This past weekend my family took advantage of the Monday school holiday/hill race combo to visit Arran. As we drove towards Ardrossan on Friday afternoon the weather went from sunny to cloudy (Goatfell clearly visible). On the ferry it went from cloudy to quite windy (top of Goatfell has disappeared into mist). By the time we arrived at our B & B in Shiskine the skies had opened up (all of the hills around us were completely clagged in). The rain carried on through the night but things were looking up in the morning. I dropped the family off at the Arran Brewery to start walking up the hill while I went to register. I was quite early (pre-ferry rush) so after collecting my number I strolled along the waterfront in Brodick, had a coffee from Wooley’s bakery and stared at the hill. You could actually see the summit! And then you couldn’t. Then it started to rain a bit. Then it was sunny again. It was going to be one of those days.
Waiting in and around the Ormidale Pavillion, warming up under the posts and the smell of deep heat reminded me of happy times playing rugby (the scrum machine reminded me of less happy ones). After a semi-random kit check the organizers did a head count prior to the start. Unfortunately the local pipe band hired to pipe us out decided to make their grand entrance at the same time. While the music was nice and the scene was comical it was less than effective. After we were all accounted for and then counted again it was time for the start.
A quick lap of the track, along the road for a mile and half or so and then onto trails and up. Before the race Brian Howie told me the nice thing about the race was it was runnable most of the way up but that results in the problem of it being runnable all the way down too. It was fairly runnable until it got quite rocky. This was the point where I met up with my cheering section (always a bonus at a race). The last ridge up to the summit was tough slogging up but I found it worse coming down. The summit was covered in cloud/mist and the wind was strong in a few places but all in all the weather was great. The decent through the forest at the bottom of the hill was great fun. Getting back on the road was not as much fun, but I managed to keep up my pace and even mustered a bit of a sprint around the track to finish (more rugby training memories). I managed to finish just before the rain came down.
All the runners received a baby blue Salomon buff (promptly given to my daughter who has not taken it off since). And there was a wonderful spread of sandwiches, tea, coffee and cakes. I had two pieces of the vegan chocolate cake that was being ignored by the others (it was delicious!).
Carnethy Results
Iain Gilmore 1:25:59 (2nd overall)
Neil Gilmore 1:40:15 (2nd V50)
Bruce Smith 1:45:33
Steven Simkin 1:49:09
Sean Walker 2:09:17
Matthew Grove 2:10:28
Georgina McAllister 2:12:01
Brian Howie 2:29:07
Full results: here
Sean Walker