West District Relays, 16th October 2004

Shettleston Mugs Taken by Westies as Don Reads Relay Perfectly

Big Al Campbell used to proclaim (and after all, if there was something at which Big Al was great, it was proclamation) that a race wasn’t worth doing unless it took twice as long as the time taken to get there. It’s a good job that Carl Lewis wasn’t a Westie, or he would have been restricted to a quick sprint down to the paper shop! Al presumably wouldn’t have approved of the idea of dashing through the midday city-centre traffic and on down Alexandra Parade on a Celtic home-match day, all for a 2-mile relay at Tollcross Park. Which would have been a pity, as he would have missed a cracking, hilly and tough wee West District Relay.

There were no women present(SHAME!) due to some late call-offs, but Cameron & Victoria Reid ran with Black W’s in the junior races ( we expect a report soon, Victoria?)

Captain Cabbie’s presence was missed during the team selection, all of which meant that the first team finished 2 minutes later than they should have, but hey, we all had fun anyway. Hamilton, building fitness strongly after his Goatfell foot incident, took off on the first stage. Not to be outdone, Dave charged off on the same leg for the second team, quickly catching and overhauling Hamilton in the first half-mile. Unfortunately, Dave underestimated the distance to the finish by 2 miles and consequently spent most of the race in oxygen debt, being overtaken by most of those passed early on. However, he did manage to hold off Hamilton and allow Drew a head start on Don in the second leg. This didn’t prevent Don from striding round the trail, majestically passing 8 runners to be fastest Westie on the day. Blair, enthusiastically embracing his no-hills/no-injury approach to the winter season, took another 2 places in the third stage. Matt took on the anchor leg; whereas some other runners were chucking up the hill at the finish, Matt was instead observed to be chuckling up the hill . It’s good to see an old man enjoying his running!

So, what about the Shettleston mugs? All finishers received a Shettleston centenary mug. It has to be said, however, that these items are nowhere near as tasteless as the memorable Westies 10th Anniversary equivalents. Eat your hearts out Shettleston! You may have won the race, but you’re way behind us in the bad taste stakes!

Results

2500 Metre Boys

Cameron Reid 13:11

2500 Metre Girls

Victoria Reid 11:51

Senior Men

A Team

47 Hamilton 16:51

39 Don 16:01

37 Blair 16:47

41 Matt 18:04

45 finished

B Team

42 Dave 16:04

50 Drew 20:56