Lomonds of Fife Hill Race

The new improved Lomonds of Fife route attracted a good turnout of Scotland’s and Westies’ finest hillrunners for the 3rd championship race of 2007. Courtesy of the Miller-mobile I was chauffeured to the village of Strathmiglo, at the foot of West Lomond. At the start it was straight uphill to West Lomond, a runnable section through the fields to begin with, then a backache-inducing steep walk up to the summit. I wasn’t feeling too great at this point, but that wasn’t unusual for me early on. Turning at the summit for the steep descent down to the checkpoint I spied Murdo and Steffen zooming away in front of me, and had a slipping sliding contour down across to the woods. The runnable forest tracks were a bit of a slog, but I was feeling OK, helped by Ellie catching me up and forcing me to up the pace on the narrow trod to the monument. It was a slow plod up but when we reached the monument I managed to pull away slightly from Ellie and chase Tommy Begley of Irvine A.C. I passed him but Tom Bowie of Fife A.C. also caught me up and together we headed for Stevie Bell just ahead. Crossing the road at Craigmead I passed Stevie and we were in turn passed by the leader who had already been up East Lomond and back! On up to the summit and back with big gaps ahead, but trying to raise my pace a little. I reeled in a couple of runners on the way to West Lomond, just spying Dave Duncan and a wee group ahead of me near the top. I donned the Manny-inspired waterproof cut-offs for the mad descent down the green wall, though they did not fully prevent some sore grass burns on my backside – some modifications still needed to the design. The bum-sliding technique definitely worked as I power-slipped my way past a Boggie, but not quite quick enough to catch the group ahead. I finished in a shade over 2 hours, just failing to beat my pre-race target of improving 7 seconds on last year to break the 2 hour mark, but still there’s always next year. Chris led the Westies men home, I think, and Ellie had a great run to lead the women home and finish just a few minutes behind me as 3rd lady. In between and roundabouts were Nigel, Manny, Steffen, Murdo, Stevie Bell, Brian Brennan, Cat, Elsie, Jason, Pauline.

13 Chris Upson Westies M40 01:39:49
14 Nigel Scott Westies MS 01:40:11
15 Manny Gorman Westies MS 01:41:50
38 Steffen Gorgas Westies MS 01:54:02
42 Murdo McLeod Westies M50 01:57:06
54 John Donnelly Westies M40 02:01:09
58 Ellen Homewood Westies FS 02:04:45
59 Stephen Bell Westies M40 02:04:57
76 Catriona Miller Westies FS 02:11:28
89 Brian Brennan Westies M50 02:17:44
98 Jason Kaushal Westies M40 02:24:18
101 Elspeth Scott Westies F40 02:28:05
124 Pauline McAdam Westies F50 02:54:25

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