Mud, mud and some more mud.
Saturday 22nd will forever stay in the memory of many runners as the coldest and harshest conditions they will have ever run in.
From the moment I woke up that morning there was no sign of the weather looking positive. Driving through to the race looking out the car window at sheep in fields brimming with water and sleet lashing them.
Arrival at the race was only met with the cold and harsh reality that the course was completely destroyed by the previous races. The course itself was challenging enough with some steep short climbs, short hard decent and some tight turns. However, as the senior mens race is the last the mud was only going to get worse.
Warming up wasn't really possible in the conditions but with a 3k warm up run and some short hard sprints I started to feel some life in my legs. Trying to keep as many layers on as possible till the last minute was a challenge as over 700 runners were in the senior mens race.
Quickly unclothing and running to the start line, thankfully we weren't kept waiting long and that familiar sound of the gun happened.
The race was 3 laps round Callander House Country estate. The start was on an uphill which quickly became a battle for placings into the first couple of corners. the course then came into one of the many decent wouldn't of been challenging in the dry however, in the wet staying up right was the main challenge.
After a few hundred metres of deep mud the course ent behind the main house and out into the fields behind with a few short steep rises. Making sure you had the correct footing in these conditions became the most important task at hand as from the start athletes had been falling due to lack of grip.
After a few more twists and turns the course brought you back to the main house however, the torture wasn't over yet with a long climb up onto a high ridge closely followed by a sharp decent and then a steep ascent.
After getting up one last steep banking that was 1 out of 3 laps completed.
The race itself was extremely tough due to the weather conditions but to add to my pain I hadn't raced cross country in over 2 years and see myself now more as a road runner.
However, despite the pain and suffering I finished in 181st place out of 700 runners and was rather happy just staying on my feet the whole way round.
I would like to say a huge thank you to the organises and Marshalls for braving those weather conditions and allowing the race still to run. Next week takes me back to my natural habitat of the road with the Glasgow Relays 2020.
As always happy running!
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