Irvine Athletic Club runners do well for Scotland.

Nov 20 2009 by John Woods, Irvine Herald

SEVEN runners from Irvine Athletic Club were picked to run for Scottish teams at the British Veterans' Cross Country International at Birmingham on Saturday.

This is the biggest event in the British Masters calendar with teams from Scotland, England, Wales, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland competing in five-year age groups.

Irvine were delighted to have the largest number selected from any club in the country and the event was hosted by the famous Birchfield Harriers Club on a course beside the Alexander Stadium consisting mainly of parkland which had become extremely soft underfoot after overnight heavy rain.

In the ladies' race Mary Miller was gaining her first Scottish vest and completed the 6km course in a creditable 31 minutes 52 seconds for the W45 team.

Club colleague, Liz McGarry, a Scotland regular over the past 20 years, put her experience to good use to finish with 30.56 for eighth overall in the W55 category and helped secure a well earned set of silver medals for her team.

The men's races in the M35 to M60 were held over 8km and split into two races with the five Irvine runners all competing in different age categories.

Alex Allardyce, representing the M35 team for second time after making his debut at Cardiff last year, again gave a good account of himself to finish with 31.05 while M50 runner Brian Craig opted to help out the M45 team and finished with a solid run of 33.55 despite the muddy and windy conditions being a disadvantage for his six-foot frame.

Colin Miller, Jim White and Andy Rennie are all stalwarts of many previous vets internationals but they are very proud to pull on their dark blue vests and competed at M50, M55 and M60 teams respectively.

Years of training and peaking for big events stood them in good stead and all three were rewarded with bronze team medals in their age categories.

Colin finished in an excellent 32.40, Jim showed that he is still a big occasion runner with a solid 35.45 and Andy ran his best race yet as an M60, leading the Scottish team for more than half of the race only to fade slightly in the last kilometre to finish second Scot.

His time of 35.47 was less than a minute behind the M60 race winner, Griff Owens of Wales.

The next big events for the Irvine veteran runners are the Scottish Masters Cross Country Championships at Forres in February and the British Masters Club Cross Country Championships at Belfast in March.