Gowans Last at the Start but not at the Finish
February 22nd, 2003The National Cross Country Championships were held at Linwood, near Glasgow on Saturday and 13 Gala Harriers made the trip up to test themselves against the best in Scotland.
Injury and call off’s depleted both the men’s and ladies teams and at one point it looked like the men might not raise a team at all. Malky Gowans even tried to press gang an old man with a wooden leg to run for the team but he was too quick for Malky and gave him the slip.
First to race on the day was Steven Laurie who competed in the U13 boys. Steven has been having a good season so far but would concede that Saturday’s race was disappointing for him, where he came in 51st out of 98 runners, well behind many runners he would normally beat. Gary Alexander ran a good race in the U17 boys, where he was up against some of the best young athletes in Britain. Gary finished 39th and will surely improve on that performance next year, when he will still be able to run in that age group.
Laura Howie led the Gala ladies home, over their 8 km course. Laura ran well to finish 27th, just failing to catch a group of 5 runners in front of her. Angela Foss prefers roads to the mud, snow and ice of cross-country but she battled her way round to a respectable 52nd place finish, with Eileen Nichol (60th) and Nicola Alexander (63rd) giving chase all the way.
Improving all season is Kate Grimsditch who has learnt to pace herself more after her experiences of the district championships last month. Kate worked her way steadily through the field to finish just behind Nicola in 64th place.
All 380 runners at the start of the men’s race gave Malky Gowans a rousing welcome, not because they all knew him but because he was late for the start and had to sprint down the starting straight to get to the race before the starters gun fired. Malky was soon swallowed up in the stampede, which is normally associated with the start of the race but he ran well considering the amount of training he’s done recently to finish 323rd.
First home in 85th place was Ron Logan, who retained the Will Lyndsey Trophy for first Gala Harrier to finish in the National XC. Ron will have to look out next year because Fergus Johnston will be right on his shoulder if he keeps improving in the same way. Fergus ran 47.05 minutes to finish 110th over the 12 km course and made light work of the heavy underfoot conditions, his one year sabbatical in France is obviously helping his running as well as his studies.
Alistair Laurie overcame twisting his ankle before the start of the race to finish a very respectable 153rd in a time of 48.49. Robin Murray suffering from a cold struggled round to finish 218th but was still too good for Rob McCrirrick who was 238th and was still feeling the after effects of his run at Grangemouth the week before.
Next races for the harriers are the Winter Cross Country Series at St Abbs and the Hawswater half marathon on Sunday.
The Harriers are hosting the last race in the Winter Cross Country Series on the 16th of March and we would like to remind all members that as many marshals and helpers as possible are needed to make the race and the presentation ceremony afterwards at the Focus Centre a success.
