Darlington Harriers Monthly Mile – 18th July 2024

by Brad Wight

Me and my 10 year old daughter Adelaide went down to South Park for the monthly mile. Heather Jones was also there. It’s a very similar route to the parkrun, only you take the high road along the river meaning you don’t have to do that little hill.

Usually it’s a proper handicap where runners line up beside a cone with your predicted time on and are released at ten second intervals on the whistle. Unfortunately, due to one of the organisers not being well, it had reverted to a scratch race this time. Adelaide had been looking forward to getting a big head start and trying to beat her old man!

Heather set off first as she was race-walking. She finished in 12 mins 19 secs which is a fairly rapid pace, remember she’s the reigning British Masters champion in the discipline!

I got round in 5:28, a few seconds faster than last time out. I doubled back to find Adelaide and was very surprised to see her coming around with runners who were aiming for under 8 minutes. Her Crook Monthly Mile best is 9:20 but she demolished that, sprinting home for an 8:16 time. Afterwards she said “running round the park isn’t as boring as four laps of a track so I can go faster”. If it had been the usual handicap start she’d have beaten me by 40 seconds and might have been first runner home!

59 runners took part including many juniors and veterans. Entry is £10 for the series or £3 per event, results go on Runbritain. There’s two events left, on the 22nd Aug and 19th Sept. See Darlington Harriers Facebook page for more details if interested.

Brad