Locke Park 20Ten

In one of the last races before the Covid 19 shutdown two of GRC’s long distance runners Catherine Payne and Robert McArdle once again made the long trip north to Redcar to compete in the  Locke Park 20Ten where both opted for the full twenty miles. This is a tough race in which the runners have to negotiate 20 one mile laps of the park, to make it tougher the new route has two 180 degree turns which makes the athletes come to a dead stop and have to accelerate up to speed again during every mile, this means it is impossible to get into any sort of rhythm and effectively the race is a 2½ hour effort session!

There is only one real straight on the lap and it enjoyed a headwind coming straight off the North Sea to further test the field. In a crowded March race calendar this event  came just seven days after both completed a full marathon so they were expecting cumulative fatigue to play a big part later in the race. Catherine started well concentrating on running as far as she could at marathon pace before succumbing to heavy legs and the inevitable slowdown. Her plan was to keep the faster pace for the first ten miles but as she was still running well she was able to go through half marathons distance around the 1:36 mark and keep some sort of form right through to sixteen miles when she decided to ease off. Her finishing time of 2:32:49 was faster than last year and good enough to place her second lady using the WMA age grading that decides prize-winners for this race, her score of just over 82% made her fourth overall.

Robert McArdle enjoyed a steady run in preparation for a marathon that is postponed until the autumn actually moving up the field by seven places in the second half as others faded more than he did to eventually secure first place in his age category and a 70%+ grading in a chip time of 2:42:06