Mike Scotney reports: My satnav has a sense of humour! Winding around the hotspots of the Black Country and Dudley, detouring around every roundabout in the area, I wondered if I was going to make it to the start line.
However, following a train of cars into Dudley Kingswinsford rugby ground, it was evident that again a large number of runners had been attracted to this midweek event. This was my second year of running in the race and I can honestly say that it’s a real highlight of my running calender although it’s not the quickest of courses.
We were shepherded down a country lane and with chip/RF timing started in ideal conditions, a little cool and with a tailwind behind us. I started with Ewen, Paul, Andrew and Nicola, and there was a very decent BVH teal turnout. It was a little congested for the first kilometer but spread out over the ensuing hill and we then hit the country lanes on the way to Kinver and Enville.
I was aiming for a steady 7 minute miling but was surprised to hit the half way point in just over 20 mins, nearer to the 6.30 p/m pace. The long twisting country lanes kept the race scenery interesting and with a large volume of club runners there was always another group ahead to try and latch on to.
The marathon training was really paying off (or was it the teal laces?) and feeling quite strong managed to make the last two kilometers after the looped mid-race circuit, my quickest. Psychologically it always seems better counting down in KM’s rather than miles, and the final ‘flat’ lane and sprint to the finish back to the rugby club was good.
We then received a very welcome banana, Red Bull shot (no vodka though) and technical T-Shirt, and there were some excellent BVH performances and a number of well beaten PB’s including those for Andrew Hoole, Nicola Cumley and Fiona Heath-Brown. I was pleased with a time of 41.10, an unexpected PB in light of a lack of any speed training, and a great incentive to train really hard for the short-race season ahead.
Full results (PDF).
Bournville results:
6th Andy Halliday 35.00
24th Steve Cumley 38.34
31st Mark Liptrot 38.54 PB
75th Mike Scotney 41.10 PB
99th Andrew Hoole 42.22 PB
134th Nicola Cumley 44.04 PB
136th Ewen Ross 44.10
145th Terry Doherty 44.39
207th Fiona Heath Brown 47.05 PB
383rd Paul Dugmore 52.57
419th Nicola Morris 54.15 PB
500th Sheldon Cooper 58.20
555th Jo Ribchester 60.20
Mike – Thanks for doing the race report – I couldn’t face it to be honest.
Having done this race last year in 34m14s, I felt in better shape and looking for a potential PB. Usually this is a field full of top-end runners, but as I got to the start line I realised that I could, and had, beat everyone there in recent races. I felt pretty comfortable in 2nd place at the 2 mile point when a niggling calf problem I’ve been nursing over previous weeks kicked in, and left me faced with dropping out or praying for a miracle. As I’ve never dropped out of a race I carried on in the hope that I could run it off, but it never happened and I drifted away from the leading pack at an alarming rate and in a lot of pain.
Absolutely gutted not to have won the race and should have just dropped out and minimised the damage.
I have had a week of RICE therapy, pain and intense repair work going on in order to make the Masters Race on 21 May. Plenty of aqua jogging, cycling and cross training going on, and will try to introduce light jogging at Monday night’s training session. Desperate to race on 21 May and make amends and looking forward to the day when I race all of those who beat me in the DK 10k.
An excellent turnout with some impressive performances. Congratulations to everyone who successfully completed what was clearly a `demanding` 10k distance.
Mike Scotney, and a significant number of BvHers,have clearly benefitted from their long distance training and I think that `we` are going to see some good times over the shorter distances in the weeks and months ahead.
Barrie Roberts