MY CROSS COUNTRY REPORTS
NOVEMBER AND DECEMBER 2008
MUD SWEAT SPIKES AND MANY PATHS
Before we start, let’s get one thing straight.
This is not my favourite discipline, hence a tendency to have one, two or three
year sabbaticals, (the one before this year was three.)
However, knowing how good it is for stamina
building I have decided that I am going to do all Cross Country races this season, including the Northern’s and National’s,
neither of which I have done before. Of course, one has been missed as it
clashed with the Wesham 10k – always
first choice in my book as there is no reason for there to be a clash as far as
I’m concerned
I have done the three other races, so far,
and here is my input as to what I thought of them:-
At 9 a.m. 16 of us met in the car park, thirteen
men and three ladies. As the men had teams of fours and the ladies teams of three,
it meant that Chairman Dave could go
home as he had only turned up to see if we were short of numbers. Now that is
what I would call above and beyond the calling!
Alan Glasgow, Mick
Edge, Alex and
myself drove and we met up at the first services on the M1 – or at least that was the plan, but Mick got confused and drove past it. We didn’t think anything of it
as he had all three ladies in his car – lucky beggar! – and
they had to register earlier.
Next plan was to drive straight there, but
that didn’t work, either, as myself and Alan had not been there before and got
lost in
After putting up the tent and registering
the teams the ladies ran at 1-30, Julie
(13-34:30); Sue Jones (17-05.00) and
There were three men teams as follows:-
|
Team A 83rd |
Team B 141st |
Team C 151st |
|
Les Cornwall 17-45.40 John Collier 19-18.30 Alex Rowe 18-14.30 |
John Bertenshaw 20-27.75 Alan Glasgow 20-43.95 Mick Edge 21-20.55 Graham Vickers
21-26.85 |
Brian Porter 24-27.35 Myself 24-25.35 Mike Walsh 26-50.50 Dave Young 25-04.80 |
What a day we had – we were one of only six
teams who had three teams for the men. That is great credit to our club. All
those had teams in the ladies, (Aldershot
had two and
As for myself, I struggled, but I really
enjoyed it. (By the way, Mr Waywell
– senior – it is not flat as you suggested). It gave me a taste of what was in
store later in the year, except that there was little mud.
The weather was Ok – dull but not wet.
I made my own way there and got there after
the tent had been put up – what a shame, (I promise, Alan, I will help sometimes)
Another decent day, eventually, weather
wise. When we were waiting for the start, it was pouring with rain and I went
for my cap – keeps the rain off my glasses. It stopped when we started and it
got a bit hot with my cap on so I discarded it after one lap.
I decided that I would try to keep it
steady for the first lap and see how it went thereafter. After all, I hadn’t
run a Mid Lancs race for three years
so I didn’t want to blow up after one lap. It worked well and I improved each
lap. I passed quite a lot of runners on the 2nd half of the 2nd
lap and thereafter till the end. My time of 53-14 was no great shakes, but I was happy that my plan had worked.
There were seven ladies who were 10th and 17th teams, (three per
team). The V45 team of Kath, Julie and Marie were 3rd
team.
There was a brilliant turn out of 19 men,
who were 6th and 21st team, (six per team).
The mathematicians amongst you will have worked out that we also had another
full team but they were not listed in the top 26 teams. As usual the V50 team of Alex, John Collier and Derek
Buckley starred in 1st
place. Our 2nd V50 team
were 4th (Gary, Graham Cunliffe and John Bertenshaw).
When you think of the size of our club to
get twenty six out for a cross country is brilliant. I am so proud to be a part
of it, even if I am not going to be one of the top members.
As I said the weather was Ok and it did mean that I still hadn’t
sampled a muddy course, YET!
This was a cross country course – I think
only partly! One benefit is that it is about 10 minutes running from my house
so Russ, (who lives even nearer),
and me ran to and from the race.
Yes we did encounter the mud, which I never
really got to grips with – and not just because I only have short spikes.
However, those runners with fell shoes glided over the many paths that made up
the 6 mile course and didn’t necessarily suffer in the mud.
Me, however, had spikes on, (I thought that
was what Cross Country was all about
– ‘Mud, Sweat and Spikes’ our trophy
is called – silly me!) and suffered as there was no way I was running on the
paths. There were many who did and, of course, pulled away from me. How they
can call it a cross country course is beyond me, but enough of my gripe.
I actually quite enjoyed the bit where I
could try working the mud to my advantage. ‘Try’
being the operative word until the final bit where I overtook at least six
runners. My girlfriend, Carol, won a
book on running, (she was thinking of me when she entered – isn’t that nice),
and I intend reading the tips on Cross
Country running. Who knows I might get under 50 minutes yet!
It
poured down before the race and turned to fine rain during – my cap was perfect
this time. It was also breezy. In this race we had eight ladies and seventeen
men – again a superb turnout on a pig of a day.
The
ladies were 5th and 9th. Carmel, Michaela and Sarah were 2nd Over 35 team and Kath,
Julie and Kerry Eccles went one
better and were 1st V45.
The men
were 4th and 12th. Again, the stars were
the V50 team of Alex, Gary and John.
However,
it takes a whole variety of standards to make a race and a club and everybody
who turned out deserves credit.
I will
definitely be continuing this season.
Written by: Pete Cooke
Submitted: 31st December 2009
Edited by: Brenda J Earnshaw WRR Editor