far up the field but had nothing to worry about as many of the runners passing him were in fact in the M35 category, although he wasn't to know. In fact Martin finished 4th in the M50 category in a good time of 26:02. Gerry Connelly has made a very strong contribution to the club since his return from Stornoway and regained third position for the team in an excellent time of 22:45. Stephen Phimister had been under the weather for the last few weeks but bounced back to health, maintaining third position in a time of 24:54. Stephen reminded me that this was only his second team podium ever! Well done to the M50 team.

Our second and third male teams were entered in the M35 category but contained a mixture of age groups from M35 to M70. After a hard week of training, Andrew Buchanan felt the fatigue in his legs but still managed to improve on July's time, finishing in 25:01. With this intense period of races, some races have to be considered as training sessions, so Andrew would definitely get the training benefit from today's hard run. Jim Holmes was on leg 2 duty and also ran stronger than in July as he gradually gets race form back, finishing in 26:50. Gordon McInally continued his return to fitness, finishing in 28:51 on leg 3 but knows he has much more to come as soon as he has built the training back up. Duncan McKellar had been feeling a slight twinge in his calf, so wanted leg 4 just in case he had to pull up. However, there were no signs of any problems as Duncan worked his way through the field in an excellent time of 23:14, finishing with a very strong sprint to make up one final place on the line.

Our third team was lead off by Kenny Leinster who is feeling better with every race. Kenny handed over in 28:49. Robert Gibson is starting to make progress again with some consistent training and completed leg 2 in 28:59. Russell Couper has run this race many times and knows exactly how to pace it. Russell finished strongly in 32:26. Finally, Billy Buchanan, who would be one of the few M70's in the race, maintained great form (although he says that was only on the bits of the course he knew we could see him from!) to finish in 30:08. Always the racer, Billy was disappointed not to break 30 minutes!

Well done to all for another fine turn out from the club despite various illnesses doing the rounds and reducing our numbers on the day. Some photos are in this album. Due user errors on my part, I didn't manage to catch everyone on photo.

Alan