Not the Dead Sea Scrolls but Blaydon Backchat

You wouldn't have thought the excitement would have been as great as that generated by the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls but I am sure that the unearthing of a few copies of Back Chat,  Blaydon Harriers' old newsletter from the 1990's caused as much interest.  As we sat huddled over them in the Black Bull following last nights training session and rediscovered past events and glories.

Obviously the main talking points were the race results and the times that we did (and why we can't run that fast now).  But also events such as the club relay following Wainwrights Coast to Coast route and of memories of former members who are no longer with the club.

On a personal note, there seems to a worrying number of mentions as to my sartorial habits - did I really dress that differently?

But from a running perspective, without boring you too much,  they detail some of my better performances.  Issue number 3 , September 1992, describes, for example, a successful June and July with the following results:

- Hamsterley Forest 16 miles - 1st in 1.33.08  (New course record by over 6 minutes)
- Tynedale 10km - 3rd
- Phoenix 14 miles - 6th
- Yorkshire Wolds half marathon - 1st
- Hamsterley Forest 10.5 miles - 1st in 62.40 (New course record)
- Hamsterly Forest 5.3 miles - 2nd

Ah those were the days!

As for my current running you can probably guess from the lack of posts on this blog that there has not been much to write about.  I have just about had to start from scratch and slowly build up over the past 12 weeks from very easy jogging.

 Last night I did my first track session for, what must be about, 4 years with 3 x 800m on 75seconds recovery, 2 min recovery then 4 x 400 with 75 seconds recovery and although I would have probably been better off timing the intervals using a sundial rather than a stopwatch - you have to start somewhere.

As far as my long term target of running 100,000 miles before my 65th birthday, I should reach 90,000 miles in about 2 weeks time, about 3 months behind what I had planned.  But I'm slowly getting there

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