Munster Masters Cross Country Championships

It isn't often you can just walk down the road and use that walk as a warm up for your race.  That was the case for me as the Munsters were held in Clarecastle which is only down the road from me.  It was a cracking day weather wise.  I have been very lucky with the weather.  Every race I have ran so far, the weather has been lovely.  That will have to change sometime.

The Munster Juvenile Inter Club XC Relay Championships were on also.  They catered from U/10s all the way up to U/16s.  I had never seen XC Relay before so it was great to catch it.  They all took off like greyhounds to complete their lap.  The lead was changing constantly.

Our race was delayed a bit as the relays took longer than normal races.  I used this time to loosen up well and get my heart rate up a bit.  We were called to the starting line and there seemed to be master runners coming from everywhere.  There was a field of about 110.  I spoke to my club mates as they are more experienced that me.  Under their advice, I decided that I would start off easy and build as the race goes on.  There was one small lap and four big laps.  It was about 7kms altogether.

Eventually the gun went off.  I ran at a nice comfortable pace for the small lap.  This was the best thing to do as I got a sweat up and felt I could push on at any stage.  I ran with my club mate John for the small lap and the first two big laps.  I felt I had more in me so I pushed on a bit.  I passed a few out and a few passed me out.  So for the next lap I kept a consistent pace. 

I was feeling it a lot heading into the last lap.  There was a runner breathing down my neck but I was managing to fend him off.  I said if he passed me out I would go with him and finish strong.  He didn't pass me out so I said with about 400m to go I would up the pace.  I saw that the runner ahead of me had slowed a bit so I took off trying to catch him.  I was surprised to find that I had a bit of gas left and I caught him going up the last hill.  I was delighted.  But with all my happiness, I nearly ran past the finishing tunnel.  I ran up the tunnel absolutely exhausted and finished in 59th place.

I was very happy with my race for a couple of reasons.  I was not feeling well during the week and I only got one run in.  I thought I might feel weak during it but I felt quite the opposite.  In my age category of O/35s, I finished in 15th place.  Our team, St. John's finished 7th overall in Munster on a score of 163 (20, 27, 57, 59).  I thought this was really good as there was some really big clubs competing.  I was the fourth member to score for our team.  Also, there was a runner from a local rival club who had beaten me in the last two XC races.  I beat him by a few places so I was delighted with that.  This shows progress and that I am going in the right direction.

All roads are leading to the Clare Senior XC Championships in St. Flannans in Ennis on December 9th.  This will be a very tough race as you will have the creme de la creme of runners from Clare running in this.  They will take off at a ferocious pace and it is a very long race for cross country at 10 kms. There will probably be a small field in this race so the aim here will be not to come last.  I hope to get three good weeks of training under my belt before this race.

I am really enjoying the cross country scene at the minute and I hope to get a few more races under my belt before the season finishes.

Thanks for reading.