Senior Race Roundup 18th August 2022

The last couple of weeks have certainly provided us with some real summer racing conditions, and
our members have been representing in all manner of events in the sunshine! It makes all the
winter training worth it…

The 6 th of August was a busy day, with blue and white vests spotted in various locations around
Scotland! First of all we had Robin Bourne competing at Dunoon 10k, completing in 1:02:20 in hot
conditions. Meanwhile, Martin Brown was on holiday and could not resist an 800m at the
Newtonmore Highland Games which he duly won! At the opposite end of the distance scale, Shaun
Dunbar took on the Devil of the Highlands, a 42 mile race on part of the West Highland Way. Shaun
completed in a very credible 32 nd place in 7:31:08 – huge congratulations Shaun!

Thursday the 11 th saw the long anticipated return of the Rowallan Rose Bowl. Conditions were on
the warm and muggy side, but this did not prevent some excellent performances on the night. The
winning team who will get their names on the coveted trophy was made up of Colin Anderson,
Callum Campbell, Amanda Bryden and Thomas Samson in a total time of 1:13:15. Commiserations
must go to the second placed team of Jamie Nix, Callum Riddell, Luca Dickson and Louise Baillie who
were only 4 seconds behind the winning team! Fastest on the night was Martin Brown in 13:15, and
the prize for the fastest lady went to Laura Haggarty in 16:29. Well done to everyone who turned
out to support this event and also to cheer for those presented with their club standards awards on
the evening. All participants and volunteers on the evening were entered into a draw for one of two
free places at the Great Scottish Run kindly offered by Great run – these were won by Martin Brown
and Jamie Nix who will both take on the half marathon at the beginning of October.

This weekend saw some of our seniors travel to Aberdeen for the 4J Studios Senior Track and Field
Championships which ran alongside the U17 championships. The fantastic performances of all of the
athletes has already been reported but huge congratulations to Andrew Baird, Lorne Kerr, Ally
Mitchell and Sara Barbour who all took part in the senior competition with Sara lifting the gold
medal for pole vault.

Wednesday the 17 th saw the next of our summer championship races take place, with 22 Harriers
putting their toe on the line at the Jim Young Marymass 10k. There were some fantastic
performances on the night with a few PBs out there, but taking top points and more importantly the
win was Martin Brown who broke the tape in 32:29. First lady back was Lynsey O’Connor who put in
another solid sub 40 performance in 39:21 to finish 2 nd V40 lady and take top points. Susan Boyd
was our other top 3 age group prize winner, finishing 2 nd in the V60 category in 53:29 – well done
Susan. Great running from everyone and hopefully you enjoyed the free ice cream!

With the Rowallan Rosebowl (a 5 bonus points event) and the Marymass now complete, we are now
left with only 2 set events left in the points and things are super tight at the top of the men’s table.
Paul Black has managed to hang on to the top spot this week on 90 points but Colin Anderson (89
points) has now passed Mark Lyden who is on 88. There is no change at the top of the ladies table
with Kirsty Mackay now sitting on 122 points, but Sasha I’Anson is on a mission with 90 and Louise
Baillie is on 85. Both of the remaining events are bonus point events so there is definitely still all to
play for! Just as a reminder, the final standings will be based on your 10 best performances only
rather than total points over every event. The league tables do not currently reflect this, but now
we are up to 11 events down then you should take this into consideration – summer points league (1)

Next up is Club Championships on the 4 th of September, sign up will be available soon. This is a great
opportunity to have a go at track and field events if you are new to them and there will be practice available in the next couple of weeks.

 

The final event will be the Valley Dash which is pencilled in for the 8 th of September and sign up will also be available soon – don’t miss these events with their
valuable bonus points! I will put out a reminder about parkrun/HM/marathon times to be included in the points after the conclusion of the Valley Dash.

If anyone has any queries or spots any errors  in the tables please let us know ASAP (Jennifer or Robert).