I’m Still Running

Old Comrades
Last Wednesday I was back in Selex Galileo, meeting the unions this time. To my delight Shop Steward Jim Cull had arranged for the Branch Officials to be in attendance, which gave me the opportunity to meet some old colleagues, Stewart Kerr and Bob Hardie, who have now retired. I’ve not seen them since about 1992 and yet the first question they asked me was “are you still running?”

I am indeed and later that night I was running 5x800m reps in the dark, cold, rainy and windy conditions at Bellahouston Velodrome.  Thursday was my weekly ‘rest day’ and I did my long/steady state run on Friday, 10miles in 80mins exactly.

My 96th parkrun
Saturday had me scheduled to do 3miles easy, which of course in my mind equated to doing my 96th parkrun. I would have liked to have gone to Edinburgh to witness Gordon McDonald achieving his 100th but with the Ayr v Killie Semi Final at Hampden at 1pm, it would have been cutting it a bit fine. Instead I joined in with over 300 runners at a very icy Pollok Park.

The organisers quickly switched the event to an off road route, which saw us running three loops and a bit, of a somewhat muddy and rather heavy going course. Each lap witnessed numerous drop outs, as people realised how boggy and difficult the conditions were.

At various stages I ran alongside Tom Ross, Kenny Clarke, Marianne Wilson and Angela Campbell. I was just completing my second lap when the latest parkrun young gun, Ethan Sloan-Denniston shot past me and crossed the finish line. I increased the pace a bit in my final lap and overtook Marianne with about 200m to go but fair play to her, she showed another side to her personality, when she dug deep and found the determination and speed to pass me in the final strait. I placed 81st with a time of 26:07 for the 5.26k.

Full results

Not much post race banter as I had to get home for a shower and a quick brunch before heading to the Shed for the pre match entertainment. It’s been a long, long time since I had a drink before noon! I was spotted by some members of the Wardrope Clan from Dunlop, I doubt if I’ve seen them since I was at school but the first thing they said to me was “are you still running?”

Killie Final
Being born in Ayr, I always consider the Honest Men as my second team but I was a bit disappointed with their defensive tactics on the day. Killie were by far the more positive side and played some attractive football before finally scoring the only goal of the game in 109mins. As the buses headed back to Ayrshire, I settled for a quiet night in, with a couple of glasses of red, as I had another race to look forward to on Sunday.

Off they go....

Scottish Masters Road Relays
There was a record number of teams registered for this years’ veteran relays, 46 men’s teams of 4 and 19 women’s teams of 3, with some class runners in both the men’s and women’s events, including Kilmarnock’s Iain Connell who handed over in third place. I had a long wait, being the fourth and final runner of the Killie B team, which gave me the opportunity to chat with loads of friends, take a couple of photos and support the other runners before warming up for my race.  My photos here

The loneliness of the last leg runner

I had been forewarned that, once again, other park users and their dogs were showing their usual lack of support for the event, by walking three and four abreast and refusing to budge for the speeding runners. Club mate Kenny Wales had actually tripped over a poodle during his leg. I didn’t have to wait long for my first hurdle, as Jethro Lennox had just completed his team’s 4th leg and was standing in the middle of the path, bent over, being sick, as I set off.

Pic by Kenny Phillips

With Jethro successfully negotiated, I made my way clockwise around Strathclyde Loch’s 3.8miles. I spied a white haired Central AC runner ahead (John Millar) and was glad to have someone to aim at. As I narrowed the gap on him, I was thinking that I didn’t really want to be in a situation where I had to race with no other runner in sight. As luck would have it just as I overtook him at the 2k point, a Carnegie Harrier (Colin Reid) sped past the both of us. Although there was no chance of me matching his pace, I was able to keep him in sight for the rest of the race, as I weaved my way through the, for the most part, apparently oblivious to the race, other park users and dogs.

I maintained my place and crossed the line in a time of 26:03, an average pace of 6:51 and a wava of 71.55%.  Results
Excellent pics as usual on roadrunpics.com


Analysis
I later checked my training log to discover that I had completed the same race last year in a time of 24:39, a wava of 74.99%! I know I’m a lot slower this year, so I wasn’t too disappointed with my time. In fact, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that it was my best performance since 5th August 2011, when I ran the Bella Belter with a wava of 71.71%.

VLM Training
That's week 6 of my 18 week marathon training programme completed, only another 12 weeks to go.  Remember you can sponsor me here