Race report by Gareth:
I’m suffering from severe race report writing fatigue so this may be brief…ish lol.
Yet another terrific turnout of 21 Lostockers took part in last night’s second instalment of the midweek champs, the Coronation Trail Race.
A fairly recent addition to the race calendar (in it’s 4th year) replacing the much missed Jubilee Road Race series, this is a testing out & back 6 mile trail race starting & finishing near the bowling green, with 600 feet of elevation.
After the usual chaos of trying to find somewhere to park & the next to useless toilet facilities we got under way at the 7:15 in much drier & warmer weather than of late.
The vast majority of the elevation is in the first half of the race & it offers some stunning views over Rivington, with the piercing call of a Curlew a constant backdrop. We headed up from the start with Anglezarke Res on our left & Yarrow on our right & on towards Lead Mines Clough, up and down a bit more on rocky trails, run round a random cone 3 miles in cheered on by Bolton Mountain Rescue & back the way we came to the finish.
As ever, the best thing about out and back courses is the chance to cheer on fellow Lostockers, the first of which was Paul Edwards powering along for a really high finish in a top quality field (unfortunately the results still aren’t published so I can’t highlight specific achievements). Janet cruised around looking comfortable, Phil, Gaz, Andy K & Greg (in no particular order) all continued their recent strong form with excellent performances & fell captain Shutters showed us how it’s done with a very smart showing.
Running in the mid pack means I’m lucky enough to see all the battles unfold & there were some crackers last night. I could see Matt & Chris B changing places regularly up ahead until Chris pipped Matt at the post on the sprint to the finish. Brian & Andy were another pair in close proximity, Andy gaining on the hills with Brian flying on the downhills as usual & they both left me for dead on the last 3 miles, Mike was on my heels for a long way until I saw him off in the last mile or so. It was great to see Rach, Terri, George & Jenna all running together & loving life & giving us lots of cheers. Mary put in another strong run despite wearing a funny coloured red & black vest 😜 & Sheila & Emma were another pair to run together & look like they had a very enjoyable race.
Well done everyone on a great night, apologies if I’ve missed anyone & I can’t show the results & highlight achievements because there are none at present.
