Race Report

4th Daresbury Dash - Wednesday 3rd May 1995

Sixteen days after Boston we had our annual race at my workplace which I helped to organise.

Afternoon all

Here I am sat at my desk after a rather hectic lunchtime. Today we held our 4th annual "Daresbury Dash" 2 mile race/fun run here at the lab, our annual attempt to encourage our workmates to run.

The course is rather interesting, we start off with a loop round the lab perimeter road which has a nice little hill before heading out of the lab and over the canal before dropping down onto the canal towpath, along the canal to the next bridge then the fun begins :-) Off the towpath and over a nasty little hump-backed bridge before turning off the road onto a footpath. This goes through a field and up a really steep hill into the woods above the lab, through the woods before heading back onto the road, then there's a steep downhill run on the road back to the lab. 2 miles of intense pain :-)

I did a lab of the outer loop beforehand to mark the course before getting back to the lab to hand out numbers, 6 of the 9 members of Daresbury Accelerators Running Club were running and we had managed to persuade 11 of our workmates to take part. We all lined up and the lab director said go.

Off we went round the site, once I had got past the *joggers* who had gone off too fast I found myself in joint 5th place Andy. Pete, our best runner, already had a big lead, Barry the undead kiwi and dead runner Robin were in 2nd with Stuart just behind. Stuart is a cyclist not a runner but he is supposed to be a good cyclist, his uncle is one of my clubmates (who can beat me). I wondered how long he would last. Andy got away as we hit the canal, along the towpath Dave (who beat me in 2 races 2 years ago but hasn't run much since), came past, we passed each other a couple of times before we came off the canal. Dave pulled away up the hill but I almost caught him up the really steep bit and I passed Robin at the top, I was rather tired by now. I wanted to try and get away from Robin here but my legs didn't want to know. Robin came past a minute later and flew away down the hill. I ran in as hard as I could down the hill to the end and I had a bit left at the end in case any *jogger* was going to come past me in the home straight. I finished 7th/17 in 13.02, over a minute outside my best time but it was rather warm out there and I have just run a marathon. Rather tired on finishing but not tired enough.

Pete won easily but the big surprise was that Stuart finished 2nd ahead of Barry, Stuart obviously has good running genes from his uncle. Robin finished 6th in 12.42.

Everything went well so all my pre-race panicking was in vain, the director presented the trophies and I thanked everyone for coming. Robin, Pete and I did a very slow run over part of the course to recover although we missed out the steep bit.

Tomorrow I can start training properly again, I think I'm over Boston now, my legs survived today unscathed.

carpe sensible racing distances

tony bell A.M.T.Bell@dl.ac.uk crystallographer and marathon runner (but not necessarily in that order :-)) council for the central laboratory of the research councils daresbury laboratory, daresbury, warrington, cheshire, UK. WA4 4AD.

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