Bishops Hill (or not - Pat)!

2nd March 1997

A nice round dozen Westies turned out for the first championship race (Graham was the roundest!). Mark had a good run to land 7th, but I'm sure he's looking forward to getting them all Stuc in May. Stuc in their Mark! Sadly there was a huge gulf before the 2nd Westie came in, and this is where things get confusing. A large number of bods had waterproofs over their vests and numbers, and I was one. As a result the one and only timekeeper at the finishing line was having his own private lottery with numbers 1 to 133. With up to twenty runners a minute finishing, the results ended up a bit of a mess.

If positions 1 - 53 are correct, then I know I was 54th - four seconds behind Fife's Tom Ross, in a time of 22:17, followed exactly thirty seconds later by Gibson, who I passed on the descent. However, the results show me as 73rd in 23:15?!

Murdo also has doubts as to his position. Although he was not timing his run, he did have the suspicion that he beat Jenny home, although the results show otherwise. Gibson won out of the deal, the results have him 26 seconds closer to Tom Ross than he should be!

If this is championship level results, the Westies must be in with a shout of winning - if only they would put me 19 places forward instead of back!

The day itself was foul. The wind was incredible and the sight of the fifty or so runners in front of me, plodding along the side of a hill at an angle of 45 degrees was unusual to say the least! Thank the Wee man above, it stayed dry long enough to run the race, otherwise the timekeeper's paper would have got wet too!

Various fit Westies were 'missing in action' that day for a variety of 'good' reasons. Pat could not find Scotland(well)!, the Baxters were lording it up on skis somewhere, Dave Rodgers still claimed to have a cold, Big George, Stevie, Ronnie and Helene were doing some wee jog around the Peak District, and your editor Brian had been threatened by his big sister to stay at home for a change. Fair enough folks - but you have all to run twice as fast at the next championship race. (Stuc!!!).

Posted by unknown on Wed 30 Nov -0001 | comments are closed

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