Woolaton Park Nottingham
Inter Counties XC (World Trials) . With the world XC Championships two weeks away and this year being held in Scotland , the Inter Counties were staged later in the year to double as a selection race for the team for the the world XC champs.
Wilmslow had three runners on duty .
Womens 8k race
199 Sue Hool 35.07
Sue helped Cumbria to a top half team finish as one of the counters.
Mens 12k race
199 Malcolm Fowler 43.50
224 Stuart Parrott 45.11
Both racing for Cheshire, Malc being one of the counters to place Cheshire 25th out of 30 counties.
The mens race got off to a fast start that seemed more like 5k pace but we soon settled as we reached the top of the first hill . Both Malc and I miscalculated number of laps as we were told three times up the hill and naturally assumed the first climb up from the start line was hill rep number one ….wrong !
On finishing I was thanked by one runner for the push on lap three (my surge for home).
Fourth time up the hill was hard but I could still see other Cheshire runners ahead, time to push again.
Adrian our team manager seemed to cover more of the course than we did as he seemed to pop up at every corner urging us on. As fourth reserve in the team I was unlikely to count (six from nine) but as I
may not get another go , I gave the race my all and really enjoyed the occasion.
All in all a great honour to wear the county vest, and with only 25 places between the last 5 Cheshire runners , if I keep training hard and improving I might yet get another go.
On the way back in the car we got Rob’s text to say that Bill had won the Bramhall 5k.This left Malc with a slight problem how to explain at work that Bill was first and he was 199th !
Not to worry I’m sure Bill would explain it far better!
Stuart