Greenock Telegraph | Sport | Mountain man Stevie's master display

Thursday, 20th November, 2008

Published: Thursday, 11th September, 2008 12:30

Mountain man Stevie's master display

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MOUNTAIN MAN: Stevie McLoone at Dolni Morava.

STEVIE McLoone delivered his best performance in his fifth World Masters Mountain Running Championships in the blazing sun on Mount Kralicky Sneznik.

Starting in the eastern Czech village of Dolni Morava, the race wound up the 11.3km mountain track to the exposed 1200m summit.

With his recent good form the Glenpark Harrier was hoping to improve on his previous best finish when he placed 37th at Innsbruck in 2002.

After a steady start he quickly moved through the field to 13th, trying to hold onto English Internationalist Craig Roberts, who would eventually go on to claim the bronze medal, at the halfway stage.

But as the temperature soared to 30 degrees, and the gradient on the upper slopes steepened to 25%, which brought most of the runners to a virtual crawl, he slipped back a few places, but still came home delighted with his 17th position.

Meanwhile, it was an unhappy debut for Stevie’s clubmate Andy McCall at Ben Nevis. After a promising climb to over halfway, an unexplained lack of energy caused him to struggle to maintain the pace. Deciding to ease off, he waited and ran the remainder of the race with his dad, Andy senior, the pair finishing comfortably in just over three hours.

Glenpark will now enjoy two weeks’ break from racing before they enter six consecutive Saturdays of relay races, which starts with the club’s 4km JG Cameron trial race on 20 September.

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