East Sutherland Athletics Club athletes achieve podium places in competition
East Sutherland Athletics Club produced some excellent performances both at home and overseas last week.
The cross country season started with the annual North District Relays at Nairn where defending champions East Sutherland were looking to retain their title from last year.
The team travelled to the event with a talented squad but were missing star athlete Ross Gollan who was competing overseas at the Mountain World Cup.
Gordon Lennox, Blair Mackay, Alisdair Coupar and Ruariadh Gollan each ran well in their individual legs but had to settle for the silver medal, finishing just 12 seconds behind Inverness Harriers.
The first North League event took place on Saturday at Grant Park in Forres where East Sutherland claimed victory in the individual and team section of the Senior Men's Race.
The 8k route which was over grass and forest trail proved to be the perfect recipe for Ruariadh Gollan who was the clear winner and scored the maximum 100 points. Former league winner Gordon Lennox was fourth with marathon athletes Blair Mackay and Shaun Cumming both finishing inside the top 10. This gave East Sutherland a 16 point victory over Highland Hill Runners.
Earlier in the day their were some fine junior performances at under-11 and under-13 level while Catriona Scott and Audrey Scott ran well in the Senior Women's Race. The next league match takes place in Evanton on November 16.
Finlay Murray, who is a Scottish Championship medalist on the track, swapped his spikes for road shoes as he took on the undulating Loch Rannoch Marathon finishing in third place on his debut, clocking a very impressive two hours and 44 minutes.
Scottish Internationalist Ross Gollan was competing at the Mountain Running World Cup at two events in Slovenia and Italy. Firstly, he kicked off his European adventure with a superb 11th place at the Smarna Gora World Cup Race. He then finished 5th the following week at the World Cup Finals in Chiavenna, an event which is widely known as one of the most competitive global off-road races.
