Anglo Celtic Plate

This weekend sees the best in Scotland take part in the Anglo Celtic plate some names heading the mens race will include Grant Jeans and  Thomas Loehndorf, whilst in the female section we will have Gail Murdoch and Debs Martin-Consani. I would like to wish all the competitors taking part in Perth on Sunday 27th March at the Inches the best of luck.

D33 Review

I travelled up on the lunchtime train on Friday to Aberdeen in preparation for the race so after checking in to the Travelodge which is right outside the station i decided to jog down the mile to Duthie Park as a recce for Saturday morning. Once in the park i jogged round anti clockwise as i got to the far end i saw the painted line with D33 on the ground, at least i had found the Registration point and the start point the only thing missing was where it went, as this was my first time on the course i continued around the park until i noticed a cyclist heading out by a post with a sign on it so off i went to check it out, this was the route,so i continued along for a while as it it was a great night for a run, before i knew it i was out 4 miles so i about turned and headed back.
On Saturday morning i was up sharp and feeling good so i again jogged down to registration, i was first there, George and the guys were just setting things up, so i introduced myself, got my number and headed back to the hotel. the only downside with the travelodge is you have to be out by 12 noon and they don't have anywhere to store your gear so i headed round to the railway sation and booked my bag in before heading down to the race, i had only realised on the road down that i had built up 15 miles since my arrival, anyway on the start line most of the usual faces where there and the weather was turning out just nice. George gave out the details before we set off, Grant as usual was away from the start followed by the rest of us,at 15.5 miles i could feel that i had put on the wrong shoe, i thought i could have got away with a racer as the course was flat and as it had been sunny the route would be dry but by 15.5 when i moved into 3rd place as Scott Bradley from carnegie passed me,i knew by now that it was going to be a long day, by 19 miles Marco passed, moving me in to fourth and from there it just got worse, my right hip was in pain and i was still being passed, i continued along and as you were passing runners we were all exchanging "well dones", it helped you along at 25 miles i managed to get some ibuprofen gel at the water station which i applied, it certainly helped in the later stages but before this i found myself having to walk in some parts while i tried to loose the pain from my hip, with 31 miles in the pain started to ease and i knew it wasn't far to the finish, my main aim before the race was to get in under 4 hours, thanfully i did this with seconds to spare.
 Looking back i felt in shape for sub 4 and got it but overall i am dissapointed that i went off  too fast in the first half , this combined with the wrong shoe,which i felt caused my hip pain, i paid the price for including a couple of black toe nails and affected how i should have ran, overall It was a great day, and well done to everyone who took part. Well organised George and Karen, i'll be back

Yak Trax Back

We were all warned that it was going to be a crap week in terms of the weather, they said rain, then strong winds followed by snow, well it all arrived, i don't mind running in the rain, you can get dried off, i hate the wind as you are fighting a losing battle, so i don't fight it, i just don't run and for the snow well it's fine as long as you get a half decent footing in the white stuff, so it was back on with the Yak Trax today for a 14 mile run and boy do they make a difference, i hope that that is the last of it as i would not fancy the d33 weekend being plagued with something similar, the 10 day forcast for Aberdeen is showers lets hope they stay off until the race is finished.

Meikle Bin

Meikle Bin (courtesy of the Gazetteer of Scotland)


A hill surrounded the commercial plantation of the Carron Valley Forest in the S of Stirling Council Area, Meikle Bin rises to 570m (1886 feet) 3 miles (5 km northeast of Lennoxtown and 4 miles (6.5 km) northwest of Kilsyth. The lower summits of Little Bin (443m / 1453 feet) and Bin Bairn (reaching 400m / 1312 feet) lie to the north. The Carron Valley Reservoir is located 2 miles (3 km) to the northeast [Link]





Sam,Paul and Tam at Trig Point 4753 Miekle Bin

Today I met up with the guys for a final training run with them before the D33, I ran over the 2 miles to the Nicholson Centre just before;Tam arrived in his car, followed by Sam a few minutes later. We waited for another five minutes to see if anyone else would be joining before setting off. the guys had been planning to get back on to the Meikle Bin for some time as you can see from the above text, this will explain to anyone not sure where exactly it is. we parked in the car park at the Carron Valley Reservoir where Paul was waiting. we headed off along the undulatiing trails as they started to climb towards then MB, just before the final push to the top you leave the trail and cut through an opening which is a bit muddy then back on to open field for the final stretch up to the top. We stopped for a quick picture at the trig point (4753) and some juice before heading back down, as we left the guys showed me a piece of  the wing from an aircraft that had crashed many years ago killing both occupants [Link]. we continued to head back down to the car park completing the 13.08 mile in 2 hours and 7 minutes where we said goodbye to Paul as we headed back to the Centre where i got dropped off for my final 2 miles back home.

February 2011 Review and blogger page changes

My February mileage turned out to be lower than i had planned to do coming in at 191.95 which a lot lower than January by nearly 100 miles,the plus points are i will treat it as a recovery month, (sounds good) and i managed to get my long weekends as follows;

Beinglas to Kingshouse 31.65 miles (Sun 27th feb)
Kilpatricks 19.24 Miles (Sun 20th Feb)
Forth and Clyde Canal 25 miles (Sat 19th feb)
Local Sunday Run 18.29 miles (Sun 6th feb)
D33 training Run 32.70 miles (Sat 5th Feb)

I have decided to move away from the traditional blogger template and use something that reflects a modern image, i have also added a favicon of the WHW marker as my logo and on my new page i have used some of JKs photos (courtesy of) from our weekend run for my launch.

Sunday 27th February - Beinglas Farm to Kingshouse

We had agreed that we would all park at the Drovers for just after 9am and JK would meet us there after  he and Ross dropped of the bus at the Kingshouse. I had arrived earlier as i though i would be good just take in the views, beats waiting in Glasgow, the weather was perfect Just after 9 everyone arrived, JK, Ross, Neal, Ritchie and Gavin with Marco just arriving in time for the photo shoot. We set off and very soon after  we  had split into two groups, Ritchie,Marco and Me then the rest of the guys, we were travelling along at a fair pace going through 10 Miles in just over 1h30m, and continued this through Tyndrum, we arrived at BoO in 2h 50m throwing in some sub 7 minute miles along the way( mile 16 and 19), by now Marco and Me had opened a small gap on Ritchie but to be fair he had a long run from yesterday in his legs, i stopped for a toilet break  at BoO and was just heading back onto the last section when Ritchie came through he continued running up the hills towards Marco,we knew he would get a second wind on the last part over Rannoch Moor. as i continued towards Victoria Bridge Both Marco and Ritchie were out of site, around 25 Miles i was starting to struggle but i could see Marco in the distance but no sign of Ritchie, i guessed he was well away. i continued on knowing that it was only a further 6 miles to go, my legs were paying the price for going to fast in the middle section, as i reached the top of the last hill i could see the Kingshouse in the distance, only two miles to go and all down hill, i arrived to see Marco and Richie waiting for me, we discussed times and it turned out there was only 10 minutes between us, i ran 4:47 (average speed 9:04 pace) with Marco 5 minutes less and Ritchie 5 minutes over Marco. we went inside to sit in and have a hot drink whilst we waited for the rest of the Guys, next in was Neale  followed by JK and Ross then Gavin, we had a chat and some food before JK ran us back to the Drovers. All in a great day out.

Week ending 20th February

Photo Courtesy of John Kynaston

On Saturday Morning i was out at 7am, back on the Forth and Clyde Canal, the underfoot conditions were bad with surface water in many stretches, on the  way out towards Bonnybridge i met a new runner to the ultra distance, David Allan, David a local from Bonnybridge who owns a furniture restoration business has entered the GEDM, a nice introduction to the distance, I wish David every success in his ultra running career, we had a chat on route what our plans were for the season ahead. i stopped my watch when i went for a toilet stop and forgot to restart it, only realising  just over 4 miles later. i about turned at the sign for High Banton and headed back home, i managed to get in 25 miles in just over 3.5 hours.
   I recieved a text from Sam organising a 2 hour run from the Nicholson at 9.30 on Sunday morning but i had to be back early, i met John and Marco for a run over the Kilpatricks as they were setting off at 7, this was ideal as we all had other things to do, John arrived first on his motorbike followed by myself then Marco, we waited 10 minutes in case anybody else arrived, when nobody turned up we got on our way, this was my first time over the one of many courses that Marco has, weather conditions were great but  the underfoot in sections was a bog with still a lot of snow lying, we were going along at a steady pace stopping for John's Customary picture at one of the trig points then we continued on. we had a good chat and i managed to pick up some points for the WHW and how to get other information on my watch  we completed the route,just over 19 miles in 3.5 hours then we had a final photo shoot at the car park before we left.
  It has been a good weekend with 7 hours of mixed running totaling 45 miles, so now i can look forward to my next run on the WHW next weekend, it looks like we have a bus load turning up for the run from Beinglas farm to the Kingshouse.

GPS

Does your watch ever decide that it does not want to play, well mine has did this the last two mornings, yesterday, it had me running in Hogganfield Loch during my 11 mile run and today, i went through my first mile in just over five minutes, i hear you say thats not bad at 5am but i know the mile marker is still a bit off. tonight when i downloaded today's route it has me starting nowhere near my house and again had me running in the Loch, i hope the satellites sort themselves out for tomorrow. map provided