North West County Relays Lancaster

The relays are a great event to be involved with and really build camaraderie. The good aspect of the Merseyside set up is that only the A teams count for medals and the fact that they aren't necessarily taken 100% seriously by the other big athletics clubs in Merseyside, our club are always in with a shout of a medal. In fact Penny Lane have finished 4th for the past 3 years, agonizingly 8 seconds off a podium finish in 2012.

James McNally has left Penny Lane which is a big loss because along with Martin Swensson, these two guys talent promoted Penny Lane to contenders in any local team event. Indeed we SHOULD have won the North West Cross Country - of the 5 races they both entered, James won 4 and finished 2nd once with Martin runner up in the races James won and winning the race James was runner up! I don't entirely blame myself but there were two race were if I'd have turned up, I'm confident we would have won as a team. Let's just say I was lost in music.

Anyway, Dale Higham has taken over the captaincy and he's done a brilliant job in motivating the men and getting them interested in the relays. We had two teams for the Counties prepared to sacrifice their Sunday for the cause.

The aim was still to try and get on the podium and we had a punchers chance. We still had Martin, our ace in the pack, Dale is running better than ever and I've never ran a relay with Penny Lane where Nige hasn't rolled back the years to deliver an outstanding performance. Oh and there's me, defo still not firing on all cylinders but training wise I had a great week leading up to the relays and was confident if I could run as well as I hoped Dale would, we were in with a shout.

On arrival we got to just about cheers the back end of the senior womens event, our fantastic ladies finished 3rd but didn't hang around for the presentation, no doubt a pleasant surprise! I bumped into the Knowsley lads who were missing Luke Parker with an injury but they still, on paper at least, had a quicker four than Penny Lane. I knew Liverpool Harriers would easily win the Merseyside relay and talking to the Southport lads they looked like a shoe in for 2nd.

That left a shoot out for 3rd between Wirral AC, Knowsley and Penny Lane. On paper we were way off the other two clubs who are athletics clubs with plenty of talent to choose from. Dale was on the 1st leg and in the terrible conditions he ran a brilliant first leg that left us in 5th, 35 secs off 3rd.

Next up was our trump card Martin who hauled us into contention, handing over to me with us 3rd with a 32 second cushion. I started off fast, too fast really and was past by Knowsley's 3rd leg runner Mark Clair, who ended up running even quicker than Martin to give Knowsley a 37 second cushion going into the last leg.

We we still 4th but Wirral were only 7 seconds behind us. Nige took off and was quickly caught by the classy Alan Woods from Wirral. Woods went on to catch Knowsley's anchor leg Jack Atkins before the end of the first lap and Nige was clawing back time but it was too much of a mountain to climb. Wirral finished 3rd Knowsley 17 seconds off in 4th with Penny Lane a further 30 seconds off in 5th.

We were gutted, probably not a much as Knowsely but it was still a bitter pill to swallow. The conditions didn't help bu they were same from everyone. I honestly don't think we could have ran any quicker - maybe if we'd have been lucky with the leg selection and Martin was head to head with Mark Clair we might have sneaked it. Still, it was a great team effort and guys in the B team ran great too.

Six stage this weekend at Blackpool, a top 25 place and a visit to the national for the 1st time ever is unlikely. Hopefully our performaces at the counties will inspire other lads and ladies at the club to get involved in the relays.

BELIEVE was the message for Sunday, we did and were so close again!