I'll be there too Travs. Looking at improving a fair bit on the 1st one at Betley, after finding some form last week at the Staffs (also at Betley, albeit in rare muddy conditions).
I'll be there too Travs. Looking at improving a fair bit on the 1st one at Betley, after finding some form last week at the Staffs (also at Betley, albeit in rare muddy conditions).
Great to speak to you Gaz before and after.
Was a really stacked field today... i ran my best XC performance of the season so far, yet still finished 40 places down on the last league fixture. I believe that the Uni teams were using the fixture to select the lineups for the upcoming BUCS championship, so they were out in real force.
As to the race... 1 small lap and 3 big. At the start of the first big lap GazB was 10 yards in front and i considered tagging onto his shoulder and seeing how long i could stick on for... given that he finished 90secs in front, it was probably for the best i took the sensible decision to play it cool in the first half of the race.
Ramped it up from halfway, and a big final lap effort to catch and pass our 9th counter... unfortunately that left me struggling on the flat run-in, and i dropped around 4 places in the final 200mtrs, including falling back to 10th counter for Godiva...
Another mid-table club finish, look to be well clear of the relegation fight, and a long way off the top 5 or 6, sat in a little group with Worcester, City Of Stoke, and Wolves & Bilston.
On to the Midlands Champs in a fortnight.
Midlands Champs at Mansfield this afternoon. an undulating rather than hilly course, very firm underfoot.
Felt that i'd had a bad run, could never really get going until the final lap when i picked up at least half a dozen places in a vain attempt to catch my clubmate...
However going on the rule of thumb that Birmingham League finish equates roughly with Midlands Champs finish, i did ok, finishing 150th today, having varied between 150's-190's in the league.
And was my usual 90secs behind GazB today... i'd expected a lot worse. So perhaps i did ok in what were admittedly tough conditions.... the wind was blowing enough to bring people to almost standstill at times, and there were long sections of each lap taking the full brunt of the wind. Was really tough to get into any kind of rhythm.
Sadly on the final lap a guy from Centurion had evidently collapsed, and as i ran past, several medics were around him, one giving him CPR, really hammering his chest.... it was quite disturbing to see and a very unpleasant experience, really made me feel like stopping... but in that situation you've just got to try and put it out of your mind. As i was returning to the car an air ambulance was landing, so i'm fairly optimistic that he was still alive at that point.
Fingers crossed.
1. Bristol & West
2. Notts AC
3. Tipton Harriers
4. City Of Stoke
5. Coventry Godiva Harriers
Nice to see you Gaz, and congratulations on your daughter's silver medal...i could see that she was getting caught by the eventual winner around midway, but she looked to finish strong and maybe could have pulled it back with another half a mile.
Last edited by Travs; 29-01-2022 at 08:03 PM.
Hi Pete. Well done mate. Nah you had a bad run as I had a shocker, sorry! I was 2 min behind my teammate, whom I've beaten the last 2 XCs. I never run well in wind for some reason and the collapsed runner was traumatising. Thanks re Louise. She maybe could've paced it better and won, but she's got another 2 years in u20 at least
Oh dear, I was dreading you saying that your run was poor..!!
Actually I was 20 secs behind Jason Brotherhood, who I've beaten in the last two as well!
Last edited by Travs; 29-01-2022 at 10:23 PM.
Final league race today at Leamington Spa, on a rather wet and muddy course... which had to be re-routed to avoid the main "ditch" as it was apparently impassable.
This still left one stiff hill in there, although it was short and very muddy, i ran in x-talons and couldn't get any grip going up it, my technique was more akin to cross country skiing going up it. However enjoyed the descent off the back of it and picked up a lot of places on each of the three laps.
A good run by my standards... finally made it into the top 150, which had been my aim for the season, and to be honest it was today's race that i'd targeted. Got into a good race with a clubmate and although he dropped me by 15 seconds over the final half mile, i managed 136th.
Godiva 9th for the season, firmly wedged in mid-table. I scored in the b-team every fixture and we were 5th.
Hello to GazB, good to see you as always. I managed to stick with you for a lap, but your rhythm over the flat stuff was too much to live with, and i think you pulled out about 75secs on me by the end.
Onwards to the National next week!
Anyone else at Parliament Hill for the National this saturday?
Classic underfoot conditions at Parliament Hill today.... i.e absolutely awful... although for once at a National it wasn't freezing, it was sunny and pleasant.
Usually they have numbered start pens due to the massive numbers, but not today, which left it a bit of a free-for-all at the start. This caused me issues as i was stranded right at the back, and had to deal with the severe bottlenecks/standstills during the first mile.
Worked my way through the field from a long way back, missing out on my target top 1000 by 29 places and 20 seconds....
Southampton AC won the team prize, with their Mahamed Mahamed winning the race. Dan Haworth of Matlock appears to be the highest fellrunner with a stunning 7th place.
We were 28th team and 4th Midlands team.
Another cracking day, it really is a stunning spectacle, i just wonder if they could have a rethink of the start.
Last edited by Travs; 26-02-2022 at 09:52 PM.
One of the two occasions when I did the National XC was at Parliament Hill. About half a mile from the start, when it was still closely packed, I briefly felt a sharp pain in one foot. When I took my shoes off after the race, I discovered that someone's spike had gone through the shoe fabric and into my foot.Originally Posted by Travs
In his lifetime he suffered from unreality, as do so many Englishmen.
Jorge Luis Borges
I had quite a bad fall yesterday, but luckily i was 2km in and at least had a small amount of breathing-space in which to bounce back up relatively unharmed (yet still came up with a few cuts).
If you went down at the very start in the middle of the stampede, you aren't getting up!
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