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Cleveland Way Relay, June 2013
By Bob How
Twelve of the team of 16 SH Runners at the
Finish
As with all the best ideas, this one was hatched in a pub on a winter
Tuesday evening, after a pint. As someone with "plenty of spare time" I
volunteered to sort out a team from the host of alcohol induced
volunteers and plan for a Smelly team was put together.
In due course it was our hero Bob Lillie who, after a pre-dawn wake up
call set us off from Filey at the unearthly hour of 05:00. In warm
conditions with a little light rain myself and Mark continued our
uneventful progress to Cloughton and Ravenscar respectively.
It's probably worth pointing out at this stage that we'd all agreed that
it was "just a social event, not competitive". Mark frothing at the
mouth in his finishing photo sort of makes a lie out of this principle.
I guess you can't take the will to win away.
Back on the run, the receding tide meant that only Barney took a dip in
the sea at Robin Hood's Bay as he led Amy across the beach to Paul
waiting at the slipway.
Talking of slips, at Whitby we were all admiring Paul's very rapid
descent of the 99 steps when he inevitably stumbled and bounced down
some of the 99. Whilst most of us hardened spectators commented on his
fall only Amy set off to see if he was OK and accompanied him to Trev
at the Whale Bones.
Despite his best efforts, Trev was passed by NYMAC ladies on route to
Runswick. It was Julia(n) Barwick so no surprise there. By the way
there's no truth in the scurrilous rumour that Trev is being helped up
the bank by Shelli which the photo sort of suggests.
Shelli raced over Boulby Cliff into the delightful fishing village of
Skinningrove passing 5 teams on route. We did have our hearts in our
mouths as she flew down the treacherous steps into the village, but she
managed to stay upright all the way to hand over to Bill despite some
really heavy showers on the way.
From this point on the forecast heavy showers took over and the handover
point at Slapewath was awash as Wai set off on probably the toughest leg
to Gribdale.
He said after he was encouraged keep moving pretty quickly to avoid the
lightning strikes. I'm not sure if that theory stands up to scientific
interrogation, but he did a good job making his way to hand over to our
oldest team member Steve for another tough leg to Battersby Moor. From
here to Clay Bank we saw the benefit of warm weather training in Turkey
as Ian Mac blasted across the moor.
Tom was our lead off runner at Clay Bank in a torrential downpour. Our
youngest competitor showed a clean pair of heels to all but 2 of the
runners on this leg to hand over to his dad, Ian, at Carlton. This
completed the third family connection in our team, with Shelli & Trev
and Amy & I.
Ian again produced a very strong run over the hilly leg into Osmotherly
where Dave was on his starting blocks. At Sneck Yate the weather
was pretty unpleasant as Rob searched along the forest track for Dave's
arrival only for him to come down the road behind us. It must be the
result of his SAS training and he's promised to get it right next year.
In continuing heavy rain Bref took over from Rob at the Hambleton Inn
for the last glory leg. "How many gates" was his most lucid comment
afterwards!
A few of us went out to meet and accompany Bref into the Cross at
Helmsley and a weary runner arrived to the cheers of the waiting throng
completing our trek in about 17hrs. No official result yet but at the
time of writing we finished in a very creditable 6th or 7th. Not bad for
a team with 2 ladies, 3 over 65s, an average age in excess of 53 and an
age span of 51 between Tom and Steve.
A great day out and everyone in the team have said they want to have a
go at getting under the 17hrs next June.
One final thought, some of us spent more time in the chip shop queue
than Tom took to cross the three tops to Carlton.
Cheers, Bob (Smelly Helly Team Manager) |
