Author: Peter Kennedy

Firstly Congratulations to all our master’s runners who ran at Horwich 5k yesterday.

A bit more on the race itself, this was my first experience of the Horwich 5k and it was difficult to take it all in. Chiptiming was in use again, but as the results would be based on gun time,  I agreed we could forego having the “chip times” based on when each runner crossed the start line.  This meant that the start could take up the whole width of the road and get everyone away within two seconds.  The photo of the start shows how successful this was – 131 runners in about 6 rows were away down the hill, almost before you could blink.  No doubt newcomers got a small shock when this soon became a gentle uphill rise.  There followed three more of these undulating laps, all the time passing the race-walkers, who had started five minutes earlier.

After 15 minutes, the chip timing team were telling me that the winner would be either #4 and #16 and whilst I was trying to get the British Master Athletics finishing tape ready, without impeding the continuous stream of walkers and runners on their 2ndlap, #2 appeared out of the blue, 20 seconds in the lead.  I then discovered that he had forgotten to put on his chip and so the actual race winner was Mick Hill from Leeds City AC in 15:36, closely followed by Raymond Eggar of Lancaster & Morecambe AC in 15:38. The first lady to finish was Kelly Edwards from Leamington Cycling & AC, in 17:43, this was 11 seconds ahead of Claire Martin from Telford AC in 17:54.  There followed many fine performances, which you can recognize by the age-graded scores, such as Angela Copson, W70, whose of time of 22:15 is an age grading of 98% and a new British W70 record, and Alastair Walker, M60, whose time of 16:58 is an age-grading of 96%.

Notwithstanding a variety of minor technical challenges, the IT team of Alex Rowe and Rob Walker had the results ready as planned for 12:30 pm.  Almost everyone had stayed for the presentations in the Leisure Centre and those who were exhausted by their race were able to sit in comfort whilst Dave Oxland, the BMAF Treasurer announced the winners.  We then had a surprise for everyone, including Dave, when we presented the trophies from Horwich Festival of Racing to the first three men and matching trophies plus flowers to the first three ladies. They missed out on shaking hands with the Mayor at the finish, but this way everyone was away home by 1 pm

Claire Martin‘s account of the race: I finished 11 seconds behind winner Kelly Edwards. “The first 3 overall were all V40s Kelly Edwards 17.43 myself 17.54, and then Elizabeth Renondeau 17.57. For me personally I was really pleased as I was injured in September and missed the whole of winter training. Therefore only started back jogging late January/February and I turn 45 this September so new age group soon. The race was very well organised and a good traffic free course. Also the presentation was pretty prompt after the race.

Results can be found here

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