Despite the early afternoon brightness and sunny spells that fooled us into believing conditions would be good for this years race. The atmosphere as usual was excellent.
A light rain started to fall as around 4000 of us lined up for the 32nd running of this event and my 29th attempt. This year however, had extra significance as it celebrated the 150th anniversary of the Geordie Ridley's song The Blaydon Races.
With a second mile in 5.52 I was still fairly comfortable but just after 3 miles as we hit the ramp up to Scotswood Bridge I started to struggle.
As we reached the turning point just past Scotswood Bridge I could see training partners and fellow club mates Mike, Alex, Peter, Dave and Davey all lined up behind me. So it was a case of getting my head down and keeping on working.
Mike (in the photo above) caught me at the flyover and although I got back past him at the top of the incline he pulled away from me as reached the slip road about 800m from the finish.
Full results are not available yet but will publish a link when available. In the meantime the leading results were:
1st Peter Lemuya (Kenya) 27.35
2nd Tewodros Shiferaw (Ethiopia) 27.36
3rd Tadele Geremew (Ethiopia) 27.37
1st Lady Lauran Howarth (Leigh Harriers) 30.26
1st M40 Ian Hudspeth (Morpeth) 27.51 in 6th place overall
For other views on this years 'Blaydon' the following sites are worth checking out - Running toward 40 and beyond; Runner Wanderings and northeastrunner
Photos by Francesca
A light rain started to fall as around 4000 of us lined up for the 32nd running of this event and my 29th attempt. This year however, had extra significance as it celebrated the 150th anniversary of the Geordie Ridley's song The Blaydon Races.
Starting a little bit back from the front of the starting line I set off feeling pretty comfortable despite the usual frantic start, going through the first mile in 5.33. However, as we hit Scotswood Road the heavens literally opened and we were deluged by torrential rain. rain so heavy that we were soon running through ankle deep water on some parts of the road. In fact, eventual winner, Kenyan, Peter Lemuya, was quoted in today's local Sunday newspaper, The Sunday Sun as saying "I've never raced in conditions like that before - in Kenya, when it rains we don't run!".
With a second mile in 5.52 I was still fairly comfortable but just after 3 miles as we hit the ramp up to Scotswood Bridge I started to struggle.
As we reached the turning point just past Scotswood Bridge I could see training partners and fellow club mates Mike, Alex, Peter, Dave and Davey all lined up behind me. So it was a case of getting my head down and keeping on working.
Mike (in the photo above) caught me at the flyover and although I got back past him at the top of the incline he pulled away from me as reached the slip road about 800m from the finish.
Full results are not available yet but will publish a link when available. In the meantime the leading results were:
1st Peter Lemuya (Kenya) 27.35
2nd Tewodros Shiferaw (Ethiopia) 27.36
3rd Tadele Geremew (Ethiopia) 27.37
1st Lady Lauran Howarth (Leigh Harriers) 30.26
1st M40 Ian Hudspeth (Morpeth) 27.51 in 6th place overall
For other views on this years 'Blaydon' the following sites are worth checking out - Running toward 40 and beyond; Runner Wanderings and northeastrunner
Photos by Francesca
Comments
It has been a while since I did that. And I must admit, I felt pretty hardcore doing that.