After “thank you marshal” at Millhouses parkrun, off I went over the Pennines to Chorley for a racewalk. This is the only current Lancashire Walking Club venue in the modern county of Lancashire, the others are in Greater Manchester and Cheshire.

9 of the usual old fogies lined up for this challenging race. Start at the edge of Chorley, about 1 mile out to a 2.4 loop, 3 laps then one mile back, about 15km with lots of hills!

Tony just ahead of Martin at the start of lap 2

 

I was with a leading group of 4 at about 1/2 mile when Nigel started to pull away, I thought about following him, I did outsprint him in the previous race. However, I had been suffering from a cold all week, I let him go. Carried on in 2nd place with Martin, we were together in 2nd place as we started the loop through the village of Heapey (In the 1980s I would sometimes do running races round this loop). Hard work up and down the hills, stuck with Martin on lap 1. On lap 2 I maintained pace and Martin dropped back, I was now comfortably in 2nd place, no sign of Nigel ahead. Tough going on last lap, pace slowed a bit and my left calf was sore. Kept going to the end.

Tired on finishing, a good “time on feet” session. Nigel beat me by nearly 10 minutes, I am not sure how long I would have lasted if I had followed him. Martin was over 4 minutes behind. 2nd out of 7 finishers, 2 DNF.