The first cross country race of the season took place in Galashiels on 1st October. This race was held in Galashiels last year and it was the same challenging hilly course in the majestic border’s countryside. The rain did threaten in the afternoon but we were lucky and the weather held, it was much kinder to us than last year with a mild dry afternoon.
There was a big difference in the number of Lasswade AC teams this year. Last year we initially had eleven teams entered for the event over all age groups and ended up fielding eight teams on the day. This year we initially had seven teams and ended up with five on the day.
The first event to get underway was the young females and u13 girl Beth McWilliam got her team of to a great start finishing the first leg in 5th place. Freya Mowbray was our second leg runner for our first team and she had a solid run to finish her leg and hand over to Olivia Meikle in 4th place. Olivia ran well on the final leg with the 3rd fastest time of the day for an u17 to maintain 4th position, a great start to the day’s events. In our other young female team Lucy Ward had a strong run to finish in 19th place on first leg and hand over to Emma Thomson. Emma an u13, stepped up to run our u15 leg and ran well to hand on in 20th place to final leg runner Bethan Kitchin. Bethan an u15 was also stepping up and running the u17 leg and had a strong run to finish in 20th place. It was great to see two teams competing and a number of the girls running amongst the fastest lap times for their respective age groups.
In the young males we also had two teams and our u13 runners were Struan Milne and Francis Ovani-Finnegan both running well on the first leg to hand over in 15th and 18th place respectively. Jonathan MacQueen and Lauchie Welsh were our u15 runners having solid runs and handing over to our final leg runners in 20th and 21st place. Andrew McWilliam and Rowan Taylor both ran well on the final leg with Andrew pulling his team up to 13th with the 4th fastest leg of the day. Rowan wasn’t too far behind in 14th and with the 7th fastest leg of the day.
The next event was the ladies race and Lasswade had placed 3rd in 2019 and won it in 2021. Sadly there was no defence of the title as we were unable to field a team.
The final event of the day was the men and Lasswade AC initially had two teams. However, with one athlete withdrawing due to injury others followed as the team was incomplete so it was scrapped and we ended up with only a Masters team competing . On the first leg Ken McWilliam got the team off to a good start in 31st place overall (14th in the Masters) to hand over to Andrew McGlone. Andrew had a solid run to hand on to 3rd leg runner Steve Brown in 33rd place (18th in Masters) . Steve was our next runner and ran well over the 4k course to keep us in the top 40 overall and top 20 in the masters. Our final leg runner was Derrick Brydon who had a good run to bring the team home in 38th place overall and 16th masters team.
A great day’s athletics with some fine performances from six of our young athletes getting amongst the fastest times of the day in their respective age groups.
Congratulations to everyone on their performances.
For full results click here
Thanks for all your help on the day especially Stuart Meikle for arriving early and helping us erect the tent.
See you all at the National Relays!
Kirk and Linda
