Guys 10 

Sunday 2nd December 2007

 

Scenery :                    8

Pb potential :              10 (Bev Wright of Blackpool knocked 5 minutes off)

Atmosphere :              9 (Despite the atrocious weather) (Good crowd support)

Organisation :             8 (Made amends for last year!)

Value :                         9 (£7 to pre-enter & a 0.45 kg circular block of local cheese at the finish.) (What a great idea!!!)

Beginner Friendly :    10

 

Not done a race report for 3 months. Had writers block!!!……….but it’s hard writing about the same races year in year out and I have not had as much time as usual due to one thing and another. I was going to do one for the Worsthorne Fell Race at Burnley (Aug 12), but by the time I’d returned from my hols, I couldn’t remember a thing about it except I really enjoyed it and definitely one to do again. The organiser also very kindly e-mailed me a map as well!

 

It’s a 10:30 start today, (Nick!) I’d pre-entered to prevent re-occurrence of last year when some runners were getting turned away. They had a lot of pre-entries this year, but I guess the weather must have put quite a few off. Was going to have breakfast first at Morrisons, but it doesn’t open early on a Sunday.

 

Despite being fairly local and no rush for a number, I still like to set off at 9 to make sure my 10 year old son, Levon is sorted. (Nic and Gayle said they’d take care of Levon, but they were nowhere to be seen). We were followed down to the race by local unattached runner, Brian Cumpsty. I was driving through all the puddles to make waves/splashes for Levon and Brian appeared to be driving round them!

 

Levon decided he was hungry, so we went in the Restaurant, but it looked like full English or nothing. (He only wanted a sausage barm)……luckily Michaela turned up with a big bag of sweets! (Lucky for Levon’s dentist!)

 

10:30 was fast approaching and I thought I’d better hunt Nic and Gayle down. I still couldn’t see them, but whispering Bob Fairclough (I could see he wasn’t going very far as he was on crutches,) (motorbike crash in the Trough of Bowland), and Malcolm Sherwood were both knocking about.

 

We set off from Guys car park straight away into a large puddle. I didn’t avoid it. (A lot did!) What was the point? We were going to get thoroughly soaked anyway! I hadn’t had chance to warm up and felt a bit weird for the first mile, (running just behind John Bertenshaw and Trevor Rayner). After a mile I felt ok and overtook maybe 10 runners in one fell swoop. I was still behind JB and Trev, but felt I’d settled into more of a rhythm. At about 5 miles, a few runners that I’d overtaken started overtaking me. I tried to go with Blackpool’s Andy Delaney for a mile, but then he left me. One of my old rivals and sparring partners, Clayton’s Alan Clarkson came past and we chatted. He said I was a bit up and down and I wasn’t sure if he meant today or in general, but he was right on both counts! There were some very large puddles at this point and they seemed to slow Alan down. (The water was freezing!) I went past him again and reasoned there’s only 2/3 miles to go and I didn’t want to lose any more places, plus I thought the first ladies couldn’t be far behind! Alan’s footsteps followed me for quite a while and spurred me on. At last they began to fade and the finish was in sight. Nic was on top of the hill taking photos on his posh new phone. My nose was running, but I sprinted past regardless!! Every second counts. (Nic thought it was 11 am start and Gayle had Levon!)

Levon and Gayle were getting on like a house on fire. I think the cheese memento reminded them of Wallace and Grommit. I walked back to the car to get changed, and then realised Levon had the key! I walked back, and then back again to the car!

 

Met Trevor Rayner, Nick, Gayle, Lee, Julie Murphy, the Wyldes, Michaela, Pete Cruse, Steve Littler and Mike, (the dog), in the Pub. I hadn’t had a shower, but Mike was on hand to wash my face at least!

 

Nic had Levon in stitches by breathing in helium from the balloons at ‘Owd Nells.

 

1st Peter Medupe 52:43 (Preston), 1st Lady (51st overall) Gemma Unsworth (Blackpool)

 

And 23 Wesham finishers:-

 

3rd Steve Littler 53:59

19th Steve Myerscough 60:36

 

27th Lee Barlow 62:16

28th Pete Waywell – must have been a close 1!

29th Peter Cruse 62:33

32nd Alan Hudson 63:06

37th Trevor Rayner 63:50

41st John Bertenshaw 64:09

49th Martin Bates 65:21(14 secs quicker than last year!)

65th Mark Midgley 69:24

94th Nigel Shepherd 72:18

99th Michaela Dempsey 72:56

124th Stephen Wilkinson 75:57

136th Brian Porter 77:26

159th Mike Walsh 79:05

167th Chris Moss 79:55

172nd Dave Young 80:38

187th George Flanagan 82:05

194th Finlay McCalman 83:40

216th Tracey Hulme 87:30

217th Julie Murphy 87:34

240th Paul Carter 91:37

269th David Wells 108:39

 

Apologies to Norman Bateman and John Howorth. I know they did it, but I couldn’t see them in the results.

 

Written by: Martin Bates

Submitted: 6th December 2007

Edited by: Brenda J Earnshaw WRR Editor