News from the Forces - Brian McNab & Colleagues

Brian McNabb was wearing his Army hat when he took part in the Cheviot Fell Race on Saturday 19th June. The race is open to all the Services, armed and not armed, so there were teams from the Post Office, Police, Fire, Ambulance and Mountain Rescue besides the Armed Forces. 120 teams of four competed over 22 miles of the Cheviot Mountains in Northumberland National Park; a testing course which covered 11 peaks of 2000 feet on a terrible wet misty day. After visiting all the checkpoints, Brian and his ITC team completed the course in 5 hours and 25 minutes and placed 7th team.

Brian McNab

Brian’s next challenge was the appropriately named North Dales Challenge - a 26 mile Orienteering and Fell Race, north and south of Grinton. This race was open to all, to run individually or in a team. Military Units ran in the Military Competition, in teams of four and must compete in boots! Each team has six hours to cover as much ground and gain as many checkpoints as possible with 220 being the maximum points available. After visiting all but one of the checkpoints, Brian and his young ITC team were awarded first Military Team, gaining 205 points in 5 hours 32 minutes 52 seconds and the Silver Cup.

On Sunday 25th July, Brian finished his off-road exploits in the James Herriot Trail Race from Bolton Castle near Leyburn, along with Jim and Rachel Robinson. It was reported that 146 runners took part and enjoyed it, despite atrocious weather; Brian said “a hard run in poor weather” - he finished 4th in 1 hour 3 minutes.

British Milers Club - 17th August 2004

On Tuesday 17th August, five Harriers travelled to Longford Park Stadium in Stretford, Greater Manchester, to compete in a British Milers Club fixture. These fixtures regularly attract large numbers, well into three figures, all intent on achieving good times in true run races. Due to the large number of competitors, the races went well into the evening; the weather didn’t help with the later heats being run in monsoon-like conditions and the last heat started at 10.30 pm! In the 800m races, well over a hundred athletes competed in eleven heats, all graded according to personal best times. Scott Wardman and Ken Harker raced in heat 3, with the rain mostly in the air and not yet on the track: Scott led from gun to tape, winning in 1:57.5, a new PB and Ken ran a season’s best 2:00.9, the magic sub2 just eluding him. Chris Peacock ran in heat 7, just as the heavens opened and ran 2:14 something, close to his season’s best, in a rain-soaked but very competitive heat. The 1500m races saw around sixty athletes compete in four heats. By this time the weather was atrocious with so much water on the track there were doubts about continuing and athletes joking they would be quicker swimming the distance. Edd Richards ran in heat 2 and, considering the conditions, finished in a very creditable 4:23.1. Louise Jackson had to wait until the very last for her heat; having arrived at 7 to register and warm-up before the meeting started at 8 pm and having got thoroughly cold and wet over the next 2½ hours. She was more than a little cheesed-off, having spent her own hard-earned time and money, to splash through inches of standing water in the forlorn chase of a fast time, and finished looking like a proverbial drowned rat in a time that was irrelevant.

Ossy Oiks Fell Race 24th August 2004

The penultimate race in this year’s Northern Runner sponsored Cleveland Midweek Fell Race Series was the Ossy Oiks on Tuesday 24th August. The race was listed as 9 miles and 1800 feet from the car park north of Cod Beck Reservoir near Osmotherley, but was actually a mile shorter over a changed course due to the quantity of water that had fallen: the organiser, Dave Parry, made a wise decision to make the runners cross a bridge rather than ford a stream which had risen more than 2 inches during the afternoon and was now a little river. Mike Brooks had a solid run, finishing in 66:23 just less than 10 minutes behind the winner, Paul Lowe of NYMAC, but was disappointed with his place, 36th overall and 2nd M50 behind Mike Hetherton of York Acorn AC, putting him out of the running for a second M50 title to go with the Harrogate League. Dan Brooks also ran but jarred his knee on the way up which forced him to walk all the way down. He finished dead last and was grateful to fellow runners Danny Gordon of Quakers and Ray Stevenson of NYM, with the rain still falling and the night getting darker by the minute, for advising him the best route back.