As mentioned at the run session earlier:

http://www.facebook.com/tritrailrun?ref=stream

There’s only a facebook page at the moment but there are some more details on entry central

https://www.entrycentral.com/tri-trail

Be quick – it’s half full and it it was only announced yesterday!

Alister

217 Kirsty Loudon 52.13

Of course, as it says on the website, these results are “subject to scrutiny”.  If you spot a mistake let me know.

Photos in our gallery or here : https://picasaweb.google.com/113949690782185441256/PeeblesXcNov2012

(Mark wasn’t actually at the race – there was a mistake)

A beautiful crisp day at the Bowhill Country Estate in Selkirk saw race 1 of the Durty Events Winter Duathlons.  For the first time it saw me ditching the Harriers and teaming up with my wonderful fiance Jamie who would be my mountain biking relay partner. 

Our job was to transport our “baton” which was really a timing chip on a lanyard round the trail run course followed by the mountain bike course.  In actual fact, both parts turned into a bit of a fight to stay upright on the hilly tarmac sections in the most lethal ice.  Had this been the Penicuik 10K, Susie would’ve hatched a master plan to grit the entire course before the race started – but sadly there was no Susie in sight.  Being reduced to a teeter on the tarmac sections was not what I needed, tarmac is my surface – thick mud on a steep hillside is definitely not!  Needless to say my lack of XC this season showed and my legs felt like lead as soon as the mud section kicked in.  Somehow I managed to keep on my feet and finished in 22.13.  No idea what the distance was, I don’t even think the organisers did!

So, after “dibbing” my timing chip I then passed it to Jamie who was waiting in the transition area and cheered him off.  The mountain bike course was a mix of single track, forest roads and tarmac (again which was like an ice rink on a hill)!  He too managed to stay upright and finished his first ever bike race (woop woop!) in a time of 27.59.

Overall we finished 57th from 132 finishers.  A lot of these finishers were solo athletes – personally I think it was a wise decision to half the task and avoid a trip to the Borders General by recruiting a biker! 

Next race (the medium length race) is on 27th January.  Think we’ve both got a fair bit training to do…anyone fancy joining in the “fun”??

Susan

Short, fast race but good fun with a million students (and us)…

Photos in the gallery; sorry no photos of the guys, but the girls have their own photographer!

https://picasaweb.google.com/113949690782185441256/BraidsXc#5812269631778321234

Good turnout from Harriers and Friends.

Weather was in the process of turning from sunshine to rain. I guess we completed just in time before the weather became really grim.

259 runners:

13^th: Tim Darlow 36.49 (sometimes trains with us on Thursday)

45^th: Mike Brooks 40.48 (lost his Tinto virginity!)

89^th: Rob Wilson 44.20 (dicky hamstring – over 2 minutes slower than BP – personal worst – PW)

98^th: Alasdair Hind 44.45 (PB)

106^th: Tim Doyle 45.10 (running in Carnethy strip…..spit!…….but a BP I think???)

199^th: Andrea Wilson 52.40 (uh ho – getting old – PW)

203^rd: Ali Hilton 53.04 (another virginity loser!)

209^th: Janice Smith 54.12 (not best, not worst!)

213^th: Chris Downie 54.32 (recovering from lung disease – PW)

218^th: Lynne Turnbull 54.49 (PB – congrats!!!)

256^th: Ngeme Ntuli  1.04.59 (congrats on your first hill race. Hope it was not too much of a shock)

I think that covers everyone.

That’s me until the Devil’s Burden in January (shall we try and get both a boy and girl team together this time????)

Rob

Many, many thanks to Lauderdale Limpers for organising a great 1st race in the Borders xc series.  7 Harriers helped to make up the 210 runners who turned out today on what was the most beautiful cold and frosty morning in Lauder.  A really great route taking in some of the Southern Upland Way followed by the muddiest, boggiest field with lots of wee streams to jump. You then have the craziest climb up a slope so deep in mud that you are really hoping that the person in front of you doesn’t fall and slide because there is nothing to stop you going too. After a couple of fields you hit the rubble path which you must navigate carefully before you reach the playing fields and the finish-line. Fantastic!

Placings & Timings were :-

37th Duncan 31:02
56th Carl 32:15
81st Kevin 33:39
147th Rachael 39:58
161st Susie 41:33
185th Gilly 45:25
188th Ngeme 45:54
209th Vicky 53:22

Thanks to Vicky’s husband Sean for taking some photos of us 🙂 they are in the gallery
https://picasaweb.google.com/113949690782185441256/LauderXc02#

Susie

It seemed such a great idea for somebody going frequently on a jolly jog in the Pentlands to finally patch the different parts together.  Doing ‘The Skyline’ just sounded fabulous, and up to the morning of the race I was really looking forward to it.

Of course experienced Skyliners warn you that this race is not for the fainthearted and quite tough. I have even seen what carnage this race can do to people – i.e. watching Rob painfully stumbling along several times.  But hearing what others tell you and feeling it yourself unfortunately are two different things.  Now I know – the Skyline is definitely not for half-hearted sunshine runners. If you want to do it, you have to seriously train for it. (To my defence, training was going pretty well up to August, when the autumn tennis season kicked in again and work / other commitments got a bit too time consuming for my liking).

The first part of the Skyline was quite jolly, although the narrow paths at the beginning of the race caused a bit of over-crowding almost all the way up to Allemuir – at least for people near the back (where I was lingering).  There were over 250 runners this year – so getting lost (my biggest worry before the race) was literally impossible. At the first hour of the race the Pentlands were at their best – the sun was shining and it was warm with hardly any wind.  Unfortunately about 1.5 hours into the race the heavens opened and sent down some ice cold sleety rain – this was very bad timing as it cooled down the body enormously and made the bogs feel arctic. Along with the temperature swing, my mood turned swiftly from happy to considerably less happy when I left the eastern Pentlands and entered Bogland after Hare Hill. By Gum, this was cold wet and never-ending mud!!!!!  Wading through this black gunk took a lot out of me – and judging by several people walking ‘funny’ (even backwards in one case!), I was not the only person struggling with cramps. The sight of a frozen Harrier at the top of South Black cheered me up enormously, and kept me going for a while (thank you Chris!!!!). [Also thank you to all the other Harrier’s spectators]

Although I was quite tired by the time I got stuck in the icy river between Black Hill and Bells I did not worry because Rob had told me “once you get over Hells Bells, you’ll be home dry”. Needless to say, I should have worried because it was when I reached the top of Bells that my body decided that it was quite enough for me for today and went on strike. How unfortunate that at this moment, Allemuir in the distance, transformed into the Himalayas. Having run Allemuir so many times it was a weird experience to realize what it means when you have nothing left in you – even the simple task of walking on the flat seemed almost insurmountable.  I had to face the cruel truth that having bagged 14 of the 16 peaks I may in fact not make it over the last 2 hills to the finish line. But then an angel [Editorial comment from Rob: Let’s not push it!] appeared out of nowhere (I first heard her before I saw her :-)). The angel jogged down and literally took me by the hand and pulled me up Allemuir, talking cheerfully all the way to take my mind off the fact that Mount Everest (i.e. Carketton on a normal day) was still to conquer. I’m not sure how she got me over the last hump – it must have taken forever – but the angel completed her job and got me down safely to the finish line where a lonely frozen and very relieved Rob waited for me. Thank you Susie for chumming me during this very very difficult part of the race!!!!

The results are in and I’m highly impressed by the great times that the other Harriers (Duncan, Richard, Mike, Rob and Carl) achieved. Well done guys – and sorry for dragging down the team time!

Andrea

Results from 250 runners:

44th – Duncan Ball: 3:10:16

75th – Richard Osmon: 3:22:11

101st – Mike Brooks: 3:32:06

114th – Rob Wilson: 3:34:38

137th – Carl Proctor: 3:44:13 (Manor Water: 1:34:01) – RESPECT!!!

239th – Andrea Wilson: 4:40:28

Thanks to Susie for most of the following piccies. I stole a couple from the Carnethy site as well. R.

Duncan making it look easy as usual

Great race from Richard

Mike feeling the previous week’s marathon with Rob hot on his heels

Rob being abused by Susie – who is NO angel!

Carl unashamedly happy despite having run both Manor Water and the Skyline

Susie waiting for Andrea! 

Andrea crossing the finishing line.

Rob realising that he will be probably be cooking that night!

Finally, Andrea earned the GrandPrix trophy.

Actually, I didn’t, but I thought such a title might grab your attention :-).

With Andrea in Aberdeen and Mike B madly running the Jersey marathon, I seemed to be the only Harrier wanting to enjoy the fabulous forecast in the hills. 🙁 . Come on Thursday evening runners – what are you training for but to have a nice jolly in the hills at the weekend.

The forecast was excellent – sunny with some clouds and a light westerly breeze. The views were amazing, although I did not hang around much looking.

The Ben Venue course is officially 12kms with 860m of climb. However, due to the forestry commission stripping out most of the Sitka spruce to plant pine, much of the area was a chaotic mess so the course this year was modified to ensure that runners were not going through clear cut areas. This resulted in perhaps more forest roads than normal. This also changed the course length/height to 14kms and 700m (according to my Garmin).

The start of the race is a fast half kilometre of tarmac road. Unlike the Breweries I comfortably (but possibly unwisely? ;-)) managed to start off in the lead pack. Of course, once we crossed the river, my legs developed that leaden feeling, and I started losing places. The next few kilometres were a continuous climb at just the annoying gradient to force you to keep running. At this point, I seemed to be an almost lone runner between the lead pack ahead and the bulk of the runners behind. The people behind slowly gaining on me, and the runners ahead creeping ahead. I hate forest roads – with fell running studs, you might as well be running on tarmac. Bad for the knees!

At ~4kms, we left the decimated woodland and ran out on to the more open heather moorland. At this point, I am not sure what happened, but I somehow felt pretty good and I just seemed to bounce through the mud and not only started catching up the tail end of the lead pack, but managed to pass some runners on the way up the steep ascent to the main peak. This has never happened to me in a race before – what a great feeling! Obviously a breakfast of Wheetabix and spaghetti bolognaise is what I should do more often. From the summit of Ben Venue, the path became much more technical for the next kilometre or so – very rocky. However, I seemed to morph into a reckless madman and just flew off the rock steps and somehow never quite managed to kill myself. I continued to pass runners who were being a little more cautious than me. The route than followed the ridge line that was delineated by a rather rusty fence. This next kilometre was very similar to the very boggy section on the Ochils2000 race (Which Mike and I detested in 2011) where there were ~1meter drops into deep peat bogs and you then have to climb out again. Somehow, my body was still packed with energy and it was great fun jumping in, squelching through ankle deep peat and then slithering out at the other end. Of course, this was a slower section, but I still managed to pass a couple of runners.

Tip of the Day: Always follow a Carnethy red vest – they always find the best route!!!

At ~8kms, the route descended down a steep boggy slope which was definitely not for people with weak ankles. I took this fairly steadily (all recklessness duly repressed) as I did not want to antagonise my knees which had been almost pain free so far and there were many hidden holes. At the bottom of the slope, the route joined itself again. Someone had attached some bungee to the gate back into the clear cut forest zone to ensure that it would close, which meant that the gate nicely ricocheted back at my head as I flew through it. Although my head hurt a lot, I found that the extra pair of legs helped for a while. 😛

The last few kms on the road was hard as finally my legs started feeling heavy. However, I was determined to try and keep my place (I had only lost a few on the descent). At least most of it was downhill. The race did not finish at the same point as the start – in fact, they made us run an extra half kilometre up over into the Ben Venue car park. Although a little rise, I suddenly realised how tired my legs were.

With relief, I crossed the finish line to see a nice spread of cakes and sandwiches with plenty of drinks. I was ravenous.

I have no idea yet where my relative place was, but I think it was quite high as I came in many minutes ahead of individuals I normally cluster with. My final time was 1:39:47 which turned out, perhaps, to be a longer race than I wanted to do before the Skyline next week. But no regrets – what a race – what a day! The only minor down side is that I have pulled my left hamstring a little, but hopefully that will stretch out through the week.

Rob

UPDATE: was 30th from 100 runners (http://www.shr.uk.com/NewsItems.aspx?NewsItemID=1302)

Ensuring that we would not get roped into helping Susie move house, Mike Brooks and I decided that it would be much less effort to go running in the Borders for several hours.

The Two Breweries is probably one of the nicest long hill races and is a pleasant mix of different terrains. It is 30kms in length with 1500m elevation gain. The first half is a more traditional hill race, while the second half is a mix of tracks, roads and woodland. The race finishes off with Trahenna Hill above Broughton – a final sting in the tail which often reduces runners to a mess of cramp (speaking from experience!).

The forecast was excellent (sunny and not too warm) and we arrived at Broughton at 9.40 to catch the Brewery’s bus that would take us to the start at Traquair House. At first we were worried about being at the start 1.5 hrs early (start: 12pm), but the weather was so pleasant that all the runners lounged around in the sun soaking up some precious late summer sunshine. Mike drank coffee and stuffed himself with scones.

After kit checks, the race started at 12pm with an initial 1km sprint on the road until the ascent into the hills. I felt awful at the beginning. Normally I am sprinting with the pack (which I always of course regret later), but this time, my legs felt heavy and individuals I normally I am way ahead of for the first half of a race were easily passing me by. Perhaps my legs were still heavy from last week’s triathlon. No idea. Anyway, I persevered – the weather was too good to consider stopping.

The route constantly rises from ~150m to 600m over the first ~7 kms of the race. By this time, I did seem to get some energy back into my legs and decided to push a little and made up quite a few paces, especially down into Glen Sax. Unfortunately, I lost most of these places on the steep ascent out of the valley where my legs turned to jelly again.

In many respects, the rest of the race is really quite runnable. From Hundleshope, the route is quite pleasant all the way down into Manor Water valley although my legs started to cramp a little when I hit the tracks. The route was very well marked so the climb up to Whitelaw Hill was a little more pleasurable than last year when many of us were worried we had gotten lost. Many runners around me were suffering around the top of Whitelaw Hill with one guy screaming and cursing as his right leg cramped up and he was reduced to holding on to a tree while he tried to recover. With some guilt (what could I do?), I continued. I took it fairly easy on the descent to Stobo Castle. Unfortunately, I also cramped a little when I hit the road and it took me some minutes to rub the back of my leg to get it to behave. After briefly considering that Stobo Spa might have been a better choice to get over the cramp, I stumbled on.

From Stobo, the next 3 kilometres is probably the worst and most frustrating part of the race. The route is a pleasant 3 km forest track with a very slight rise over the whole length. However, at this point, I was exhausted, my legs were like jelly and there was no juice left in the tank. I alternated between walking and jogging and spent the whole time stuffing myself with jelly babies and crisps (from the last drink station), a muesli bar and drinking profuse amounts of electrolyte. In hindsight, this was a good strategy as Trahenna was rearing its ugly head above the trees. Last year Trahenna was excruciating with my legs cramping in the thighs going up, me pulling something in my groin coming off the summit, and then cramping in my calves on the way down. This year, although I cannot say it was easy, I was able to climb steadily and even managed to pass a couple of people going up and descended at a good pace (no groin injury this year!). The final descent is the steep hill that those who have run Green Mantle Dash now so well. I ran surprisingly well through the last field – dodging the bullets of a young kid with a stick who was trying to shoot the runners as they passed. However, again, when I hit the road, my legs suddenly tightened. I don’t understand what it is about roads, but I had just ~1 km to go and I was not going to let cramp get the better of me. I tried to settle into a comfortable slow pace and gritted my teeth. On the high street about 500m from the finish, I saw Mike walking towards me shouting that I might make it under 4 hours if I hurried. I did not look at my watch. If I had tried to up the speed, my legs would have gone. I just kept at the same pace. Weirdly, as I crossed the last 50m, my legs decided that they had had enough and when I finally crossed the line, my right leg completely spasmed and instead of yelling in celebration, I held on to a wooden fence post and groaned for about 3 minutes.

Last year, I ran the race in 04:06:57. I had hoped to improve on that and in an ideal world go sub 4.

I crossed the line in 03:59:47 (76^th) – a 7 minute improvement. Perhaps the moral of this story is that a slow start is a good start for these long races!!!

Mike finished in 03:44:02 (55^th).

Perhaps the best thing about the Breweries race is the large spread of food and drinks at Broughton village hall – and of course, the apparent limitless amount of beer to be consumed. Luckily I was driving.

Mike and I did consider popping around to Susie’s on our return to Penicuik to help with some final boxes, but somehow we did not feel up to.

Rob

Until a few days ago, I was under the impression that I was preparing (or resting) for The Two Breweries on the 22^nd. Unfortunately, Andrea’s partner (Lisa) for the upcoming Cairngorm Adventure Triathlon (CAT) had to pull out at the last minute and after fluttering her eyelids, I had no choice but to step in as my wife’s backup.

For those who don’t know, CAT is done as paired teams with 3km open Canadian Canoeing, 25 kms non-technical mountain biking and a final 5km run.

http://www.cairngormadventuretriathlon.org/

This is probably quite an easy triathlon (compared to what Stuart used to do), but as I have only been training for hill running, I was a little worried about the mix of different sports and I guess it was the perfect first Triathlon.

The whole race is set in the Glen More/Rothiemurchus region of the northern Cairngorms. Individuals in each team do not have to stay together, but the final team time is the sum of both individual’s times. We decided, after the canoeing, to go our own ways. Little did I know that I would have a hot blooded German breathing down my neck for most of the race.

Andrea and I B+B’d on Friday night in Aviemore and stuffed ourselves with the works for breakfast which initially did not seem a good idea but by the end, I was thankful for the greasy sausages/bacon and eggs.

The forecast was relatively warm and sunny, but there was a stiff breeze which felt more like a full blown gale on the shores of Loch Morlich where the first part (canoeing) started. Unfortunately, the organisers decided not to cancel the canoeing and with much trepidation, we started at 10am. The CAT is split into 4 heats (~25 teams) – the slowest starting first and the quickest starting last. There is probably ~50mins between the starts of each heat. We were in the first heat although Andrea and Lisa should really have entered into the 2^nd or 3^rd.

The start consisted of a ~300m sprint along the sandy beach of Loch Morlich to the canoes. Luckily our canoe was the first of 27 and Andrea and I managed to get out on the water in 2^nd place. However, with the strong wind and choppy waves of the near shore water, we really struggled at first. Fighting for our own survival we had no time to watch the carnage of capsizers floating in the loch, but based on the spectators’ loud cheering and laughing this must have been some good entertainment. 3kms canoeing seemed to take forever with our rather untrained arms constantly being sapped of strength and each time we swapped sides, I had to constantly fight the wind to get the boat back into a straight line – a 16 foot canoe is like a big sail in such a wind and it constantly wanted to go sideways and be pushed to shore. On the return, the wind being on our back was not much help as it still tried to turn the boat. Anyway, by the time we got back to shore, we were in ~7^th/8^th place out of 27. There was then about a ~400m sprint to the changeover point and we quickly jumped on our mountain bikes to try and catch up places. I do believe we gained a few important minutes having no clip-on shoes etc.

Changeovers, as I have now learnt are quite hard. Going from one type of sport to another really drains you, and the initial kilometre was really quite hard (mostly uphill) while your legs adjust to the new activity. However, once up on the relatively flat forest roads above Glen More, I quickly got a good pace and started catching people up. This was also one of the few times in the race where the wind actually helped and this was probably the most enjoyable part of the whole race for me. However, on the incline up to An Slugan pass, Andrea, who I thought I had left in the dust back at Glen More quietly passed me grinning (knowing exactly what I was thinking of her). Of course, this was not on, and I dug deep and ensured I kept up with her and on the fast rough descent through the pass, I was happy to leave old krauty thunder thighs behind. At the end of the An Sluggan track, the CAT route joins the B970 which takes you back towards Coylumbridge. This is the lowest point in the whole race, and the next 13 kms is an almost continuous ascent (~150m) which was made worse with a stiff draining headwind.

Despite this, I still managed to pass a couple of people although I did not realise that my better half was slowly catching me up on the road section and was not that far behind me when we entered the Rothiemurchus pine woodlands after Coylumbridge. For once, not stopping to hug the pine trees, I kept pushing against the wind and it was at this point that I managed to start pulling away from Andrea. Once the route turned sharply eastwards, the rest of the tracks and forest roads to Loch Morlich were again quite pleasurable with the wind mostly from behind.

The bike/run changeover was quite quick – dump bike, dump backpack, strip off and run! Well – it would be easy, if someone had actually told my legs that they were supposed to be quite good at running. But as soon as I started off from the changeover point, I suddenly realised that I had somehow lost my legs somewhere along the route and I felt like I was swimming through treacle. Obviously this is where a lack of cross training between bike and running did not help. These were surely not my legs. I persevered and kept saying, it is only 5kms and it is all flat. Despite feeling awful, I managed to quickly pass a couple of other runners and thought that my legs just might get into a reasonable rhythm. However, this circular route around Morlich has one little incline from the lake side path up to the forest road on the south side. It was running up here that my thighs, especially my left one, decided to start cramping a little. With The Breweries only a week away, I did not want a major cramping episode so I had no choice but to slow down a bit and massage my thighs while stumbling along. I kept this rather hunchbacked approach to running up for about 2kms until I felt that my thighs were behaving again. Unfortunately, one of the runners I had passed earlier, slowly passed by me and I just couldn’t motivate my legs to keep up with him. Despite this, I managed to settle into a reasonable but slow pace for the last 2 kms and when I crossed the line, I was nicely surprised to realise that I finished 3^rd in my heat. However, the really nice surprise was that only about ~6 minutes later Andrea crossed the line as the quickest woman in the heat with the two of us being the quickest team. Remember though, this was the first slow heat so we should not get too excited by these places.

As of writing this, we do not know how our individual and team results compare with the other ~200 participants. Our overall results were:

Canoe: Rob (33.31), Andrea (33.42) – I ran quicker on the beach.

Change1: Rob (1.22), Andrea (1.13)

Cycle: Rob (1.13.25), Andrea (1.16.04)

Change2: Rob (0.39), Andrea (0.46)

Run: Rob (26.00), Andrea (29.08).

Total: Rob (2.14.59), Andrea (2.20.54).

Total team time: 4.35.53

Although sunny and warm, the windy weather probably slowed overall times compared to last year, so we wait with baited breath for the full results to become available so we can see where we came overall. It does not really matter. We had a great day and it was a lot of fun. At £40/person it is not the cheapest race in the world (the free pint mug they gave us when we crossed the finish line could have been full of beer), but we would certainly do it again if we could persuade some other Harriers pairs to compete as well.

Now I just need to rest my tender legs for next Saturday.

Rob

UPDATE:

We were the 5th overall mixed team.

Of 208 participants, I was 53rd (49th male) and Andrea was 74th (9th female).

see here for dates of the forthcoming Borders Series http://www.bordersxc.com/

Susan

Come along and try a training session with Penicuik Harriers on 11 September at 7pm! The venue is Cornbank Park, Penicuik, at the head of Gardener’s Walk, near Cornbank Primary School. We’re a friendly bunch of runners of all abilities and look forward to welcoming those from complete beginners to more accomplished runners, so long as you’re at least 18 years old! Our session will include a warm-up jog followed by some interval repetitions which can be run or jogged/walked at any chosen pace. Or, if you don’t fancy joining in, then come along and watch and chat to one of our coaches or Jog Leaders. Please note there are no changing facilities/toilets at the meeting location, so please come prepared.