Race report: Lindsays Scottish National XC Championships
- Details
- Published: Sunday, 24 February 2019 14:46
- Written by Elaine Omand
It was a beautiful day (especially for February) at Callander Park, Falkirk. Even quite hot when the sun was out during the womens race. It was the first time that we had a Male team (6 runners) for as long as John Mill can remember and he was delighted to finally have a DRR team at the champs. However, it could’ve easily been different. When Graeme Brown was in the process of getting into the car with the door open John Mill began to drive off, thankfully, Graeme’s police training allowed him to prevent any of his limbs from being crushed or removed. (Note: this event has been dramatized for the purposes of todays race report, there is no need for an official DRR club investigation).
On to the race itself. The course is tough there are 3 and a bit laps. With a small hill at the start and 3 hills in each lap there are 10 hills in total over about 6.65 miles. The hills are all quite short but very steep. Takes a lot of energy out of the legs especially as your trying to get as much speed in on the flats before and after the hills. The course was in good condition and there was only deep mud in a couple of small parts. I really do think that anyone who is a regular at Camperdown Parkrun (with its tough hills), a hill runner, trail runner or ultrarunner would get a lot out of these challenging cross country courses. With the biggest ever turnout out ever for both the womens and mens races the run was at times congested but soon enough the pack began to spread out.
The mens race was won by Adam Craig in a time of 33:50 and the womens race was won by Olympian, World Championship bronze medallist and commonwealth medallist Steph Twell in a time of 38:38.
Onto the DRR times, positions out of 719:
133 Chris Earl 40:13
243 Graeme Brown 43:26
271 Lee O’Connor 44:10
437 Michael Mitchell 48:02
482 Matt Hooper 48:54
699 John Mill 58:49
I was delighted with my own time. It’s a very high standard at these events so very pleased. Special thanks to John Mill for pushing through the pain barrier as he was desperate to complete the team, as some of you may have already heard. Report courtesy of Chris Earl, photograph courtesy of John Mill
