Tour of Clydeside: Garscube Gallop

With legs well and truly gubbed from Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday’s races, Chris and I jogged up to Thursday’s 5K trail race around the familiar stomping ground of Garscube woods behind Dawsholm Park. The route is reassuringly undulating and takes in three loops along the paths which meander through the woods. With six minutes to kick off, we turned back from our warm-up toward the start line catching a marshal’s wry comment that the race had started. Ha ha! Safe in the confidence that Chris’s watch is reliably coordinated to the satellite that sits above Greenwich, we jogged on, but were somewhat puzzled by the fact that there was no one on the start line apart from a few marshals gesturing wildly at us. Some twenty odd minutes later, it was explained that, in a twist, which is admittedly unconventional in normal racing circles, someone had decided to start the race five minutes early. Interesting.

However, starting a race at the back turned out to be quite an experience. Rather than spending most of the race desperately hanging on to my peers and trying to keep focused in the zone needed to retain a steady pace, I had the glorious and unfamiliar experience of reeling in runner after runner, most of whom appeared to be walking on the spot as I nipped past. I was glad to happen upon Pat and later, Paula, although didn’t stop for a natter, pressing on through the undulating terrain, and feeling disconcertingly unaware of where I sat relative to my peer runners – I had no idea at this point when the race had begun. In contrast to last year, when I found this trail run unbelievably hard work, the ‘handicap’ system gave the race a much greater sense of movement and progression which added immensely to the enjoyment and served to tone down the seething irritation at missing the premature start…and at least no one overtook me!