Chester Marathon

Held on the River Dee: a nice wide river, with not very much flow after a period of good weather; natural banks (so no re-bounding waves); and nice warm and sunny to boot. Chester has to be one of the best venues for a marathon race and well worth the effort of getting there. Twelve Wey Racers entered the first Assessment Race of the season: Rob W, Roy F, Paul Y, (senior men); Claire G (senior ladies); Mark C, Michael L, Richard L (junior men); and Alice H, Hazel C, Marthe dF (junior ladies).

A new course was set up conforming to the international 4.3 km circuit, consisting of seven laps for the senior men, six laps senior ladies, five laps junior men and four laps junior ladies. If that wasn't hard enough, a "false" beach portage was added on each lap.

Some good results came the club's way. The selectors were looking for times that will be competitive in an international race, clearly working this out is made a lot easier by virtue of having a standard circuit. That being said, it should have been advertised as such as it was clear that some competitors were only looking for a good placing! I recorded the lap times and when I have found out how to upload a table here without the blogger stripping my html code I'll do so! But in the mean time you can find it here as well.

Like all good gigs, Chester threw on a support act to keep the fans quiet. The morning started with a regional hasler marathon. Why more people don't regularly race in the north-west I don't know but the decision to hold the assessment race on the same day ensured a larger field as the Hasler results show.