Melantee Hill Race 2009

Where wuz you all??!!

Especially you Westies Women! It was left to a small but select band of Westies men to uphold the honour of the black and gold at this crazy little upstart of a race in Fort William. The 3 hour drive through road works and caravans, spying the gorgeous mountains all around while marooned in a car, had not set me up in the best of moods for racing, though I chilled out a bit upon arrival in the sweltering sunshine and the company of friends. Only Brian B Don and Manny were there to make up the team amongst 100 or so other SHR Championship chasers. This is a brutal little race, a dash round the shinty park followed by a quarter mile track and then – boom – straight up 1500 feet of near vertical grassy slope. Power walking was the name of the day as I inched my way past runners to the summit. The views were stupendous and it was tempting to sit down right there and just take it all in. Alas, it was a race after all so it was straight back down for the near suicidal descent, where I held my position well before passing a few runners on the track at the bottom. I paid for dry hot descent with a cracking blister on my heel but I deemed it worth it as I was chuffed with my run and finished inside the top 30. Manny had a great run well ahead of me, and Brian ran well too but Don pulled out early on. A nice cold pint of Hebridean Gold with Manny, Brenda, Davy Duncan and Christine rounded things off nicely.