If you had been at the National Relays on Saturday you may have wonder why most of Scotland was under a weather warning. The athletes and spectators were treated to sunny but a cold autumn day at the Cumbernauld venue. The club had a fantastic turnout at senior level with 9 teams between the men and the ladies .As the day progressed the underfoot conditions got a bit muddy but the sunshine made up for this.
It was a day of firsts again for the ladies achieving their highest every finish in the National Cross Country Relays when finishing 2nd behind a very strong Edinburgh University team. This improves on the 3rd of last year with two new names on the medal winning team – Lynn McKenna and Eilidh Bell. It was an exciting race with the girls always in the top three thorough out the race. Lynn and Fionnuala Ross will both be in the top 5 fastest times of the day once confirmed. With B team 13th it should the strength of the girls squad with a few still missing on holiday or at the FRA Relays this weekend
Ladies Results
Lynn McKenna 14.36, Aoife Carr 16.01, Eilidh Bell 15.56, Fionnuala Ross 14.25 Team 2nd
Hannah Terrance 16.01, Emma Baird 17.45, Avril Mason 17.20, Anna MacFadyen 16.49 Team 13th
Charlene McCallum 17.28, Tara Walker 17.56
The men have been out of the medals for a few years and this year was no different. With a few of the top men missing (Jamie Burns in the USA and Lachlan Oates working) it was always going to be difficult to make the top three. The team performed well finishing 7th in a very competive race won by Central AC for the 5th year in row. Philip Neilson was the lead off man handing on to Taha Gafari who moved through the field to record the 2nd fastest time on his leg . Wearing his spikes and running cross country for the first time in 2 years Weyany Ghebreilasie found the course very difficult.
It was great seeing Weyany supporting his club after his fantastic run in the marathon a few weeks ago. He leaves for his training camp next Thursday to prepare for the Seville Marathon (Feb) where he hopes to achieve the Olympic qualifying time. He is very grateful for the support the club and the Scottish athletics Marathon Project is giving him to try achieve this dream. The team was finished off by Matthew Turner to secure yet another top 10 finish.
Men’s /Masters results
Philip Neilson 13.08, Taha Ghafari 12.39, Weynay Ghebreilasie 13.28, Matthew Turner 13.13 Team 7th
Andrew Taylor 13.58, Sam Lesley 14.20, Fred Davies 13.29, Adam Peters 15.21 Team 23rd
Scott McKelvie 15.09, David J Houston 15.36, Gerry Pelegri 16.18, Steven Clark 18.49 Team 51st
M40
Ronnie Strachan 15.12, Ally Scott 14.28, Mark McColl 16.37, Paul Sorrie 14.33 Team 7th
Duncan McCauley 16.32, David Murphy 18.53
M50
John Duffy 17.03, Denis Williams 16.37, John Oates 18.22
The day was kick off with the Young Female relay where one team completed the race in 38th position. With 4 teams(Boys/Girls) entered in both but due to holidays /injury the numbers were depleted for the club.
Young Female
Charlotte Reilly 13.10, Imogen Millar 13.11, Katie Woods 11.06 Team 38th
Young Male
Ryan McCallum 11.27, Lucas Millican 12.36, Matthew Fox 9.46
Joseph Reilly 10.21
As always we rely on a few key people to help organise our teams and bring the club tent. Many thanks to Des Reilly /John Duffy for the club tent sent up and delivery to the course. Elaine Mackay who picked up the numbers and allowed Senior Team Captain (men) John Mackay to carry out announcer duties for the first time at a National Championships .Gary Woods was assistant referee and Margaret Daly was on declarations, a busy day for club officials. It is essential the club can provide officials and John and Gary are gaining experience at the highest level .Tracey Fox kept our social media channels going throughout the afternoon and Ladies Captain Avril Mason was on hand to organise the increasing number of Ladies. Many thanks to all the parents who made the effort to bring their children to the event and give great support to the club. It has been a very busy weekend for the club with the FRA relays in England and the National relays at Cumbernauld. We think about 50 senior members competed between the FRA event and the National Relays
Parkruns
With two important races on this weekend the parkrun attendance across Park runs by the club was understandably low.
At Strathclyde Parkrun, Toby Hession was 9th in a time of 19.46. Gerry Mason finished in 26.27.
At Penrith Parkrun Rowan Lennox finished in a time of 23.44 and Jethro Lennox finished in a time of 23.35.
At the Bangor Parkrun, Andy Jackson was back in action taking a credible 2nd place in a time of 18.22.
Finally at Queens Parkrun, Fred Davies ran easy after his marathon pb in a time of 23.27