Race report Howard Jeffrey

My training regime has served me well for many years but I recently revised my schedules to take account of the bigger number in the age category. I have come up with a 6 month plan to be in the best shape possible for mid next year. Part of that plan will include some races because they are the major reason for the training in the first place. The rest of the plan is building up a base (including swimming and cycling for du and triathlons) and then build up speed work from early spring. So far so good and the first race was today at Whixley which is an old style friendly community village and the race is to raise funds for the village hall.

The forecast was for heavy rain and the course includes 50% off road tracks and paths which in previous years have been extremely challenging. Given the rain over the preceding few days I was expecting it to be a hard slog through the mud. It was in many places but not as bad as some years. I had looked at who the competition was going to be in my age group and thought the winning time would be around the 52 minute mark. The weather was windy and luckily for me the rain had stopped for the exact duration of my race, belting it down before and starting again after I finished. The start is from the sports field behind the village hall and I stationed myself middle of the pack to get up to race speed quickly. On leaving the field the route to 2k is generally uphill and I felt pretty strong going up and passed quite a few people. Tim, a long time rival from Harrogate Harriers, was a 100 yards or so ahead at the top of the hill but I had been slowly catching him up. Between 2 and 4k, where the route was along slippery tracks around fields I was able to catch up and overtake. Back onto tarmac and downhill and still feeling good I had spotted a guy in front who was most likely the front runner in the age group and the man to beat. I slowly reigned him in and had decided to follow and blast past in the last few hundred yards. At 5k and going back uphill again there was a drinks station and one of his club mates had stopped to walk and when he got up to her, he did the same! Luckily I have included skipping in my new training plan so was able to avoid running into the back of a stationary object. 26:41 at 5k so not far off the required pace and still feeling OK.

I think he was surprised to be overtaken by a rival, so he got going again and tried to catch up. 6 to 8k is back through mud and woods with long thorny brambles to shred the kit and skin. At 8k it is back onto the road and downhill to the finish back on the sports field. I was beginning to feel a bit jaded but as John Cleese famously said as the Black Knight: ‘none shall pass’. My watch at the finish was at 52 minutes ish, so I was pretty sure I had done what I had hoped. In previous years, my age category wins were, a giant pork pie and a giant box of chocolate… yummy. This year I got some anti-wrinkle cream, some hair restorer and a bottle of Sanatogen (vitamin supplement). That’s what it looked like but turns out it was hair tonic, shampoo and a jar of Yorkshire honey which along with the extremely generous goody bag made for great rewards.

The race was won by Dan Cavan of Knaresborough Harriers in 36:00. First lady was Samantha Davies of Easingwold RC, in  42:55 and I was 28th in 52:20. 74 finished.

Results at ukresults.net?2024/whix10k.html