Kaim and the exploding shoe

Results

Brilliant turn out by 23 Westies last night at the Kaim Hill race. Organiser Scott McKendrick presented us with a slightly different race route (which from my point of view was great but more of that later), which cut out most of the trod up the side of the glen and instead, took us across the burn after about 100m up the glen, through a kissing gate and diagonally across a field towards Kaim hill. A long slog through another couple of fields eventually led the runners on to the original route through the heather. There is definitely early signs of a trod starting to appear on this race route and i am sure times will gradually get quicker.    

 Can’t speak for other westies but my race was def. one of 2 halves. Took it easy at the beginning tussling with Sarah and Murdo, but gradually pulled away once we got on to the heather and focussed on keeping Duncan and Jamie in sight, hoping that i might catch them on the descent. 

Round the trig point with the wind gusting real hard and thought, great its all down hill now – boy was i right!! The first bog i stepped in ripped the sole right off my left shoe, leaving it hanging by a couple of slivers of rubber. I ripped it off completely with the uppers still on my foot and kept going. This made for an interesting descent. The heather part was ok and i even managed to pass a guy from Inverclyde. Things got a bit hairy when i got to the fields lower down, Sarah sneaked past and i nearly garotted myself on a barbed wire fence cause i could not stop on the slippy grass! Over the burn and down the rocky trail beside the wall saw me break the world record for the 100m hobble (i hope nobody heard the expletives!!). I turned on to the finish straight glad to be on some flat smooth tarmac and a quick glance back revealed the stealthy figure of our Val dressed all in black, bearing down on me. A last minute sprint held her off and boy was i glad to get over that finish line!!

 Not sure where everybody finished, but i think Niall was 2nd or 3rd and Sarah had a great run to finish 1st lady and Val first female V45

I will leave it to other people to tell their own stories!!

Well done to all who took part.