Dumyat Hill Race

7 May 2008
8km 380 metres
45m 13s 73rd/260 runners

These big races are great aren’t they? You run your slowest time in 12 attempts yet finish 73rd of 260 runners, so you can delude yourself you are a not bad runner, brill! A classic slog up and dash down that epitomises the true essence of hill running in under an hour. Despite being a bit tired after Stuc last Sat, and a 100 mile and 70 mile cycle on the Sun and Mon, I was determined to get over for this fun evening. It was well worth it. I thought I ran not too bad, legs not completely dead to the top and as always enjoyed the rollicking mad descent, Val and Murdo passed me about half way down and I tried my best to hang on to them. Trying to chase Murdo down at the end, and trying to keep ahead of Judith from Carnegie, meant a hard finish all the way to the line. One of the great things about running is that you can finish way down on your best (39m 50s 1993) but still feel that you gave it your all and be happy with that. And, of course, everyone else apart from a few youngsters seems to be doing the same. A fantastic turnout of Westies and some great individual runs. And all rounded off with a curry back in Glasgow – excellent evening.

Results
Summit Photos
Finish photos

Stuc a Chroin Hill Race

STUC A CHROIN HILL RACE
SATURDAY 3 MAY 2008
13 MILES 5300 FEET

Westies did well at the Stuc race this year with newcomer Elsie Riley doing great to win the female race and David Riach placing in the top ten. The slog up the forestry track never gets easy, and it took me the full 20 mins to the end of itto feel warmed up, sort of. My poor wee legs were feeling the effects of last week’s Three Peaks race so I tried to relax and just enjoy the race. The precipitous climb up the Corbett of Ben Each was, well steep and heathery, heathery and steep. I slowly edged a few places here before the cracking undulating ridge along to the foot of Stuc, where the leaders had already came down. Plenty of chance to say hello to everybody as they flew past in the opposite direction. Turned at the top feeling great and taking in the beautiful views and then hared off the long descent all the way down to Glen Ample for that infamous slog back up the final climb. Caught a few here by ever so slowly crawling past them, then big gaps ahead meant a solo last few miles to finish just over 3 hours. Well pleased with the time on tired legs and still in the top half of the field. I even got to down a couple of pints of the specially brewed “Stuc a Chroin Anniversary Ale” in the pub after. A grand day out, many thanks to the masses of helpers strung out everywhere on the course handing out virtually unlimited supplies of water and goodies, and well done all you Westies.

7 David Riach MV 02:31:46
20 Simon Triger M 02:45:53
25 Graham Kelly M 02:48:00
26 Don Reid MSV 02:48:19
41 Crawford Spence M 02:59:12
52 Murdo Macleod MSV 03:04:14
54 John Donnelly MV 03:05:48
63 Elsie Riley F 03:14:53
102 Elspeth Scott FV 03:37:26
120 Davy Broni MSV 04:16:52

121 finishers 5 drop-outs

Full results

Photos

Three Peaks Fell Race

Saturday 26 April 2008
24 miles 5300 feet
With the wild Fifers Louise, Bill, Jocelyn, Tom, Tom, Louise, Hilary and Moira ( really pretty nice actually) I travelled to Yorkshire for the grandly named World Mountain Running Long Distance Championships held over the long established Three Peaks Race. What awaited most of us for the first time was 23 miles of trail, rocks, limestone pavement and 5300 feet of climbing up the peaks of Pen-y-Ghent, Whernside and Ingleborough. For me it was the chance to run one of the classic fell races and the lure of being Westies World Champion if I was lucky enough to be the lone Westie, shame on you Gordon Robinson for spoiling my fun! Picturesque Dentdale was our home for the weekend and what a cracking area this is - rolling hills, drystane dykes everywhere and full of great pubs and tea shoppes. I behaved the night before, restricting myself to only 2 pints of the lovely local ale in The George and Dragon in Dent village. Topped up the next morning by a cooked breakfast it was off to Horton in Ribblesdale, where we were greeted by a very well organised event that had to cope with almost 800 runners and hangers-on. After trying to out-psyche the Russians and top Brits with our extensive warm-up routine of lounging around and gossiping away and, of course my tartan lycra shorts, Gordon, me and the few other Scots were off up the wee lanes and onto the hill for a 4 hr blur (well more a sort of trudge, plod, walk and gravity-assisted plunge) of blood, sweat and tears. The field split up quickly on the runnable climb up Pen-y-ghent, where we had to be careful to avoid the mad leaders descending past us. We then had miles of track and trail leading to the famous Ribblehead railway viaduct, before a steep “on all fours” climb up to Whernside. A pretty tricky descent for a few miles led to the equally steep final climb to Ingleborough, where I spied Gordon a few minutes ahead of me at the summit. Trying to stay ahead of long-time rival Wendy Dodds, and maybe seeing if I could make up time on Gordon, I hared off (sort of) down the tricky descent taking about 40mins to the finish, ungraciously out-sprinting a lady just on the line. I was well please to take 4h 14m and finish in 320th place, easily in the top half of the field. Gordon was easily ahead of me, and in a fantastic performance Jethro Lennox of Shettleston Harriers was ahead of everyone.

1st Jethro Lennox (S.H.I.T.) 2:53:39
32ND Anna Pichrtova Czech Republic 03:14:43

295th Gordon Robinson 4h 10m 04s
320th John Donnelly 4h 14m 07s

754 starters
685 finishers

my photos
Race website
Grough report
NickHamPhotos

Mull and Iona

A lovely sunny two days on Mull. Climbed Ben More on Saturday and had a barbecue at Arle Lodge afterwards. Visited Iona on Sunday with Arthur and Gilln and had a nice sunny lunch on their 100m high hill.

FLICKR photos