Carl's taken to Calgary's roads

Carl Pryce was 10th in the Robert Hamilton 10 mile race in Calgary last weekend.

Lomonds of Fife 2007

The Cosmic Vet ladies team of Elaine, Linda and Anita made the trip down to Fife on Sunday for the latest SHR championship. The race had a new course for last year, billed variously as 17.5K and 950m, or 17.7K and 1040m; it looked rather over complicated on the map but seemed to work OK in practice.

Fortunately the weather forecast was correct and the pouring rain that greeted us first thing in Aberdeen did die out – it was even sunny by the end of the race. The start is out the road a bit from registration in Strathmiglo village hall and up the road a bit from the parking field – a point to be borne in mind when travelling to this race in future. Eventually we were off, practically straight up West Lomond via a very wet gully, then a slippery descending traverse down into the woods to join the track that formed part of the Devils Burden Relay Leg 4, then up to the monument – here Elaine and I followed Jocelyn Scott up a very very steep local Fife short cut, then down and across the road, along the track and up East Lomond and back, up again to a mound called the Maiden Castle, down to the track then up West Lomond again, for the final very steep grassy descent to the finish.

Elaine was climbing like a demon and I had to descend like a maniac to stay in touch! In fact the 3 female over 50s Elaine, myself and Jocelyn were together more or less the whole race. Elaine and I did get in front but Jocelyn caught us on the track back to West Lomond, Elaine took her again on the climb, but was left behind on the descent. The route description said “ some feardies have been known to don thorn-proof shorts for this descent” so I guess I should have known what to expect here (and I did wear old shorts). I launched myself off in pursuit of Jocelyn and soon ended up on by bum. The 2nd time this happened I realised it was actually much faster than running, it didn’t hurt on the grassy slope (so long as you stood up again before you got to the thistles!) and actually I had a reasonable amount of steerage and control. In fact I nearly caught Jocelyn until she realised and adopted similar tactics. Elaine was not impressed by this behaviour and came down carefully a minute or so later. The thorn proof shorts were in fact cut–off over trousers – and were actually used by some guys (mainly Westies) (see http://www.flickr.com/photos/scottishhillrunners/1196130555/in/set-72157601586766680/). But apart from acquiring some lubricating sheep shit and a lot of grass, my shorts and bottom were unscathed. Linda finished in her usual controlled manner about 10 minutes later. The race was won (in record times for both male and female by Andrew Symonds (Carnegie) and Elke Scmidt (Bellahouston). No prizes for us, but we are still the leading Female Vet team!

Results: http://www.shr.uk.com/RaceResults.aspx?RaceID=RA-0196&RaceYear=2007

Some photos are at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/scottishhillrunners/sets/72157601586766680/detail/
And photos and a short video of people bum sliding the last descent (thankfully not us) on the Carnegie Harriers site: http://www.carnegie-harriers.co.uk/

Carl 2nd in Calgary Ultra

Things going well over here. I opened my running account at the weekend
with 2nd place in the cross- calgary ultramarathon (55km, 4:08). The
winner was 16 mins in front, while the third placed guy was 4:55. Myself
and the winner also beat all the relay teams, so I'm getting the feeling
the standards are not too high here in spite of the thousands of runners
out at lunchtime! There are lots more races coming up, including the
29km Moose Mountain soon, so should be interesting.

Slowly getting a few running routes worked out. Today I did a
replacement for the Banchory Devenick run - a similar 10 mile route
along the Douglas Fir hiking trail with a lot of ups and downs on steps.
Also found a good place for reps and some shorter runs.
Keep in touch with any race results etc, especially now that dave must
be in the middle of his racing season.
Carl

Wet, wet,wet at Tap O Noth

Tap o’Noth Hill race

Wet Wet Wet for Tap o’Noth this year, but still a great little race – where were the rest of you? The weather did not seem to dampen the spirit of the Rhynie Gala much. Having registered we had to rush to get “Fine pieces” from the WI stall and raffle tickets and so on, then off up into the murk. In fact, despite the warning from Simon Beeson, the organiser, conditions underfoot were OK – one guy I passed who had road shoes was complaining about a bog, but there was nothing a Cosmic would consider a problem. The route was well marked and it’s a great down hill run. Eight Cosmics (including Dave Wilkinson masquerading as Garioch) did the course. Jason was just pipped for 1st place by Craig Mitchell, but his course record still stands. Ruth Mackenzie broke her course record by 23 secs, and I think I was 4 secs slower than last year, but I got the prize for 2nd lady and Lois was 3rd. New member Gillian Clunas and Sue Buchan (renewed member?) also finished in fine style. As it was the 25th Anniversary, everyone got a medal and a goody bag – not bad for £3 entry!

Results are at Scottish Hillrunners.

Shunter Triumphs at Tarland 07!

Results for Tarland Show 5 mile Hill Race, Saturday 11th August

Cosmic Triumph

Men
1 S Hunter (Cosmics) 31.48
2 R Smith (Glentanar) 32.03
3 O Bass (Deeside Runners) 32.20

Women
1 R Mackenzie (Deeside Runners) 32.40
2 R Duncan (Tornaveen) 35.12
3 C Dale (Tarland) 41.29

Woodcroft 3K Fun Run

See what you missed - see attached.
Woodcroft%203k%20fun%20run.doc

Aboyne Hill Race

Dan won though second man wasn’t far behind and Jason came in 4th. It was a lovely warm day with the sun shining for once. The rest of us - Murray, Peter, Derek & I weren’t particularly noteworthy! Our biggest dilemma was how to drape the numerical bibs they gave us – they looked like they had been modelled on the caber throwers! Peter has a couple of photos of the variations on how we dressed ourselves – and a photo of his mid-area sporting the “Cock of the North” motif! Well, we couldn’t NOT take one!! .....watch the photo board....

Sonia 6th in Snowdon International Race

Congratulations to Sonia Armitage who had a fantastic race at Snowdon at the weekend when she finished 8th place in the female elite race. She was second Scottish female home and the Scottish ladies team took second place in the team prizes to England. Jill Mykura was the first female Scot home in sixth position with Dawn Scott third Scot home in thirteenth position. Full results at www.shr.uk.com.