Goolab wins long leg gold as depleted Bels enjoy National 12-stage return
l-r: Tommy Taylor, Jonny Neville, Conall McNally, Val Rigori, Ross Christie, Rob Kelly, Nick Goolab, Steve Gardner, Sam Gebreselassie, Ewan Somerville. Will Cockerell and Arne Dumez not pictured.
The beginning of April sees the pinnacle of the club road running season as the best clubs from across the country gather at Sutton Park outside Birmingham. After two years of Covid cancellations, it was finally back - the National 12-stage Road Relays.
The men in claret and gold had run in the Southern relay championships in Milton Keynes two weeks prior where they earned their invite by placing a modest 13th. But just because Covid was generous enough to allow the race to take place didn’t mean it wasn’t still ripping through our squad at its highest rate since the start of the pandemic. TMs Arne Dumez and Steve Gardner had a hard time finding runners who were available to run, healthy and testing negative for the bug. It quickly became clear we weren’t the only team with this problem. Whoever ended up winning on the day would have luck to thank to some degree for sparing their biggest guns. By the time we arrived we were just grateful to have 12 men with legs.
The legs
Sam Gebreselassie wasn’t thrilled with his run in Milton Keynes. Understandable. He’s an entire arsenal all by himself and we’d saved him for a bit of target practice. Time to bring him to the front - literally. Arne told him right before the start: “Listen, this is the first leg of the national 12-stage. It’s a big deal. Don’t worry too much about how it goes, just relish the occasion and enjoy the opportunity.” He didn’t want the pressure to get to the relatively inexperienced star. How silly those words would sound in hindsight. They’d barely been gone 10mins before we got word from Goolab further up the course: “Sam’s in the lead pack. Only a second or two off the leaders.” Bloody hell! The PA system quickly confirmed the rumours - Sam came into view of the finish line in 6th place. A scarily wide turn at the bottom of the road made Steve grimace, but Sam powered to the finish line and dropped us off comfortably within the top 10. Wow.
Who would take it from there? Ewan Somerville had recently run his first sub-16 5k in Battersea Park and was looking in extremely fine form. Even so, this was a nasty move from Arne and Steve. They knew full well Ewan would spend the entire 5,08km leg trying to fend off onslaughts from the likes of Leeds City, Tonbridge, Southampton, etc… They were expecting Ewan to bleed around 25 places, but the young man is a racer true and pure. He kept the losses to 12 spots only, floating into the finish with that attractive sprinters’ form for what would be our quickest short leg of the day. We were in 18th place and Nick Goolab was about to be unleashed onto Sutton Park.
Goolab powers out of the final turn having put 30s into Kadar Omar, who’d won the Trafford 10k in 28:27 a month earlier.
The relays in Milton Keynes were Nick’s first race in a year. He was healthy, “three quarters fit” and most importantly, he was hungry. Your correspondent didn’t have the pleasure of witnessing the hellfire Nick must have brought to the opposition over those 8,66km but one can only imagine. By the time we saw the claret and gold vest through the trees, he was in 4th place. FOURTH! Then he snuck past 28:28 10k runner Kadar Omar before charging towards the heels of Bedford and Highgate who had looked supreme at the front so far. Just the 15 places taken for Nick, and no surprise, the fastest long leg of the day in 25:23. What a return to the scene for our man with the man bun. The return of the King.
Rob Kelly is improving fast.
Rob Kelly had the privilege of running his 12-stage debut in the top 10. Setting off in 3rd place, the Irishman ran the living daylights out of himself to keep the race as far behind him as possible. He’d earned his spot in the A team with a rock-solid leg in Milton Keynes so we knew he wouldn’t be daunted by the responsibility. Sure enough, he handed the proverbial baton to TM Arne Dumez in 7th place - a great springboard for the 3rd long leg of the day.
Just like Sam, the Belgian was disappointed with his run at MK. He was here to make amends. He had never run the long leg before, but we was determined to stamp his mark on it. It wasn’t long before Wimbledon’s Tom Jervis caught him. That’s fine, he’s a class runner. Then came the footsteps of Freddie Hessian, Sam Eglen, Dewi Griffiths, Carl Avery, Jacob O’Hara and eventually Leeds City’s Josh Dickinson. It was a fine run from the TM - much better than in Milton Keynes - but there was very little he could do about the calibre of athletes hunting him down. We were back in the top 15… just.
Ross Christie on his club debut.
Newcomer Ross Christie would see our men over the 2hr mark. Joining us from Gateshead Harriers, Ross is a great find. Charlie had emailed our TMs informing them that he had recently joined his training group and that he “would be useful in a relay squad”. Thanks for the tip, Charlie! Right you were. We can’t wait to see the Scot in action again soon.
We were over halfway now. Into the business end we went. Conall McNally is brilliantly dependable and dependably brilliant. Pretty sure he’d bring you a glass of warm milk at 3am too if you asked him nicely enough. He was expecting a short leg but late Covid withdrawals had meant a surprise promotion to the longer course. We wanted a strong leg out of the Notts man and we got exactly that. A touch over 29mins did us just fine - we were still in the top 20 with only five legs remaining.
At the front of the race, the battle was raging with extreme violence. Highgate were still out in front with raging bulls charging up a storm behind them. Meanwhile, TM Steve Gardner saw a whole bunch of friendly faces on his leg - including a course record three Goolab high-fives - but not one other runner front or back. We’d never call Sutton Park peaceful but it was pretty much as quiet as the national relays get. After his debut marathon in February, Steve has been making a slow return to faster running - but there’s little about this run that could be called slow. No places gained or lost. Steady as she goes.
XC plate runner up Jonny Neville took our 9th leg and was only 5s off Conall’s time and - as always - did the whole thing with a smile. And there was plenty to smile about! He had witnessed Derby’s Barclay Izzard clock one of the fastest legs of the day and had only leaked 2 spots. The “smiling assassin” had struck again. Boston Marathon - only a week away - you better watch out!
We’re fond of our Europeans in claret and gold, and we’re particularly happy with Valentin Rigori who has been a reliable part of our success this season. Not afraid of any distance or surface, the Frenchman, a late call-up to the side, was a more than willing leg 10 saviour. Much like Steve, it was a lonely experience but Val was clearly in his element, running close to his 5k PB on the hilly, 5.09km course. Bien joué!
Will Cockerell on the 20th anniversary of his National 12-stage debut.
Only two legs to go at this point, which meant it was time to throw a slightly diseased Tommy Taylor at the course. Since the Southern XC champs, Tommy had had bad luck with his health and, while his achilles seemed in pretty good nick, the tail end of the Covid that had kept him out of the Southern relays kept him up all night with a coughing fit. Fuelled by nothing more than three hours sleep, a pint of service station Benylin and his competitive juices, Tommy set off to clock the exact same time as Jonny. Well, well, well… Coach Charlie’s trio was starting to form a real axis here. Losing just the one spot, Tommy set up the anchor leg for the eternal Will Cockerell, exactly 20 years after his debut at the competition.
The Cockerpillar has won two golds and three bronzes in previous decades at this competition. But this time, as another night-before Covid replacement service, his job was just to finish off the 12 and have us register a complete team. That didn’t make the sight of us losing out to Herne Hill in the final 1km an easier to take, but we still went home in 26th in the country. That’s not where we want to be, and no reflection of our current quality, but there were plenty of positives to take: Nick’s explosive return to action (and a gold medal to show for it), yet another manifestation of Sam’s huge talent, and valuable long leg experience for the McNally-Neville-Taylor trio. A good day out, too, and we extend our grateful thanks to Charlie Dickinson and Leo Coy for making the journey to support us.