Nopesport

Its one of the toughest areas in the world. And thats on a dry day! Mix in a persisent rain and the Trossachs becomes about as tough as it gets. Marsh, rock, heather, crags, streams and hills. Lots of hills.

But the courses are the same for everyone, so the toughest will win. And the toughest did.

On M20 it was a close call between the EUOC guys, this time Scott taking the glory from Oleg by less than a minute and Andrew Brunton putting in his best performance of the season thus far to take Bronze. It was a top three reminiscient of JHI98, where two young M12's pushed the English giants off the podium - they were Oleg Chepelin and Andrew Brunton!

It was a similar story of EUOC glory on W20, Alison O'Neil taking the victory by over three minutes from Mhairi who was suffering from a bad blister which has been troubling her since SpringCup. Third went to another 18 year old, Cerys Manning from Wales, showing she is adept in all terrains following her victories thus far in the FCC.

In the Elite Test Proper, the senior classes had the added dimension of the Lithuanian Team flown over by the British Embassy in Vilnius for a rematch of last years Scotland vs Lithuania match. The team this year was noticably stronger, including several members of their WOC team.

But on M21 it was (Old Man) Andy Kitchen who won by 1 second to Marius Mazulis of LTU. Third and fourth were also Lithuanians, Simonas Krepsta, one their most promising juniors who took a top 10 place at JWOC last year and will be going for glory in Poland again this year, and Edgaras Voveris who has been a stalwart of thier senior team for several years. Next Brit was Oslo based Nick Morgan, not selected for the England team because of a lack of form!

The W21 results followed a similar pattern: Gillian Godfree and Toni O'Donnovan holding off the Lithuanians with strong runs then the top three LTU runners filling out the top 5.

The courses proved to be as tough as expected, with no one going under 10 minute kms and many a beaten runner dragging themselves up the finish chute.

The Scotland versus Lithuania match was far closer than in Vilnius last year, where LTU won by close to 90 minutes. After day 1 LTU were only 7 minutes ahead of Scotland.

And in the SHI? For the second year in a row Scotland won the Individual day, with wins in M20, W21 and M21 and second in W20 giving them a two point advantage over England. Scores:
Scotland 15
England 13
Ireland 7
Wales 5

As runners relaxed at the [nope] banquet thoughts turned to day two, the relays. Hopes were for better weather and easier terrain... Would England pull back as they did last year? Could Scotland close the 7 minute gap on LTU? And who would win the Wales/Ireland battle?

Provisional Results