Six Men Make Edinburgh’s Day

I sometimes get quite nostalgic, of course my regular clients will know this as I use Alsop’s Fables to illustrate a point. It was whilst in reminiscent mode that I decided upon this week’s blog. I was taken back to a great day when I was unexpectedly thrown into the thick of it and emerged a National Champion. I am of course referring to my debut run for Edinburgh AC, though in those days they were named City of Edinburgh (and there was another name they were referred to by our friendly rivals the Hunters Bog Trotters).

But before I go into any details about the great day in question, let me start by explaining a little how I ended up a member of Edinburgh AC. Since starting to run, at the age of 24, and turning 40, I’d only ever had one club. It was my local club, Belgrave Harriers, and such was my attachment to them, I served my time as Road and Cross Country Captain and also held the position of Honorary Club Secretary. I had no intention of leaving them but around the time I turned 40 there were a few circumstances that came together, the result of which was that I switched allegiance to local rivals, Herne Hill Harriers. Soon after this switch my marriage broke down, which was taking the Belgrave/Herne Hill rivalry a little far (my ex-wife being a member of the Belles). With the marriage over I had nothing to tie me to London, and, having worked abroad as a contractor before, I started thinking about all the exotic locations I might go to work.

Having mentioned my good fortune to my boss and in my usual honest way, commenting that I didn’t anticipate staying in London much longer, I found myself being offered a promotion and relocation to the Edinburgh office. A move which would cement my future in the Bank, I so enjoyed working for. To cut a long paragraph short, I found myself living in Edinburgh by November 2005. As I was still making regular trips back to my home in London I didn’t really do anything about getting to know the running scene in Edinburgh, in fact it wasn’t until Boxing day (I had worked Xmas day so needed to get out and do something) that I ran my first race in Scotland. The race in question was a 14k multi terrain handicap race at Beecraigs. It’s not the sort of thing I’d normally have done on Boxing Day but faced with a miserable lonely day in a small flat it was a mighty relief. Thanks to my friend, Jim Buick, who provided the transport but also gave them information on my best 10k time, achieved 12 years earlier, I found myself going off scratch. Needless to say I had a lonely run, went off course and managed to punch myself in the face on a descent of the Cockleroy. I did however finish 2^nd fastest so it wasn’t a complete failure.

My second race in Edinburgh was on New Year’s day 2006, in the Portobello 4 mile Road Race. It was nice to get out on New Year’s day, for some company, I’d spent a lonely New Year’s Eve and retired to bed early, having received my only New Year’s Eve greeting from a prostitute hanging out of a window on my walk home. Mind you going to bed early on New Year’s Eve in Edinburgh guarantees nothing other than being woken up at midnight by exploding fireworks. At the race I ran well and finished 4^th but first man over 40, so not a bad start to the year. It was around this time that Jim Buick emailed me, asking if I’d joined a Scottish club yet. My cheeky response being that nobody had asked me resulted in Jim forwarding my reply to Alex McEwen and thus contact was made with City of Edinburgh. I’ll admit to being a bit hesitant at first, after all I was in a club already, and we were successful, but I knew I would be getting down to London a lot less once I’d settled in Edinburgh and the UK Athletics rules allowed me to run for both Herne Hill and Edinburgh.

So I joined City of Edinburgh and, due to other commitments, lined up my first race at the Scottish National Road Relays on 1 April. Of course being an oldie, and knowing that Edinburgh had more than 6 men better than me I expected to play a part in their Master's team. The week before the race I had spent in London, on a course, and as I flew back on the Friday night I figured that Edinburgh’s Masters were so strong it wouldn’t matter if I wasn’t on full cylinders so decided to have a couple of glasses of wine to assist in enjoying the short flight. When I arrived back at my flat it was like walking into the Sahara Desert, without the sand. I’d moved in only the week before and my central heating hadn’t been working. I’d left keys with the workmen whilst I was in London and they’d fixed it but then left the heating on full output for four days. Despite turning it off, and opening windows, it was still the height of summer in my flat when I awoke from a restless night. So I hadn’t had the best preparation for my debut for Edinburgh. Still I was keen to run, get to know some of the local lads and set down a marker.

Still not knowing many people I drove to the race on my own, taking the long way round by getting lost twice. When I finally found the Edinburgh guys it was apparent Alex wasn’t around, he was on race marshal duty and had left the team in the hands of Mark Johnston. It was then that I was told I wasn’t going to make a difference to the Master’s team, I was actually last man into the A team for the Seniors. I looked at the team names, recognising nobody except Darren Gauson and Mark Johnston. I then noticed Martin Ferguson’s name in the Master’s team. ‘Surely’ I said ‘Martin is running better than me’, I’d seen some of his results and he was going well, I was beginning to regret having drunk two glasses of wine and sleeping in the oven. It was then I was introduced to Martin Ferguson, who had been standing next to me whilst I was singing his praises. Clearly happy to have someone say something nice about him Martin declined the place and was sure Alex knew what he was doing. I was beginning to wonder if Jim Buick had mentioned my times from previous decades and this had bumped me up the entry list. Oh well in for a penny.

I wasn’t nervous as the race started, I was on leg 5 and knew nothing of the team chances or the opposition. I had a lot of experience running and winning relays for Belgrave and Herne Hill so I was prepared for anything that came my way. Before the start I’d been introduced to the other 5 team members, but I knew very little about them and they knew even less about me. In the following few paragraphs I’ll describe the race as I saw it, with thanks to Mark Johnston who sent me a link with the full results. For any statos out there here is that link http://www.salroadrunningandcrosscountrymedalists.co.uk/Archive/Road%20Running/Road%20Relays/Results/2000s/2006%20ALL.pdf

It was Mark Mitchell who set us off on leg one. Still only 17, Mark was highly ranked in the UK in his age group for the 800m. But it was a big challenge to pit him against some of the strong runners on leg 1. Mark ran a fantastic short leg 16:17 to bring us in 3rd, just 11 seconds off 1st.

Grant Stewart, more of a hill runner than a road runner, took over from Mark on the first long leg. His time of 30:18 was 5th fastest on the leg but good enough to gain us 2nd place. In front a 29:21 from Irvine's David Millar had moved them from 8th to the lead.

Then it was the turn of Darren Gauson. Darren had been running well and was on his way to an American college, but before that he was to take us into the lead in this relay with a superb leg of 15:41. Great as it was this was only the 2nd fastest on the leg as Kilbarchan's Ross Toole ran the day's fastest short stage at 15:39, which brought them into 2nd place. 

Half way through and we were leading, things were looking promising. Relays can fluctuate from leg to leg so being in the lead didn’t necessarily mean we had it sown up, still it does you no harm. I was one leg away and beginning to psyche myself up.

Mark Johnston was on 4^th leg and although he had an 89 second lead he had some strong opposition on his long leg. Mark did a great job, running the 6th fastest time on his leg but couldn't hold of Irvine's Lee Richardson who brought them back into 1st position from almost 2 minutes back. I should point out here that Mark was at the Beecraigs run and was fastest man, running a minute quicker than me, that’s probably why he got the long leg and me the short – but I wasn’t complaining.

Not knowing for sure how long the long legs were I was at the start line early. I was enjoying not having to small talk with people, then an old gent came up to me and said ‘are you going to win this for Edinburgh, we’ve never won before’. Well history is one of my favourite subjects but my knowledge of City of Edinburgh’s lack of success was sadly lacking so all I could say was ‘I’ll give it a go’. At last the leader came in sight, and it wasn’t Mark. Irvine had taken the lead and they seemed to be a long way ahead, though it was actually only 16 seconds. Irvine’s 5^th leg man set off and seemed to be pulling well away before Mark showed handed over in 2^nd place.

Well I’ve done some pretty good relay legs in my time and I wasn’t about to let an old Edinburgh gent’s dreams get shattered. I set off after Irvine’s man, with a vengeance. Just before the 1 mile point I was metres down. It was at that precise point that I caught a quick sight of the Edinburgh lads, with mournful faces. It was only later that I realised they weren’t too happy with me because they’d seen Mark, on the previous leg, a long way ahead and, because they didn’t know me, they’d assumed I’d just lost the lead, it wasn’t until after the race that they realised I’d run ok. I pushed into the lead and, though I tired towards the end, the cheering Edinburgh lasses helped me on my way and I brought the team in 1^st. My time of 16:26 was 2nd fastest on the leg, only 2 seconds down from one of Scotland's greatest athletes, Bobby Quinn, who'd brought Kilbarchan up to 3rd. 

Matt Bell had the task of holding onto the 44 second lead I'd given him. As usual, I went for my cool down back along the course to cheer Matt on. I had no idea if he was going to hold the position and it was a long wait before he turned up, but he was and remained in the lead running the 3rd fastest time of the last leggers with 30:35. We’d won in a time of 2 hrs 20 min 50 secs and made an old gent happy, actually make that two old gents as I was pretty chuffed too, my first race for Edinburgh and I was a Scottish National Champ at the age of 41. 22 seconds behind us William Richardson had brought Irvine back up to 2nd and a further minute and 7 seconds behind were Ron Hill Cambuslang.

A couple of interesting post notes. The Irvine man I passed on my leg turned out to be Colin Miller. He was 48 years old at the time, so he’d had a tough task to try to hold first place, even if I was only a few years younger than him. We subsequently met up when we both represented Scotland, later in the year, and have become good friends. And here’s one for my Cambuslang friends, a lot of people made remarks about how it was a slow winning time. But do I care, no, the results speak volumes, it’s City of Edinburgh who were Scottish National Road Relay Champions in 2006, beating all those great teams who ran even slower and my medal states National Champion, not National Champion from a slow race.  

Now 5 years on it’s interesting to see what has happened to Edinburgh’s team. They’re all Facebook friends of mine but we all live different lives in 4 different countries.

Mark Mitchell, still a young man at 23, he left Edinburgh at the end of the 2010 track season and is now putting in some good performances with Birchfield Harriers. I saw him on the TV yesterday, running in the UK Champs 1500m, along with another ex colleague Kris Gauson (brother to Darren). Mark ran a pb 3:44.44 to come in 8th with Kris two place back in 3:46.76.

Darren Gauson is still in America, he’s now coaching at Butler University, where he’s been joined by brother Kris. He’s still running and not bad too, having got close to 4 minutes for the mile this year. Interestingly both Darren and Kris also represent my old club, Belgrave.

Grant Stewart, born on the same date as me but 11 years later, just in time to enjoy one of the UK’s hottest summers, he’s also now a Master. He’s had some success with Mountain running but it appears he’s given up the running now to concentrate on being a Doctor.

Matt Bell was always a reliable runner, he also seemed to prefer running hill races. He’s now moved to Melbourne, Australia. Another one who has reached the age of Master, I hope he manages to find some good races in Australia.

Mark Johnston was the first to leave the club, moving to Bellahouston Road Runners within two years of this victory. Mark trained with the Bellahouston guys and felt a growing affinity with the club. He’s still running, and not badly too as he gets close to his 40^th birthday.

And of the others;

Alex McEwen is still coaching at Edinburgh and I have him to thank for helping me when I was in training to become a Level 1 coach. As well as all the other athletically minded things he did for me whilst I was up in Edinburgh. A true club man, dedicated to seeing the success of athletics in Edinburgh and the sort of club man who should be given a leg of the Olympic torch relay. But don’t give him whisky, he doesn’t drink it. Incidentally he’s marked down on the Power of 10 as 40, which is quite interesting as I’d have said he saw his 50^th birthday some time ago.

Jim Buick is now training to become a Personal Trainer and is already qualified as a Fitness Instructor and Run Leader. Jim has helped many people to pace their marathons, being a bit of a marathon expert. We still keep in touch and Jim pops down here sometimes to try out English races, I’ll have to get him along to Pennington Flash one weekend.

Five and a bit years on, what have I been up to. If you’ve read last week’s blog you’ll know that I was feeling a bit tired and decided it was time I took a little break from the intensity of my training. The desire to train easy was there, but, as I said last week, it was fitting it in around other circumstances, so my planned easy week ended up an easy 3 days. I hadn’t intended running the Pennington Flash Parkrun but after chatting to Ray, during our training session on the Tuesday, I decided to give it a go. It’d been a hard week for sleep as the removal of all the old curtains and poles, so that the sills and walls could be painted, meant we had the constant glare of street lamps and early morning rises. So I wasn’t feeling great as I drove up to Pennington Flash. We had a car full as Ray and his wife Sharon and my Carole were all aiming to run. We got a bit of a shock when we arrived as the car park was full of tri-athletes, preparing for the following days triathlon, but we managed to park ok and headed for the start. The usual suspects were there, plus a few new faces. In particular I’d noticed one guy who looked like he might be a serious contender to win. You’re never sure, but I had a feeling I wasn’t going to win my 4^th Parkrun. As we set off I was surprised I was on my own again, but about 50 metres into the race I had company, yes he was a serious contender. I decided to set a good pace to see how he ran, up the first hill he was breathing harder than me. At that point I thought I might be able to break him so kept the pressure on, at the top of the 2^nd hill he spoke to me and told me he’d only come along for a tempo run. Never the quickest witted person I was fighting for something to put him down with but failing that I thought the best possible putdown would be to finish in front of him. The pace was still pretty quick but I seemed to be ok with it. Halfway round the 2^nd lap he decided it was time to push me and he succeeded, I couldn’t match him. But I wasn’t going to give in without a fight. The two times I’ve been beaten at Pennington Flash I was beaten by about 50 seconds, this time I was keeping him in my sights. It was just after the start of the 3^rd loop I decided to check my watch, it said 11:57. I’d figured it was about 5 minutes to the finish from here but as I saw my time I thought I’d either miscalculated or I was having a good run. It didn’t feel like a good run as I was starting to hurt, but I stuck to the task as best I could. As I crossed the line I was slow to stop my watch, but was amazed to see 16:57. The winner, who wasn’t registered so I don’t know who he was, though I think I’ve seen him before, ran 16:46, and my official time was 16:56. That’s another course pb by 18 seconds and meant I was only the 4^th person to run sub 17 minutes for the course. Some achievement on this tough course. It also gave me a better age graded score though I’m still lying 3^rd. I realise that to knock Jeff Whittington from top spot I’ll need to aim for a new course record, something I thought was impossible for me a few weeks ago, but now I’ve dipped under 17 minutes I’m not so sure. What’s the betting Jeff runs a 19:10 to raise the bar again. Now I’m sure many of you are reading this and wondering what the fuss is about over a 16:56 5k, well you see this is a tough course. When I ran a road 5k in Hollins Green I finished in 16:39, at that point my best around Pennington Flash was 17:33, but buoyed on by the Hollins Green run I ran a 17:14 PF the following week. So you could look at this and say that, were I to run a road 5k now I should run something between 16:02 and 16:21, which is about the time I ran last year at Hollins Green. The difference now is that I had reached my peak by Hollins Green, whereas this year I feel like I’m on the way up. Interesting for me, of course running isn’t an exact science and I know I now have to get out there and compete against my peers in some road and cross country races if I’m to make the England team. Which is what I intend to do, so it’s goodbye to Pennington Flash for a while, hello to road races.    

Illnesses and injuries - to train or not to train

I’ll dedicate this blog to former Edinburgh AC team mate and sub 4 minute miler, Kris Gauson, who gave me the idea after complaining about hay fever on facebook. Hope you’re no longer suffering Kris, looks like you’re ok judging by the weekend results. This blog covers more than just hay fever and is about how to deal with illness and injury when you’re a regular trainer.

The general advice is that if you are feeling unwell or have an injury you should rest until the illness/injury has passed. It is, however, perfectly feasible to continue to train with minor ailments or minor injuries, though it is advisable to ease back on the effort level somewhat. Don’t take this as my personal recommendation, you should always be careful not to overdo your training, but we probably all know people who will train through injury and illness and on many occasions they carry on without any serious implications. Each individual situation needs to be assessed by yourself, or a healthcare/fitness professional, there is no definitive list of when you should or shouldn’t train and I have done it both successfully and unsuccessfully. Also I’ve been advised to continue exercise whilst having treatment on many occasions, from the healthcare professional I was being treated by. The key is to recognise what has potential to cause serious illness and injury and avoid it. The wise man says, if in pain, don’t train. Of course that is a different sort of pain to that pleasurable pain induced by physical activity.

I’ll start with hay fever. I used to get it a lot in London and there was a period when my life was hell as my nose would run and sneeze all day. It was a particular issue standing on the tube in a full carriage, hanging onto the roof of the tube, with my nose running constantly. It also caused me problems sleeping so for about a month I was really tired and grumpy, for the other 11 months I was just grumpy. I actually found that my nose was much better when I was running, it gave me a relief, I probably should have done marathon training in that month. The other thing that seemed to relieve it was an air conditioned office, my favourite time of the year to work long hours. I did try homeopathic remedies, though I don’t really like putting any drugs into my body, but they never really worked for me so I just tried to ride out the storm. It never stopped me running and, although I worried it might do, I don’t think it had any effect on my form. When I moved up to Edinburgh I suffered a lot less, with hay fever that is, the only time I can actually recall suffering from it was when I went for a walk in the Pentlands and passed a rapeseed field. Back now in England and I am suffering again. So far it’s been the odd sneeze and itchy eyes but a couple of weekends ago I was at a Simple Minds concert in Delamere Forest and about half way through my nose started running and it was constant suffering for the rest of the concert. Thankfully, irritating as it was, it didn’t ruin the concert and I rate that as one of the best I’ve been to. So you can exercise through hay fever, however, because the sneezing comes on without warning, I would suggest you need to be careful if contemplating any exercise involving equipment, particularly any heavy lifting.

One thing we all get is the common cold. Colds can range from a little sniffle to the fully blown up flu like ailment. Flu is much worse and you should not consider training when suffering from it. I have continued to train through the minor cold symptoms, though at a lesser intensity, but I always stop if the cold is bad, my way of looking at it is, if I can exercise then I can work, if I can’t work I can’t exercise. Consequently I have a very low sickness record at work. My worst cold hit me in 1996, I’d had a good start to the year and was running into some good form. I was 2^nd in the Surrey 5000m and won the 10000m, but the rest of the summer turned into a bit of an anti-climax. However, I remained injury free and continued to train hard. As we approached the autumn my form returned and I produced some good road relay results. At the first Surrey Cross Country League I produced my best result to that point, finishing 13^th and went on to my first cross country race win in the South of Thames Junior Championship (more of that in a later blog). I was now in full swing and training hard, my focus was on the Surrey Cross Country Champs, I firmly believed I was a contender to win. Two weeks before the championship the guy who sat next to me at work got a really bad cold, but continued to turn up to work. Eventually it came my way, it had taken a full 8 days to reach me but when it did it knocked me sideways. It was probably the worst cold I can remember. I was desperate, 5 days to race day and I could hardly move. I spent a few days off work and training in the hope it would go away. Come the Saturday I went for a 1 mile jog. I can’t say I felt great but I convinced myself I was fine, big mistake. The race was that afternoon, at Coulsdon, 7.5 miles of cross country. I was still confident when we kicked off and hit the front row straight away, but then at about 1 mile I hit what can only be described as the wall, I suddenly had nothing left and started to fade. I continued to run as hard as I could, dragging my wall with me, but spent the next 6.5 miles watching other runners pass me. Understandably I didn’t win, I probably wouldn’t have anyway as it was won by Gary Staines (European Silver medallist) with John Solly (Commonwealth Gold medallist) in 2^nd, but I think a top 5 position was on the cards that day. 15 more guys got the better of me that day, as I faded to 18^th position. The one consolation is that I made the 6 man Belgrave team which won the team event for the first time in 30 years. No consolation really when you appreciate what damage I’d done. For the next few weeks I struggled with my training and when I came 34^th in the next Surrey League race, in what was quite a weak field, I knew something was wrong, so I went to the doctors for tests. I was lucky, I could so easily have caused serious damage, I’ve heard of Cross Country skiers having heart attacks by training through colds. I had strained my heart, the doctor told me it was just like straining any other muscle, I needed to rest and start back slowly. Ever since then I’ve been more careful about running with colds. Ten years later I got a cold the week I was due to make my debut for Scotland in the British and Irish Masters Cross Country event. I was still unsure if I should run on the day but my heart rate was close to normal so I gave it a go. This time I got away with it but I’m not convinced it was a sensible decision.

Following on from the 1996 cold story, I struggled to regain fitness for the rest of the winter, but only on the relative scale as to where I’d been in November. My heart recovered, I didn’t have any further issues, and still haven’t. So I was still fit but annoyed that I’d been in such great shape and thrown it away over one race. So what did the less sensible version of Roger Alsop do? Yep that’s right I drove myself hard to get back to that level of fitness. I remember I went for a week’s holiday to the Lake District and before I went walking I’d do a really tough hill session or a flat out run over a 5 mile undulating loop, no rest days for me I had races to win. It worked, I got my fitness back, but I was putting my body under too much pressure. I managed a 3^rd place in the Surrey 5000m, irritated that it should have been a victory if only I’d been in shape. Over the next three weeks I noticed a dull ache at the top of my foot, near the toes. It didn’t stop me running so I just kept training. It was getting gradually more painful but I’d had pains before and run through them. Then on 31^st May I ran a 1500m at Tooting Bec. It was a tactical race, with some good runners in it but I wasn’t looking for a win I wanted to reassert myself and run a good time, so I hit the front to push the pace on. Entering the start of the 3^rd lap I was still in the lead, with a bunch right on my shoulder. It was at this point that the biggest long jumper I’ve ever seen, got out of his sandpit and without looking stepped onto the track, right in front of me. We hit hard and I was stopped dead in my tracks, this felt like a thicker wall than the one at Coulsdon. I don’t know how many runners behind me were also affected but nobody fell over. The race continued and I finished a disappointing 5^th in 4:12. I hadn’t felt any pain during the race, but as I walked back to my kit I suddenly felt a sharp pain in my foot. I hobbled home and went to the hospital, nothing showed up on x-ray so I sought help for what I suspected was ligament damage. Two weeks later I was still in pain, another trip to the hospital and the tell tale deposits confirmed that I had actually got a very fine fracture to my metatarsal. 9 weeks off running, unfortunately not 9 weeks off work, but actually that was a godsend as my boss sent a computer home for me to work on and that kept me sane as I sat cooped up in my flat. 

But it’s not all doom and gloom I’ve been running for 22 years now and most times, I recognise when I shouldn’t train and usually seek out expertise when in pain or ill. However, training at my level I always get niggles and it’s sorting out the niggles from the problems. I’ve often run with niggles and they’ve eventually gone. Earlier this year I took two months off to get rid of a persistent knee problem. When I started running again I was ok for a couple of weeks but then my knee started niggling. I identified what caused the pain and adjusted my training accordingly. After a while the pain went and now I’m able to train properly again.

 

Tiredness and stress, whilst not an illness, needs to be managed as it’s very easy to run yourself down. During my first year in Scotland I worked nightshifts for the first time in my life and I was also under a lot of pressure to perform for a job that clearly wasn’t suitable for me. Consequently I was under a lot of stress. I was still training hard and, surprisingly, running quite well. I headed down to England for the BMAF 5k in Horwich and remember being on the start line feeling like I was going to faint. For a moment I was worried I’d have to pull out or drop out. Then the gun went and I was away. I ran 15:44, still my fastest 5k since I turned 40. A few weeks later I didn’t fare so well over the half marathon distance.

That’s all I’m going to say at this point, regarding training with illnesses and injuries. Obviously there is a lot more that could be covered, such as training after recovery from a serious illness or pregnancy but that would make the blog quite long and take away subjects for other weeks. I would say that I have continued to train on many occasions, with minor ailments, and I haven’t suffered any long term issues, usually if there is a real problem it will become apparent early, however I would advise that you take care if you think you may be ill or injured, and get yourself checked out by a professional.

To finish off a quick update on what I’ve been up to. If you’ve been following my blogs, weekly, then you’ll know I’m now getting myself into some good form by gradually increasing the intensity levels of my training and the mileage. I’ve got my Australian client, wwwthegirlthatruns.com following a similar programme, if a little less intense than mine. I’m now able to run for longer than an hour without getting any pains in the knee. I’ve also noticed that I’m running quicker, comfortably, in my steady runs, and I’m loving the grass reps, which are mentally stimulating and right on the cusp between speed and endurance. Last week I did 18 of them and I felt like I was running each one as hard as the others, though there is no scientific fact to base that on as I don’t track the times, that way it doesn’t shatter any illusions, if I feel I’m running fast and hard then there’s no point in trying to dent my confidence. I have to say, though, that as soon as I finished there must’ve been a lactic switch turned on, because I could barely move. It reminded me of a training session I did with Richard Nerurkar, but that’s another story. I’ve used the same grass session for Carole and she loves it too, less reps of course. Tonight it’s Ray’s turn to sample it. Last Saturday I decided to run Pennington Flash again. I didn’t really want to but Carole was keen, so I mentioned it to Ray (getting Ray’s buy-in makes it harder for either of us to change our minds). I woke up feeling tired and still didn’t want to run, but at the end of the day it’s just training and at least it’s out of the way early. It had been raining for a couple of days so I was anticipating the ground to be soggy, in fact it wasn’t too bad but there was a strong wind. As we parked up, who should park next to us, only Jeff Whittington, my rival for age group victory. It was the first time I’d actually spoken to Jeff and it was nice to find out a bit more about the character behind the man. It was a good attendance at the race, 59 completed the course. Once again I was allowed to take the early lead and set my own pace. I knew I wasn’t going to set a blazing time, with my tiredness and the wind but I pushed all the way, reluctant to ruin my average time around the course. I actually thought I was pushing to avoid running in the 17:50s so was amazed when I crossed the line in 17:20, my 2^nd fastest around the course. Ray ran great to improve his pb and, although not setting a pb, Carole was 3^rd lady and 1^st in her age group. We went for coffee in the Ranger’s hut and it was nice to chat to some of the other runners. So that’s 5 runs completed at Pennington Flash, I’m not sure when I’ll next be back, but I will be.