Welsh Castles Relay 2008

Above: Winner of Stage 4 to Harlech, John Dineen.

The Welsh Castles is a 20 stage relay run over two days, with stage lengths varying from 8.6 miles to 13.3 miles.  The route, starting early Saturday Morning, takes athletes all the way from Caernarfon Castle to a glorious ending in the grounds of Cardiff Castle late on Sunday afternoon.  Six of the stages are ominously called Mountain Stages and as the term might indicate -only the very keen or very stupid should ever attempt these.

Having finished 23rd in 2006 and 14th in 2007, hopes were high for Bromsgrove & Redditch going into the 2008 event.  New Welsh Castles Team Manager, Mike Hanson, assembled a team of great and noble athletes (some great, some noble) and set off into the Welsh sunshine early on Saturday 14th June.

As things turned out, Bromsgrove and Redditch finished a very creditable 17th. With a few athletes debuting in the event, things look pretty rosy for the future. 

The tone was set from the very first leg.  Ian Keyte blasting out of the blocks to finish Stage 1 in 6th place and bag a winner’s jersey for being the first vet home.  Peter Hawcroft took a break from his ‘official photographer’ duties to finish 17th on his stage, handing over to Gavin Moorhead on Stage 3 who finish the first of the Mountain Stages from Criccieth Castle to Maentwrog in  37th place.

John Dineen then took up the reigns for B&R and, running in the event for the first time, blew away the opposition, winning his stage by 35 seconds and collecting our second jersey of the day.  Former B&R athlete (now running for Vale Royal AC) Bernie Jones could be heard cursing in the background.

Above: Kevin Lanckham finished first vet on leg 5 from Barmouth to Harlech.

Above: Clive Brown on the way from Barmouth to Dolgellau.

A third winner’s jersey was collected on Stage 5 when Kevin Lanckham came home 4th (1st vet) and Clive Brown, having improved his 2006 time by 5 minutes last year, shaved yet another minute off his PB to finish in 20th place on Stage 6.

Above: Mark Graham finishing leg 7 at Dinas Mawddwy.

Above: Judy Appleby clearly enjoying leg 8 from Dinas to Foel.

Above: Simon Lanckham ran leg 9 from Foel to Llanfair Caereinion.

Above: Castles team manager Mike Hanson on leg 10 to finish the first day at Newtown.

Mark Graham helped the team stay in contention with a good Stage 7 (Mountain Stage) run, finishing 21st and Judy Appleby beat all but two female competitors to finish 40th on stage 8.  Simon Lanckham, B&R’s youngest squad member, finished 21st before handing over to Mike (13.3 miles: what was I thinking?) Hanson who finished the last leg of the day in 36th place.

Above: Phil, Steve, Ian and Helen (seemingly drinking a double round) relax at Newtown on Saturday night.

Day two

The organisers know a thing or two about making people suffer so, not content with Stage 11 being a Mountain Stage, they decided that everyone should set off at 7:00 a.m sharp.  Still, that didn’t stop Brian Doran from skipping his cornflakes and making his way round, finishing in 41st place.  Dave Stokes was the next of the early morning risers finishing 25th on Stage 12 and then Len Quartly, running because both James Bowler and Andy Freeman drank too much beer the night before, came home a very respectable 37th on Stage 13.

Never frightened of a challenge and determined to out-do Len, Calvin made his way up to Drovers Arms (the fifth mountain stage) and finished 36th.  Next up, Jamie Dancyger didn’t let the fact of not having a race number hold him back (writing his no. on an A4 sheet of paper and pinning it to his chest instead).  He finished 23rd on Stage 15

Above: Alan Esmere working hard on leg 16 to Beacons Reservoir.

Above: Simon Bowen heading towards Cyfartha Castle on leg 17.

Alan Elsmere beat almost half of the field on Stage 16 (finishing 31st) and handed over to Simon Bowen who ran excellently to finish 15th on the following Stage.

Stages 18 and 19 saw good solid performances from Jane Anderson and Dave Cleverly (38th and 26th respectively) setting thing up nicely for Rich Malin to bring the team home.  Soaking up the pressure of being the last Stage runner with ease, Rich finished 4th and won our 4th winner’s jersey (first vet).

The two day event was a success.  There were some wonderful performances.  The team spirit was fantastic.  Special thanks must go to the marshals, especially Andy Freeman, James Bowler, Steve James and Phil Carbutt, who marshalled despite not running.

Wales haven’t seen the last of us.  I’m off to the bookies to place a bet on a top ten finish next year!

Click for full results on Welsh Castles Relay website

(Report by Mike Hanson Welsh Castles Team Manager & photographs by Pete Hawcroft)