Diverse conditions for club athletes

Jan 25 2013 By Jackie Grant

Carlisle Resolution 10K

On Sunday, January 20, five members – Danny Queen, Les Hill, Alan Baxter, Kevin Conchar and Mark Johnston – crossed the border to compete in the Carlisle Resolution 10K.

The race followed the same route on quiet country roads as the Carlisle Tri 10K that is held in June each year, starting and finishing at Carlisle race course.

This was the inaugural Resolution 10K and all five Dumfries Running Club men were not expecting too much in the way of fast times and were participating mainly to test out recent training and kick start this year’s racing programme.

The temperature at the start sat just one degree above freezing but with only a little wind it didn’t feel too cold other than the section from four to 5.5 miles that entailed running into what breeze there was.

This section also included a few climbs and resulted in all five DRC guys running at their slowest pace on this part of the course.

However, all were pleased with their performances.

Alan was first DRC man to finish in a time that was bang on six minute mile pace for 10K with 37.20.

Kevin, in his first competitive run since the Jedburgh half marathon in October, was not far behind in 37.48.

Danny, with arguably the best age-related DRC performance, gained his first Gold Standard result of the year with a finishing time of 40.51which saw him win the V50 category.

Les was three minutes slower than when he tackled this course seven months ago to record 43.39 but he was just delighted to be racing again having not run at all from August to December with a foot injury.

Mark’s time of 45.06 was just outside his personal target for the day by five seconds but still a good performance and one that he was pleased with.

Santa Pola Half Marathon

On Sunday, January 20, Ross and Sarah Queen enjoyed the Spanish sun in the Santa Pola Half Marathon.

Situated just outside Alicante, Santa Pola is easy to get to, has a great race route and best of all, it doesn’t snow there!

More than 7,000 took part on the shoreline course in an event that had a real party atmosphere with a fireworks display getting the race underway early in the morning.

A slowish start due to the high entrant numbers suited Ross and Sarah but both were soon into a good running pace.

Sarah underlined her recent good form by finishing strongly to knock two minutes off her PB in an excellent 98.26, in 1,949th place overall and 23rd in her category.

Ross also suffered with the heat on the day and dropped back a little but his time of 107 minutes was good enough to place him comfortably in the top half of the field.

The club welcomes runners of all standards with the development group on a Monday night meeting at Dumfries Sports Club at Nunholm at 6.30pm where runners are lead in organised groups from two up to five miles.

Further details can be found on www.dumfriesrunningclub.org.uk