Edinburgh Athletic Club

East Lothian Open Cross Country Championships. (under SAL/UK Athletic rules)
Sunday 15th February 2009, Meadowmill Sports Complex, Prestonpans, East Lothian, Starts 12.30pm.

Entries open at 11.30am, registration closes 30 minutes prior to start of each event. Entry fee: Juniors SAL Affiliated £1.00 unatteched. £2.00
Seniors SAL Affiliated   £2.00 unattached £3.00

Championship Trophies and medals to first three in each category plus first team award in each category. Ample Car Parking space available.

Event is promoted on behalf of the East Lothian Athletic Development Group by Haddington East Lothian Pacemakers.
Further details from: helprunningclub.org web site or Henry Muchamore Event convenor: 45, Whitecraig Crescent EH21 8NQ
Tel:0131 653 2547. henryinworld@yahoo.com.

For those interested in going on the Barrathon weekend Garry asked me to draw some information to your attention. So here goes.

The race takes place on Saturday 4 July at 10.40am starting at the Castlebay School. Unless you have your own boat or hire a plane you will need to be on the Friday 1.40pm ferry from Oban to Castlebay. Again, you cannot get off the island by public transport on the day of the race so it’s a weekend away in other words. The return Sunday ferry is at 9.20am.

The race fills up these days pretty quickly and it’s the tenth anniversary so I suggest you book early to avoid disappointment. The limit is 150 runners and already there are only 60 places left. The race website is very informative and has everything you need to know as well as the application form. http://www.barrathon.org.uk/

The Calmac ferry from Oban can be booked online. See link http://www.calmac.co.uk/ it costs about £21 as a foot passenger and an extra £100 for your car if you do not leave it at Oban. It’s not really necessary to take the car although you will see more of the island on the Saturday afternoon if you take one (or a bike). The car also comes in handy when, sorry, I mean, if it rains.

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Congratulations to :
Cameron Goodall 60m Hurdles and relay.
Tom Holligan 200m & relay.
Kieran Kivlin 60m & relay.
who are all selected to represent Scotland at the U16 international in Cardiff on 21/22 February.

Apologies for the delay in updating the spreadsheet, I was on holiday in Verbier last week up to my knees in powder! I have now updated the Grand Prix with the results from the East District at Dunfermline, 4k at Bellahouston and did not need to do much with the Norham cross country as we had no seniors running!

In the Grand Prix series, Adam is back on form with a couple of good results and leapfrogs Roger to the top of the table. Meanwhile Joanne is still holding onto top spot by her fingernails having missed one of the events due to injury. Jenny is now breathing down Jo’s neck only one point behind.

Roger has also passed me the stats for the EAC Male championship from Dunfermline and I have added these to the spreadsheet. In the Male EAC Championship, with one event left, Owain is looking almost unbeatable with only Roger as a possible challenger. In the vets category, Roger is unbeatable! There is a close contest in the super vet category with Brian and Willie level pegging. 

Full details at: eac-seniors-cross-country-results260109

Scottish Athletics 4K Championships, Bellahouston Park Glasgow, 25th January

Freya Murray retained her Championship title when she cruised to victory in Bellahouston Park.

Edinburgh AC, led by Freya, won the team competition with three athletes in the top ten, Scottish Universities silver medallist Niamh Devlin 6th and Jennifer MacLean 8th making up the gold medal winning trio.

Our men’s team also got into the medals, with Juan Mareque 24^th Adam Priestley 29^th Neil Calder 39^th and Iain Whitaker 43^rd, taking 3^rd place behind Shettleston and Central.

Full results on:
http://www.scottishathletics.org.uk/index.php?p=80&itemType=fixtures&itemId=7479

Freya also won the inaugural Stewarts Grand Prix, making it three wins from three outings and securing the overall series victory.
Jenny Maclean was 6^th in the overall standings.

Details including full provisional results of the Grand Prix series are available on:
http://www.scottishathletics.org.uk/index.php?p=220

Scottish East District Indoor Championships – 17/18 January 2009
Listed below are our medal winners:

Full Results on www.scottishathletics.org.uk
(Keith Ridley)

Scottish Closed Indoor Championships – 17/18 January 2009

Listed below are our medal winners:

Full Results on www.scottishathletics.org.uk
(Keith Ridley)

Celtic Nations Cross Country, Cardiff 18^th January.

 Emily Dudgeon and Chris O’Hare both ran well to help their respective teams win Gold in the Celtic Nations Cross Country.

In the Under 20 Men’s race, Chris finished second to Callum Hawkins (Kilbarchan AAC) and ahead of Scott McDonald (Central AC) in third and Shettleston Harriers’ Matthew Gillespie in fifth.

Emily was third in the Under 17 Women’s race, with Gala Harriers’ Alice Haining in second,  Kathryn Pennel (Pitreavie AAC) in fifth and Sarah Cassells (Ayr Seaforth) in eighth.

By Graeme Brown

For the past 18 months or so I’ve been going to the pilates classes which Jenny MacLean teaches for runners and traithletes at Energywise in Duddingston.  I have been meaning to write a piece for the site giving my impressions of this class and detailing some of the benefits, as I see them, for runners.  I’ve finally got round to it as I think it might be of some interest to EAC folks.  Although I do quite a bit of cycling I have never done any triathlons and as such I’ll leave it to others to comment on this from a triathletes perspective.

Improving core fitness was the main reason for taking this class in the first place, and this certainly has been a big benefit for me, though its certainly not the only thing that pilates can help with, as I was very pleased to discover.  Biomechanically speaking I’m not the most efficient of runners, as anyone who trains with me will know, so when pilates was suggested as a good way to improve stability, coordination and alignment I jumped at the chance.

Right from the very first class it was clear the pilates involves isolating particular muscles or muscle groups so that these can be exercised independently and strengthened.  On the face of it this may seem simple however, as anyone who has done pilates knows, this is by no means an easy task.  For instance, it was quite a while before I was able to routinely keep my leg muscles from playing a part in exercises designed for abdominals.  For runners this type of approach is particularly useful when it is applied to stretching- the benefits of which for injury prevention are now widely appreciated.  Over the years I’ve been shown many different stretches but in truth nothing has impoved my stretching so much as pilates! (more…)