The second of this year’s Babcock 10km race series was held in Dumbarton on a cold and wet Thursday night, a far cry from the tropical weather for the previous week’s race in Glasgow Green. Twenty one hardy harriers donned their waterproofs and headed across the water for what is often a 10km PB opportunity. Despite the weather, this year was no different.
The course starts on the cycle path near Dumbarton Academy and follows this east to Milton, before following the path back and looping the town’s houses to the finish. As the rain had poured down for 24 hours prior to the race, the paths were flooded and the grassy start/finish resembled the muddiest XC course you’ll see. One stretch alongside the A82 allowed the runners a quick shower from the passing motorists, very refreshing!
Team prizes are the story of the year so far for our ladies, and another one was added to the bag on Tuesday. Jill Cox, Jill Aikman and Lynne Harrison finished third team on the night, and only one place away from sneaking 2nd from Shettleston Harriers. Jill Cox ran a superb 37.41 to win the F40 category by a clear minute. Jill Aikman took over 90 seconds off her time from Shettleston and Lynne put her ongoing pain issues aside to run a cracking time to secure the prize (while finishing 4th and 5th in their category respectively). Nathalie Smith was very unlucky to miss out on the prize, finishing just 18 seconds behind Lynne. However, this was another PB for Nathalie who really has been running so good, a well deserved PB and maybe more to come!
Charlotte McKay ran a fantastic PB and was second in her age category. Despite having to rely on her club mates to get her back on the course after a near disaster missing the cut off for the A82 road section. Husband and wife Andy and Viki Smith were just ahead of Charlotte and Doris Heron, Mary Robinson and Alison Smart following all, all progressing really well as the race series continuous.
On the men’s side, Neil Lafferty ran a stormer to finish second in the V40, just 5 seconds off the winner in 33.02. Neil was followed in by the returning Wes Pattison who travelled up from Bute and ran a superb 34.34. Oliver Reilly rounded up the top 3 in 35.19, with Paul Monaghan and Daniel Doherty not far behind, with Paul claiming 3rd V50.
The big stories on the men’s side were the huge PBs that were spread between three of the hardest workers in the club over recent years. Malcolm McLean is striving towards that sub 40 time and got one step closer with his PB of 40.27. Colin McKnight broke through that 40 minute barrier and was punching the air through the finish line for his 39.35. Stephen Harrison wasn’t confident on the start line, but put the big boy pants on and set off alongside club mate Stephen Hanley who was targeting around 39 minutes. A brave run from Harrison saw him not only break 40 minutes, but actually clock a sub 39 in 38.58! Stephen Hanley, confident the pace job was done at 8km, upped his own pace to finish in 38.31.
Donald Shaw got very close to a sub 40 as well, just missing out in 40.08, maybe next week it’ll happen for him and Malcom. On a final note it was brilliant to see Andy Osborne return to racing following his sad injury in the lead up to London. One of the club’s best runner over the last few years was looking great for a big marathon PB in the capital, but an Achilles injury put pay to that and 8 weeks of running. We are sure he will bounce back stronger.
Full results can be viewed here.
Onto Helensburgh this Thursday night to end the series, with the club one mile race on Tuesday night to endure first.
