Running: Harriers at Hawkshead

Jul 3 2009 by Our Correspondent, Dumfries Standard Friday

ON A warm summer’s evening, there can be few better settings for a 10-kilometre road race than the village of Hawkshead in the Lake District.

The fantastic scenery was some consolation for the 165 runners who took part, as they tackled the seriously hilly route around Esthwaite Water, which lies just south of the picturesque village.

Tosh McCaig was the first of the four athletes from Dumfries Harriers to finish the race, showing his depth of strength and speed to finish in 40 minutes 20 seconds, 28th place.

This was Tosh’s third race in four days, following his impressive 12th place at the East Kilbride 10k on Sunday and third place at the Lockerbie 10k the night before.

Next home and demonstrating once again how much he has improved this season, was Ian Gray.

Ian had set himself a target of sub 45 minutes for the race and worked hard to achieve his goal by finishing in 44 mins 30 seconds; 55th place.

Steve Head was another Harrier who had been racing earlier in the week at East Kilbride, taking on the longer Half Marathon distance.

Steve has been enjoying his racing this year and is starting to show the first signs of a long overdue return to form.

Maintaining a steady pace, Steve came within less than a minute of his season's best time for the distance in a time of 48 minutes four seconds and just squeezed into the top half of the field in 82nd place.

Completing the line-up for the club was Anne Head. Anne judged her race to perfection, keeping her composure during the worst of the hills in the first eight kilometres and powering to the finish in the closing 2k.

Such was the high standard of competition at Hawkshead that she just missed out on the prizes, finishing fourth in the V50 category in a time of 55 minutes 52 seconds.