Category: Elite Endurance

Luddon Half Marathon, 1987

Hammy Cox (2039), Graham Crawford (17) and Alex Gilmour

I joined the Scottish Marathon Club in 1960 and for one of my first races I was to be picked up by Jimmy Scott in his van outside Queen Street Station in Glasgow.   When I first arrived there was no one else waiting other than a man with glasses, a toothbrush moustache and hair slicked back.   We got talking and he was very friendly.   As the weeks and months went by, I became quite friendly with Bertie Cox who was a good class road runner for Greenock Wellpark Harriers.   We also met up at the annual inter clubs between our two clubs and at Marathon Club presentations and socials.   His son, Hammy, was to be a much better athlete than his father and known throughout Scotland from early on in his career.   No stranger to controversy, he was a very talented runner respected throughout the sport.    He came into the sport as a boy and in 1971-72 as a Senior Boy (Under 15) was 28th of the 171 finishers in the National Championship.   A year later and in the same age group he had moved up to sixth.   As a Youth (Under 17) in 1973-74 he was seventh, and then was back up to sixth in 1974-75.   He had moved that year to the new club of Spango Valley AC.   He raced in more than the National of course but his progress as marked in these events was marked.

 

Hamilton Cox was born on 27th May, 1957.   He showed early talent with Spango Valley AC running 3:59.5 for 1500m in 1977.   Hammy ran in thirteen Edinburgh to Glasgow Relays between 1977 and 1992 for three different clubs – Spango Valley, Bellahouston Harriers and Greenock Glenpark – the club he had started out with and with which he ended his running career.    Later in 1977 he made his debut in the Edinburgh to Glasgow eight stage road relay on Stage One.   He ran the same stage in 1978 and Stage Four in 1979.   Then in 1981 Spango Valley finished seventh (with Hammy on Stage Three) and his team won the medals for the most meritorious unplaced performance (ie the most improved team.).   By 1982 Hammy had switched to Bellahouston Harriers.  .   In the 1982  Edinburgh to Glasgow, he was second fastest on Stage Three by only five seconds and moving from sixth to second with the team ending up fourth and out of the medals    They put this right the following year.    The Bellahouston team of Peter Fleming, Andy Daly, Graham Getty, Tony Coyne, George Braidwood and Alistair McAngus had been strengthened by the addition of Hammy and Neil Black had a wonderful race to finish second.   Hammy was fastest on Stage Three, where he devastated the record with 23:48 – setting a new record and erasing the outstanding 20:18 set by Colin Youngson on the former shorter stage.  Hammy’s time stood until the race met its end.    In 1984 he moved Bellahouston from fifth to second with second fastest on Stage Three.   He did not run in 1985 but in 1986 he ran for Greenock Glenpark Harriers on Stage Six where he moved up from 15th to 13th.   Missing 1987 he ran the sixth stage again in 1988 when he held tenth position.   In 1989 he held on to ninth position but ran the third fastest time on the leg.   In 1990 he had a real stormer on the second stage moving from nineteenth to sixth.   In 1991 on the second leg again he moved up from tenth to eighth.  His last run in the great old race was in 1992 when he went from fourteenth to twelfth in a team that won the Most Meritorious medals – he had won one with Spango Valley in 1981 (and Glenpark would win them again in 1995 but without Hammy’s services

He was also a very good relay runner generally, whether on the road or over the country.   In the West District Relays he tended to specialise in the first stage where he had some really outstanding races.   In 1976 he led the first stage home and Spango Valley was third team.  The following year they were second after he led the first stage with the fastest time of the day, and in 1979-80 he won the first stage for the winning team.   In 1981-82 he was again first on the first stage with the fastest time of the day for Spango Valley.   In 1982-83 he turned out for Bellahouston where he was fifth fastest for the unplaced team.   He didn’t run again for the Bellahouston team in the West District Relays.   In 1982,  his team was second in the Scottish Relay Championships.    A great triumph was in 1985 when Bellahouston Harriers won the Scottish Six-Stage Relay championship and they added Scottish Cross-Country relay bronze that autumn.    He ran subsequently for Glenpark  Harriers in the West District Relays with his best run being in 1988-89 when the team won.   This time he ran on the second stage and brought the team from 20th to fifth.

If we stick with the country for now, he ran in nine District Championships as a Senior with many fine runs among them – 13th in 1976-77, tenth in 81-82, 12th in 84-85, 4th in 85-86, 5th in 88-89, 5th again in 89-90 and an unwilling 2nd in 1990-91: I say unwilling because Tommy Murray who had won was disqualified and Hammy was upgraded to second from third.   Equally unwilling to be elevated to first place was Alaister Russell who was quoted in the Press as saying Tommy won the race fair and square   The reason for the disqualification was simple: – Tommy had resigned from Glenpark and joined Cambuslang but had been entered for the West championship by Glenpark before his resignation.   He refused to wear a Glenpark vest and so was disqualified.   It had been a good year so far for Hammy who had been second to John Sherban in the Nigel Barge Road Race and then won the Jimmy Flockhart Memorial Cross-Country race at Coatbridge.   However none of his hoped for Scottish selections had come to pass, mainly I suppose because he ran mainly on the road.   The March 1991 issue of the “Scotland’s Runner” carried this under the headline “Cox Snubs Officials.”   Despite heaping abuse on Scottish Cross-Country Union officials, the confused Greenock Glenpark runner Hammy Cox was offered an olive branch then snubbed them again!   Cox, citing his road form, had ranted at international team manager Jim Scarbrough and his fellow selectors when he was passed over for national cross-country teams this winter.   He stated categorically that he would not compete again for Scotland.   A week later he complained that the selectors had the nerve to believe this when they read it in the papers.   “They should have checked with me,” he said.

Then, after having finished third in the West District Championships behind Tommy Murray (later disqualified) and Alaister Russell, he yelled at Scarbrough, “You couldn’t pick your nose!”   He declined to accept his medal.   “I wouldn’t shake hands with any of that lot,” he said.   But he confided he wouldn’t mind running in the Inter-County Championships.   “I can get plenty of road races on my own but I need to be selected by Scotland to run in the Inter-Counties,” he told me.  

All credit to the long-suffering Jim Scarbrough – when he heard this, he phoned Cox and offered him a place.   You’ve guessed it, Cox turned him down!

Just to confirm their good faith, Cox was named as a reserve for the Scottish squad which competed in the UK trial for the World Championships. “

In the National at Irvine on 24th February  Hammy had one of his best cross-country races and finished fourth.   Doug Gillon in the “Scotland’s Runner” for April 1991 commented as follows:   In fourth place Hammy Cox, passed over by Scotland this winter, cocked a gleeful snook at the selectors as he pointed out that several of the men preferred to him had finished in his wake.   His wife, Jayne, has taken legal advice on certain matters alleged to have passed on certain matters alleged to have passed between her husband and the SCCU officials, and this contest may run and run.”  

In June 1991, “Scotland’s Runner” had an extended interview with him by Margaret Montgomery which I will reproduce here.   The article plus illustrations are on line at

http://salroadrunningandcrosscountrymedalists.co.uk/Archive/Scotland’s%20Runner/SR%20No%2058.pdf

SURVIVING THE HEAT

At 34, Hammy Cox has been running competitively for 19 years and over the past few years has earned himself a reputation as one of Scotland’s better distance runners.  Cox, a civilian mechanic with the police in Greenock, spent his formative years as a track athlete concentrating on 800 and 1500 metres.   At 15 he was fastest senior boy in Scotland over 1500m with a personal best of 4:13 and throughout his teens also held a number of Scottish Schools and club titles over 800m.   “My father was a good athlete and he gave me lots of encouragement,” says the Glenpark Harrier whose own children, Graeme 16 and Jill 14, have distinguished themselves as junior and schools athletes.   

Cox made the move from track to roads four years ago.   His first half-marathon attempt was at the Luddon in 1987 – and not only did he win but he broke the course record!   With the event now a 10K, his half-marathon time of 64:31 presumably can not be bettered.   “I suppose I should have increased my distance years before I did,” he now reflects.   “Until 1987 I was still battling away on the track and getting nowhere.”    Having found his niche rather later in life than he might have liked, Cox didn’t waste more time making his mark.   After his revealing debut at Luddon, he decided to test his capabilities over the full 26 miles by entering the Glasgow Marathon, and although his preparation didn’t go as intended, he nonetheless managed an impressive third.   “Three weeks before I was due to run, I injured an ankle,” he recalls.   “I ripped up my number thinking I wouldn’t be able to enter and resigned myself to being a spectator.   Then the day before the race, I decided I wasn’t feeling too bad and that I’d give it a go.   Really, in the circumstances – all my preparation having gone haywire and my fitness not up to scratch – finishing at all was a bonus but getting third in 2:19:43 was great! 

It seems that since rediscovering athletics at 30, Cox has blossomed.   He is adamant however, that he wouldn’t have achieved nearly as much had it not been for forging a successful athlete-coach relationship with Joe Haverson in the aftermath of the 1988 Warsaw Marathon.   As British team manager for the Warsaw event, Haverson impressed Cox with his solicitous attitude to the athletes under his care.   Foreseeing that there wouldn’t be much of the right type of food in Poland, the manager had taken plenty of it himself and duly doled it out to the UK athletes when the reality of what they could eat struck home.   “I’d never met an official who cared so much,” comments a somewhat wry Cox, “He watched over all of us but in such a way that I didn’t feel patronised or lose self confidence.”

By his own admission, the Greenock athlete “didn’t have a clue about marathon preparation and race tactics.   Asked by Haverson prior to the race what time he hoped to run it in, Cox responded that he was looking for a 2:16.   What he hadn’t thought about, what Haverson pointed out to him, was the heat.   “It was 80 degrees,” recalled Hammy with a laugh.   Joe advised that I took half a minute off my time for every degree of the heat over the temperature I was used to.   He suggested I tried for 71 minutes at the halfway stage – I was going for 68.   In the end I took his advice and even doing that, I was surviving and no more over the last mile.   If it hadn’t been for him, I’d never have finished.”

Haverson was also keeping a bemused eye on the Scot’s eating habits.   A confessed “junk food junkie” Cox prepared his body for the Warsaw event on his usual diet of fried and fatty foods.   Haverson said nothing until after the race and then pointed out to the Glenpark runner that he was probably running at 80% of his full capability eating as he did.   During a five week rest period following the Warsaw, Cox had time to reflect on Haverson’s words and guidance.   He then phoned Haverson and asked him to be his coach.   A strictly low fat, high fibre diet followed and Hammy lost 12 pounds in two weeks.   “I couldn’t believe it when I first ran at my new weight,” he says, “I felt so much healthier and there was a marked improvement in my performances.”   As an example he quotes the British Airways 10K at Bellahouston where he came fourth behind Nat Muir, Allister Hutton and Chris Robison.    “Before I would have been lagging a minute behind that lot,” he says.   “This time I was a very close fourth, there were about three seconds separating the four of us.”       

Hammy says luck has played a big part in his athletics progress.   Had he not met Joe Haverson, he feels he would have continued approaching distance running the wrong way, and might have become discouraged and given up when his times didn’t improve.   As it is, he found not only encouragement and guidance from Haverson but also from fellow runner Gerry Helme.   The latter, who wears the hat of promotions manager for New Balance, was responsible for encouraging Cox to run in international races abroad.   He also arranged a sponsorship which provided your man with a year’s supply of New Balance clothing and shoes.   “I met Gery at the Derry Half-Marathon in 1988,” explains Hammy.   “After the race he asked me what races I was planning for the rest of the year.   When I told him my plan was to run the Dublin Marathon in six weeks, he was horrified and said I needed to run half-marathons and 10K races on a regular basis to build up to an event like that.   He said he’d find me some races abroad and before I knew it he was ringing me up telling me I had a place in a  ten miles road race in Holland the following week.   Two weeks after that I was running in a ten mile road race in Germany.”   The relationship forged with Helme has continued and even today Helme is largely responsible for the Greenock athlete’s participation in prestige road races abroad.     

“I thought that to appear in the sort of races Gerry was talking about, you’d have to be an Allister Hutton.   If it hadn’t been for him I’d still be making do with two mile cross country races in Scotland – which aren’t really enough.   On the whole I don’t think there’s enough encouragement or advice to Scottish athletes.   After all, it was just luck that I met Gerry.”   Cox says  that the fear of disappointing his friend after he has gone to the trouble of securing him a place in a big race abroad is usually more than enough to make him turn out a good performance.   He is also convinced that the higher number of quality races he now runs has played a major part in his development as an athlete.   “When I went to the 1988 Dublin Marathon, I was more prepared than I had ever been and I ran my personal best time of 2:18:04,” he avers.   “Actually I should be able to knock three or four minutes off that time, but most of the marathons I’ve run have been either very hilly or very hot.  

Although Cox enjoyed a successful start to 1990 with seventh place in the City-Pier-City in Holland and fourth in a half marathon in Denmark, he was soon knocked off his stride with injury.   Consequently he decided not to try and defend his Dublin Marathon and Land o’Burns half-marathon as planned and concentrated instead on the Sun Life Great Race.   While this doesn’t sound like much of an “easy option” for an injured athlete, Cox thought it was ideal in the circumstances.   “I wasn’t in the right condition to defend my titles so this seemed like a good compromise,” he says.   “I had to run ten or 15 miles every day for 20 days but at least other runners could have taken over if it had got too much.   However, I managed OK by by putting in about 85% effort each day.”

An unfulfilling road season behind him, Hammy decided that, for once, he’d put a lot of effort into the cross-country season.     For once?    “Usually I focus all my energy on road running and then lie low during the cross-country season,” he admits.   I normally give cross-country about 60-70%, but this time I was determined to do well after missing so many of the major road races.”   Last December he won the Renfrewshire CC Championships and in January came third and was awarded second in the West District Championships (Tommy Murray was disqualified with the rest of the field moving up a place).   His winter season included wins in the Jimmy Flockhart Memorial Race, the Glenpark Harriers Willow Bowl and the CIBA Geiggy Road Race plus second places in the Nigel Barge and Bill Elder 10K.   Despite his consistent road and cross-country form, Cox was overlooked for every cross-country international during 1990-91.       It is a subject that he feels very strongly about – not least because he claims there has been a fair measure of confusion surrounding the reporting of what he has, and has not, said about the matter.  

“It’s true that I said I didn’t want to run for Scotland again at the West Districts, but it was just one of those heat-of-the-moment things,   I was completely sickened at running so well and being passed over for the National side,” he says.   “What had particularly aggravated me was that there had been a late call-off for the international at Mallusk two weeks earlier.   The person who was asked to step in to the team hadn’t beaten me all season.   The selectors tried to tell me they had picked someone who had no family and who would be available at short notice.   But as everyone knew, I was intending running that day anyway – in the Nigel Barge.   I was prepared to put that before family commitments so I’d obviously have put the Mallusk meeting before them.   Although Cox admits he lost his cool at the West Districts (he distinguished himself by refusing to accept his medal) he says he later calmed down enough to make it known that he wanted to run in the UK Cross-Country Trials.   He says this intent was picked up – mistakenly – as the inter-counties event by a well-meaning journalist who in turn informed the selectors.   The net result was, according to Cox, that he looked like a ‘complete turkey’ who didn’t know his own mind.

“I was duly asked to go to the inter-counties but I’d already arranged to spend the morning of that race taking my daughter to a race,” he says.   “There was just no way I could go.”   I explained to international team-manager Jim Scarbrough that it was the trials I was hoping for a race at.  Unfortunately though nobody ever got to know about the mix-up and it looked as though I’d turned down the very thing I’d wanted.”   Having performed well at the West Districts and with a good cross-country season behind him, Cox was convinced that his wish to go to the Trials could not be overlooked.   He says he was supported in this belief by SCCU Secretary Ian Clifton, who indicated that the way to ensure getting to the trials was to run well at the West Districts after which the team was always picked.          Despite this alleged assurance, Cox was – once again – overlooked.   He remains bitter about the circumstances.   “Normally the team gets printed in the paper very soon after the West Districts but this time it didn’t go in for weeks,” he says.   “In the meantime I found out that a number of people had been phoned and asked to be part of the team.   It’s my belief that they held off choosing the team as long as possible in the hope that they could pass me over.   In the end it included a lot of people who weren’t running nearly as well as me .   Out of the final nine they chose, I should have been about fifth.    At the last minute I was made second reserve.”   Having put his version on the record, Cox adds ruefully that he just wants to forget it ever happened.   And despite everything he says he bears no personal grudges.

” I don’t have anything about the guys who were picked over me, even though some of them weren’t running as well as me at the time.   It’s not their fault and I dare say that if I were asked to represent Scotland over and above Allister Hutton, I’d probably do it even though I’m not his standard.    I realise it’s probably only a matter of time until some of them overtake me anyway – they’re young with lots of potential and I’m 34.   But then that is what is so hard to swallow about the whole thing – it might have been my last chance to represent Scotland at cross-country.”  

Despite the rumpus surrounding his recent performances, Cox remains as dedicated an athlete as ever, usually training seven days a week and showing no signs of disillusionment with the sport.   In many ways his life revolves around athletics.   Between Monday and Friday he pounds an average of 16miles per day.   Weekends when not spent in further training are devoted to races – running them and getting to and from them.   But for all this, Cox remains the devoted family man, managing to keep his athletics from interfering too much with the rest of his life.   Organisation is the key word, with the bulk of training taking place during lunch hours and before getting home from work for the night.   “I run home from work and get in before my wife does,” says Cox.   “In fact I’m the one who makes the tea.   At weekends I often race or train on a Saturday, but my wife works most Saturdays anyway.   On Sundays I get one long run in before lunch which leaves us the rest of the day to ourselves. “

A balanced unobsessive attitude.   But then for all the controversy he has managed to immerse himself in, Hammy Cox seems to me that sort of man.

*

Weekly training schedule: Monday – Thursday: Ten miles lunchtime, six miles home in the evening.     Mon/Tuesday: 10 x 1000 with one minute recovery; 12 x 800 with one minute recovery.   Friday: Ten Miles, or four if racing Saturday.   Saturday: 12 miles plus 20 x 400 with half minute recovery if not competing.   Sunday: 14 – 20 mile run.  

It is however as a road runner that Hammy is perhaps best known and we should have a look at some of his best races on his favourite surface.    Note, please, that his E-G third stage run in 1983 was quite outstanding and the record set on that day was perhaps one of his best ever runs.   After the race in Warsaw in 1988, he returned in June 1989 and led the field for the first half of the race but the heat got to him and he finished third in 2:22:0 behind Tony Duffy (2:18:38) and Ian Hagen (2:20:43).

In the Luddon Half-Marathon in May 1987, Hammy won by half a minute.   The picture at the top was taken after 7 miles – Graham Crawford (number 7) recalls Hammy telling him that if he had made one more surge, he would have dropped him at three miles, he was so shocked and stretched by the early speed – to which Graham replied that one more surge would have finished him as well!   Hammy won in 64:31 to Graham’s 65:06 and Alex Gilmour’s 65:24.   The time was a course record which withstood challenges from Peter Fleming, Nat Muir and Fraser Clyne before it was changed to a 10K in 1990.  In September 1987 Hammy ran very well in the Glasgow Marathon where 5516 runners started the race.   The race was won by Eire’s Eamonn Tierney in 2:19:19 with Scotland’s Terry Mitchell from Fife AC  second in 2:19:40 and Hammy only three seconds behind in a personal best of 2:19:43.   The race was very competitive with a group of 20 runners together at 10 miles.   This was reduced to five at 20 miles.   Tierney broke clear at 23 miles although MItchell closed the gap two or three times before losing touch with only a mile to go.   Fast finishing Cox (Greenock Glenpark Harriers just failed to catch Mitchell.

Hammy’s victory in the Edinburgh People’s Half-Marathon on May 1st in 66:14 from Alan Robson came before they both represented Scotland in the international team later that month over the full marathon distance at Aberdeen.   Coincidentally his son Graeme (12) won the 200m and 400m titles at the Renfrewshire Championships on Saturday and daughter Jill (10) won the Inverclyde 200 ad 800m races on the Sunday.

Then on 22nd May 1988 Hammy ran brilliantly to win the City of Aberdeen Milk Marathon which featured an international contest between England, Scotland and Wales.   The ‘Press and Journal’ report by Russell Smith tells the tale:

“ENGLISH RUNNERS ROUTED

Scotland the Rave

Winner Hammy sets sights on British team

The police garage mechanic who put the brakes on England’s seven-year domination of the Aberdeen Milk Marathon has his sights set on new horizons.   For Hammy Cox. the 30 year old Greenock Glenpark Harrier, is hungry for a British vest.   The Aberdeen run was only his second marathon and Cox claimed “Not only did I win on a tough course but I had two current British Internationals behind me.”   He now plans to run a marathon trial in Nuremberg but added, “I’ll gladly go elsewhere if they want me to run for Britain.”  

Cox celebrated after the race with fellow Scottish international Frank Harper from Pitreavie who came second.   Edinburgh Southern Harrier Alan Robson Kept the English out of the medals by coming third.   Cox said “England’s Dave Jenkin was the runner we feared most, but it was the Welshman Owen Lewis who gave us most to think about.   We knew we had Jenkin beaten by the 12 mile mark.”   The Scots had it all to themselves from the 14 mile mark, having motored to the halfway stage in 1 hour 9 minutes 20 seconds.   And it was Cox who found the extra gear as Harper struggled around the 18 mile mark.   The Greenock runner finally emerged with a 65 second winning margin on a day of triumph for the Scots.   The battling Dave Jenkin salvaged some English pride in fourth place before Scottish team-mate Doug Cowie wrapped up the international team honours with fifth place.

1. Hammy Cox (Scotland) 2:21:15;   2.   Frank Harper (Scotland)  2:22:20;   3.   Alan Robson (Scotland)  2:26:21;   4.   Dave Jenkin (England)  2:25:55;   5.   Doug Cowie (Scotland)  2:26:21.

International teams:   1st Scotland (8 points);  2nd Wales (23 points);   3rd England (24 points)

It was not made clear whether the British vest ever materialised but on 16th July that year he won the Nuremberg Marathon in 2:22:25 running for Glasgow in a Glasgow v Nuremberg match where Glasgow won the team race.   He followed this on August 14th with fourth in the Glasgow Half Marathon in 67:49.

One of Hammy’s best events was the Sun Life Great Race, referred to above, which involved a stage race from Glasgow to London – similar to the old Trans-Continental Foot Races, or the Tour de France for cyclists.   The actual event Hammy referred to is reported in “Scotland’s Runner” for November 1990 by Jason Clark under the headline of ‘Paulo wins race, but Hammy, Brian and Graham are the local heroes.’.

“The winner of the inaugural Sun Life Great Race was Paulo Catarino of Portugal who collected prize money of £35,000 for his not inconsiderable efforts.   Twenty six year old Catarino completed the 230 mile, 20 stage race in the incredible time of 18-32-43.   Consistency was the key to the event, illustrated by the fact that Catarino did not win a single stage over the three weeks of the race.   The deciding factor in his triumph was that he did not finish any lower than eighth on any given day.   Delmir dos Santos, the 24 year old Brazilian running for the American Boulder Road Runners Club took the green vest for the overall points winner.   His colossal total of ten stage victories ensured his success.   The first four stages of the race were dominated by 43 year old Kenyan, Kipsubei Kosgei  if not always for the right reasons!   Although he won all three Scottish legs, he self destructed when he was seen to strike dos Santos on the fourth stage from Gretna to Carlisle.   The starting field numbered 107 when the race got under way in Glasgow on September 2nd.   By the day of the final Westminster stage, only 82 runners remained.   Many of the ‘big’ names withdrew or failed to finish including Mike McLeod, John Graham, Fraser Clyne (who was supposed to write a diary of the event for ‘Scotland’s Runner’), Steve Brace, Gary Kiernan and Dave Moorcroft.   In the team contest, the lead changed hands many times before the Boulder outfit took the title.  

Hammy Cox, representing Red Counties AC, finished 18th, the highest placed Scot and the third Briton.   Brian Kirkwood, UK Elite, ended 38th with Graham Crawford, Wolverhampton & Bilston, finishing in a highly creditable 58th, after entering the event at the last minute.   After recovering, Graham said, “It was a first class event which was highly professional in its organisation – especially considering that this was the first event of its kind.   The word most used by competitors when describing the event was ‘fascinating.’   Both your own performance and the changes of position up front made it constantly interesting,” he said.”

Date	Route	Stage No	Distance	Stage Winner	Time
September 2nd	Glasgow – E Kilbride	1	12m	K Kosgei	60:44
September 3rd	E Kilbride – Lockerbie	2	10.6	K Kosgei	52:40
September 4th	Lockerbie – Annan	3	10.5	K Kosgei	50:53
September 5th	Gretna – Carlisle	4	12.8	D Dos Santos	65:09
September 6th	Keswick – Grasmere	5	13.2	D Dos Santos	65:13
September 7th	Windermere – Kendal	6	9	E Khattabi	44:08
September 8th	Kendal – Kirby Lonsdale	7	11.5	K Kosgei	56:10
September 9th	Bolton – Manchester	8	13.7	D Dos Santos	66:49
September 10th	Manchester – Stockport	9	6.9	P Evans	32:55
September 11th	Stockport – Macclesfield	10	13.1	D Dos Santos	65:37
September 12th
September 13th	Leek – Stoke on Trent	11	12.2	D Dos Santos	62:24
September14th	Stone – Stafford	12	10.4	P Evans	50:19
September 15th	Penkridge – Wolverhampton	13	12.5	D Dos Santos	62:55
September 16th	Wolverhampton – Birmingham	14	15.5	P Evans	76:59
September 17th	Solihull – Coventry	15	10.5	P Evans	50:31
September 18th
September 19th	Coventry – Kenilworth	16	7.3	D Dos Santos	35:33
September 20th	Daventry – Northampton	17	13.1	P Evans	63:38
September 21st	Milton Keynes Time Trial	18	6.5	D Dos Santos	31:26
September 22nd	Hitchin – Knebworth	19	11.7	D Dos Santos	59:18
September 23rd	Westminster	20	10	D Dos Santos	48:10
September 23rd	General Classification		222.9	P Catarino	18:32:43

The above information was sent to me by Brian Kirkwood who might have more to add to a separate page on the Great Race but it is printed in tabular form so that the incredible performances turned in day after day by the leaders can be seen and the demands made on every one of the participants.   223 miles in 20 days!

Graham Crawford of Springburn Harriers who also ran well in the race commented, I cannot emphasise enough how impressive Hammy’s performances over three weeks in the Great Race were.   His final position of 16th in the general classification saw him on the heels of some world class runners and ahead of others he would not have expected beforehand to have bested.”

Unfortunately many of Hammy’s road races were abroad – Warsaw twice, Dead Sea in Jordan, etc – and not reported in the press back at home – it would be interesting to find what his own assessment of his best runs is.   Competitively he is better than his placings in the all-time Scottish Road Rankings would indicate.   They have him at sixteenth for 10K with a time of 29:29 run in 1991 and twenty first in the half-marathon with 64:57 run in August 1989.   Meanwhile at the marathon distance,  Hammy recalls 3 marathons in 1989. He did Barcelona (Scottish team) in the Spring (sixth). Warsaw in the Summer where he ran for Britain and came third and Dublin in October (second). He got another British vest in 1990 at the Hong Kong marathon, where he was 3rd. His last Marathon was representing Scotland in Las Vegas in 1991.

This profile began with Hammy’s Dad, Bertie who was one of the long standing members of the Scottish Marathon Club and it is fair to close by mentioning his daughter Jill who ran for City of Glasgow.   Jill was a popular and able athlete who ran right through all the age groups and who is still in action as a Vet 35.   Ranked – often in the top ten and at times even higher – in the 1500m, 3000m, 5000m on the track and at 5000m, 5 Miles and 10000 metres on the road with an excellent record over the country as well, Jill continued the dynasty into the third generation.   She had many victories to her credit including the Beith New Year’s Day race in January 2000 – the very first race of the new millennium has to be one for the scrapbook!    Indeed a talented family with Hammy certainly the best – so far – and at least two of his times will never be bettered.   The records set in the Luddon Marathon and the third stage of the Edinburgh to Glasgow both lasted until the races were finally brought to a close.

 

Graham taking over from Lachie Stewart in the 1983 Six Stage Relay

Graham Clark (born 31^st March 1956) was a Scottish Cross-Country International athlete. Tragically, he died young in 2003 and since then Carnegie Harriers Running Club have organised the Graham Clark Memorial Race every August. This is 3.9 miles in length: three laps of the Knockhill Racing Circuit near Dunfermline. Below is a profile of this talented, sadly-missed runner.

At the very start of Graham’s athletic career, a major influence was Olympic Marathon runner Donald Macgregor, who contributes these memories of his young protégé.

“I first met Graham when he was a third year pupil at Dunoon Grammar School in 1972. I had just got back from the Munich Olympics and taken up my new job as Principal Teacher of Modern Languages. I had written an article for the school newsletter in which I described my experiences and asked if any pupils wanted to come running with me. Only around three or four responded. Graham was clearly the best of these, and in a group we ran around 3.5 miles round Hafton Estate. Soon Graham and I started going longer runs up Glen Massan and over the hill to Kilmun, an extremely hilly route through Puck’s Glen. On one occasion Kenny Moore (USA Olympic Marathon runner) and his wife came to visit me in Dunoon, and we went out with them on a sunny but damp day.      

Graham, whose father worked as the school janitor, by now was doing quite hard fartlek with me, although he did not come on my long Sunday runs over 15-20 miles. We were more like club mates than pupil and teacher.

At the end of fourth year (I think), he left Dunoon and went to work for the Ordnance Survey in Southampton. That didn’t last too long and he was soon back in the area, and joined Spango Valley AC.

I had left Dunoon by then, and saw him only occasionally at races.

I was shocked to hear of his early death. Purely by coincidence I saw an ad for a ‘Graham Clark Memorial Race’ and on enquiry established that it was him. I then discovered that his wife Angela taught at Bell-Baxter High School in Cupar, not far from St Andrews. I went to see her and showed her some souvenirs from my Dunoon days, and later presented her with a cup from the Fukuoka Marathon (in Japan) for the winner of the race in Graham’s memory at Knockhill.Graham was a fine cross-country runner and competed twice for Scotland in the World Championships.”

Cameron Spence, who ran for Northern Ireland four times in the World Cross, was a key member of Spango Valley. He wrote the following. “I first met Graham in 1975. Dave Martin had brought him over for the ‘Sail Away Greenock’ Relay. I got him signed up and what an asset he proved to be to Spango. He helped us to establish the club as one of the best in Scotland and to win many, many championships. But for me his finest performance was at Irvine in 1980 at the Senior National CC, where he finished fourth. This was at a time when Scottish Athletics was on the crest of a wave, because we had so many talented runners in those days and to make the top ten or even twenty you had to be good. Graham was. He represented Scotland at two World CC Championships and won many individual titles on track, cross-country and road.”

In the Edinburgh to Glasgow Road Relay, Graham Clark first appeared for Spango Valley in 1977, when they finished 21^st and last. However Graham moved up four places on the classy Stage Two and finished only three seconds slower than his erstwhile mentor Don Macgregor. In 1978, Graham’s club improved considerably to tenth, and he was sixth-fastest on Two, gaining five places. In 1979 Spango repeated tenth place, but Graham gained no fewer than eight places on Two and was third-fastest. In 1981, Spango won the most meritorious performance medals for finishing seventh, with Graham gaining three places on Stage Four (third fastest). Finally in 1984 Spango Valley were the third team to reach George Square, with Graham having moved them into that position on the long Stage Six.

In the Six-Stage Road Relay, Graham Clark’s best run was in 1980, when Spango ended up fourth and he was sixth fastest on the long leg. Then in 1984 he was one of the team that won bronze medals in this Scottish Championship event.

Graham’s best times on the track all dated from 1982: 3000 metres (8.13.5); 5000m (14.38.42); 10,000m (30.28.4).

There was little doubt that his favourite surface was the country. In the West District Senior CC he was third in 1978; second (by six seconds to Brian McSloy) in 1979; and second again (by only three seconds to McSloy) in 1980. In the West District CC Relay, Spango finished second in 1977, but enjoyed a day of triumph in 1979, when Hammy Cox, Graham Clark, Tom Dobbin and Cameron Spence led from start to finish. Graham recorded the third-fastest time in that event.

Other highlights recalled by Cameron Spence include the following.

“Graham first ran for Scotland in 1977 and finished second. He won his first Renfrewshire title in the 10 mile Road Race Championship in 1979; in the same year he won his first Renfrewshire CC title.

In 1982 he won the famous Beith road race on New Year’s Day, after he had been up all night celebrating. This was even mentioned in the national press.”

The Scottish Senior National CC Championship was perhaps the setting for Graham Clark’s greatest runs. In 1979 he was seventh, and unlucky not to be selected for the World CC. However he made no mistake at Irvine in 1980. In his centenary history of the SCCU, Colin Shields wrote the following.

“The Championships were held over the level, well-drained grassland course at Beach Park, Irvine…….The course, which received fulsome praise from competitors as the best championship trail for over a decade, was conducive to fast running except for the final 600 yards of each of the three laps in the Senior race. A long, sweeping downhill stretch led to a 150 metres stretch of strength-sapping sandy beach, and this was closely followed by a 1 in 5 sandhill that had the fittest athletes walking up with their hands on their knees by the final lap. Defending champion Nat Muir recorded his usual outstanding performance, turning in a decisive mid-race surge that brought him home 17 seconds clear of John Robson, with 1978 champion Allister Hutton finishing third a further 29 seconds behind.”

Graham Clark finished an excellent fourth, only 8 seconds down on the illustrious Hutton, and in front of so many international runners, such as Lawrie Spence, Gordon Rimmer, Brian McSloy, Jim Brown, John Graham, Cameron Spence, Ron MacDonald, Fraser Clyne etc. In the World CC Championships on the Longchamps Racecourse in Paris, Graham Clark was sixth counter in the Scottish team which finished seventh. This was to prove Scotland’s best team performance in the World Cross while participating as an individual nation between 1973 and 1987.   Graham was tenth in the National in 1981; ran for Scotland again in the 1982 World Cross; and finished 13^th in the 1983 National.   Cameron Spence added the following.

“Graham moved south in the early 1980s and continued running down there. He moved back to Scotland, to Dundonald in fact, in the 1990s and rejoined Spango. He wasn’t the same runner who had left ten years earlier but he still enjoyed competing. He then moved to Dunfermline and made the sensible decision to join Carnegie. I had a phone call from one of their members and he was very glad that Graham had joined them. Graham started competing for them, joined the Committee and became Secretary. Then he started coaching. He had a great bunch of lads under his wing and they were all improving. During his final year he became their President. He will be sorely missed.”

Back to Elite Endurance

 

Sheila Catford winning the Glasgow Half-Marathon in 1988

Sheila Catford is ranked fifth on the Scottish all-time list for the marathon behind Liz McColgan, Kathy Butler, Hayley Haining and Lynn Harding and above such as Lynn MacDougall, Karen Macleod and Susan Partridge.   She is also eleventh on the Half Marathon list and has good times at 10 miles, 10K and 5 miles on the road.   However, along with Heather MacDuff, she is possibly the least known of all Scottish ranked distance racers.   A lot of that has to do with her domicile being in Yorkshire where she ran for Leeds City AC,  but her career as a Scottish internationalist was comparatively short and that added to the complications.   Nor is there much information in the press about her, nor are other athletes a good source if information.   What follows has been put together solely from information available in the public domain in an effort to paint a portrait of this excellent athlete.

Sheila Catford first came to the attention of the Scottish athletics public in September, 1987, when the ‘Glasgow Herald’ carried the headline “Brave Marathon Victory” above an article by Doug Gillon which read “Scotland found a new athletics star when Sheila Catford scored a stunning victory in the Glasgow Marathon.   Catford was unable even to walk after a serious accident last year yet she was only 26 seconds away from breaking the course record when she clocked 2:37:31. sixtieth  overallamong a field of 5300 finishers.   It was her sixth marathon. …. Catford, who disguises her Dundee birthplace beneath a thick Yorkshire accent, wrote to the SWAAA last year telling them she was available for selection.   But her hopes of international recognition were dashed when a car crashed into her bike on a roundabout.   ‘I couldn’t walk for three and a half months,’ she said  with scarcely a pause to draw breath.   ‘I had severe headaches for six weeks and it was five and a half months before I could even jog for ten minutes.   In fact I spent the day of the London Marathon doing a two hour session on an exercise bike, watching the TV and moaning, “I should be running in that!”   I had hoped to get into the Scottish Commonwealth Games team.’   Catford, who has aspirations of being selected for Scotland in future, reckons a cup of water cost her a record and a return trip to Paris for two.   “I’m not used to drinking on the run, and it gave me a dreadful stitch.   I was nearly two minutes inside  record schedule at 18 miles.”   Victory represented a double for Maryhill Harrier Brian Scobie, Catford’s coach.   Scobie also trained the 1985 women’s winner, Angie Pain.”

That was on the 11th September but just a month earlier, on 9th August, 1987 – she had won the Newark Half Marathon in 1:13:26 and on 20th December in the Saltwell Harriers 10K Road Race she won in 34:21 which was a course record.   She actually won this race four times in succession recording subsequent times of 34:40 (1988), 35:04 (1989) and 35:58 (1990).   So with these three races alone she had shown impressive quality at 10K (where she had also won the Liverpool 10K), Half Marathon and Marathon.   Having ,missed out on the 86 Commonwealth Games Sheila must have had a realistic chance of going to the Commonwealth Games in Auckland in 1990.   Her next race in Glasgow was in the Half Marathon in September 1988 where the race description with the photograph above read : “The exhaustion of running a half marathon flat out is all too graphically expressed by Sheila Catford.   Unusually for a road race of this distance, Sheila Catford, Sandra Branney and Lorna Irving ran alongside each other between miles three and ten before Catford’s strength allowed her to pull away and win in 72:49, a personal best.   Branney. who like the winner will be chasing a Commonwealth Games marathon place in New Zealand also ran faster than ever before, recording 73:02.   Irving was 73:26.”

The reference to Catford’s strength above is interesting because neither Sandra nor Lorna were perceived by anyone to be lacking in that department in any way.   Sheila was a member of :Leeds City AC and trained with Brian Scobie’s excellent group of endurance runners.   It was probably the best group of women long distance runners in Britain at the time with runners of the calibre of Veronique Marot, Angie Hulley (Pain), Julie Holland, Sarah Rowell, Jill Clarke, Sandra Atherton and Sheila taking part in his sessions.    Undoubtedly this helped Sheila and explained the remark from ‘Scotland’s Runner’ about her strength ‘allowing her to pull clear.’

Came 1989 and in the London Marathon in April and Sheila finished eleventh in 2:33:04.   Doug Gillon reported under the headline “England Snubbed As Lynn Books Her Games Place”  as follows:    “After having shattered the UK women’s marathon best in the ADT London race yesterday, Veronique Marot snubbed England’s selectors by announcing, ‘I’m not interested in the Commonwealth Games’  …  Lynn Harding, first Scot in 2:31:45 beat Lynda Bain’s Scottish best and was well inside 2:35 which guarantees Auckland selection … Sheila Catford, also of Leeds, booked her passport when she knocked 40 seconds from her best time with 2:33:04.”   Sheila also won the Moray Marathon on 6th August, 1989 on what was clearly a bad day for road racing (the men’s race was won outside 2:31!) in the slow time 3:10:08.   Back racing in Leeds she again won the Saltwell Harriers race in December to set herself up for the Games the following year.

The Auckland Games were held in January 1990 and the Scottish representatives were Lynn Harding and Sheila Catford.   There was a report in the ‘Glasgow Herald’ on 23rd January, 1990 which read: “Sheila Catford who is due to run in the marathon for Scotland a week on Wednesday, struck a big blow for her morale this evening when she finished second in an 8000m road race in the city’s Domain Park.   The winner was the New Zealander Wendy Bisset who is not due to compete in the Games.   Ripon-based Catford finished eight seconds behind in 26:07, scoring a seven second victory over England medal hope Angie Pain, the former Glasgow marathon winner.”    This time was ranked highly in the GB 5 Miles lists but was demoted to a sidebar marked Measurement doubtful’   The Games marathon was another story however.   The race was won by Lisa Martin of Australia in 2:25:28 (eight minutes clear of second placed Tani Ruckle, also Australia) with Angie Pain (under her maiden name of Angela Hulley) third in 2:36:35.   Sheila was first Scot and placed ninth with 2:43:48 with Lynn Harding eleventh in 2:47:24 and Moira O’Neill of Ireland (brought up in Scotland as Moira O’Boyle and member of both Clydesdale Harriers and then Victoria Park AAC) twelfth in 2:48:52.   All three were well below their normal running form.    It wasn’t her last marathon in 1990 however because she was third in the WAAA’s Marathon Championship in April (held in conjunction with the London race) in a time of 2:36:42 against the winning time of 2:33:07 run by Nicky McCracken.   the following year, 1991, she won the Albo d’Oro della Firenze marathon in Italy in 2:35:37 and the trail runs cold thereafter.

It is difficult to find results for Sheila after that although she is reported to have run in the 1992 Glasgow Half Marathon where Liz McColgan managed to get a run on the when she had not entered – apparently she woke up at 6:00 am, felt like a run and had Peter phone in saying she wanted to run!   However it went, the trail for Sheila effectively went cold after 1990.  Sheila  split from husband Dave and reverted to her maiden name of Sheila Boyde and appears on various websites as Sheila Boyde.     A good number deal with her career outside of athletics:   “Sheila Boyde, Nutritional Consultant trained under Dr Patrick Hatfield at  The Institute of Optimum Nutrition  in London.   Sheila has a BSc (Hons) in Health Related Exercise and Fitness and continues to be actively involved in her local community promoting health and fitness and she also has both the UK Athletics Coaching Award (Level 3) and the YMCA Personal Fitness Trainer Award (Level 3).   She was also Nutritional Advisor on the Yorkshire TV Series “Wellbeing” along with a teaching career in a range of schools and institutions.”

She continues to run however and has appearances recorded under the colours of Ripon Runners (“Coaching sessions at Ripon Runners continue with professional ex-athlete coach Sheila Boyde.   She recently threw up a challenge to anyone interested in running.   “Do you want to get fitter in 2007?   Do you want to streamline your physique and be part of a very sociable happy group?   If so then join Sheila on Thursday nights at 6:30 at one of Ripon Runners club meeting nights”    and Harrogate Harriers (On the first Sunday of the New Year (2009) Harrogate Harriers A Team of Sheila Boyde, Paul Render, Ben Grant and Ashley Brook came second in the Harrogate Ringway Relay covering the 22 miles in 2:18:04.)   The Power of 10 has her as a member of Ripon and gives her credit, as a V45 for 10K’s in 39:54 at Melmerby and 40:07 at Harrogate in September in 2009.

However it works out, it is good to see that she is still running and running well in addition to putting something back in to her local communities.

Back to Marathon Stars

 

 

Mike Carroll leading Graham Crawford in the Kirkcudbright Half Marathon in 1986.

Mike Carroll (28 June 1958) was an excellent distance runner on the roads and on the track who was one of the country’s best marathon runners.    I only met or spoke to him once – when he ran in the Scottish team which took part in the international fixture to open the new track at East Kilbride.   He was perfectly affable, friendly and sociable but went for his warm-up run before the race and took so long to return that there were fears that he might miss the actual race!   Teamed with Adrian Callan, he ran very well indeed though.   Mike was a talented runner who would disappear from the scene for a year – or maybe longer – then come back running as well as ever.  It was as a roadrunner that he is best known and that is where most emphasis will be placed in the profile but we can start with a look at his places in the rankings over a ten year period which show the range of distances covered with some distinction.

Year	Distance	Time	Ranking
1985	Marathon	2:18:24	8th
1989	5000m	14:15.3	9th
1989	10000m	29:22.5	1st
1990	3000m	8:17.9	18th
1990	5000m	14:19.76	13th
1990	10000m	29:59.43	2nd
1993	Marathon	2:19:18	3rd
1994	10000m	31:54:00	23rd
1995	3000m	8:27.2	10th

 

Ranked first for the 10000m in 1989, second for the same event in 1990 and third in the marathon in 1993.   Not bad statistics but his competitive record was also very good with two victories in the Scottish half-marathon championships plus medals in the 10 miles and 10K championships.   Unfortunately for all his ability he only ran in one Edinburgh – Glasgow Relays – one for Annan in 1990 where he ran sixth fastest time on the second stage/   He took up the sport in his Twenties because he had a brother who was a runner and there were lots of races then with thousands of competitors, it took his fancy and, as he wanted to get fit he started running.      Mike’s breakthrough year was 1985 with three very good marathons and that’s where we will start.

***

In the Great Scottish Run of 30th September 1984, Mike Carroll was thirteenth in 2:19:19 following immediately behind fellow Scots Tony Coyne and Jim Brown.   Despite running under the name of ‘J Warwick’, this late season marathon may well be what won him his first Scottish vest the following year.  At the time however it got him into a lot of trouble with the authorities.   It was the first of the really big Glasgow Marathons, there was a lot of coverage on the BBC and, running under an assumed name, he led for the first half of the race.   The Scottish authorities were not at all happy and they let him know it.    Be that as it may, Mike’s first marathon of 1985 was as part of a Scottish team competing in Barcelona on 17th March.    The ‘Glasgow Herald’s headline read: MARATHON MEN TAKE TEAM TITLE and it went on to read, “Scotland took the team prize against top Continental opposition in the Barcelona Marathon with three runners finishing in the first six.   Scottish Internationalist Paul Kenney (Birchfield Harriers) finished runner-up in 2:18:34, just 18 sec behind the winner, Raphael Garcia-Perez of Spain, with Glasgow dentist Tony Coyne (Bellahouston Harriers) third in 2:21:33.   Mike Carroll (Annan and District) running in his first international race finished sixth in 2:22:31.” And that was the entirety of the report.   Barcelona was always a good race for Scots on a fast course and not too much travelling involved.   It was a good debut for Mike very early in the season.

With the high spot of his career coming in September, the rest of the 1985 season was a fairly good one for Carroll.   For instance,

“Mike Carroll of Annan and District, who represented Scotland in the recent Barcelona International Marathon, won the Kirkcudbright Academy Milk Half-Marathon when defeating 500 rivals in 1 hour 5 min 52 sec.”   ‘Glasgow Herald’, 27th May.

“Mike Carroll of Annan and District AC, a member of Scotland’s winning team in the recent Barcelona International Marathon, was an easy winner of the Dalry Civic Week 11 mile road race.   He defeated 350 rivals to to win in 56:53.”  (Glasgow Herald, 1st July 1985)

‘Glasgow Herald’ of 5th August, “Mike Carroll, the 27-year-old Annan and District runner, surprised British track international runner Jim Brown (Clyde Valley) and Edinburgh marathon champion Lindsay Robertson  (Edinburgh Athletic Club) to win the TSB 10 mile road race in Edinburgh yesterday.   Carroll fought back after Brown had taken the lead at six miles to win in 49:46.”

Edinburgh Marathon, 1985: Mike Carroll, Murray McNaught and Evan Cameron

The ‘Glasgow Herald’ of 2nd September, 1985 had this report in the ‘Results in Brief’ section: “Only 2000 runners finished the Edinburgh Waverley Market Marathon out of a total of 3300 entries.   The winner was Mike Carroll, a 27-year-old production engineer from Annan, in 2:18:41.   In 61st place overall was the man who the Commonwealth Games gold over the same classic distance in Edinburgh in 1970, Ron Hill, who recorded 2:48:15.   The first woman home was Heather McDuff of Edinburgh AC.”   And that was the report in its entirety.   Hardly fulsome but it was a different story later that month.

When he ran in the Glasgow Marathon on 22nd September, Mike surprised many when he was first Scot to finish crossing the line in sixth place in 2:18:24.   e was not a member of the official Scottish team although he beat them all, he was even ahead of Don Macgregor.   Doug Gillon’s report read: “If anything the veteran victory of the redoubtable Don Macgregor from Fife only underlined home discomfort.   For Macgregor, 46 years old, finished tenth overall in 2:19:36, beating all of the official national team.   He missed out on the honour of being first Scot home by only 68 seconds.   That honour fell to Mike Carroll of Annan and District Athletic Club.   It won him the Anthony Finlay Memorial Quaich and a trip to the Sea of Galilee Marathon in December.   It also completed a remarkable double for just three weeks ago he won the Edinburgh Marathon.   Yesterday’s time of 2:18:24 was 17 seconds faster than his capital run.   Last year he ran with another athlete’s number, much to official disapproval.”

As it turned out, the Sea of Galilee Marathon was won by a Scot – but by Lindsay Robertson and not Mike Carroll.  In fact Mike did not run in Tiberias at all that year because of injury – he was to have some recurring injuries to his hamstring and calf which would keep him out for quite long stretches of time.   He also worked shifts and had a young family which also affected how much running he could do.   He was coached for a time by Gordon Surtees, who also coached Tom Hanlon, in the North of England who sent him schedules by post which he had to follow.   Unsurprisingly, Gordon was not a big fan of Mike’s shift work but that was the way it was.    He was also put in touch with Gerry Helme, the agent, by Hammy Cox.   Helme got Mike several races abroad notably two in Amsterdam.   Again, what races Helme could get were complicated Mike’s shift work and family commitments.

 Glasgow Marathon 1985: First Scot

Mike did not run in the 1986 London Marathon in April where Allister Hutton in third place was top Scot in a time of 2:12:36.   The first major appearance for him in 1986 was in the Pearl Assurance Half-Marathon in Edinburgh on 4th May.   Neil Tennant won the race in 64:41 with Australian Laurence Whitty second and England’s Bernie Ford third.   Tommy Murray was fourth and Mike was fifth in 66:21, six seconds behind Tommy.   Then it was on to one of his favourite races – the Kirkcudbright Milk Half-Marathon on 24th May which he won and was reported in the ‘Herald’:   “Scottish international Mike Carroll of Annan and District AC, won the Kirkcudbright Milk Half-Marathon from 300 competitors and led his club to victory in the team race.   Carroll set a course record of 63:22 when winning for the second successive year with Graham Crawford (Springburn Harriers runner-up in 64:27.”   On 3rd June Mike won the Lockerbie Gala 6 Miles in 28:17 from club mate Rob Carey who ran 29:34.   With the Commonwealth Games being held in Scotland in 1986, there was massive coverage of that and then of the European Games a few weeks later which led automatically to a shortage of reporting on other athletics events but it is clear that 1986 was not as good for Mike as 1985 had been.   In 1985 he had been ranked in every list from local, to national to British rankings but he was nowhere to be seen in 1987 at all.  Even the many local races in Annan, Dumfries, Lockerbie, Kirkcudbright and even Ecclefechan were being won mainly by his clubmate Rob Carey.

‘Scotland’s Runner’ for April 1988 had an article called ‘Focus on Dumfries and Galloway’ which noted the main races and the illustration on the page was a good picture of Rob Carey in action with the caption reading ‘Annan’s Rob Carey – the local man to beat in Dumfries and Galloway’s road  races.’   The only reference to Mike was a single sentence on the Dumfries half-marathon pointing out that Mike Carroll set the course record in 1985.    Well, Mike answered that on 24th June with his third victory in the Dumfries half-marathon in 65:42 – the second fastest time ever and one which has only been bettered twice in the 24 years since then.   Other than that though, the only time credited to him was 14:15.3 for a track 5000m which placed him ninth in the national rankings.   1989 was even faster for the Kirkcudbright half marathon with a victory over K Moss of Chorley in England and Andy Daly from Bellahouston in yet another record of 63:55 from a field reported to be over 300 strong.   A hint as to why he was out of action for so long was in the comment in “Scotland’s Runner” was “The fastest time by a Scot to date this year was recorded at the Kirkcudbright Academy half-marathon,  Mike Carroll of Annan established himself well clear of injury problems to complete the course in 63:55.   Ken Moss of Chorley was second man home and Bellahouston’s Andy Daly was third.”   1989 was also the year that he took to the track with success.   In the SAAA 10000 metres championships he lifted a silver medal and again “Scotland’s Runner” reported.   “Kevin Forster of the new Tyneside club, Valli Harriers, went through the halfway mark faster than many of those in the 5000m leading home a field of runners with Annan’s Mike Carroll the surprise package.   He returned from prolonged injury to win his first championship medal less than a week after buying his first pair of track spikes.   Result:   K Forster (Valli)   29:08;   2.   M Carroll (Annan) 29:22.”  This time placed at the top of the Scottish 10000m rankings for the entire year.   The time and the manner of doing it saw him selected for the international match organised to open the new track in East Kilbride.   He ran in the 5000m with event winner Adrian Callan.   Callan was timed at 14:11.2 and Mike at 14:15.3 which, at the end of the season, had him rated eleventh in the country.   There were two more races of note for him in 1989.   On 25th June he ran in the Dumfries half-marathon which he won in 65:42 – a new course record and his second of the season – from R Hall of Teviotdale who was over four minutes behind in 69:48.   On 6th August he travelled to Cramond in Edinburgh for the 10 miles road race which he won in 48:11 – a course record, the third of the season – from Fraser Clyne of Aberdeen who was over two minutes adrift with 50:23.   By the end of 1989, Mike Carroll was back in action and injury free for the first time in several years.

 ***

Mike ran more races in 1990 that he had done in the past three or four years combined – and with great success.   He started the summer with a win and a course record in the Selkirk People’s Half-Marathon in 66:43 from Alan Robson (ESH: 67:35) and three weeks later was third in the Glasgow Brightside SAAA 10K Road Race where he was behind Geoff Turnbull (29:21) and Gary Nagel (29:23) – both Valli Harriers) – in 29:59.   On 3rd June he won the Irvine Valley Halh-Marathon from Galston by more than 5 minutes in 62:19 with Gordon Tenney of Kilbarchan second in 67:38.   On 10th June the Scottish People’s Half-Marathon was held in Dunfermline and Mike won in a new course record of 66:48.   The report in Scotland’s Runner said  “Mike Carroll won the Scottish People’s Half-Marathon when it was held for the first time as part of the Dunfermline Half-Marathon on June 10th.   Carroll’s time of 64:48 was more than two minutes inside the 198 winning time and 80 seconds ahead of Dundee Hawkhill’s Ian Campbell (66:07) who was himself almost a minute ahead of third placed Fraser Clyne (Aberdeen).   On  24th June, he missed the Dumfries Half-Marathon where he would normally be found because he was running in a 10000m in Austria for Scotland. The race in question was in Kapfenberg and Mike was eighth in 29:59.43.   He also missed the SAAA Championships which were immediately afterwards on 27th/28th June.   However he was back on form again on 1st July when he won the Cumnock Half Marathon in a new record of 63:54 from Billy Nelson of Law and District (67:38).   Two weeks later (14th July) he was at the other end of the country setting a course record at the Inverness 10K which he won in 29:30 from Bruce Chinnick (29:48).   On to the end of August when hw was second in Livingston.   The report reads: “Ieuan Ellis of Wales won the Livingston International Half-Marathon from over 800 runners, but his time of 64:57 in warm conditions never looked like threatening the £10,000 on offer for the winner if he broke 62 minutes.   Second was Annan’s Mike Carroll who had been leading until the eight mile mark, in 65:34.   Carroll, Ian Campbell and Hammy Cox won the team event for Scotland.”   On 16th September he was second in the Land O’Burns Half Marathon in a torrid race with some of the country’s very best road runners.   The first few places: 1.   P Fleming (Bellahouston)   64:18; 2. M Carroll (Annan)  64:50;  3. Ian Campbell (Dundee Hawkhill)  64:57;   4. T Murray (Greenock Glenpark)  66:34;   5. G Croll (EKAAC) 66:53;  6. D Frame (Law)   67:36.   He also ran well on the track in 1990 and was ranked in three events     In the 3000 he ran 8:17.9 to be 18th, at 5000  he ran 14:19.76 to be 13th and in the 10000m 29:59.43 was good enough for 2nd.   1990 was also the year of his first run in the Edinburgh to Glasgow.   After several years out of the race, Annan & District AC competed in 1989 without Mike and finished twenty second of twenty two teams, nevertheless they were back the following year.  He was on the second stage, taking over from Rob Carey, whose 16th place must have been a disappointment to the club as well as to Rob.   Mike could only gain one place pulling the club up to sixteenth and the team eventually crossed the finishing line in eighteenth.

In 1991 it seemed that Mike was back suffering with his injuries again – after a good April with second in the Selkirk Half-Marathon (which was 155 yards short) to John Robson (62:12) with a time of 62:39, he next appeared on the first Wednesday in September after winning the Dumfries 10K in 30:11 which was the first of four victories in five years in this event.  He was not in the rankings at all nor did he run in most of his ‘regular’ events.

In 1992, Mike was back to his best with a whole series of good runs and victories to his credit.   He won the Annan CC River Race on 1st March from Alaister Russell of Law and District in 30:14 (a new record) to Alaister’s 31:04. He then won the Tom Scott 10 miles from Charlie Thomson in April but the story of the race is remarkable in its own right.   Report from “Scotland’s Runner”:

“Scottish marathon internationalist Mike Carroll produced a fine piece of front running to win the first major road race of the season, the Tom Scott Memorial.    Contested over a ten mile course from Law Village in Lanarkshire to the finish in Strathclyde Park, the 33-year-old Annan runner finished in 48:05, a convincing 50 seconds ahead of Cambuslang’s Charlie Thomson with Edinburgh Racing Club’s Brian Kirkwood in third.     This was the thirtieth year of the Tom Scott Memorial, held in memory of the Motherwell club runner who used to run to work every day between Law village  and the town before he was tragically killed in a car crash in England.   The 1991 victor, Nat Muir, was forced to pull out shortly before race day through injury.   

From the outset of this year’s run Carroll was closely shadowed by the British cross-country internationalist and pre-race favourite Chris Robison, recently back from competing in the World Championships in Boston.   At the half-way stage Carroll and the Spango Valley athlete were in a group of five , with Carroll doing all the work at the front into a slight headwind.   By six miles however the pair had made a significant break and opened up a gap on the chasing pack, led by Alaister Russell of Law and District.   Just as it looked as if  a tight finish was to ensue, Robinson pulled up with a calf injury around a mile out leaving Carroll with a clear run into the Park and subsequently to the tape.   Robison later explained, “When we came to Motherwell itself it was a close race.   Mike was running well down the hills and I was perhaps pushing it just a bit to hang in with him.   Then about two miles out I felt a twinge in my calf, but kept on going.   Unfortunately it got steadily worse and with around a mile to go it really went and I thought it best to pull out before I did any lasting damage.   It’s very disappointing to lose a race through injury.” 

Carroll who was unaware of Robison’s misfortune until well after the race, said he was fairly pleased with his performance but was forced to alter his tactics almost from the start.   “I’ve always liked to make the running in the past, but my coach was trying to get me out of that habit, so initially I was planning to just sit in with the pack.   However I was kind of taken aback at the start of the race when there was no pack and no one seemed willing to take it up, so against all orders I found myself at the front early on.   Luckily I could still run a solid race from that position.”   He revealed that the Selkirk Half Marathon and then a 10K at Wishaw were his next targets with all the major championship races around that distance in his season’s packed schedule.      “I might even run a full marathon,” added Carroll after the race.   “I’ve been a wee bit inconsistent over the past two or three months running really badly one week and then the following race running very well, but I’ve been trying out a couple of new things under my marathon coach, so hopefully this is everything starting to click now, as that wasn’t a bad run today.”    (Scotland’s Runner, May 1992)

That started an excellent season.  His best run of the year ranked him ranked third Scotsman for the half-marathon distance with a best for the season of 63:48 when he won at  Haarlem on 18th October.   The only other home Scot to run quicker was John Robson with 63:27, run in Selkirk on 19th April.  Mike had three other times listed that year for the distance and they were 64:09 finishing 57th at South Shields on 20th September, 64:31 when coming second to John Robson at Selkirk in September and 65:00 for victory at Coatbridge on 2nd August – this last was yet another course record.   He had three times faster than fourth placed Peter Fleming’s best of 64:45.   One half-marathon time not in the rankings was for the Dunfermline Half Marathon where he was a previous winner.   This time it was a race against his old rival, Terry Mitchell.  “The cool, misty conditions at the eighth Dunfermline Half-Marathon may not have been ideal for the large crowd of spectators but they certainly worked to the benefit of the runners.   The men’s race was scooped this time by Fife AC’s Terry Mitchell in a record of 66:49.   Mitchell tailed Annan’s Mike Carroll (who won the event on a slightly different course two years ago in 64:48) for almost ten miles before taking up the front running position.   Though never seriously challenged by Carroll thereafter, the two remained within several hundred metres of each other to the finishing line.  Carroll’s time, 67:10.”   He won the Annan and District 6.75 miles Road Race on 24th June in 32:05 from Steve Binns, an English and British athlete who had moved to Scotland and joined Annan and District, by two second.   He finished the summer season with another record – in the Dumfries 10K on the first Wednesday in September for the second time in 29:25.   1992  was also notable for two silver medals in Scottish championships: on 31st May Mike was second in the 10 miles championship at Glenrothes behind Terry Mitchell in 51:42 to Mitchell’s 51:17.   Then on 12th July he followed David Donnet (Springburn) home in the Scottish 10000m championship with 30:23, nine seconds down.

As he had hinted at the Tom Scott in 1992, Mike was back up to the marathon in 1993 – at the end of the season he was ranked third behind Peter Fleming but ahead of Alan Robson, Fraser Clyne and Hammy Cox – with a time of 2:19:18 run in Paris on 14th March.  Mike tells me that he was running for Great Britain that day, a selection assisted by the intervention of Gordon Surtees.  “Scotland’s Runner” has him listed as winning the Selkirk Half-Marathon on 11th April in 66:10 which was less than a month after the 26 miler.   On 6th June he won the Dunfermline half marathon from Pittencrieff Park in 66:05 to gain revenge over Terry Mitchell who ran 69:24 and Martin Coyne (70:10). and this was another course record for Mike.   But generally he was not as fast over the half-marathon as in 1992, ranked fifth best with 65:03 recorded when he won at Helensburgh on 25th July.   As far as rankings go, he was ranked  at 10K on the road where his best of 30:31 saw him twentieth, a time turned in when winning at Dumfries on 9th September.     This was his third win at this race.   As far as championships were concerned, he won  the Scottish half marathon in Aberdeen on 27th August in 65:05 from Terry Mitchell who ran 66:54:

Mike retired from racing at the age of 37 – actually he says he retired three or four years before that but he was being ribbed by friends that he couldn’t run any more and so on, so he ran in the Dumfries 10K in 30:30.

In 2008 he was suddenly in all the papers for the wrong reasons.   Mike was badly injured on 10th October 2008 in a car crash near Annan and it was described simply by the ‘Daily Record’ as follows: “Former long-distance runner was badly hurt in a crash involving his car and a bus.   Mike Carroll, who ran for Scotland, is said to be stable in Dumfries and Galloway Royal Infirmary after the crash near Annan.   Mike, 49, of Annan had to be cut free from the wreckage of his car by firefighters.   A family friend said he had suffered a number of fractures and a neck injury.”   The Annandale Observer added the information that He was one of three people injured and taken to hospital after the accident at Newbie Bridge.  It happened at a notorious blackspot on the Dumfries – Annan B724 Low road which was closed for much of the day.   Firefighters from Annan and the Major Rescue Vehicle from Dumfries freed the motorist.”

When Mike looks back on his athletics career he can be really proud of his achievements: many very good times, many good head-to-head wins against some of the very best and Scottish vests on the road, country and track.   We could do with him back running at that standard today.

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he article below is a fascinating account of the life and sporting career of Paddy Cannon, written by Alex Wilson who donated it to us and published in the Track Stats magazine.   Alex has taken a lot of trouble to research the subject and he is the only one from that particular period on this website.   It not only tells us a lot about the man himself but also illustrates and describes an athletics scene that is different from our own but which at its heart is basically the same.

The Career of Paddy Cannon, farm worker, record breaking professional runner, successful football trainer.

By Alex Wilson

The name of Paddy Cannon, alias Peter Cannon, will not be familiar to many today, but in his time he was a very popular figure in his native Scotland and even further afield.   During the 89 years of his life, he created what you might call an enduring legacy by leaving his indelible imprint in the history books, both as a distance runners and as a football coach.   Cannon was of medium build, stood 5’8″ (173cm) and never weighed more than 147lbs (67kg) during his competitive days.   But behind the moustache and unassuming demeanour lurked a ferocious competitor with a burning desire to win – whatever the sport.   In addition to setting two professional world records on the running track, he coached Edinburgh side Hibernian to their last win in the Scottish Cup.

Paddy Cannon first saw the light of day at Raploch, near Stirling, on 14th January 1857, the son of Irish immigrants Peter and Bridget Cannon.   His father was an agricultural labourer who worked on King’s Park Farm.   In those days the farm occupied a sprawling piece of land beneath the craggy outcrop on which Stirling Castle stands.   Today, it’s a golf course.   From an early age he learned to pull his weight on the farm.   Just like any other youth, he played football and enjoyed sports, but never did he imagine that he would make history on the running track and set two world records.   In fact, he was 20 years of age before he realised that he had any talent for running.   It was by mere chance that Paddy Cannon became a runner.

The story has it that in 1877 a Glasgow shoemaker who had settled in Stirling noticed a group of young men in King’s Park.   The shoemaker had been an athletics trainer and, seeking to carve out a new niche for himself in Stirling, persuaded the men to show their paces.   One of these was Paddy Cannon, who, despite being dressed in heavy workboots and corduroys, romped home an easy winner.   The shoemaker was so impressed with what he saw that he arranged for another trial a short time later.   On this occasion he brought along a pair of running shoes for Cannon who, now properly attired,   showed his true ability.    Excited by his discovery, the shoemaker became Cannon’s sponsor and two weeks after the second tryout persuaded Cannon to enter the Strathallan Games at Bridge of Allan.   He ran in the open mile off the 100 yards mark.   there was a huge field but Cannon held his own and but for inexperience would have won.   He was only beaten by a foot and a half into third place behind David Livingstone of Tranent, himself on the cusp of a successful career.   On May 31st 1881, Livingstone would finish second in 53:53.5 to William Cummings in the prestigious “Ten Miles Race for Sir John Astley’s Champion Belt” at Lillie Bridge Grounds, West Brompton.   Cannon’s rookie performance created quite a stir among the local pedestrians.   A week later at Falkirk, he avenged his Strathallan defeat by winning the confined mile for Stirlingshire men, the open mile and the two and three mile handicaps!   This was an extraordinary performance for a novice.   Paddy Cannon would not have been a runner had it not been for the Scottish Highland Games, a millennium old tradition which had enjoyed something of a revival in Scotland with the advent of half-day working on Saturdays and statutory bank holidays.   By the late 1870’s they were a common and highly popular Saturday afternoon pastime.   He was practically invincible in two and three mile races at Highland meetings where he would concede all manner of starts to his opponents and still come out on top   Unfortunately, promoters were rarely particular about track measurement or timekeeping.   All that essentially mattered was finishing order, as this dictated the distribution of prize monies.   many of Cannon’s performances no doubt some very good ones, are therefore unknown.    Not much is known about Cannon’s early career, save that he is said to have run the great William Cummings of Paisley, then world record holder for the mile,  to within a yard in the Bute Highland Games in the early 1880’s.

In 1883, Cannon renewed his rivalry with David Livingston in the Five Miles Championship of Scotland at Arbroath on 15th September.   In a close-run race he finished a yard behind the Tranent runner  who was credited with a time of 24L31.0.   It would have been a world record had the track withstood scrutiny.

Back on the Farm and hard Work to keep Fit

After his early successes, Cannon went back to working on the farm with occasional spells at the saw-mills during the winter, and when the summer came round, he would free himself for the Highland Games season.  However the farm work, as Cannon knew, was hard graft without labour saving mechanisation.   Stacking hay, to mention but one example, was an intensely physical chore before  the advent of hay baling machines.   This was one reason why Cannon was extremely fit despite doing little in the way of specific training.   In fact he was a great believer in the benefits of walking and hard work.    By his own admission he was a hard taskmaster, as demanding of himself as of others, a sentiment echoed by John James Miller in “Scottish Sports and How to Excel in them: a Handbook for Beginners”:   “Punishment”, vowed Paddy Cannon to me on one occasion, “that’s the keynote for distance running efficiency.   That is the mill I had to go through and there’s absolutely no other way.”   Unusually fro the time, Cannon neither drunk nor smoked.   His physical fitness and healthy lifestyle no doubt enabled him to withstand the rigours of weekly competition during the summer Highland Games season.   He usually ran in two events, and sometimes in three, at meetings, racking up the racing miles.   He clearly showed a preference for meetings which promoted both one and two mile events where he could make double money.   In 1885, having been practically unbeatable in Scotland over two miles, Cannon turned his attention further afield.   Pedestrianism was flourishing in Lancashire and Cannon’s sponsors entered him for what was a famous four-mile handicap promoted by Albert Fletcher at the Moorfield Recreation Grounds in Failsworth, near Manchester.   The “All England Sweepstakes” were held on 19th September 1885 and featured a quality field including Arthur Norris of Brentwood and William Cummings, lately of Preston.   Cannon was comparatively unknown in these parts and Cummings was handicapped by 200 yards.   Cannon’s backers couldn’t believe their luck and betted heavily on their man at odds of 4 – 1 against.   The outcome was almost a foregone conclusion: Cannon overhauled the last of the runners to whom he had conceded starts at the halfway mark.   Taking the lead before the three mile mark (c14:40), he ran out an easy winner in 19:28.0 (equivalent to a shade over 20 minutes for the full four miles.)   The backmarkers didn’t stand a chance, and Cummings pulled out early in the race after failing to make any inroads on Cannon’s lead.   Needless to say, Cannon’s jubilant backers went home with a sackful of money.   However, in his defence, Cummings was likely saving himself for an upcoming race at Lillie Bridge that would decide a high-stakes three-race match against Walter George, the ex-amateur champion from Worcester.   If so, the strategy certainly paid off, Cummings easily defeating George by 420 yards in a world record time of 51:06.6 amid claims that George had been poisoned.

Cummings and Cannon seem to have struck up a working relationship after crossing paths at the Failsworth meeting.   A little over a week after Failsworth, Cannon accompanied Cummings to Lillie Bridge for his race against Walter George.   On 3rd October both men appeared in the Mile Handicap at the Edinburgh Royal Gymnasium.   The reporting newspaper noted that Cannon had been “training along with the Scottish champion Cummings.”   The working partnership continued in 1886 when Cannon trained Cummings at Preston in preparation for another series of matches against Walter George over a mile, four miles and ten miles for £200 each.   The first match in the series, a Mile race at Lillie Bridge on 1st August culminated in a victory for George in a phenomenal 4:12 and three quarters – over three seconds below the previous world record held by Cummings, who collapsed (gave up) 100 yards from home.   Cummings levelled the scores by winning, albeit with suspicious ease, the second race over four miles at Preston Pleasure Gardens in 20:12.6 on 11th September, thereby forcing a lucrative decider at Aston Lower Ground, Birmingham, on 2nd October.   This time George had his revenge, setting a hot pave with the avowed intention of running his opponent off his legs.   Indeed he succeeded in breaking Cummings in the third mile, which can be explained by the fact that the first three miles were accomplished in a near-world-record  14:40.2.   Cummings fell increasingly further behind and eventually retired in the sixth mile, having been lapped.   George reached six miles in 30:26.8 but without any opposition to spur him on, slowed thereafter to outside world record pace and was eventually allowed to stop in the ninth mile.   That concluded Cannon’s working partnership with Cummings, even if the consensus was that Walter George was unbeatable.   Cannon had by all accounts done a good job of nursing Cummings through injury and back to peak fitness.   In his mile race against George, Cummings after all had led at the three quarter mile mark in a near-record 3:07 and three quarters, and would probably have beaten his own best time had he finished.

With the matches out of the way, Paddy Cannon and William Cummings went back to being adversaries.   Apart from coaching Cummings, 1886 was a relatively quiet year for Cannon.   He did, however, seize the opportunity to visit his ancestral homeland turning out in the half mile and mile handicaps at the Caledonian Games at the Ball’s Bridge Ground, Dublin, on 13th June.   He was npt in his best form however, and lost both events, coming in third in the half mile in 2:09.5 and second in the mile in 4:41.3.   On to the 1887 season which Cannon began with a bang, winning the two mile handicap at the Broxburn Annual Athletic Games on July 14th, in 9:21.0 – a Scottish professional record  and one of the fastest times to date.   Nine days later, he showed a good turn of speed in the mile handicap at the Edinburgh Royal Gymnasium finishing third off 50 yards in an estimated 4:21.0.   On 8th September 1887, Cannon dispelled any doubts that there might have been over his performance in the

two miles at Broxburn by winning the two mile handicap at the Manchester Royal Jubilee Exhibition Sports, held to commemorate 50 years of Queen Victoria’s reign.   After rushing through the first mile in 4:33.0, the Stirling runner came home in 9:21.5, defeating fellow Scot Joe Newton of Dundee by 150 yards.   Also in September, 1887, and probably in connection with his appearance at the Manchester Exhibition, Cannon competed in the ix Miles Handicap at Failsworth – the scene of his four miles coup two years before.   The field included Will Snook, of Shrewsbury, the former Birchfield Harrier who, as an amateur, was a two-time AAA 10 Miles Champion and two mile world record holder.   In 1886 Snook had been suspended by the Amateur Athletic Association on allegations of roping (not trying to win) un the National Cross Country Championships and banished to the professional ranks.   Snook had recently won a mile race at Leicester in 4:27.8 and so was still a force to be reckoned with .   Details are sparse, save that Cannon was placed at the 110 yards mark and won in 30:46.2 (worth 25:54.7 for five miles), beating Snook by 400 yards.

Three months later Cannon returned to Failsworth Ground to race Arthur Norris of Brentwood in a mile race for a £50 cup and £50.   Norris, a 4:36 miler, had unexpectedly defeated Cummings the previous year and needed only to win to make the cup his absolute property.   He received 40 yards start, thus presenting Cannon with a stiff task.   A crowd of fully 1000 persons watched anxiously as cannon went off at a great pace and caught his man at half way, but he couldn’t break Norris and in the home straight the Brentwood man drew right away to win by eight yards in 4:31.5.    In Cannon’s defence, the Failsworth race came only three weeks after marrying a 22 year old weaver called Annie Mackin at St Mary’s Chapel in Stirling.

Cannon set about preparing for the 1888 season with a new found zeal and strength of purpose his self-professed ambition to set up a professional record for the two miles or any other distance.   Having broken with his previous summer/winter cycle by running at Failsworth in late 1887, Cannon entered the Professional Mile Championship at the recently opened Victoria Park Grounds, Govan, on 21st January 1888.   There were three competitors: himself, William Cummings of Preston and Arthur Norris of Brentwood.   The match was for a sweepstakes of £25-a-side and a challenge cup.   The 50 guinea solid silver cup had been presented by Mr Lewis, a London patron of pedestrianism, and had to be held against all-comers for 18 months.

Defeat by William Cummings for the Mile Championship

Despite the unfavourable weather and a heavy track due to rainfall on the morning of the race, some 3000 persons assembled to witness the event.   Cummings was the favourite at 6 to 4, while odds of 3 to 1 were being offered against Norris and 4 to 1 against Cannon.   Norris received 40 yards start, Cummings and Cannon starting from scratch.   Cannon reeled off the first quarter in 62 seconds with Cummings, playing his usual waiting game, on his shoulder.   At the end of the first lap, Norris still had his handicap having set off at an equally hot pace.   In the second lap, the scratch men pegged back 20 yards on Norris and the half mile was reached in 2:09.5.   Cummings went past Cannon in the third lap and was within 10 yards of Norris when the three-quarter mile post was reached in 3:16.0.   Cummings rushed past Norris on the last lap and sailed up the straight, looking back the easiest of winners by 10 yards in 428.0.   Cannon was second in an estimated 4:30.0, a similar distance in front of Norris.   In February 1888, there was talk of a series of races against William Cummings at two miles, four miles and six miles, each race worth £25 a side.   However, the proposed match fell through, as these kinds of tentative arrangements so often did.   On 14th May 1888, Cannon entered into a three mile match with Robert Hunter of Govan at the Victoria Park Grounds, Govan, conceding Hunter a start of 350 yards.   Nine days earlier, Hunter had run a dead-heat with Cannon in another three mile handicap at teh Vale of Clyde AC sports having received 350 yards start there too.   A close race was again expected though Cannon was still the bookies’ favourite at 6 – 4 on.   The Stirling man went away at such a fast pace that everyone expected him to crack.   However he was in fine fettle and the track was in good condition.   Hunter was overhauled three quarters a mile from home and retired with a lap to go.   Never slackening his pace, Cannon plugged away and broke the tape amid thunderous applause, to find that he had written his name into the record books.   His time of 14:19.5 was fully 16 seconds inside Jack White’s record.   From now on, Peter Cannon would be named in the same breath as Walter George and William Cummings.   Cannon now turned his attention to the two miles record.

The opportunity arose out of a three-way two-mile sweepstake involving himself, Walter George and William Cummings.   Cummings however was forced to withdraw at the eleventh hour owing to a leg injury.   On Saturday, July 28th, 1888, in heavy rain, Cannon finally crossed swords with the great Walter George at the Victoria Park Grounds in Govan.   A close race was anticipated, and given the constellation, a world record was definitely in the air.   Of the two men, George had the faster time, having run 9:17.4 at Stamford Bridge in 1884, but Cannon was the man in form.   Despite the weather, some 3000 spectators turned out to witness the race.   The track was rough and heavy, and a record looked impossible, but the Stirling man was undeterred.   The toss fell to George and he took the inside lane, but shortly after the start, Cannon went to the front and soon left his illustrious opponent far behind.   He was 150 yards ahead at the end of the first mile in 4:33.4, his powerful stride eating up the ground.   Maintaining an electrifying pace, Cannon won easily by 300 yards and brought the house down with a comprehensive victory.   The official timekeeper, Mr Bonar registered 9:12.5 on his watch.   Cannon had therefore missed Bill “Crowcatcher” Lang’s long-standing record by a mere second.   But for a better surface and someone to push him, as James Sanderson had done Bill Lang at Manchester 25 years earlier, the record would have been his.    In return for his efforts, Cannon carried off a mammoth money prize of £300, which surely would have made up for any disappointment he felt at missing the record.   That year, Cannon made another attempt to break the two miles record at the Glasgow Exhibition enclosure on September 8th.   His race was the highlight of an excellent afternoon of sports at the “Highland Gathering” and witnessed by a bumper crowd of upwards of 25,000 spectators.   With a number of runners starting ahead of him, Cannon made his usual fast start, passing the mile post in a blistering 4:32:0   However this effort was too much to sustain; he faded in the closing stages and was left licking his wounds in second place.   Ferguson of Greenock took full advantage of 140 yards start to win a “punishing” race by a good 10 yards in 9:22.4 to Cannon’s estimated 9:25.0.

An attempt on the four mile record and a crowd of 10000 to spur him on

Cannon returned to the Glasgow Exhibition and made his next record attempt in a Four Miles Handicap on Saturday November 3rd 1888.   The world’s best was 19:36.0, accomplished by Jack White, the legendary “Gateshead Clipper” at Hackney Wick on 11th May, 1863.   The weather was raw and uninviting, and not conducive to record breaking but nevertheless a large crowd turned out to watch the professional sports and, in particular, to see Paddy Cannon run.   Eight started, the Stirling man the back marker off scratch and conceding big starts to veterans William “Cutty” Smith of Paisley, and Bob Hunter of Govan.   The task looked impossible for when the men stood on their marks, Smith and Hunter were only 40 yards behind Paddy, with practically a lap in hand.   Nonetheless, Cannon immediately set about pegging back their lead, passing the mile post in 4:48.2, 2 miles in 9:44.0 and 3 miles in 14:45.0.   Entering the last half mile he was only 50 yards down on the leaders, Hunter and Smith and closing rapidly.   In the last lap he finally took the lead but despite a spirited sprint down the straight to win by 12 yards, he missed breaking the world record by 4.2 seconds.   Nonetheless his time of 19:40.2 was a Scottish professional record.   So great was the disappointment among followers of pedestrianism that the Executive of the Glasgow International Exhibition staged a special four mile race against time and arranged to give a valuable prize if he broke the record.   The trial finally came off on the evening of Thursday, November 8th, 1888.   The track, according to “The Scotsman”, “was officially measured and certified … [as] a guarantee to those who look upon Scottish performances as open to question.”   Three well-known runners were entrusted with the task of pacing Cannon – Bob Hunter of Govan, J Ferguson of Greenock and A Arrol of Glasgow – each taking it in turns to draw Cannon out.   the track was specially lit up for the occasion, and at eight o’clock in the presence of 10000 vociferous spectators the race got under way.   there was a high, biting wind blowing throughout the race and having to run alone  did not make Cannon’s task any easier.   All he had to guide him as to his progress was the timekeeper’s call every half mile.   Cannon set off at a quicker pace than five days earlier, passing the mile in 4:22.0 and two miles in 9:37.8.   After the call at two and a half miles (12:06.2), he knew that he had the record within his grasp.   Having covered three miles in 14:34.4, a time only he himself had bettered, Cannon went through three and a quarter miles in 15:47.0 and three and a half miles in 17:002.2 to reach the bell in 8:15.4.   The crowd sensing a new record was imminent, the noise inside the enclosure grew to a deafening pitch as the excitement mounted.   Straining every sinew, Cannon finished with a sprint to stop the clock in 19:25.4.   Finally the record was his!   Not only that, he had neaten the existing mark by fully 10.6 seconds!   His intermediate quarter times from three to four miles were world records too.

Cannon was still hungry for success and, therefore, two world records were not enough.   He would not rest until he had claimed the two, five and six miles figures as well!   Another winter of hard training lay ahead.   On 4th January 1889, Cannon began his quest with an assault on Jack White’s figures for five and six miles at Hampden Park, Glasgow.   He had with him three pace makers – Robert Hunter of Govan, H McDermott of East Calder and Tom Graham of Lanark.   the conditions were not ideal – a cold wind was blowing and the track was soft owing to a recent frost.   When the race got under way at 2:35 pm a large crowd was present to cheer the Stirling man on, with the pace makers organised to draw him out mile by mile.   He shrugged off the adverse conditions and gave it his best, passing the mile in4:45.6, two miles in 9:46.4, three miles in 14:52.0 and four miles in 19:59.4.   However the record was never truly within his grasp that afternoon, and despite efforts by Graham and Hunter to shield him from the wind, Cannon slowed to reach five miles in 25:13.4 – a fine time but well short of the requisite 24:40.0.   Ultimately it was too tall an order, even for a man of his ability.   However a strong closing mile brought him to within 27 seconds of the record, and he breasted the tape in 30:17.0.   Cannon at least had the consolation of setting a new Scottish professional record, eclipsing the previous figures of 30:18.4 set by his great rival, William Cummings during his record-breaking ten miles at Lillie Bridge on 29th September 1885.

From One Highland Games to Another: two in One Day

Following a successful summer campaign, with recent wins at the Strathallan Meeting and in the Great Three Mile Handicap at the Bute Highland Games, Cannon launched yet another attack on the two miles record.   The undertaking took place on the ground of St Mirren FC at Westmarch, Paisley, on the morning of Friday 16th August 1889.   Cannon ran strongly throughout, sprinting the last 200 yards, but again the record eluded him.   the official timekeeper’s watch registered 9:13.0 – 1.5 seconds outside Bill Lang’s mark.   Cannon was said to have remarked on finishing that he could have broken the record had he been pushed.   Most runners would have been satisfied with a good day’s work, but not Paddy Cannon!   Later that afternoon he put in an appearance at the Luss Highland Gathering in the picturesque village of Luss, on the shores of Loch Lomond.   However after his hard work at Paisley, coupled with the fact that he had been over-handicapped, he had to be content with second place in the two mile handicap.   Two weeks later, on 31st August, Cannon competed in the Two Miles Flat Race at the inaugural Highland Games and Sports in Belfast, Northern Ireland, where there was a large Scottish colony, thus ensuring a good attendance.   Cannon was a little off colour, probably because of the long journey over from Scotland, but caught and passed every opponent but one.   Compatriot Tom Graham took full advantage of 145 yards start to win by 30 yards in 9:42.2 to Cannon’s estimated 9:30.0.   For Cannon the nig race of 1889 was only a month away: the One Mile Championship for a sweepstake of £1100 and Mr Lewis’s Silver Championship Cup.   It took place at Victoria Ground, Govan, on Saturday 28th September 1889,   The four competitors who joined in the sweepstakes were William Cummings, Preston, and Peter Cannon, Stirling, both off scratch; George Powell, Wales, 30 yards start and Fred Goodwin, London, 66 yards.   Each man had laid a £25 stake.   Cummings was the holder having won the first race at the same venue twenty months earlier.   An immense crowd of spectators filled the enclosure and the stands, with most interest centring on the mile championship.   In the days preceding the event, the Glasgow Herald had dampened any expectations of a phenomenal time by commenting that the ground “was not a good one” .   Indeed the 352 yard track was heavy and on the day of the race a gusty wind was blowing.   Cannon, reportedly “in capital condition”, was attended on by JM Campbell of Alexandria.   Cumming was the bookies’ favourite on 7-4 on, while odds of 6-4 were being offered against Cannon.   When the race got under way, Powell set off quickly and overhauled Goodwin in the second lap but then retired, suffering from cramp.   Cannon and Cummings ran side by side, and the Stirling man tried earnestly to shake off his opponent, albeit without success.   The first four laps took: 48 and a quarter, 1:41 and three quarters, 2:36.0 and 3:35 respectively, and after Goodwin was passed the race took on an air of inevitably for Cummings was a 52 second quarter miler.   Sure enough when they entered the home straight Cummings pulled out and, amid thunderous cheering, romped home the easiest of winners by six yards, smiling and looking back.   The times were as good as could be expected: 4:28 and three quarters for Cummings and an estimated time of 4:29.9 for Cannon.   Being from nearby Paisley, Cummings was a popular winner.   By retaining the Mile Championship, he not only won the sweepstakes but after the race, Cummings announced his retirement from racing after having already announced his intention to do so.

The Clans Gather in Paris, and the “Great Champions” race at One Mile

In the autumn, Cannon crossed the English Channel to represent his country in the Gathering of the Clans in Paris as part of the Exhibition.   This unique sporting event saw the greatest number of Scots descend on the French capital since the days when the Scots furnished a fighting contingent for the Kings of France in the 16th and 17th centuries.   However, instead of men-at-arms, this particular Scots contingent – some 300 strong – consisted of bagpipers, wrestlers, caber tossers and, of course, athletes.   There were ten entries for the ‘Great Champion One Mile Race’ on Thursday, October 17th, 1889.   They included Will Snook and Joe Hind of Carlisle, but neither man had shown good form that year, and Cannon was the favourite.   The race was not so much fast as controversial, for Cannon was badly fouled by both Snook and Hind in the closing stages and he could only finish third.   However, the stewards ruled in his favour and awarded him the win, much to the displeasure of the English supporters who in turn cried “foul”.   Snook who had been first past the post  was relegated to second, and Hind to third.   the ruling made a great difference to Cannon’s pocket, for the first prize was 50 guineas, a gold vase and the medaillion d’honneur de Paris (Paris Medal of Honour).   In the four mile champion race the next day, Cannon with a point to prove, set off quickly and ultimately ran out an emphatic winner, finishing a quarter of a mile in front of Snook in 20:34 and three quarters.   The French spectators were said to have been awestruck by his running.   For his efforts, Cannon collected 100 guineas and another gold vase and medaillion d’honneur de Paris, making the trip to France a highly profitable venture.

Just as Cannon was at the pinnacle of his career, a leg injury caused him to break down in training.   The injury was so serious that it wrecked the first half of the 1890 season.   A proposed three race match against J Courtney of Portsmouth fell through and tentative plans to go to America and compete against their best professionals also had to be shelved.   The trip to Paris had evidently whetted Cannon’s appetite for racing abroad.     Cannon eventually made a recovery and when he won the two mile handicap at the Glasgow Police Sports in 10th May 1890 he knew he was back on track.   Injury or no injury, Cannon evidently had his mind set on racing in America, and in early June 1890, he sailed out of Glasgow on SS Ethiopia, travelling under his alias, Peter Cannon.   Upon his arrival in New York, Cannon stopped with a friend in Brooklyn and let it be known that he was ready to accept engagements with “any man in America”.   Despite securing the services of MJ Finn of Natick as his manager, Cannon’s search for competition at first proved fruitless.   His main would-be adversaries, Peter Priddy of Pittsburgh and James Grant of Boston were playing hard to get, demanding that he put up $1000.   After failing to secure a match within several weeks of his arrival, a disappointed Cannon was on the verge of returning to Scotland when the Caledonian Club came to the rescue.   Scots accounted for a large share of the immigrant population in North America, and consequently most major cities had their Caledonian Club or a similar organisation, which served to promote the musical, Literary and social heritage  of Scottish culture.   The premier event in the calendar of any Caledonian Club was the annual Scottish Highland Gathering and Games which naturally were similar to those typically held in the Motherland.   And so it was that Cannon participated in the 37th Annual Picnic and Games of the Boston Caledonian Club at Oak Island Grove, Revere Beach on Thursday 28th August 1890.   The club had put up $2000 for professional athletes and a good field was thereby secured, upwards of 15000 spectators paid their admission to watch the event.   the bustling ground was awash with men in kilts and echoed to the sound of bagpipes.

Cannon was entered for the five mile scratch race.   It was the event of the day and had been the principal topic among athletes in the month  leading up to the Gathering.   The Caledonian Club had allocated some $300 to this race alone.   Cannon was up against stiff competition in the shape of James Grant, Boston; Peter Priddy, Pittsburgh; Ed McLellan, Pittsburgh; Dan Burns, Elmira; and Nick Cox, New York.   Grant, the local hero, was tipped to win, having set an American five mile professional record of 25:22.3 at Cambridge, Mass, only three days earlier.    Cannon must have been mortified by his billing as “Peter Cannon, Champion of England”!   Ed McLellan set the pace from the second mile onwards, reaching three miles in 15:49.0, with only Cannon and Priddy for company, and Grant who was suffering from cramp 50 yards in arrears and practically out of the race.   Three and a half miles were dispatched in 18:35.0 and four miles in 21:21.0.   the order remained unchanged until a quarter of a mile from home, when the Pittsburgh duo set about themselves, much to the detriment of Cannon, who lost contact, McLellan producing the better finish  to win by 20 yards in 26:37.5.   Priddy was second and Cannon third.   A newspaper reported that “Cannon was left by the two Americans as if anchored”, but without detracting from what was a respectable performance under the circumstances.   On 1st September, Cannon competed in the five mile race in Philadelphia, PA.   It was the feature event of the annual athletic sports promoted by the Philadelphia Caledonian Club at Rising Sun Park.   A crowd of 5000 “canny Scots” witnessed a close race between Pennsylvania’s own Peter Priddy and Cannon, the former winning in an astounding time of 24:30 which suggested that the track was considerably short.   Only three days later, Cannon was back in action at the 34th Annual Games of the New York Caledonian Club at Jones Wood and Washington Park, New York.   He was entered for the three and five mile scratch races both of which were open to all-comers.   In his first event, the three miles, victory went to Peter Priddy in 15:40, Cannon comin in second before an audience of 10000 ebullient spectators.   The subsequent five mile race provided the most thrilling finish of the day.   British ex-patriot Nick Cox of New York took the lead from the start and set a stiff pace which only Cannon and Priddy were able to match.   Cannon moved to the front half a mile from home and began a long drive but Priddy went right after him and took the lead, both men dropping Cox.   Thus it remained until the finishing straight when Priddy and Cannon engaged in a mad scramble for the line, Priddy winning by inches as both men clocked 26:59.0.   After a week of frenetic activity Cannon concluded his racing tour of America, packed his belongings and bade farewell to the Land of Opportunity.   The 1890 season had been one of mixed fortunes.   Apart from his racing tour of America, the year had marked the birth of Cannon’s first child, John.    Over the next decade, the family would grow to include another four boys and a girl.

Paddy Cannon did not so much retire from professional running as to fade away.   Age was beginning to creep up on him and after the injury-plagued 1890 season his performances began to slip.   Cannon was now at the crossroads. with the responsibilities to think about, his first priority as a parent was to feed and clothe the family.   The money from pedestrianism was a supplement, no more, no less.    His regular income came from working on a farm where he prided himself on being a threshing machine operator although this was generally considered a hazardous job.   Threshing engines were designed for the removal of husks from grain to make flour.   They had various moving mechanical parts and their operators literally risked life and limb.   A contemporary newspaper tells of a woman threshing machine operator who “had her clothing caught in the machinery and one of her legs drawn and dreadfully mangled”.   Another tells of a foreman who “put his hand too far into the beaters while feeding the machine and the beater tore a finger from his hand.”   From 1890 onwards, Cannon confined his competitive outings mainly to weekends and public holidays.   He continued to compete at Highland Meetings for several more seasons and, for a time at least, continued to pull crowds thanks to his undiminished popularity.   He held on to his scratch man status for a while, albeit conceding ever decreasing starts as his biological clocked ticked onwards.   At the Blackford Highland Games on August 10th, 1891, he won the two miles off scratch but had to settle for second to John Taylor of Kirkcaldy in the mile handicap after finding himself unable to make up the handicap of 25 yards on the latter.   On August 27th 1896, Cannon, now in his 40th year, was third in the two mile handicap at the Abernethy Games where, remarkably, he was still the backmarker!

By now however he was generally receiving rather than giving starts and, therefore still enjoying a modicum of success at meetings.   At the Jedburgh Games on July 11th 1896, he competed in three events, winning the ‘Basket and Stone’ race (winning £1), finishing third in the ‘Go as you Please competition’ and winning the two mile handicap (winning £1 10 shillings).

An older looking Paddy Cannon dressed in running kit

Two weeks later, at the Kelso Gathering, he had another payday when he finished third in the half mile handicap off 65 yards, third in the two mile race and second in the mile handicap off 75 yards.   The following year Cannon competed at the Strathallan Games in the two mile handicap, which featured Anglo cracks Harry Watkins and Fred Bacon.   He started from the 75 yard mark alongside T Conchie of Shap who provided a turn-up for the books by winning in 9:33.2.   A newspaper described it as a “very punishing race”, adding gallingly that “veteran P Cannon [brought] up the rear.”

One Sporting Career Finishes, Another Opens.

However, little did Paddy Cannon realise that as the curtains were coming down on one great career, another exciting career was about to take off!   In 1896, Cannon took on a job as the groundsman of Hibernian Football Club (Hibs) in Edinburgh.   He enjoyed outdoor work and coming from a Catholic-Irish household, was a loyal Hibs supporter.   It was something of a dream job for Cannon, and would be the beginning of an association that would last for almost half a century.   The family moved to Edinburgh and into a tenement at 9 Lyne Street in the aptly named Canongate district which then had a large Irish population.   Hibs were founded by Irish born football enthusiasts in 1875 and named after the Roman word for Ireland.   Hibs early years were turbulent.   In 1887 they won the Scottish Cup, but the following year they almost went out of business when a number of their best players defected to the newly formed Glasgow Celtic Football Club.   The game wasn’t professional in those days so no money changed hands directly.   However Celtic lured away the Hibs players by offering them businesses such as pubs and shops.   Consequently Hibs struggled to field teams during the following seasons.   Things went from bad to worse when their treasurer emigrated to Canada with a large portion of the club’s funds.   The upshot was that the club went defunct in 1891.   A reformed club called Hibernian Football Club was established in 1892 and acquired a lease on a site at Easter Road which is still their home to this day.   Hibs fortunes took a turn for the better when their committee promoted Paddy Cannon to the post of trainer-groundsman in 1897  thereby enabling the club to draw on Cannon’s experience and knowledge of conditioning for athletic performance.

Cannon put his charges, many of whom were young players, through a new training regimen destined to reap benefits in the longer term.   His training methods were considered innovative and modern in that era and he was highly respected by the Hibs players of the day.   The young Hibs players blossomed under his tutelage, and with club secretary Dan McMichael holding the reins, Hibs reached the final of the Scottish Cup in 1902.   The week before the final, Cannon primed his charges for the big challenge with long walks to Portobello, dominoes at night and a “diet of thick potted-head sandwiches washed down with cups of milky cocoa.”   It was his unique way of fostering good team spirits.   The plan worked perfectly: the Hibs team gelled together to beat Celtic 1-0 in the final, which bizarrely was contested at Celtic’s home ground of Parkhead Stadium.   The following year Hibs won the Scottish League title for the first time in impressive style, amassing 37 points in 22 games to finish six points clear of Dundee FC.   Arguably the period between 1901 and 1903 was the finest in Hibs history when they were concurrent holders of the Scottish Cup and the Scottish League Championship Trophy.   Hibs have won the Scottish League Championship three times since then but have never repeated their Scottish Cup victory of 1902.

Of course other clubs were quick to follow the example set by Hibs.   “Levelling the playing field” so to speak.   Hibs would never again reach those lofty heights during the remainder of Cannon’s tenure as their trainer but they performed by and large consistently during this period, save for a bad patch during the First World War and were never once relegated.

Like Father, Like Son: Another Cannon on the Track

Cannon’s son Tom was cast from the same mould as his father and shared his father’s passion for running and football.   Not surprisingly, he also followed in his father’s footsteps, becoming a professional runner and later a football trainer at Hibs.   It was probably his son Tom’s running aspirations which induced Paddy to make a sensational comeback on the pedestrian scene in 1918 at the ripe old age of 61.   A nostalgic match over half a mile was arranged between himself and his old adversary William Cummings at Ibrox Park, Glasgow, on August 17th 1918.   Even in old age, Cummings (60) was still the faster of the two men over the short middle distance, winning by 30 yards in 2:49.   Sadly this was to be Cummings last appearance on the running track.   he died the following year in a Glasgow hospital.    At the same Ibrox meeting, Banknock coal miner George McCrae eclipsed William Cummings’ ancient 10 miles record with a time of 50:55.0.   Earlier in the year McCrae had also erased Cannon’s three miles mark of 14:19.5 from the record books with a time of 14:18.6.   George McCrae was, as it were, the “spiritual successor” to Paddy Cannon.   In fact, McCrae was the first Scottish runner since Paddy Cannon’s heyday to be truly worthy of such an epithet.

The following year, Cannon entered the Powderhall Marathon alongside his son Tom.   remarkably, the distance, ten miles, was the farthest he had ever raced!   Of course given his age, he was the limit man with a start of nine laps.   the veteran Hibs trainer tenaciously defended his lead for fully half of the distance but then had to yield to his younger rivals.   He eventually finished fifth, just outside the prize list having covered seven miles in about 52 minutes.   For a man approaching 62 and on a heavy track and in cold conditions, it was a creditable performance.   The new ten miles track record holder McCrae finished eleventh in the handicap but did enough to win the £25 and the challenge cup for the fastest time (53:32.0).   What an occasion it must have been witnessing those two greats of Scottish distance running, Paddy Cannon and George McCrae running in the same race.

Paddy Cannon and son Tom

As heart warming as it was to see the old champion back in action after all these years, Paddy Cannon never intended to make more than a brief comeback for the sake of the family album, as it were.    From then on he left all the running to his son Tom who developed into a 4:30 miler and flew the Cannon family flag for several years, winning various Powderhall handicaps over the mile and two miles.   In the early 1920’s, Paddy Cannon retired from active trainer duties and handed over the reins to his son and fellow pedestrian “Di” Christopher of Currie.   However, he remained loyal to Hibs and worked as their groundsman until old age compelled him to give that up too.   He was blessed with a long and healthy life and remained a loyal football and athletics enthusiast until his death in his ninetieth year at City Hospital, Edinburgh, on August 23rd, 1946.   His wife Annie died three weeks after him.   In the late 1920’s a journalist writing in praise of Paddy Cannon created what is actually a fitting epitaph to the man:

“He was a great athlete and a sound trainer, and the pity is that Scotland cannot raise more of Cannon’s kind.”

Paddy Cannon’s Personal Best Performances

Distance	Time	Venue	Date
880 yards	2:09.5e	Dublin	13 June 1886
1500m	4:10.5e	Edinburgh	23 July 1887
Mile	4:29.9e	Govan	28 Sept 1889
2 Miles	9:12.5	Govan	28 July 1888
3 Miles	14:19.5	Govan	14 May 1888
5000m	15:05.2	Glasgow	8 Nov 1888
3.25 Miles	15:47.0	Glasgow	8 Nov 1888
4 Miles	19:25.2	Glasgow	8 Nov 1888
5 Miles	25:13.4	Glasgow	4 Jan 1889
6 Miles	30:17.0	Glasgow	4 Jan 1889

I hope and think that you will agree that the above comprehensive account of the life and times of a wonderful athlete sheds some well-deserved light on an athletics scene similar to our own but of which too little is known by the present generation.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jim Brennan leads Pat Maclagan in the Midlands Championship in 1968

There are many runners who work their way through the age groups showing great promise and even run well as Junior and Senior before dropping out of the sport and totally disappear from view.    One of my favourite runners of the 1960’s was Jim Brennan of Maryhill Harriers.    Jim was a friendly, approachable runner in a club which at that point was not having much competitive success, a runner who won International recognition at Junior and Senior level and who beat most off the best in the country at one time or another.    Jim’s best track times of 9:05.6 for 2 Miles and 30:03 for 6 Miles would have seen him in the top 20 in the country in 2013 -and his steeplechase time of 9:25.2 would have had him ranked sixth in 2013!   None of them on tartan tracks either.   Jim was muscular individual, looking more like a boxer than a distance runner perhaps, who supported his club in everything and when they came to an inter-club fixture with my own club on one occasion he agreed to take some time to talk to some of the local young athletes about his training.

Before we look at his career in detail it might be appropriate to ask the man himself about his career as an athlete.   We put the questionnaire before him and his replies are given verbatim.

Name:  Jim Brennann

Date of Birth: 2nd July, 1946

Clubs:   Maryhill Harriers and Irvine AC

Occupation: Painter and Decorator

Personal Bests: Probably 10 Miles Championship in 1969 and Tom Scott 10 Mile Road Race finishing behind A Brown and winner Jim Alder

How did you get involved in the sport in the first place: Glasgow Schools Champion half mile in 1960 aged 14.

Has any individual or group had a marked effect on either your attitude to the sport or to individual performances?   Mr Bob Bell and Mr Matt Lang, true gentlemen; the whole club members and my friends Nirmal Singh and Edmund MacKenzie

What exactly did you get out of the sport? Friendship and a good upbringing.

Can you describe your general attitude to the sport?  Friendship and a good upbringing.

What do you consider your best ever performance?  My first race ever at 1960 Garscube Harriers boys races relays.   I was in a mixed team, I ran first, fastest time for my age group.

And your worst?   Barry International Cross-Country.   Should have withdrawn from the race with a bad cold but that was the way I was brought up.What did you do to relax?   Cycling, golf and love watching athletics.

Were there any goals that you failed to achieve?   Probably at my young age I am sure I could have been much better if I had a coach but I was self coached since I was 14.

Can you give any details of your training?   Track: lots of repetition work, all distances; road, 60 to 80 miles a week.

Your career as far as most of us are concerned ended in 1969 but you did run for Irvine AC too ?   Yes, I ran for Irvine for about 12 years with good memories.

Do you still run for any reason – fun, habit, etc?  Occasional;ly I put the gear on and do one and a half to about two miles.

Your family ran too.   Can you tell us a bit about that?   My son and two daughters ran with Irvine with a lot of good results.  My son is a qualified coach with North Ayrshire AC.

Did you yourself ever get involved as a coach or official or in any other capacity in the sport?   Yes, I did a bit for about four and a half years.   Four of my Youths finished second in the Scottish Schools AC.

The start of a West District Three Miles at Westerlands: Jim Spence, Colin Martin, Albie Smith, Bert McKay, Alex Brown, Lachie Stewart, Alistair Milroy, Ian McCafferty, Hugh McErllean, Jim Brennan, Brian McAusland

That is what Jim himself has to say and it looks like a good career in the sport despite the fact that it was cut short in a running and racing capacity in 1969.   He clearly enjoyed running, inculcated that love in his children and also gave something back as a coach.   

As a runner, he first appears in the results in season 1961/62 when he was fifth in the Boys National at Hamilton 13 seconds behind the winner, Duncan Middleton of Springburn.   A look at the top six reveals the quality at the time –

1.   D Middleton (Springburn)   7:58;   2.    R Wedlock (Shettleston)  

8:03;  3.   W Eadie (St Modan’s AC)    8:07;   4.   W Donaldson (Edinburgh AC)   8:11;   5.   J Brennan (Maryhill)   8:11;   6.   T Brown (St Modan’s AC)   8:15.   All went on to become good senior athletes.

During the following summer, he suffered from the fact that there were really no distance races for his age group – many races only had an 880 yards, others only went up to the Mile.   He would have followed the normal pattern of running in handicap races at highland gatherings and preparing for the winter.   By season 1962/63 Jim was in the Youths (Under 17) age group and started 1963 with the Midlands District Cross Country Championship on an icy course at Strathleven, just outside Dumbarton.    It was up an age group from last year but he also finished up a few places when he finished second, and only 4 seconds behind, to Ian McCafferty .    Behind him were Ian Young (Springburn), Duncan Middleton (Springburn), S Grant (Motherwell) and Davie Tees (Springburn).   A good run.   Came the National and he was fourth behind McCafferty, Young and, the favourite on the day, Carroll of Edinburgh AC.   Time differences were slight with Jim only 27 seconds down on the winner and followed home by Tom Brown (St Modan’s), Duncan Middleton and Dick Wedlock.

In winter 1963 he was a bit more experienced and already known as a good runner and hard worker – one you had to battle to defeat.   In the Midland championship, again at Strathleven, he was second again – this time to Duncan Middleton and one place in front of Eddie Knox, also Springburn.   Seven seconds down on Middleton he was only two ahead of Knox who was followed home by Dick Wedlock, Tom Brown, Walter Eadie and Alistair Blamire.        In the National, at Hamilton he was 6th behind Knox, Middleton, Wedlock, Eadie and Brown.    Summer 1964 was a replay of 1963 – in the West Districts at Westerlands the longest race was the 880 yards which Tom Dobbin (Greenock Glenpark) won from Eddie Knox.    In the National there was a mile where Eddie Knox won comfortably, but there were no steeplechase races or anything further than a mile on any programme.

In the early 1964 winter season short relays, Jim was not prominent partly because his club at that time was not winning many medals but mainly because the quality of the opposition was too much for any first year Junior.   The sheltered haven of Youths races (where there was often a fast start and a fast finish with a rest in the middle) was not preparation for hard-all-the-way races against seniors on a weekly basis.  However the progress was there for all to see.   He missed his own club’s Nigel Barge Road Race at the start of January and then ran in the Senior race at the District Championships  and was ninth across the finishing line.  In the process he picked up many notable ‘scalps’ including Hugh Barrow (fastest man in the Kingsway Relays, later at Fernieside and enjoying a spell of very good form)) and his Victoria Park team mates Pat Maclagan and John McLaren.  He next appeared on 6th February in the Inter-Counties Championship at at Cleland Estate, Motherwell, where he was sixth in a very good field.  One week later and he won his club’s Junior title in a time 12 minutes faster than the winning senior but less than a minute ahead of the second Junior, Robert Stevenson, who was a very good runner indeed, only unfortunate that the standard in the country was so high at this time.   Robert ran many good races and beat many of the best runners but never received the credit he deserved.    In the National Jim Brennan did well to be 7th in the Junior race where he was competing against runners some of whom were nearly two years older than he was. The result is worth noting.

1.   I McCafferty;   2.  R Young;   3.   AP Brown;   4.   R Wedlock;   5.   W Eadie;   6.   I Young;   7.   J Brennan;   8.   J Raeburn;  9.   A Blamire;   10.   S McIntosh;   11.   J Wight.

Although not selected for the International in Ostend, Brennan was first non-travelling reserve for the Junior team

Following this, summer 1965 was a good one for Brennan with a series of very good races.   As a junior he was racing against seniors most weeks and when it is remembered that the seniors included Ian McCafferty, Lachie Stewart, Andy and Alex Brown, Dick Wedlock and the like, it was not easy.   However he did perform well – on 22nd May he was second to Graeme Grant of Dumbarton in the Junior Mile at the Glasgow Championship at Scotstoun, on 28th June he was second in the SAAA Junior Mile to Alistair Blamire, on 24th July he won the handicap mile at Gourock from Jim Johnston of Monkland Harriers, admittedly off 60 yards to Johnston’s 20 and in the SAAA v Army match at the end of July he was second in the Junior Mile, again behind Blamire.   (In the latter meeting the Junior 2000m steeplechase was won by Doug Gillon in 6:26.6).   By the end of 1965 he was ranked in three events – 25th in the Two Miles with 9:18.0, 14th in the Six Miles with 30:12.0 and eighteenth in the 3000m steeplechase with a best of 9:58.0.   This set him up nicely for another good winter which was to culminate in his first Scottish international cross-country vest.

1965/66   His first race of the season was in the City of Glasgow Relay Championship in early October where he was fastest over the course.   Then on a very muddy trail for the Midlands Relay in Stirling at the end of the month he was first on the opening stage, eight seconds ahead of Alex Brown, and third fastest on the day.  It was a very good run that surprised the pundits.   The good form continued into November when he was fourth in the University Road Race behind Lachie Stewart, Bert McKay and Eddie Knox.   Maryhill was not involved in the Edinburgh to Glasgow so Brennan’s next race was at the end of November when he ran as a non-counter in the SCCU v British Army match at Glasgow Green: so well did he run that he was sixth finisher in the race.   The first Saturday in December was dedicated to County Championships and in the City of Glasgow event, Brennan triumphed.   The report in the ‘Glasgow Herald’ read:

“The surprise of the day was in the Glasgow championships where WH Barrow (Victoria Park) finished second equal with P Maclagan, a clubmate, behind J Brennan (Maryhill Harriers).    Brennan’s ability to charge without fear through the rough undergrowth in Garscube Estate   contributed largely to his margin of victory; those following were inclined to pick and choose their routes.  Occupying all positions from second to sixth Victoria Park had a walkaway win in the team race.   Details:   1.   J Brennan (Maryhill)   33:01;   2=   WH Barrow and P Maclagan (both Victoria Park)   33:24;   4.   C Laing (Victoria Park)   33:29;   5.   A Smith (Victoria Park)   33:45;   6.   A Johnston (Victoria Park)   33:47.”

A week later in the SCCU v Scottish Universities he was sixth in a race won by Lachie Stewart.   The races kept on coming and seven days later he was fastest over the course in the Maryhill Harriers handicap championship.   Such running deserves its rewards and his came in the form of an invitation to take part in a Three Miles race to be held at Celtic Park at half-time in the Celtic v Rangers match.   The boy done good and finished third behind Lachie Stewart and Andy Brown but in front of Alex Brown, Bert McKay, and Pat Maclagan.   His next outing was in the Maryhill Harriers open road race for the Nigel Barge trophy where the winner was again Lachie Stewart but Brennan was fifth only 35 seconds behind.   The ‘race-a-week’ routine went on and the following Saturday he was ninth in a very good Midland Championship at Strathleven Estate, Dumbarton.   It had been a race a week since mid-October for Jim Brennan but there was now a two week gap until he was fifth in the Inter-Counties race in Musselburgh at the start of February.   The week before the National is club championship time and Brennan won the Maryhill Harriers junior title for the second successive year.    Then on 26th February it was the National at Hamilton where he was fifth to finish and selected to run in the Junior team at Rabat in Morocco with Knox, Blamire and Steel.      The star of the day was Eddie Knox who finished third with Brennan tenth – “JJ Brennan in his first big meeting did well to take tenth place and helped put Scotland third in the team race with 28 points.   Our other counter, JR Blamire, was fifteenth.” – and Alistair Blamire five places back.

The next mention of him in the prize list was on 4th June when he was second in the Mile at the Burgess Week Sports at Bishopbriggs in Glasgow behind Jim Johnstone of Monkland Harriers in 4:21.7 to Johnstone’s 4:16.2.   Brennan probably kept racing but results were limited to the top three in some events and in other weeks, only the winner was given: unfortunate in the run-up to the SAAA Championships were Brennan did not take any medals, hardly surprising with Stewart and McCafferty in great form leading into the Games.  He was fourth in the Three Miles however.  Nevertheless he did race during the season and was ranked in three events – Mile, Three Miles and Steeplechase.   The mile was run 18th October in Glasgow where he was fourth in 4:18.6 – 0.6 behind Duncan Middleton.   Twelfth in the Three Miles with 14:03.6 run at Meadowbank on 12th June in the Inter-Counties meeting.   His best race of the season however was the SAAA Steeplechase on 25th June where he was fourth in 9:25.2.   He was also second in the District championship behind Lachie Stewart and ten seconds in front of Jim Bogan in 9:38.0.   There were several noted steeplechasers behind him including Alistair Blamire, Ian Harris, Tommy Cochrane, Jim McLatchie and Doug Gillon.   In cidentally, 9:25.2 would have placed him fifth in the rankings in 2013 =- and his time was run on cinders.

Winter 1966/67 started for him in October with fastest time for the second year in succession in the Glasgow Relay championship ahead of Maclagan and Johnston of Victoria Park.   Clearly in good form, he was third fastest in the Midland District  relay at Stirling and ran the third fastest time just 19 seconds slower than Ian McCafferty and 14 behind Lachie Stewart.   The following week in the Glasgow University Road Race he was third – Lachie Stewart won in a course record time of 25:16, Andy Brown was second in 25:32, Brennan third in 25:42 followed by Eddie Knox in 26:02, Alex Brown in 26:15 and Dick Wedlock in 26:22.   Lachie led the race from the start followed by a bunch of four – Brennan, Andy and Alex Brown and Eddie Knox.   Jim and Andy broke away from the other two and the ‘Glasgow Herald’ reporter had this to say:   “Brennan must have felt that second place was his a mile from the finish as he challenged and overtook the veteran Brown.   But, as he said in the dressing-room after the race, “Brown knew how to play with the head!”    Coming in the gate of Westerlands, Brennan was out-manoeuvred by a quick break and in the finishing lap gradually fell50 yards behind.”   Although his club did not feature in the Edinburgh to Glasgow Relay on 19th November he was selected after the race for the SCCU team to compete against the Army at Carlisle the following week.   It was a good team – Ian McCafferty, Andy and Alex Brown, Lachie Stewart, John Linaker, Ian Hathorn and Gareth Bryan-Jones with Eddie Knox as reserve.   In the actual race he ran well enough to finish fifth (fourth Scot) and that was good enough to see him selected immediately after the race for the team to race against Scottish Universities two weeks later.   And the team this time included Fergus Murray, Mel Edwards, Kenny Ballantyne, Eddie Knox and Alastair Johnston as well as Stewart, McCafferty and the two Brown brothers.   I list the teams to show the quality of men that he was running with – he was not selected in poor years for the sport.   The following week, Brennan led from start to finish to win his third Glasgow championship in three years with Victoria Park taking the team title for the third successive year as well.   The headline for the SCCU v SU match read “Scottish Union win with Customary Efficiency” and Jim Brennan was fifth behind Linaker, Alex Brown, Bryan-Jones and Knox.

Into 1967 and he started with seventh place in the Nigel Barge race at Maryhill but followed that with a good third at Springburn the following Saturday, beaten by McCafferty and Knox.    His third race in three weeks was the Midland championship at Bellahouston Park where he was fifth – just 36 seconds behind Lachie Stewart in second place.   At the start of February, Brennan was third in the Inter-Counties Championship, held again at Cleland,  behind the two Brown brothers and ahead of Knox, Cochrane and McKay.   It seems incredible when reading these results to realise that so many of the chief protagonists were still Juniors as far as the cross-country season was concerned, but that’s how it was and the National Junior Championship at the end of February was a keenly fought contest.   Eddie Knox won by one second (28:03 to 28:04) from Alistair Blamire with John Myatt third (28:33) and Jim Brennan fourth (28:59).   The rules defining eligibility for the Junior age group were anomalous in that both Blamire and Brennan were eligible for the age group domestically but were seniors for the purposes of international competition.   Their running for the season had been so good however, that the selectors put them both into the team for the international at Barry, Glamorgan, in Wales on 18th March.   The result in the international was a comfortable win for Gaston Roelants of Belgium, Blamire and Brennan were 63rd and 88th respectively.

He doesn’t seem to have competed at all that summer, certainly not in any of the main events such as SAAA Championhips, District Championships, Glasgow Championships, in any of the invitation events at Grangemouth or elsewhere or even at any of the big Highland Games meetings like Gourock or Babcock and Wilcox.   It has to be believed that he was ill or injured because he was never one to shy away from competition.

Winter 1967/68 started for Jim Brennan on Saturday 7th October in the McAndrew Relay when he was mentioned in the ‘Herald’ report as running on the first stage thus: “For a time J Brennan (Maryhill), a  Scottish cross-country internationalist, challenged the Shettleston man [Bill Scally] for the honour of leading in the field of 77 over the first two and three-quarter miles, but this was an athlete of some stature he was running beside, not the  moderate performer we have known.  Over the last mile past Scotstoun Showground, Scally crushed Brennan with a fiery burst and the race was over.”   At least he was back in action, probably more than a bit ‘ring rusty’, and the report the following week gave some indication of why he had been absent.   The event was the City of Glasgow Relay championships where he had the fastest time for the fourth consecutive year with Victoria Park winning the team race – also for the fourth consecutive year.   The key section in the report read: “The best individual time was returned by J Brennan (Maryhill Harriers) who appears to have recovered from the foot injury which has kept him out of competition for several months.”   The event was held this time on the flat Knightswood Park so his time could not be put down to charging through rough undergrowth.   A week later he was first on the first stage of the Midland District Relay, one place ahead of Brian Goodwin of Bellahouston Harriers with the fourth quickest time of the day.   Despite racing relatively well, Brennan was not picked for any of the teams that year – he was absent from the SCCU teams v the Army and against the Universities, and when a big team with six reserve (all allowed to run) was picked to race at Granollers in France, there was no Jim Brennan.   It may be that his foot injury had flared up again but it seems strange that he was not there.   He was back in the results columns again on 2nd December when he won the City of Glasgow championship by 28 seconds from Alistair Johnston of Victoria Park, a competition where Glasgow University won the team race.   When the race between SCCU and the Universities came along in the second week in December he was allowed to run as a non-counter for the Scottish team and showed them the error of their ways when he finished third behind Knox and Blamire but in front of Bryan-Jones, Wedlock, Wight, Brown, Maclagan and Myatt.   The ‘Herald’ said “The form of Brennan, who suffered the anonymity of being a non-counter, was especially pleasing.   His third place confirmed his return to top class competition in the future and, who knows, maybe a place in the team for Tunisia in March.”   

“BRENNAN RECOVERS BEST FORM” was the headline in the ‘Glasgow Herald’ on 18th December and the brief report read “J Brennan (Maryhill Harriers), an Internationalist last year, recovered his best form when he won the East Kilbride open senior five and a half mile road race with a time of 25 min 57 sec.   Other placings were:- 2.   AP Brown (Law)   26:04;   3.   J Myatt (Strathclyde) 26:08”   In the traditional first race of the New Year – the Nigel Barge at Maryhill – Brennan had a fine run to be fourth, this time lifting the scalps of Wedlock and Morrison of Shettleston and Knox of Springburn although he had to give best to Bryan-Jones and Blamire.   After the race teams were selected for races on the continent for small three and four man teams and Brennan was not selected for any of them, one of the penalties for running in the same era as Stewart, Alder and McCafferty.   He was not alone in this and the following week, the ‘Glasgow Herald’ pointed out that the first three in the race at Springburn were all reserves for these races – Wedlock won, Brennan was second and Maclagan was third.   Two of the three were in action in the District Championship at Bellahouston Park the following weekend and the headline read

“MACLAGAN BREAKAWAY BROUGHT NO RESPONSE FROM BRENNAN.”    “The effect of a sudden breakaway on an athlete was clearly illustrated at the Midland District championship at Bellahouston Park on Saturday.   The man making the break renews weary limbs with winged heels.  The victim clanks on his way, no longer stemming the onset of weariness.   For more than four of the six miles in the senior contest a grim struggle was played out between P Maclagan (Victoria Park) and J Brennan (Maryhill) over the toughest course they have encountered this season.   Out on their own they flitted in between trees, choosing the path they felt best for themselves, Maclagan the turf, Brennan the tarmacadamed path.   Held together by an invisible thread they gave the crowd every reason to expect a searing battle for the tape.    But a mile and a half from the finish on a deserted stretch of the course  Maclagan made the telling move which only he and Brennan could describe later.   Brennan apparently dropped slightly behind the other without the Victoria Park runner speeding up and on sensing this, Maclagan increased his stride rate and built up a 60 yard gap without response from Brennan.   From then to the finish Maclagan made the distance between them 100 yards and he crossed the line for his first major success.”   The times were 31:26 and 31:53.

The National championship at the end of February, 1968, was Jim Brennan’s first as a senior.   He finished ten seconds behind Pat Maclagan – unfortunately the positions were eleventh and twelfth while the race was won by Lachie Stewart who defeated Alistair Blamire by only one second.   Twelfth meant no international vest for Brennan this time despite being a very good run by a first-year senior.

He did no appear often in the first three in 1968 but there were some significant runs.  On 9th June he competed in the Inter-Counties steeplechase at Grangemouth and finished third in 9:58.8 behind George Skinner (Shettleston) and William Allan (Edinburgh Southern).   Sixteen days later, on 25th June, in the Glasgow Transport Sports Meeting at Helenvale, he ran in the Two Miles track in Glasgow and won in 9:05.2 which was to be his season’s best and ranked him sixteenth in Scotland at the summer’s end.

The new competition year began in October and although the winner of the Glasgow Relay was not named, Victoria Park won the team race, if things went to form, then Brennan may have won that one, but he did not run in the Midland Relay the following week although there were three full Maryhill Harriers teams on parade.    He was also missing from the Glasgow University Road Race and the Springburn race round Bishopbriggs the week after that.    After missing more races and not being considered for selection for any of the SCCU squads, he suddenly reappeared in mid December when he retained the City of Glasgow Cross-Country Championship by 52 seconds from J Crawford of Victoria Park with Glasgow University winning the team race over the gentle, grassy Knightswood trail.   The return to competition however seemed short lived as he was nowhere to be seen in any races in January1969 – at least not in the top eight or ten and in the case of the District championships he was not in the top twenty, so it is probably safe to say that he was not racing at this period – crucial if he had any designs on the Commonwealth Games team for 1970.   He could only finish 20th in the National at Duddingston that year but he did run in it..

1969 was to be the year that Jim Brennan won his first track championship as a senior.   The championship was the Ten Miles track championship on  3rd May at Scotstoun which he won in 50:41.2 from Bill Stoddart (50:53.0) and Bert McKay (51:23.0) .   That had him ranked at number one in Scotland in a year when  Bert McKay was the only track man to contest the distance – the others were all marathon men  seeking a shorter faster race before the SAAA Championship.   On the way he was timed at 30:03.0 for Six Miles which ranked him  second in the country.   It was however a distance that had been replaced by the metric version, 10000m, and all the very top men were running that distance in ’69.   Lachie Stewart and Jim Alder had the top six times in the land with Fergus Murray third and Hugh Barrow fourth individuals.   There were nine Scots faster at 10,000 metres that year than Jim was at six miles but they did not have to do another four miles at the end!   It has to be said however that the 10 miles was right at the start of the season – seven weeks or so before the SAAA championships and bearing in mind the few races he had at the end of the cross-country season, he maybe needed a long, fast run at that point.   The ‘Glasgow Herald’ reported –

“BRENNAN CHAMPION AFTER 40 CHILLING LAPS.   Victoria Park’s stretch of bad luck with the weather continued at Scotstoun on Saturday when their open scratch meeting was bedevilled by a biting nor’easter.   Contrary to the proverbial ill wind, no one was benefited by it.   Among the most cruelly affected by it were the sprinters and the 10 milers, the latter group having to tour 40 chilling laps for the title of Scottish champion.   Jim Brennan finally took the tape 100 yards in front of W Stoddart who was in turn comfortably ahead of Bert McKay.” It was Commonwealth Games preparation year and most athletes were trying to catch the selectors eye and establish dominance over the opposition and Jim, possibly with the hangover of the foot injury, found it impossible that summer.   Nor did he run over the winter until the National when  he finished 40th and second Maryhill Harrier.   This was not his usual running by any means.

Whatever the injury Jim disappeared totally from the sport after only eight years – eight years when he ran at the top of Scottish distance running against the very best in the country.   He competed on the odd occasion in the early 1970’s but his career was basically over in 1969.

Alex Brown receiving the leader’s baton from  NoW representative Ron Bacchus

Alex P Brown was born on 9th September 1944, and became one of the best distance runners in Scotland.    It’s maybe not surprising that that was the case – his father Andrew was a good Scottish runner for Motherwell YMCA after the war, and his older brother Andrew Brown was one of the country’s best ever representatives and captained the national cross country team for many years.   They all ran for Motherwell YMCA until Law & District AAC was formed in 1967 when Alex and Andy both switched to what was now their local club.   They are best known for their cross-country and road running exploits but were also classy track runners.   Andy was the older by 12 years and provided Alex a lot of ‘instant experience’.   The family all helped each other – there are stories of their Dad tieing Andy’s shoe laces before a race to make sure they were tight enough; I have two instances of Andy giving good advice to Alex in the race situation.   First, at Beith before the New Year’s Day race, when Alex did some strides from the starting line away from the direction of the race he was called back by big brother and told to do them down in the way the race was to go because, “they’ll start the race if you’re 50 yards behind the line, they’ll not start it if you’re 50 yards in front of the line!”    And then at the last ever Rangers Sports when Alex and I were on the same mark in a crowded Mile handicap race.   We were off 100 yards + and Andy appeared immediately before the start – “Watch the starter,” he told Alex, “and go when you see the smoke: you’ll see that before you hear the gun and can pick up some places.”   I used both myself and passed on the advice to many runners that I coached.   Two miles to go at the end of the first stage of the Edinburgh to Glasgow relay and Andy calls out to Alex to pick up the pace NOW – less than 10 minutes running left.”     Well, maybe for him, but not for too many on the stage that year.    Alex grew up in a running household, he was given advice and help but there were also expectations laid on him – if not by the family, certainly by other athletes.   He responded well.    It’s as a road and cross-country runner that this profile will concentrate but a look at his ability and performances on the track would be worth while.   First his progress and rankings over distances from the Mile to Six Miles are summarised in the following table.

Year	Distance	Time	Ranking
1962	2 Miles	9:19.9	13
1963	1 Mile	4:20.9	33
	2 Miles	9:09.4	11
	3 Miles	14:04.8	9
1964	2 Miles	9:06.6	12
	3 Miles	14:17.2	9
	3000m St	9:32.4	9
1965	2 Miles	9:07.4	16
	3 Miles	14:00.6	10
	3000m St	9:47.8	13
1966	2 Miles	9:20.4	26
	3 Miles	14:28.0	28
1967	2 Miles	8:54.8	8
	3 Miles	13:56.0	12
	6 Miles	28:55.0	5
1968	2 Miles	9:08.0	18
	3 Miles	14:06.0	17
1969	3000m	8:26.0	13
	5000m	14:43.6	27
1972	3000m	8:42.8	27

The typical summer season for endurance runners in the 1960’s was to run in their county championships, the two miles team races all summer, the championships, any invitation events that came up and a few road races such as the Tom Scott 10 Miles Law to Motherwell.   Alex followed that pattern – one of the differences between then and now was the summer two mile team races in which all the best runners competed head to head.    Shettleston’s Lachie Stewart, Dick Wedlock, Hen ry Summerhill and all would compete against Motherwell’s McCafferty, Brown, McKay and company as well as Victoria Park’s Hugh Barrow, Pat Maclagan and Joe Reilly.   The racing scene was the better for it, in my opinion.   As an example we could look at a typical summer, 1964, when he won his only Scottish track vest.  The list of races is not comprehensive but gives the pattern followed for most years.  He started the summer with sixth place in the Tom Scott road race in 50:50 and along with Andy (2nd) and Bert McKay (4th) was part of the winning team.   On 13th June Motherwell won the Two Miles team race at Shawfield where the Lanarkshire Police Sports was the event.   The team was McKay, Brown and Brown.   The following week the same trio won the Babcock & Wilcox Two Miles although Lachie Stewart won the individual race for the second week in succession.   There were no medals at the SAAA Championships on the last weekend in June, and the Motherwell team did not travel to Kinlochleven for the two miles at that Highland Gathering where Shettleston won easily.  In the SAAA Championships at Edinburgh he was fourth in the Three Miles in 14:17.2.   Then it was Gourock Highland Games in the last week of the month and Shettleston with a very strong team beat a Motherwell team without Ian McCafferty.   His next reported outing was at Ayr, on 8th August, he competed in the Scotland  v  Ireland in the steeplechase where he finished second to team mate Robert Henderson in 9:32. 4.   Henderson ran 9:23.8.     Scotland won by 102 pts to 91.   Motherwell as a team was quiet for several weeks although Bert McKay and Ian McCafferty were active across Scotland and, in McCafferty’s case, south of the border.  On 12th August there was an open meeting at Westerlands in Glasgow where Lachie beat Ian McCafferty by two yards in 9:03 with Alex third in 9:06.6.   Three and a half seconds down on that pair was a very good run – although Alex might have been a bit ambivalent about having brought Ian into the sport in he first place!    At the end of the month there was the Cowal Games at Dunoon where in the invitation two miles, Derek Ibbotson defeated Hugh Barrow and Ian McCafferty: although there was no names for the team event given in the result it is safe to guess that Alex Brown was out in such a big race, held before what was probably the biggest crowd in the country.    It is however as a road and cross-country runner that he is best known.

Alex in the middle, between Les Meneely (B7) and Tom O’Reilly

As a cross-country runner he was really first noticed in January 1962 when he won the West District Youths Championships at Strathleven, Dumbarton.    Andy won the senior title with team mates Bert McKay and John Lineker in second and third and Alex defeated his friend and team-mate Ian McCafferty by 2 second for the Youths event with Hugh Barrow 15 seconds further back.   He had been fifth in the same age group the previous year and third behind Hugh Barrow and J Grant (Monkland) in the previous year’s Boys race, although it should be noted that he was on the same time as Grant and only 5 seconds behind Barrow.   Already we are seeing one of the reasons for Alex Brown’s lack of appropriate recognition – his contemporaries included luminaries of the Scottish distance running scene as Ian McCafferty, Hugh Barrow, Lachie Stewart and that entire generation of top class athletes.   The Midlands Youths title was his first real championship victory and indicated that he was not just a good boy runner.   On 3rd March, 1962, the cross-country runners all headed for Hamilton for the national championships and it was here that Alex won an even bigger event – the result of the Youths race was 1.   AP Brown 15:18;   2.  I McCafferty 15:23;   3.   WH Barrow  15:23.   Three within five seconds, two on the same time.   It was a tough race but the younger Brown had come through it triumphantly.

Season 1962-63 Alex was out in the McAndrew relay at Scotstoun in the winning Motherwell team.   Taking them from third to first and followed by Andy running the fastest time of the day, his first season racing seniors started well, and he also had the day’s third fastest time.   The following week the team won the Lanarkshire county title and again Brown had the third fastest time.   The YMCA championship was won the following week, he missed the Garscube Harriers races the following week (McCafferty won) and then in the Midland Relay Championships he gave the winning Motherwell team a 130 yards lead at the end of the first lap, to finish the short relay season.   Andy had the fastest time of the day with Alex second quickest over the Stirling trail.   Then it was the big one, the Edinburgh to Glasgow relay and Alex was one of the four from the club who set stage fastest times when he moved the club from third to second on the fifth stage.   His running had earned him a place in the SCCU team to compete against the British Army team on 28th November at Barrachnie, Glasgow,  where he finished eighth.   On 6th December the Motherwell team was out in force at the Lanarkshire championships and the winning squad was made up of McCafferty (1), Andy Brown (2) and Alex (4).   Then came his second representative run in a week – the SCCU team defeated Scottish Universities in a trail from King’s Buildings.   McCafferty won from Andy Brown, with Bill Ewing third, Roger Young fifth, Lachie Stewart fifth, Alex Brown sixth and Hugh Barrow seventh.   Into the new year and Alex’s introduction to the classic road races continued with sixth place in a star studded field for the Nigel Barge Trophy at Maryhill.     Won by Ian McCafferty from Fergus Murray, Andy Brown, Lachie Stewart and Roger Young,  Alex was less than half a minute behind the winner.   There was another top class field battling it out at Strathleven, Dumbarton, the following week for the Midland District championship.   McCafferty won comfortably from Andy Brown, Lachie Stewart, Alex, Jim Johnston and Dick Wedlock.   (Looking at these runners facing each other week in, week out, it provokes the question about why we do not see such sterling battles as regularly now and whether there is a connection between that lack and the decline in standards,   In the National at Hamilton on 27th February, Alex raced in the Junior race where he was third.   Look at the quality in this one, runners in finishing order were Ian McCafferty, Roger Young, Alex Brown, Dick Wedlock, Walter Eadie, Ian Young and Jim Brennan.   The senior leaders were Fergus Murray, Jim Alder, Lachie Stewart, Andy Brown and Donald Macgregor.   The selectors did not select Brown for the international, choosing instead to have him, along with Roger Young, as reserve for the senior team.   The baptism of fire continued as Alex turned out in the Tom Scott Road Race on 3rd April  which was a battle royal between Alder, Andy Brown, Stewart and McCafferty while the second group contained Alastair Wood, Dick Wedlock, Jim Johnston and Henry Summerhill along with young Alex.   McCafferty faded seriously at the end to finish fifteenth with the first  four being Alder (47:34), Andy Brown (47:40), Lachie Stewart (48:45) and Alex (49:07).

1965 was a good year on the track for Alex but the winter would start again in the first week of October with the McAndrew Relay at Scotstoun.   Alex ran on the first stage for the team that won and set a new record for the course although Alex could nly finish three seconds behind Eddie Knox on the first stage.    In the Lnarkshire championship relay the following week Motherwell split their resources with Andy Brown and Bert McKay runningin the second team.   The A team with McCafferty, Alex, Wedlock and McNulty on comfortably enough in the end    A week later, 16th October, Motherwell travelled to Dundee for the Kingsway relay – it was unusual for them to run in this one where the main contenders were usually Shettleston, Victoria Park, Dundee Hawkhill and the university squads.   However the team of Davie Simpson, Alex and Andy Brown and Ian McCafferty won by 9 seconds from an Edinburgh University team of Elson, Gamwell, Blamire and Murray.  The following week was the Scottish YMCA relay championships and again Motherwell switched their teams around with one being made up of older runners (Marshall, McKay, Simpson and Andy Brown) and the other of younger men (Wedlock, Greenshields, Alex Brown and McCafferty.)   Separated by only two seconds at the end of the first lap, McKay opened up more than a minute on Greenshields which made the task facing McCafferty and Brown impossible.   And so it proved with the old’uns beating the young’uns by 36 seconds after McCafferty had started 58 seconds behind Andy Brown.  Nevertheless, McCafferty had the fastest time of the day with Alex third quickest.   They were separated by Andy Brown.   There was no messing about with team selections in the Midland District relays though – the top team of Alex Brown (second on the first stage behind Jim Brennan of Maryhill), Bert McKay, Andy Brown and McCafferty  was on duty and they duly won from Shettleston.   The only runner from the club to tackle the Glasgow University road race at the start of November was Bert McKay who finished second, 15 seconds down on Lachie Stewart.   The SCCU team to face the British Army on 27 November was chosen and it included both Brown brothers, Ian McCafferty, Jim Alder, Craig Douglas, Fergus Murray, Eddie Knox and Lachie Stewart.   The Edinburgh to Glasgow relay came two weeks later and while Motherwell had been carrying all before them in the west, a very good Edinburgh University team was doing at least as well in the East.   The two teams came head-to-head in an eight man a side competition.   Davie Simpson was third on the first stage on which Alistair Blamire was first for the University, Alex Brown pulled the team up to first on the second stage passing Joe Reilly of Victoria Park and Alex Wight of the University team.   But it was back to third for Motherwell on the next stage where Johnny Poulton dropped two places to Pat Maclagan (Victoria Park) and J Rough of Edinburgh Southern with the University back in fifth.   On to the fourth stage and Andy Brown in the fastest time of the day moved up to first while Chris Elson pulled the University into second place, 51 seconds down.   On the undulating and exposed fifth stage, Willie Marshall ran well but still dropped two places to Frank Gamwell (EU 1st) and Calum Laing (VPAAC 2nd).   Ian McCafferty v Fergus Murray on the long sixth stage with Murray having a 29 second advantage.   By the end of a terrific seven miles Murray had increased his lead to 66 seconds with Hugh Barrow in third place for Victoria Park.   John Wight for the University took a further 4 seconds out of Bert McKay with the fastest time on the penultimate stage and Roger Young coming across the line 80 seconds up on Motherwell’s Wedlock with Alistair Johnston of Victoria Park turning in the fastest time and finishing only 15 seconds behind in third for Victoria Park.    Alex’s run on the second stage had been a very good one indeed being one of only two runners inside 29 minutes for the stage.

The following week’s representative match against the Army was a bit of an anti-climax after that but Alex finished fourth in the race behind Stewart, Knox and McKay, McCafferty having been spiked on the starting line by a Scottish team reserve.   The New Year started with the annual Beith races where  Alex was second to Ian McCafferty with Andy in third place   On Monday, 3rd January at half-time in the Celtic v Rangers match at Parkhead, Alex was fourth on the ‘frozen, rutted’ track in 14:28  behind Lachie Stewart, Andy Brown and Jim Brennan.  and then in the Nigel Barge race the following Saturday, he was fourth behind Lachie Stewart, Eddie Knox and brother Andy.   It was a terrific start to the year and the next big race was the Midland District Championship one week later but Alex was side-lined and could not turn out for the club which finished second behind Victoria Park.   The National was held at Hamilton on February 26th that year and Alex was there and finished ninth.   The Motherwell team was without McCafferty who was the winner of the Junior race and Alex’s place was not good enough to get him into the team for the international at Rabat.

That three miles time in January was to remain his best for the year and the only other ranking time was the two miles run at Shotts – again on a difficult dirt track with one straight sloping slightly downhill and one slightly uphill – the time on 3rd September was 9:20.4.   Ranked twenty six in Scotland for two – and twenty eighth for three miles, he went into the first race of winter 1966 – 67.

As usual the winter season started with the short relays and this year the Motherwell team which had won everything the previous year, started with the problem that Ian McCafferty was not available for the first two relays.   This was compounded at the Lanarkshire relay by the absence of the injured Bert McKay.   Well though the Brown brothers ran, the club lost both titles.   McKay was back for the YMCA relay but there was still no sign of McCafferty and Alex had the fastest time of the day.   McCafferty ran for the first time in winter 1966-67 at the Midland Relays at King’s Park in Stirling.   Alex on the first stage handed over a 120 yard lead and McKay, Andy Brown and McCafferty never looked like losing that.   They won by two and a quarter minutes from Victoria Park with Dumbarton AAC third.   Alex was fourth fastest behind McCafferty, Stewart and Brennan.   In the Glasgow University road race at the start of November, Brown was fifth less than a minute behind winner Lachie Stewart who had set a new record for the course.   In the Edinburgh to Glasgow on 17th November, Motherwell was third with Alex running the fastest time on the fourth stage in bringing the club up from fourth to second.   The team to represent the SCCU against the British Army the following Saturday was chosen after the race and both Brown brothers and Ian McCafferty were all in there.   In that match, Alex was sixth and was picked again after that match to represent the Union two weeks later against  Scottish Universities.   Before then however came the Lanarkshire county championships and Motherwell won comfortably with McCafferty and Alex Brown taking first and second spots.   In the Universities match on 10th December, McCaffety was second to John Linaker, losing by only 3 seconds.   McCaffety was running really well at this point and won the Nigel Barge race at the start of January with Alex down in eighth place.

The Midland District championship was held in Bellahouston Park on 20th January, 1967 and high quality race it was.   Look at the first twelve finishers:

1. I McCafferty 30:00;  2.   L Stewart  31:08;   3.   Alex Brown   31:21;   4.   Andy Brown   31:31;   5.   J Brennan  31:42;   6.   J Myatt  32:03;   7.   E Knox  32:11;   8.   H Barrow   32:13;  9.   R Wedlock  32:20;   10.   I Donald   32:26;   11.   R McKay   32:28;   12.   P Maclagan  32:30.

Apart from McCafferty’s outstanding run on the day, every place was fought for although Motherwell easily won the team race from Victoria Park.   Into the national championships at Hamilton Park and 1967 was the year that the New Zealand team turned out in real force – it was a good run out in preparation for the international to be held at Barry, Glamorgan.   The result was six NZ runners in the first seven places with others not far behind.   Alex was sixth Scot to finish and was selected for the international.   The Scottish team was a creditable fifth in the international, led home by Lachie Stewart, with Alex as last scoring runner in 67th place.

1967 national:   Alex fourth from the left, behind Lachie Stewart.

1967 was the summer when Law and District AAC appeared on the scene.   As might be expected they all performed well in their debut summer season with McCafferty topping several ranking lists and Alex and Andy both being well up in several more.   Alex’s top Two Mile was at Helenvale in Glasgow on 27th June when his time of 8:54.8 in second place placed him eighth in the national rankings at the end of the season and his best Three Miles was on 27th May at Westerlands where he was second in the Wesr District which rated him twelfth.   He also hada good Six Miles to his credit when he ran 28:55.0 finishing third on 23rd June to be fifth at the end of the season.

In the McAndrew  on 7th October the team was ninth with Andy and Alex having third and fourth fastest times of the day.   In the  LAAA county realy, Law was fifth with Alex 2^nd fastest, but there was no Law team entered in the Midland Championship.   When the Motherwell club splitr at the formation of Law and District, Bert McKay and a few others of the regular top men stayed where they were and this was to affect team performances.   In November at the University road race, Alex was fourth, and Andy fifth behind Stewart, Knox and Maclagan).   In their first year, the new club was not in the E-G;  On 25^th  November, in the SCCU   v Army  Ales was  3^rd  behind Bryan-Jones and Blamire.   The first race in December was the Lanarkshire county championships and Alex was third in a race won by McCafferty.   A week later in the race between the SCCU and the Scottish Universities he was seventh and of course a member of the winning team.   Not out in the Nigel Barge road race, Alex was eighth in the Springburn Cup race.   He picked up for the more important Midland District championships at Bellahouston where, with most of the top six or seven runners away at European races, he was third behind Maclagan and Brennan.   A taste of the track tested out his speed when he won the three miles at the Shettleston Harriers open winter meeting at Barrachnie in 14:27.   The gradually escalating races throughout February included the Inter-Counties Championships at Dundonald in Troon where he was second to John Lineker and then the National itself where he was fifth – two places in front of Andy.   Despite McCafferty and Alder missing the race but being added to the international team, both Brown brothers had done well enough to be selected.   In the race held in Tunis, Scotland, following a superb run by the older Brown was fourth with Alex well down the field in 67th.   The Tom Scott was either the last race of the winter or the first of the summer, but in any case Alex was third in 48:44 behind McCafferty (48:39) and Gareth Bryan-Jones (48:49)

In summer ’68 Alex again ran his best Two Miles at Helenvale – 9:08.0, and in the Three Miles he was third in the West Districts in 14:18.8 and second in the Inter-Counties in 14:08.4

Second to Shettleston Harriers in the McAndrew relay and in the Lanarkshire relay too, they won the YMCA relay on the third Saturday of the month.   The Midland relays were on the first Saturday in November and Law was fourth – Strathclyde University surprisingly finishing second to upset the order of things, however Alex Brown was second fastest of the day behind Lachie Stewart.   None of the Law men ran in the Glasgow University road race and the club did not have a team in the Edinburgh to Glasgow relay in 1968 so it was right on to December. where both Alex and Andy faced the British Army on behalf of the SCCU where they were part of the team which won the battle.   In the Midland District championship there was no Alex Brown, indeed there was no team at all from Law and District.   Nor was there any Alex Brown in the National Championships so he missed out on the International as well.

That summer, 1969, Alex recorded 8:26 for 3000m when he won at Airdrie Highland Games at Rawyards Park and 14:43.6 when he finished second in the West District Championships 5000m.

1968 National: Linaker (399), Stewart (413), Alex Brown, Jim Wright (105), Andy Brown (217), Jim Brennan (223) and Donald Macgregor

In the McAndrew in October 1969 the ‘Glasgow Herald’ said all that had to be said.   “Shettleston Harriers, unable to field their strongest team, had to give best to Law and District in the McAndrew relay at Jordanhill on Saturday.   The Law runners finally won easily but were well outside the record these same four runners set four years ago when running in Motherwell YMCA’s colours.   In the past Law have usually put their weakest runner off first leaving Alex and Andrew Brown and Ian McCafferty to pull in the deficit on the remaining three legs.   On Saturday they reversed the order.   After these three had built up a lead of 65 seconds for David Simpson, their anchor man, there was really very little Bill Scally, Shettleston’s last runner could do about it.”   It should be noted of course that David Simpson had run for Scotland in the International cross-country championship in 1962 so it was really a solid man closing in at the finish for Law.    The following week end Law was second in the county relay with Alex returning the third fastest time.    In the West District championships, Law was second to Shettleston – it was clearly Shettleston’s year with former Motherwell runner Dick Wedlock and Lachie Stewart making a massive contribution to that success.   On 8th November, Alex finished third in the Glasgow University Road Race behind Pat Maclagan and Eddie Knox.    1969 was the year that Law made the Edinburgh to Glasgow relay race but they found it hard going and could only finish ninth with Alex on the long, hard, seven miles of the sixth stage.   He picked up one place, from eighth to seventh, but was not among the fastest times on that stretch.   Alex was picked to run for the SCCU against the British Army and Northern Counties the following week where the Scottish team won comfortably enough.   He ran in neither the Nigel Barge nor the Springburn Cup road races at the start of 1970.   But on 24th January at Lenzie, in the Midland District Championships, Alex was sixth in the event which Ian McCafferty won.   However, came the National and the Brown brothers were well down the field, Andy in 25th and Alex in 30th.

Alex had no international cross-country in 1970 and no ranking times at any distance during the track season.   No Law team took part in the McAndrew or Lanarkshire relays but there was one team entered in the District championships: it finished 17th with no Alex Brown in the team and Andy could only finish 12th on the first stage.   There was a team in the Edinburgh to Glasgow relay in mid-November but it finished 17th with Andy eighth on the first stage, Alex dropping to fourteenth on the seconds, then a drop to sixteenth for the next three stages before David Simpson picked up one place on the long leg with the team slipping back to 17th on the seventh stage and finishing there at the end of the day.   Alex had nineteenth time out of the twenty with twentieth time run by A Brown of East Kilbride.   The Law team finished twelfth in the West District at Stirling but although Andy Brown was the first scoring runner in twenty sixth, Alex was not in the team.   In the National at  Bellahouston Park, Alex was third counter for Law in 105th position.   His running was a shadow of what it had been.

Alex was never a runner that was courted by the Press.   I do not remember ever seeing any interview  with him as there were with Ian McCafferty, brother Andrew, Jim Brennan, Lachie Stewart or any other of his contemporaries.   He was never loud or ostentatious at meetings.   In 1970 when he had virtually retired he was only just over 26 years old.   I have a friend who reckons that 26 is the key age for keeping young seniors in the sport – at that point their careers are starting to take off.   They are probably married with children or about to be so.   It is a time when priorities are being set.   Without any knowledge of Alex’s situation, I would guess that he had decided to concentrate on his career rather than on his athletics.  Whatever the reason, there was a clear lowering of the standard of his performances.

He did not stop running but his results slipped considerably.  In the Edinburgh to Glasgow of November 1971 he ran on the second stage and dropped from fifth to eleventh with fourteenth time of the day: not really bad on this most difficult of stages but not what we’d have expected a few years earlier.    In the National of 1972 he was down in 76th place and third scorer for the Law & District team.   He had a good 3000m the following year but slower than he had run for some time.   In winter 1972-73 he ran the fourth stage for the Law team in the Midland District relay and dropped to third place.   On the sixth stage of the Edinburgh to Glasgow, Alex Brown moved his team up one place from thirteenth to twelfth, overtaking Robert Anderson of Cambuslang with ninth time of the day.   In the Midland championships in January 1973, Law & District finished seventh team but did so without the services of Alex Brown.  He had a good run in the National though when he was 35th – one place behind Eddie Knox.

The Law team for the Midland District relay in 1973-74 was Fairweather, Miller, Thonson, McIver.   There was no place in  the team in the Edinburgh to Glasgow for either of the Browns or McCafferty.   There was no sign of either Andy or Alex in any of the major championship races that year – the Law team was even unlucky enough not to be in the first three in the Lanarkshire relays where for many years they were a ‘banker’ and could afford to switch teams around to get first two places.   Alex’s career was effectively over.

Alex was always a bit overshadowed by big brother Andy who had the advantage of being first to display his talent on the athletics stage.   But Alex was a notable talent in his own right.   Five international cross country vests between 1963 and 1968 (1963, 64, 65, 67, 68).   Twice as a Junior and three times as a senior.   National youth cross-country champion, district champion, medals at SAAA and District level on the track and a Scottish international vest on the track.   Add in the other, slightly lesser triumphs such as fastest time on his stage of the Edinburgh to Glasgow relay and the number of excellent scalps he had taken in head to head races and you have a more than competent athlete the likes of which Scotland desperately needs in the twenty first century.   Remember, this was all done before he was 26 years old – and many authorities reckon that a distance runner doesn’t reack his peak until he is 27!

 

If you say “Jim Brown” to any distance running aficionado in Scotland they will immediately say “Cross Country” in response.    There was a lot more to Jim than that – track running and road racing were equally good and when he turned to the marathon then there were good times there as well.    Were we dealing with cross country or all round endurance talent he would have to be well up in the list.   However we are focusing narrowly on the marathon here.   We can inspect his cross country performances, look at his track running and then review his marathon running before reproducing his reply to the Scottish Marathon Club magazine questionnaire.   That being said, his cross country running was masterly and in the early 70’s in particular he was quite outstanding.    He ran seven times for Scotland in the Senior International team and three times for the Junior squad where he was third, then second and then, in 1973, first.   He won the District titles (Junior and Senior simultaneously) in three consecutive years and then won the senior title.   Let’s just lay them out clearly.

1. Midland District Junior Championship:   Winner in 1971, 1972 and 1973
2. Midland District Senior Championship:  Winner in 1971, 1972 and 1973
3. Scottish Junior Championship: Winner in 1972 and 1973
4. Scottish Senior Championship:   1974.
5. Junior International Championship:   Third in 1971, second in 1972 and first in 1973.
6. Senior International Championship:   Seven appearances (position in brackets)

1974 (4th), 1975 (75th), 1976 (24th), 1977 (36th), 1978 (114th), 1980 (31st), 1981 (DNF).

Jim winning the World Junior Cross-Country in 1973

On the roads over the winter season he ran superbly well and maybe his best were reserved for the Edinburgh to Glasgow in 1979 and 1980 when the Clyde Valley team won and Jim had the fastest times on the sixth stage in 1979 (starting in first place and running a faster time than Allister Hutton, Jim Dingwall and Lawrie Spence among others) and the fifth stage (1980).    There were many other fine performances – eg in 1973 he pulled up six places on the second stage including Nat Muir and Alastair Wood.

How about on the track?    Again he was a top talent and is still ranked in the top twenty of all time in the Two Miles (8:33.2 in 1975), 5000 Metres (13:39.0 in 1975) and 10000 metres (fifth with 28:00.62 in 1975).    There were Scottish representative honours on the road and track as well as over the country.

So when he turned to the twenty six miles plus of the marathon there was genuine interest on what would be produced.   In 1979 he raced to 2:22:22 on a fierce course in Aberdeen to be second to Graham Laing (Aberdeen) who was less than a minute ahead with 2:21:40.   His fastest in 1980 was 2:19:03 at Milton Keynes to be ranked fifth in Scotland for that year.   Not ranked in 1981 his best in 1982 was 2:20:38 to be eleventh Scot and he was not ranked on 1983.

Scottish Marathon Club Magazine: June 1986

Profile

Name:   Jim Brown

Club:   Motherwell YMCA Harriers

Date of Birth: 13/9/52

Occupation:   Assistant Facilities Officer – Monklands District Council

Personal Bests:   1500: 3:49           3000: 7:58          5000: 13:39        10000: 28:00.6        10 Miles: 46:22            Marathon: 2:19:03

How Did You Get Involved In The Sport?   It was by accident really, whilst in the Boys Brigade I was more or less volunteered along with four or five others to take part in the Motherwell Battalion cross-country championships at Cleland Estate.   At that time most of my spare time was spent playing football or travelling to watch Motherwell.   I was a pretty ardent ‘steel men’ enthusiast in those days.   I was 15 when I ran at Cleland I remember the race very clearly, we were asked to follow a certain runner who would win anyway. as the course was not marked in any way.   As the race progressed both of us broke clear and eventually I won on the run-in.   I always remember the BB Captain saying he thought I was going to sprint out of Cleland Estate such was my enthusiasm over the last 100 metres.   It was then I met John Waddell who persuaded me to start running with Bellshil YMCA.    This had been my first introduction to cross country running and my attendance was very sporadic but in these early days it was the continuing promptings of John Waddell which introduced me to the sport.   We have been friends ever since and he can still quote my DoB (for entry on the day purposes!)

What Do You Get Out Of The Sport?   From my days as a Junior (17-20) I had built up a tremendous will to win.   I loved the involvement and competition at National and International level, also the travelling and the pre-race atmosphere created  eg San Sebastian.   I always felt I thrived on those conditions.   I’ve also struck up many friendships at home and abroad and met some really interesting characters – competitors and officials alike.

Can You Describe Your General Attitude To The Sport?   Until my years as a Junior I had a really easy going attitude to races.   For those who can recall I was usually the bridesmaid to Ron McDonald.   My attitude was really shattered by Alec Johnstone, an official with the SCCU during my first ever trip to San Sebastian – I finished second to Fava of Italy.   I was reasonably pleased with my afternoon’s work as I thought was Alec.   Whilst chatting to him applause broke out at the finish area, this was for Fava to receive his winning trophy in the stand.   Alec Johnstone casually turned to me and said, “That’s the difference between being first and being second – he’s up there and you’re down here.”   He never added anything else but I’m positive I became a better and more aggressive runner from that moment.

Has Any Individual Or Group had A Marked Effect On Either Your Attitude To The Sport Or On Your Performance?   I think in my early days my first coach Bob Henshaw helped shape my attitude.   He was a professional sprint coach and during my first two years under him he taught me tremendous restraint and patience in training.   I was beginning to handle training workloads and was always looking for longer workouts but he was an advocate of set work loads and never tried to run me into the ground.   In my later days at Borough Road College I was very impressed with Phil Banning who I found was a very organised, systematic and forthright character.   I think we were the same in some respects but we tended to dodge each other in training because when we got together the rest of the team were posted missing as he, like me, wanted to be number one, even in training runs.

What Do You Consider Your Best Performance?   Regards time and ranking 28:00.6 10km run at Crystal Palace when finishing second to Dave Black is looked on as one of my best runs.   I think it ranked me seventh in the world that year, although personally I took as much pleasure at dipping under 3:50 for 1500m for the first time.

And Your Worst?   I think it must have been the 1976 Olympic Trial at Crystal Palace.   Previously I had been ranked third in Britain due to my 10k the previous year.   It was my final year at College, I was due to sit my Physical Education finals and although my training, especially speed work, had been going well, my competitive work outs that year had been terrible.   I went for broke, went through halfway in just over 14 minutes.   I recall the elation of thinking that I was nearly in the team but it was short lived as I tied up and finished the last half running backwards.   I don’t think I have ever been so depressed or disappointed after a race.

What Do You Do Apart From Running To Relax?   I enjoy club nights at Motherwell.   We’re building up a strong squad and there’s nothing better after the Tuesday ‘Steady 10’  than a few beers.   Besides training, my two little girls Sharlene and Deborah tend to take up most of my time, although my wife and I are very partial to Indian food and we tend to do the rounds of the Indian night spots!   I’m first to admit that it doesn’t do a lot for your early morning run!

What Goals Do You Have That Are Still Unachieved?   I’ve had a lot of calf trouble in the last year and my training has been curtailed.  I’d just like to be injury free and enjoy the road racing scene.   I’ve no immediate goals – I’d like to speed up a bit as I enjoy the shorter road races and forget about marathons for a while.

What Has Running Brought You That You Would Not Have Wanted To Miss?   The travelling and meeting people as already mentioned, also the rewards, when winning major events, for the months or years of conditioning.   The involvement at club level and some of the characters one meets, we had our share at Clyde Valley, mentioning no names – I don’t want to start any rumours.

Can You Give Details Of Your Training?   Injury free, I run between 70 and 90 miles a week in winter including one rep session of one and a half or two minute reps, these sessions are usually part of a 7 – 8 mile run with the time of the repetition being the recovery.   The rest of my runs are made up of lunchtime 5 – 6 and easy evening 6 or 7 with a 10 mile club run on Tuesdays and a long run on Sunday, between 15 and 20 miles.   I run most of my sessions at around 6 minute a mile pace.   I’ve tried the pre-breakfast run at various times but I find I’m more sleep walking than perpetual motion, so my first venture out is always around lunchtime.   Although I work at a leisure centre I only have around 45 minutes to fit in a run and I’m usually on call between the three sports centres in the District.   I also work shifts so if I’m on a late shift I generally try to run about a further 7 – 9 miles in the morning.   I like to compete once every three weeks which fits in with my shifts.   In the summer I usually run around 80 miles a week – most runs are made up of 5’s or 6’s.   I run two rep sessions sometimes three a week.   6/8 x 2 minutes, 8 x 1 minute and one track session of 200 or 300 with a short recovery.   My rep sessions are run on grass or cinder paths.

What Changes Would You Like To See In The Sport?   I’d like to see more athletes taking up posts in administration at SAAA and SCCU level.   We’ve had occasions in the past when  officials have been accompanying teams abroad who have no idea how to encourage or motivate an athlete and have the awful habit of saying the wrong thing at the wrong time.  Perhaps it is now time for full time paid officials – with a background in the sport, not someone stipulating that you should be wearing white shorts and a certain style of track suit prior to an event.

On the competitive side I think there are too many half marathons and marathons, we’ve already had a few fatalities.   I feel that 5k and 10k road races should be encouraged  more as too many people are jumping on the marathon kick.   Gradual progression is the key.

Jim’s first run in the Junior Cross-Country International was in 1971 and we will start the rest of this profile in that year when he started racing against Seniors.    The summer of 1971 was one in which Jim and his friend Ron McDonald totally dominated the endurance events in Scottish athletics in the junior age group.   In the 1500m, Ron was top with 3:46.0 (run on the cinders at Rawyards Park, Airdrie) with Jim third with 3:51.5 (at Birmingham)   and they were separated by Frank Clement on 3:48.0.   McDonald topped the 3000m with 8:07.2 at Helenvale, with Brown second with 8:08.4 at Crystal Palace, Brown led the 5000m rankings with McDonald second (14:03.4 at Meadowbank, and 14:24.6 at Scotstoun).   Brown was also second in the 2000m steeplechase (5:50.0 behind Kilpatrick’s 5:41.8) and 3000m steeplechase (9:23.6 behind Kilpatrick’s 9:20.0).    The domination was competitive as well as time based: McDonald won both the SAAA Junior 1500m and SAAA Junior 5000m, while Brown won the Junior 2000m steeplechase and was second in the West District 1500m behind Dave McMeekin.   At Senior level, McDonald won the West District 800m and Brown was third in the SAAA Senior 5000m.   The Scottish Athletics 1972 yearbook commented: “Ron McDonald and Jim Brown successfully challenged the best of Scotland’s seniors in open races and were clearly superior to the rest of the juniors who nevertheless contain some talented performers.   Brown finished second and McDonald third in the AAA Junior championship race, and then tied for first place with Junior multi-record holder Dave Black, when representing Great Britain in a Junior International v West Germany and Sweden.”   So nobody could say that the Seniors hadn’t been warned.

However, many good young Youths come up and make an impression in the Senior Ranks as Juniors – but none had made an impact like Jim did in winter 1971-72, or made it so quickly.    The winter season usually begins with the McAndrew Relays in October and Jim’s McAndrew debut was on 3rd October 1970.   Immediate impact.   The headline in the Glasgow Herald read “FASTEST RUNNER IN McANDREW RELAY DISQUALIFIED” – and it was Jim they were talking about.   No doubts about the quality of the run, he was faster round the course than Don Macgregor, Lachie Stewart, Norman Morrison, Alastair Johnston and all the other top men of the day.   “The  revelation of the day was the run by 18-year-old Jim Brown the former Bellshill YMCA member who has moved to Monkland Harriers.   That change of club however automatically brings a 14-month suspension from team competitions on an individual, and Brown’s time is nowhere near served.   And so, despite leading home a record field of 83 runners on the first leg and unbelievably finishing up the fastest man in the whole race, Brown was rightly discarded from the official results and his team disqualified.   Nevertheless this cannot detract from his great run.”      Jim had gone straight to the front and handed over 30 yards up on Norman Morrison, his final time was two seconds quicker than Don Macgregor who received the award.   Unable to run in the Lanarkshire Relays or the  Kingsway Relays in Dundee, he next raced on 24th October in the Scottish YMCA relay at Bellshill where he had fastest time of the day.   All well and good but the top opposition did not compete in the YMCA event.   They were not to appear again until the Glasgow University road race on 14th November.   This time they were head-to-head  –  Fergus Murray, Alistair McKean, Donald Macgregor, Hugh Barrow and company faced the starter along with Jim Brown.    “Jim Brown, the Monkland teenager who shook all of us six weeks ago by running the fastest time in the McAndrew Relay, came back on Saturday in the Willie Diverty Memorial Road Race with a reminder that his initial claim for attention was no seven-day wonder.   The eight-stone stripling with the broad Lanarkshire accent audaciously forced the pace against the world-travelled schoolmaster from Fettes College, Fergus Murray, ten years his senior, as the pair of them battled over the closing stages they presented a picture of two runners poles apart in  so many departments.   For anyone looking for a fairy-tale ending there was a disappointment.   Murray controlled matters over the last three-quarters of a mile of the five mile course and entered the gates of Westerlands having at last subdued this youngster at his heels.   The Edinburgh man completed one lap of the track finishing in 24 minutes 41 seconds which takes an enormous 35 seconds off Lachie Stewart’s record of three years ago.   Brown was a mere three seconds behind in recording his most satisfying performance since taking up the sport.   Afterwards he said he hadn’t expected to beat his more experienced opponent but was delighted at having come so near.   Murray too was impressed, “I think he has a big future.   He was certainly setting a fast pace – one I was quite content to follow.”    Jim Brown had certainly arrived.   The next test was for a SCCU select in a four-way competition at Durham on 5th December against Northumberland & Durham, Northern Universities and Morpeth Harriers.   One of the main aims of this fixture, and others that season, was to give some of the younger Scottish runners experience outside of their own home area.    How did Jim do this time?   Well he was fourth overall and first SCCU runner home behind Jim Alder, John Caine and Ernie Pomfret,  but  ahead of such as Maurice Benn, Tom Grubb and Willie Day.    A week later, running for the SCCU in their B team match against Scottish Universities at Knightswood Park in Glasgow, Jim was second to his Monkland team mate Ron McDonald, beaten by only four yards.  Third was Alastair Johnston of Victoria Park – 6 seconds down on Jim.   The classic road race start to the New Year was the Nigel Barge race promoted by Maryhill Harriers and in 1971 it was on 5th January.   Almost all the top men were there – along with Jim and his team mate Ronnie McDonald.   This time the winner was Ronnie – the finishing sprint of the top-class miler was enough to give him victory ahead of Dick Wedlock, Gareth Bryan-Jones and Alistair Blamire with Jim Brown sixth.   He lifted a few good scalps here too though.

With the Nigel Barge past, attention was on the Championships and the representative outings.   The first of these was the Midland championship on 23rd January at Stirling University.   The headline and report read as follows:

“BROWN COOL AND CONVINCING MIDLAND TITLE WINNER.   Jim Brown, the 18-tear-old Bellshill Academy schoolboy, ran his way back into the headlines on Saturday with an easy-looking win in the Midland District cross-country championship.   The course, at Stirling University’s playing fields, was as severe as any on the Scottish circuit but the lightweight Brown skimmed over the mud and stones as if he were on a summer track.   He covered the six miles in 30 minutes   04 seconds and finished looking almost as cool as he had at the start.   Coming in over 60 yards behind was Norman Morrison (Shettleston) a 1500m runner in the Commonwealth Games , and about the same distance behind him came Alistair Johnston (Victoria Park).   Those three had dominated the race virtually from the start.   Brown looking almost too young and spare of flesh to be a senior winner flicked the caked mud off his body as he expressed surprise at the way the race had unfolded “I thought the pace was kind of slow.   With only three of us clear of the field after the first lap, I just decided to go to the front and see how things went.   Norman seemed to drop back and I knew the race was mine.”    It should be noted though that none of Lachie Stewart, Ian McCafferty or Dick Wedlock was running.    The following Sunday, Brown was in San Sebastian where he finished second in the international Junior race over 6200m less than eight seconds behind the winner, Fava of Italy.   In Madrid on 13th February, Brown was third in the Junior international won by his Monkland team mate Ron McDonald.   Frank Clement was sixteenth and the team finished second.   McDonald and Brown were lso first and second in the National Junior CC Championships at Bellahouston and were picked for the team to contest the international at Spain in March.   Before then there was the Scottish Schools cross-country championships in which Brown, running for Bellshill Academy beat McDonald (St Patrick’s, Coatbridge) by half a minute.   In the International, Jim was third with the team second – Ian Gilmour was thirteenth and Ron McDonald fourteenth on a muddy course with a heavy wind blowing.   It had been an excellent first season against the seniors with the bronze medal in the international the icing.

Jim had finished summer 1970 ranked in three different events – his best time for the 1500m was 3:57.2 which ranked him 23rd in Scotland, the 3000m 8:39.8 which ranked him 24th and the steeplechase where his 9:24.2 ranked him seventh in Scotland.   Coming off the back of the winter he had just had, it was expected that he would be much quicker in  the summer of 1971.   The Glasgow Corporation Sports were held at Scotstoun on 22nd May and Jim Brown won the steeplechase in 9:23.2 – exactly one second faster than his best of 1970.   Unplaced, if indeed he ran, in the West Districts the following Saturday, he was next in action at the Airdrie HG at Rawyards Park at the start of June where he won the open 5000m in 14:20.8 – a full 25 seconds ahead of second placed Dick Wedlock and a further 10 in front of Paul Bannon in third.   Club mate Ron McDonald was turning in more than a race a week at this point over 800/1500/mile distances and winning them all.   On 19th June it was the Scottish Schools championships and McDonald and Brown both won their respective events – McDonald the 5000m in 14:24.6 and Brown the 2000m steeplechase in 5:55.4, a best championship performance – which set them up nicely for the SAAA Championships the next Satrday.   Brown was third in a very good 5000m behind Ian McCafferty and Adrian Weatherhead in 14:03.4, and McDonald lost the 1500m by 0.2 seconds to Craig Douglas.   It should be remembered that Brown was a fast miler as well as an endurance specialist: on 3rd July, for instance, he ran against Ron McDonald and Frank Clement in a Graded championship meeting at Grangemouth Stadium.    “The event which created the greatest interest was the 1500 metres in which three top-class juniors met – Ronnie McDonald and Jim Brown (both Monkland Harriers) and Frank Clement (Strathclyde University)   Brown led at the end of the first lap and, although McDonald took over  temporarily, Brown stepped up the pace in the second lap, closely pursued by Clement.   The unflappable McDonald was content to stay in the first three.   In the back straight over 300 yards, Brown believing that the only way to beat McDonald was to take him that distance in a buirst of speed, put in all he knew in an effort to shake off his clubmate.   Undaunted, McDonald held on and he and Clement fought out the finish in which McDonald recorded the best championship time of 3:59.2,    Clement was second in 3:49.8 and Brown third in 3:51.5.”

On 17th July Jim suffered a rare defeat in schools athletics when he finished second in the 2000m steeplechase in the schools international at Meadowbank where he was beaten by Ian Kirkpatrick of England.   The trouble seemed to be that the Englishman was a much better hurdler than he was and the reporter felt, probably rightly, that Jim should have been selected for the 5000m.   His time was 5:50, 7.2 seconds down on the winner.   It was though a good summer with Brown racing against his elders as often as he could.   One such race was the 3000m team race at Cowal at the end of the season where he took on Lachie Stewart – “In the 3000 metres team race, Stewart found once again that his chief opponent for individual honours was the younger Jim Brown (Monkland) who tried hard to hold his more experienced opponent over the seven and a half laps of the course.    Brown failed to live with Stewart in finishing tactics, however,  and lost by eight yards.”   By the end of the summer he was ranked in 56 events with every time better than  the year before.   In the 1500m he had run 3:51.5 to be 13th in Scotland, in the 3000m his 8:08.4 ranked him 7th, at 5000m his best of 14:03.4 had him in sixth place and his steeplechase time of 5:50.0 for 2000m and 9:23.6 for 3000m ranked him second and sixth respectively.

Winter started for distance runners on the first Saturday in October at Scotstoun in Glasgow at the McAndrew Relays where Jim Brown had raised more than a few eyebrows the previous year.   This time he was again the fastest over the course.   “Brown, now a legitimate member of Monkland Harriers, was even more spectacular this time.   He took up the challenge on the second leg and fought his way from twelfth to second position behind Shettleston.   En route he always looked menacing and although Lachie Stewart was a mere figure in the distance, Brown must have pulled him back 120 yards by the time he finished.  Anyone doing that to a commonwealth champion is someone to be reckoned with.”

In the Lanarkshire Relay the following week, Jim had by far the fastest time of the day when Monkland finished second to Springburn with Shettleston third.   At the very end of October in the Allan Scally Relay at Shettleston, Jim Brown took over in 27th place and picked off all but four of them, inevitably turning in the day’s fastest time equalling the course record of 22:09 when he ran the second stage – Ronnie McDonald pulled the cub int third on the last stage.   A week later in the Midland Relay at Bellshill, he had the day’s fastest time, 10 seconds faster than Dick Wedlock and 13 seconds better than Lachie Stewart.   Missing the University 5 at Westerlands where Fergus Murray defeated him the previous year, Brown ran in the Edinburgh to Glasgow Relay on 20th November.   Running on the fourth stage, he moved Monkland up from twelfth to sixth with the fastest time of the day, a full minute quicker than the next best.    From a great run on the roads to a very good one over the country at Parliament Hill Fields in London, Brown finished fifth and second Scot (Lachie Stewart was fourth) in a race won by David Bedford who was only 14 seconds ahead of the 19-year-old Scot.   As a wee aside, the ‘Glasgow Herald’ pointed out that ‘plucky’   young Jim Brown’s big worry in the race was counting the laps and, near the end, he had to ask Lachie Stewart if they were really on the last lap.   The next major race for him was the Midland Championship at Bellshill where he had a head to head with Ian McCafferty while Lachie Stewart, Dick Wedlock and Ron McDonald were competing at Elgoibar.  The ‘Glasgow Herald’ of 24th January, 1972 read “McCAFFERTY AND BROWN TAKE A STEP NEARER MUNICH.   Jim Brown and Ian McCafferty took a step nearer Munich at the weekend when they plumbed depths of stamina at the weekend that left a huge field in the Midland cross-country championship helpless to respond.   Brown, the 19-year-old Monkland Harrier, retained the title at Bellshill and thus kept his unbeaten record in domestic competitions this winter, but what a challenge McCafferty offered in only his second outing of the season – his previous having also ended in defeat by Brown.   Sporting a Mexican-type moustache and long hair, McCafferty gave the holder the treatment he had been hoping to avoid – a hard punishing contest.   After the race, which Brown won by six seconds, he said “I had been hoping for an easy one here today because of the San Sebastian race next Sunday, but there’s no doubt about it – McCafferty’s fit all right, I thought he ran very well.”    It couldn’t have affected Brown too much because he won the Junior 6000m race in Spain by 17 seconds from England’s Bernie Ford.

The Scottish Junior Cross-Country Championship was on 19th February at Currie   and Jim Brown won from Paul Bannon by 29 seconds and gained selection for the international championships at Cambridge in March.   The date was 18th March and Brown had been third the previous year.   “Jim Brown won the silver medal in the junior race behind Aldo Tomasini (Italy( but until the lats 100 metres he was heading for nothing better than the bronze.   Suddenly Franco Fava, the other leading Italian, who was well clear of the Scot staged a Jim Peters type stagger and, as if in slow motion, the exhausted Fava slumped to the grass.   Brown, revitalised, sprinted 30 or 40 yards, passed the luckless Italian, who to his credit, managed to stagger to his feet and struggle his way over the line for third place.”    Two world junior championships, a third and a second – good going!

That summer (1972) Jim was ranked in four events and won two championship medals.    Third in the 5000m and second in the 10000m his best times for the year were 3:53.2 for the 1500, 8:17.4 for the 3000m, 13:59.8 for the 5000m and 28:57.8 for the 10000m.   In the 10000m championship, he was first in 29:25.13, thirteen seconds in front of Fergus Murray.       This championship was held in the GB v Poland international match at Meadowbank one week before the Scottish Championships and the photo-finish showed his time as 29:25.13.  The SAAA 5000 came the next week and he repeated his bronze medal of 1971 being behind David Black (Small Heath) 13:51.4, and Lachie Stewart (Shettleston) 13:58.8 with his own time being 13:59.8.   This title earned him selection for the GB international against Greece and the Netherlands in Athens the next week again.   He was a replacement for the injured Ricky Wilde and was described by Athletics Weekly as ‘a wobbly and plucky second’ behind Grenville Tuck in 29:47.0.   Clearly in brilliant form, just two weeks later he was seventh in the AAA 10000m at Crystal Palace in 28:58.   On 16th September Jim won an Edinburgh Southern Floodlit Meeting at Meadowbank in 14:00.0

n 7th October 1973, the ‘Glasgow Herald’ ran with the headline and article:.

 “BROWN SMASHES RECORD BUT SHETTLESTON WIN. 

It was hardly surprising that a good many of the runners in Saturday’s McAndrew Relay in Jordanhill, Glasgow, found it hard to swallow the extraordinary time set up by Jim Brown (Monkland Harriers) on the second leg.   Brown makes a habit of drawing attention to himself in this opener to the official cross-country season, a four-man road relay covering a circuit something short of three miles.   Two years ago he was the fastest individual, but was disqualified for competing while serving a 14-month suspension imposed automatically when a runner changes from one club to another. Last year everything was legitimate and he was again individual prize winner.   On Saturday Brown, wearing the now fashionable hairband, resembled some obsessed dervish as he thrashed his way round the course, dragging his club from the thirteenth place they occupied when he took over to an unbelievable second, behind Shettleston Harriers, the eventual winners. Monkland, however, dropped to seventh after the remaining two legs.   The really astonishing feature was Brown’s time – 13 min 2 sec – which smashed Lachie Stewart’s seven-year-old record by 18 seconds, roughly equivalent to a distance of about 120 yards.   After recovering from this early-season effort Brown said he had had to stop training after the AAA championships in July because of a strain in his right calf. It persisted for weeks, but now he is back into a strenuous schedule which for the moment seems to be paying dividends. His major ambition is to impress sufficiently next season over 10,000 metres to put himself in line for the Christchurch Commonwealth Games, just 16 months away.”   The first three teams were:  1 Shettleston H 55.22′ 2 Victoria Park 55.47; 3 ESH 56.17.   Fastest individuals were Fastest: JB 13.02; N Morrison (Shett) 13.20; P Bannon (GU) 13.30; JL Stewart (Shett) 13.32; Colin Youngson (VP) 13.36; D Macgregor (ESH) 13.37.”      The time was outstanding and when you look at the supporting cast of Morrison, Bannon, Stewart and Macgregor, you realise just how good.   The next big race was the Allan Scally Memorial Trophy Relay at Shettleston on October 28th and Jim Brown was fastest again (21.52) with Andy McKean (EAC) 21.58 and Norman Morrison 22.06. in second and third.

Jim was fastest man yet again in the Midland District Relay on 4th November at Lochinch in Glasgow: described this time as “the amazing workhorse of Monkland Harriers” who “thrives on adversity”, he moved from tenth to sixth on the last lap to be 18 seconds faster than Pat Maclagan who was next best runner.   A week later and the runner described this time as “Scotland’s best and most consistent cross-country runner since the season began” suffered “an inexplicable lapse” and finished twenty fifth in an international race in London against the best of English and Kenyan runners.   In the Edinburgh to Glasgow on the 18th November Jim was second fastest on the fourth stage, only 2 seconds behind Alex Wight of Edinburgh AC in the Monkland team that finished tenth.   The next international was the match against Wales, and various English regions at Stafford.    Scotland won from Northern Counties and the first three individuals were all Scots – Lachie Stewart first in 28:25, Jim Brown second in 28:27 and Ian Gilmour third in 28:55.   Missing several races his next outing was in the Midland Championship at Bellshill on 20th January – and it was a third successive win for the Monkland Harriers –   31:36 as against 31:53 by second placed Alan Partidge (Susan’s Dad), and Dave Mc Meekin’s 32:18.   A week later and Jim was in San Sebastian running in the Junior race – his third season as a Junior – where he won the 6.5 km race in 2:17.4 and Norman Morrison was second to Dave Bedford in the Senior race.   The National on 17th February was won by Jim eleven seconds ahead of Lawrie Spence with Ron McDonald third and this gave the selectors a problem.   As Ron Marshall said in the ‘Glasgow Herald’:    “The vexing question over Jim Brown still remains.   He is eligible to run as a Junior in Belgium, but would obviously be a marvellous asset to the Senior team, everyone is well aware of this.   No matter how well our Seniors perform, there will be this nagging feeling that young Brown, had the ability to finish well up the field making a vital contribution to the points total. “    He was selected for the Junior team: how could he not be?   He  had been third in 1971, second in 1972 and still a Junior.

The International championships had previously been held by the ICCU but from 1973 they were to be held by the IAAF, and the first of these was at Waregem in Belgium.   The IAAF had changed the qualifying conditions for Juniors such that “competitors had to be Under 21 years of age on the day of the race.”   Brown was 20 years and 5 months on the day of the race and really went for the title right from the start, he ran away from Leon Schots (Belgium) on the second of three laps, and eventually won by 30 yards from Cianaros Haro (Spain) who was second.   (Haro’s older brother Mariano was second in the Senior race.)   Jim Brown had done it – third, second and now first in the Junior Championship.   The fancied Scottish Seniors could do no better than eighth.

That summer (1973) saw Jim’s racing sabotaged by injury and his only mark of any note was a 5000m run in 14:27 which was almost half a minute slower than his 1972 time, at the Edinburgh Highland Games on 18th August.   With the Commonwealth Games being held in Christchurch, New Zealand, in January, 1974, selections had to be made on form that summer so Jim unfortunately missed out on selection.   He was also a notable non-starter in the early season races such as the McAndrew Relay, the Midlands Relay and the Glasgow University road race, making his first appearance in the Edinburgh to Glasgow Relay on 17th November where he moved up from fourth to first on the second stage with the third fastest time of the day.   Monkland finished eighth team and were awarded the medals for the most meritorious unplaced performance.   This was not an indicator that he would run in the County Championships the next weekend – the race was won by Ronnie McDonald but Brown was nowhere to be seen.   It may be of course that the uneven surface and course conditions were a deterrent to one who had missed so much time through injury.   His next appearance was on 5th January on the firmer and mostly safer surface of the roads around Maryhill where he was third in the Nigel Barge Road Race.   Won by his clubmate Ronnie Morrison from Lachie Stewart in a sprint finish, Brown was ahead of Norman Morrison, Jim Wight and Don Macgregor and was obviously in very good condition.   The Herald reporting at this point was not very satisfactory from the road and country running point of view, giving space and apparent precedence to comment, opinion and reporting on the upcoming Commonwealth Games in New Zealand at the expense of basic results eg the only time given for the classic Nigel Barge race was that of the winner, and no places were given below third and the following week the bulk of the space available was given to doping and the Games with the Springburn road race squashed into a bottom corner and not a single time, not even the winner’s, given.   Jim’s comeback was cemented with his selection to run in Elgoibar in Spain on 19th January when he was fifth individual and first Scot in the team which won the international team race, the others being Lawrie Reilly in sixth and Frank Clement ninth over the 9200m trail.

Came the National at Coatbridge on 16th February, 1974, and the reason for Brown’s absence became clear in Ron Marshall’s report on the race: Jim was now studying at London.   The report read:

“FORCEFUL BROWN RUNS McKEAN INTO GROUND

Jim Brown’s Physical Education studies at Borough Road College, London, are at least doing his running no harm.   On Saturday at Coatbridge he became Scottish senior cross-country champion in the most convincing fashion, and yesterday he was an automatic choice by the selectors for the international cross-country championship in Italy next month.   ….  Brown, winner of the Scottish and International Junior titles last year, faces the daunting prospect of stepping up into the big league in Milan but if his forceful attitude on Saturday is an indication of how he intends breaking into senior competition then the rest of the runners are in for a nasty experience.   He and Andy McKean, the defending champion, took little time in breaking away from the field of more than 400 starters and for two of the five laps of Drumpellier Park that made up the seven and a half miles course, they harried each other mercilessly.  Up slippery grass slopes, down greasy grass, they fairly tore at each other.   It was evident that some one had to give way at this relentless pace.   McKean it was who conceded the leading position, but Brown was not content just to slip ahead.   He dug afresh into the turf and mud stretching an astonishing gap between them.   After three laps it was 20 seconds, after four it was half a minute, but some equality was established on the last lap, where McKean lost no more ground.   Brown is in tremendous form, and is intent on building up over the next four weeks for a really serious crack at the senior title.   He runs mostly in Richmond Park these days, covering about 90 miles a week, and has three college commitments in the next three weeks – the Hyde Park Relays, a contest in Madrid and the English Championships.”

In the English National on 2nd March, Jim had a good spell early in the race, challenging the leaders, he even looked a possible winner for six of the nine miles, but slipped back in the latter stages to finish ninth.   But in the International on 14th March, he was back to his best.

“BROWN EXCELS ON A GOOD DAY FOR SCOTS

…  The most important talking point, naturally, was the fourth place attained in the individual race by Jim Brown.    His was a sterling.   Blessed with an endless determination, Brown approaches every competition with the attitude, “Who’s going to be second?”  And Saturday’s 12000m was no exception.    Reputations had little meaning for the slim Monkland Harrier as he forged ahead at what seemed like a reckless speed.    But the close attentions of Erik de Berk (Belgium), Mariano Haro (Spain) and Ray Smedley (England)  indicated that something more punishing than Brown’s pace would be needed at the “killing off” stage.   With half a lap to go the Scot showed signs of how sapping his efforts had been on him.   De Berk and Haro became the principal actors, but as the Scot slipped reluctantly upstage, he could take ample consolation from the strength of his supporting role.   The Belgian won in 35 minutes 24 seconds, a couple of strides in front of Haro.”   Karel Lismont of Belgium was third, only passing Brown in the last few strides.  Jim Brown was only 5 seconds behind the winner.    Four runners within five seconds!   It had been a good winter for him.

Having missed the Commonwealth Games in January, it was into summer 1974 in great shape for the track season.   At Crystal Palace on 2nd June, he won a 3000m in 8:01.2 which placed him second at the end of the year – to Ron McDonald (7:55.2).

10,000m was clearly Jim’s best track distance, and the Yearbook later commented: “Former World Junior cross country champion Jim Brown ran brilliantly at this distance, producing three times under 28 and a half minutes. His fastest performance was just over three seconds behind Ian Stewart’s list-topping 28.17.2, run when he was sixth in the Christchurch Commonwealth Games on 25^th January.”

At Meadowbank on the 22^nd of June he was second (13.51.2) in the SAAA 5000m, behind Dave Black of England, who won in 13.38.4.   On 12^th July the AAA Championship 10,000m took place at Crystal Palace. Athletics In Scotland reported: “Jim Brown excelled himself by improving on his previous best 10,000m time by over half a minute to finish in a very good fourth behind Dave Bedford (27.48.6), Bernie Ford (28.15.8) and Tony Simmons (28.19.4). Jim’s time was 28.20.8, which places him in third place in the Scottish All-Time Rankings and won for him another UK vest, this time against Czechoslovakia at Meadowbank on 26^th July.”   Jim remembers that race well and was leading the field with two laps to go, lapping many good quality runners and thinking he’d get well inside his previous best time – maybe even get a 28:30 – when on the back straight with less than two laps to go, he started to fade and eventually dropped to fourth – and recorded well inside the 28:30 that he had been hoping for.   Just one second behind Tony Simmons who was selected for the European championships on the strength of that run.   Result for Simmons?   Second in the Europeans!    Jim’s performance in that high quality, international race was later considered by Colin Shields to be the best performance of the Scottish season.    AIS again: “The most exciting race of the evening (actually closer than the 100 metres) was the 10,000 m, in which Jim Brown did exceptionally well. All four competitors, Jim Brown, Mike Baxter, Stanislav Hoffman and J. Jansky ran together throughout, with Baxter and Brown sharing the lead for most of the way. Hoffman took over at the bell, closely followed by Brown, Baxter, with the other Czech, Jansky, struggling. Jim Brown made a great effort on the back straight and overtook Hoffman to lead round the last bend. He appeared to have gone too early as, entering the home straight, both Hoffman and Baxter overtook him. All appeared lost for Jim with 50 metres to go until he displayed great fighting qualities by getting back on terms with the other two and crossed the line six inches behind Hoffman and just ahead of Baxter. Hoffman and Brown recorded the same time of 28.28.4, with Baxter two tenths of a second away third.” Athletics Weekly  agreed that the 10,000m was the most exciting finish of the evening, and added that the speedy Hoffman had been a   3.39.1   1500m performer back in 1966.    UK won the match overall, with 108 points to Czechoslovakia’s 102.

Then at Crystal Palace on September 25^th and 26^th, Finland’s Men’s team beat UK by a single point. On the second day of the match, Pekka Paivarinta (Finnish winner of the World Senior Cross Country Championship in 1973) defeated that year’s World Junior Champion, Jim Brown, in the 10,000m. Pekka recorded 28.18.4, and Jim his second-fastest time – 28.23.8, in front of Grenville Tuck (28.25.8) and Rune Holmen (28.48.2). AW reported: “Jim Brown and late replacement (for Dave Bedford) Grenville Tuck gave the 10,000 everything they had and the rewards went to all four runners in the shape of personal bests.” (A mistake by AW as far as Jim was concerned.) “Knowing the vast range of Pekka Paivarinta’s talent, they had no choice but to make the pace as hard as they could and hope he would drop. Brown led through 3k in 8.23.8 and 5k in 14.11.2, with all four runners together. Tuck took over the work and lapped in a steady 69 seconds, which dropped Holmen by 7k but Paivarinta always looked easy with his long relaxed stride. In the closing laps, Tuck and Brown could only manage to quicken the pace by a second or two and it was not enough. Paivarinta hit the front finally with 500 to go, but still the two Britons refused to give in and surprisingly the Finn had not burst away as expected. Brown and Tuck chased until 250m to go, when finally Paivarinta exploded and rocketed around the last 200m to open up a five second gap with a 57.6 last lap.”   It was no disgrace to lose to such a great runner; and Jim Brown must have been proud to look back on such an impressive track season, with a new personal best and three international 10,000 metre races in a British vest.

*

That winter (1974-75) saw the appearance of a new name on the entry lists for Scottish races – the new club of Clyde Valley AC had been formed from four clubs in North Lanarkshire including Monkland.   Jim would be competing henceforth as ‘Clyde Valley’. On 14th September, 1974, he won the Coatbridge 5 Miles Road Race by 19 seconds from Jim Dingwall, and then the following day he went to England and won the Berwick round the walls race.   Two wins in two days.   The new amalgamated club won the Midland Relays and in the ‘Glasgow Herald’ on 2nd November, Ron Marshall spoke of an interesting invitation to Jim.   He wrote: “Jim Brown (Clyde Valley) has been asked to compete in the Canadian Cross-Country Championships in Montreal on Saturday week as part of a British team (the first time any team has competed cross-country under British colours).   Brown’s Canadian trip will not  be universally welcomed.   His club, Clyde Valley, who won the Midland Relay on Saturday at Lochinch, had been nurturing the idea that a third place in the inter-city relay was within their grasp.   With Brown away, their hope had been shattered, but they now intend throwing all their efforts into winning the national relay title the following week.”   In the event, Brown did not go to Canada but ran on the sixth stage of the E-G and held on to third place with second fastest time of the day.   No reason was given in the press for Jim’s absence from the Canadian venture but he also turned out for the club in the District Relays.   Anglo Ian Gilmour could not make the trip to Scotland and Ray Baillie ran on the first stage where he finished eleventh.   Next up for Clyde Valley was Jim Brown who moved from eleventh to first in the course of 10 minutes.   He had fastest time of the day – 10:56 – and gave John Graham a lead of 24 seconds with Andy McKean the man in pursuit.  McKean not only caught his man but gave Jim Wight 7 seconds start on Ron McDonald.   McDonald was in great form all through 1974 and it was difficult to see anyone holding him off in such a position.  McDonald won by 9 seconds with third fastest time of the day, only McKean splitting the two ex-Monkland men.

Absent from the domestic scene for the next few months although running well in the South , he won the race to celebrate the 75th anniversary of Barcelona FC over 8000m in Spain with Scotland winning the team race from England, Belgium and Spain.   Other team members were Andy McKean 4th and Laurie Reilly 5th.   The ‘Glasgow Herald’, remarked that after his ‘rather moderate’ 14th place at San Sebastian, he may concentrate on the SCCU Championships at Coatbridge rather than the English National at Luton.   The prize for a good run was, of course, selection for the international in Morocco.   Jim chose however not to run in the Coatbridge race but was nevertheless selected for the team to go to Morocco on 15th March.   Jim ran but with Mariano Haro second to Scot Ian Stewart, the other Scots all ran poorly and Jim could only finish 75th.  Others were A Hutton 38th, L Reilly 43rd, A McKean 54th, R Ward 81st, I Gilmour 88th, F Clement 89th, J Alder 106.

Scottish Teams for the International Cross-Country in 1975: Jim sixth from right, beside Lachie Stewart

Picture from Lachie Stewart

 Into summer 1975 – possibly Jim’s best summer season.   By the end of the season his best times ranked him in five events.   He was second in the SAAA 5000m and also second in the AAA’s 10000m.  The 10000m was a new Scottish National record – one which broke Lachie Stewart’s 28:11 from the Commonwealth Games in 1970 and which gave him great pleasure!   It also ranked him third in Britain.

Event	Time	Ranking
1500m	3:51.1	14th
2 Miles	7:58.0
3000m	8:08.83
5000m	13:39.0	2nd
10000m	28:00.62	1st
Steeplechase	9:08.64	12th

He had however started with a brilliant win in a local road race – the Tom Scott Road Race over 10 miles early April.   It is worth reproducing the article in its entirety here since the race was a good one between two real rivals and Jim gets the credit that he was due.   It read:

“JIM BROWN’S RECORD TIME

The capricious nature of sporting form was well illustrated on Saturday when Jim Brown (Clyde Valley) won the Tom Scott Road Race from Law to Motherwell not only by a wide margin but in a record time as well.   Only three weeks ago the same man was languishing in seventy fourth position in the International Cross-Country Championships, a race in which he had been fourth the previous year.   With that weighing on his mind, then Brown had approached the Tom Scott with more than a degree of apprehension.   He is sorely needed a morale booster.   For a long time it looked as if he would be denied satisfaction.   Andy McKean (Edinburgh AC) the national cross-country champion set a fearsome pace over the first four miles dragging what appeared to be a reluctant Jim Brown in his wake, at least 40 yards behind.   Jim Dingwall, going for his third successive win, was already showing signs of distress.  

Through Wishaw’s main street McKean sagged a bit, Brown sensed the lapse and swept past, not gradually but punishingly fast.   Within seconds he had 30 yards on the other and the race was over.    The next three miles to the finish only served to allow Brown to build up an ultimate winning lead of something like 175 yards and he crossed the line in 46 minutes 33 seconds.   This beat Lachie Stewart’s 1967 record by eight seconds.  

The winner had two main concerns after the race.   The first was to retrieve his front plate of teeth from the bus carrying athletes belongings.   He never runs with it fitted, but the demands of a radio interview made it essential.   His second worry was the appearance of some raw blood blisters on both feet.   A compete rest yesterday, he imagined, would be enough to let them subside.   Brown returns this week to his physical education studies at that breeding ground of sporting progress, Borough Road College in London.   His first big race, apart from student fixtures, is on June 11th when he runs over two miles against Brendan Foster and Ian Stewart.   You cannot choose sterner opponents than that.”

Summer 1975 came between Commonwealth, European and Olympic Games but it turned out to be a good year for Jim as can be seen from the table above.     Even if we only take the major races, there is a lot to cover.    In the SAAA Championships, he was second in the 5000m behind Dave Black from Small Heath AAC in Birmingham in 13:39 which was good enough for him to be one of only 10 athletes selected by the SAAA to have their expenses fully paid for the AAA’s Championships on 1st and 2nd of August.   Came the championship and the result in the 10000m was the same as it had been over 5000m at Meadowbank: Black won in 27:54.23 and Brown was second in 28:00.2 which was a new Scottish native record, taking Lachie Stewart’s record from the books and which was also to be Jim’s lifetime best for the distance.    ‘Athletics Weekly’ reported on the race as follows:   “Last year Bernie Ford strove mightily but unsuccessfully to drop Dave Bedford; this time he forced the pace to such effect that he recorded a magnificent persona best of 28:02.4 . . . and finished third.   Dave Black was the winner of his first national senior track title in 27:54.2, fastest by a European this year, while Jim Brown smashed the Scottish record of his hero, Lachie Stewart, with 28:00.6.   A great race all the way through with further personal bests for Bernie Plain and my colleague Jon Wigley among others.   Matthew Batswadi (who improved from 29:20.4 to 28:38.4) and Ford were the men responsible for the excellent times.   The South African led through kilometres of 2:48.2, 5:32.6, 8:23.4 and 11:12.0 and then Ford took over.   His time at halfway was 14:03.4, with Wigley, Batswadi, Black, Brown, Ewald Bonzet and Plain in close attendance.   By 6000m (16:48.6 by Ford) Batswadi and Wigley had dropped back and a lap later, with Brown now in front, the other South African, Bonzet, had begun to lose contact and he dropped out after 7km.   That left four men ahead: Brown, Ford, Black and Plain.   The 7000m mark was reached in 19:38.8 and Ford brought them up to 8000m in 22:29.6.   Plain slipped back on the 22nd lap and then with two and a half to go, Black made his move.   He drove in a crushing 62.9 lap, which carried him 30 metres ahead of Brown and 35 clear of Ford, and was further in front at the finish, having covered the last 1200m in a sparkling 3:07.8.   Note his second 5000m of close to 13:50!   Further down, both Mike Tagg and Trevor Wright enjoyed their best track runs in two years.”   Hard, hard running and it is only right for the leading times to be noted.

Name	Club	Time
D Black	Small Heath	27:54.2
J Brown	Clyde Valley	28:00.6
B Ford	Aldershot, Farnham and District	28:02.4
B Plain	Cardiff	28:15.0
M Tagg	Norfolk Gazelles	28:28.6
Gren Tuck	Cambridge and Coleridge	28:34.0
J Wigley	Invicta	28:35.8
M Batswadi	South Africa	28:38.4
R Holt	Hercules Wimbledon	28:42.4
R Lunnon	Gosforth	28:45.0
T Wright	Wolverhampton & Bilston	28:46.2
J Goater	Shaftesbury	28:50.8
L Reilly	Sale	28:58.8
A Rushmer	Tipton	29:13.6

And behind that lot were such well-known and highly respected distance men as Colin Moxsom (Woodford Green), Mike Critchley (Cardiff), Hugh Starkey (Shaftesbury) and many more.    There was another good run in the International Students Meeting in Rome on 30th August where he was third in the 10000m in 29:03.6 behind Fava (28:37.8) and Floroiu (Romania).

There were also two GB selections that year – against Russia over 5000m and Sweden over 10000m    The Russian match was on August 26th and Jim was one of three British representatives in the 5000m, the others being Dave Black and Dave Lowes.   Black was second (13:28.52), Brown fifth (13:43.44) and Lowes sixth (13:48.65).  The UK v Sweden match was three weeks later, on 13th/14th September at Meadowbank.   Britain won by 113 to 99 points and Jim’s contribution was maximum points in the 10,000m.   Run on his 23rd birthday, into a strong wind which he himself reckons cost him up to 2 seconds a lap, he pulled clear just after halfway to win in 28:54.4 with Wales’s Bernie Plain second.

These results also led to a detailed profile in the ‘Athletics Weekly’ of 15th November that year.   Some of the replies make an interesting comparison with that in the SMC Magazine of June 1986 quoted above.  for example:-

In early days was inspired by Lachie Stewart who was then at his best.   Athlete he particularly admires today is “I think Ian Stewart because he’s so tough and serious when he’s on the track.”   Realised he could make international level, “when I ran 28:58 for 10000m at AAA Championships in 1972 – I couldn’t train seriously that summer as I was nursing a calf injury during the year.”

Most pleasing performance: My 3:51.1 in 1971.   Up until then I had just run cross-country and iit proved to me that with the right application I could do something on the track.”   Greatest disappointment was “Missing the Commonwealth Games in Christchurch through injury.”   Target for 1976 is to make the Olympic 10,000m team.”   All-time goal is “to compete and hope to improve.”   What he likes most in athletics is “travelling and meeting people, well organised trips and most of all the atmosphere prior to big meets.”   Dislikes “chaotic travel arrangements and disorganised trips.”

Comment: “This is a great chance to condemn individuals for their running and organisation of the sport.   All I can say is if everyone was as organised as the local council back home where I live there would be no problem in athletics today.  The construction of an eight lane all weather track has just been completed (first of its type in the west of Scotland) – that speaks for itself.   The track is going to be combined with a Sports Centre and schools are going to be encouraged to use it to tap the local talent.   As you can imagine this is going to be more of a long term project.   At present the council fork out the prizes for the Coatbridge 5 (which are among the best in Britain) an the Coatbridge Games (the standard of prizes being similar   with  to the Coatbridge 5).   They have also sponsored the Scottish Cross-Country Championships for the past three years.   So with this new venture of track and sports centre I’d like to wish them all the best of luck as they deserve it and thank them for all they did for me in the summer. If only there were more councils like them who adopted a similar attitude towards sport.”

Training:   Usually trains twice a day – “but at present I’m on teaching practice and can only manage once” – between 9:00 and 10:00 am, 5:00 and 6:00 pm for 30 minutes to two hours.   Trains at College in Osterley Park and Richmond Park and “try to change courses as much as possible.”   Two train journeys lasting just under an hour take him to first class training facilities at Crystal Palace.   He rates having a coach as important.   “I was OK.   I received advice from here and there but it’s when things are going really badly that you need to have someone close to you.   Charles (Elliott) introduced a lot of new ideas into my training and I’m enjoying it.   Variety and enjoyment are Charlie’s magic words.”   Likes and dislikes in training: “There’s a lot I dislike buit I work on my dislikes as that’s usually the best session for you.   I don’t think in terms of likes and dislikes – I do what I have to do without thinking about it or complaining about it.”

Typical week’s training in winter (last year):

Sunday – am 15 miles steady; pm 5-7 miles relaxed;   Monday – (am) 5 miles easy; pm 7 miles steady;   Tuesday:  (am) 5 miles easy;   (pm) 4 x 600m x 250 recovery on grass;   Wednesday: (pm) 10-12 miles steady; Thursday: (am) 5 miles easy; (pm) 6 miles fartlek (200-300);   FGriday: (pm) 6 miles if competing next day otherwise easy run in the morning followed by steady evening run;   Saturday: Compete.   Most of my training is done on grass.

Typical week’s training in  summer (1975):

Sunday (am) 12 miles easy run; (pm) 3 x 6  200m hills (emphasis on style);   Monday: (am) 5 miles easy;   (pm) 5 x 1 mile build-up run;   Tuesday:   (am) 5 miles fartlek (long items); (pm) 5 x 600m x 600m and 5 x 300 x 300 on track;   Wednesday:  (am) 5 miles (short items); (pm) 6 miles including 2 miles build-up;  Thursday: (am) 5 miles easy); (pm) 6 x 300 x 300 and 6 x 150 x 150;   Friday: 5 miles including 4 x 1000m build-up;   (pm) 5 miles relaxed gentle strides.

Training this year compared to previous years is “very different – a lot more varied and interesting.”   Major changes planned for next year: “I’ve only been coached by Charles since AAA’s (1975) so I’m really still getting used to the new schedule and if changes are needed he’ll soon advise them or should I say change them quickly.”   Likes to compete “but not too often, once every three or four weeks but being at College I have to compete most weeks but I enjoy it – they are a great bunch of blokes in the club and we all enjoy travelling and competing for ‘Borough’.   ”

You could have a good time comparing these replies from 1975 with those of  1986.

In the AAA’s 10000m in 1975: second in a Scottish National record

At the start of winter 1975, Devlin, Graham, Small and McDonald were in the team that was second in the Western District Championships and Jim Brown wasn’t seen until the Edinburgh to Glasgow on 15th November.   John Graham had an uncharacteristically poor run on the first stage and handed over in tenth place to Jim who picked up six places against some of the very best runners in Scotland on the notoriously difficult second leg with the second fastest time, just 18 seconds behind Andy McKean.   Clyde Valley was third, upholding the honour of the West of Scotland behind Edinburgh Southern Harriers and Edinburgh AC.   Two weeks later at Gateshead in an international cross-country fixture Jim raced the top Englishmen including Brendan Foster, Dave Black and Bernie Ford and Belgians led by Jos Hermens and Poland’s Bronislaw Malinowski and ran well to finish eleventh – four down on McKean but one ahead of young Nat Muir.   He was obviously running well because he was spoken of as pretty well certain of selection for the Scottish team for the cross-country international, but all his running was done in England and the results were not in the Scottish press.   The British Universities Championships were held at Stirling University in February and he was runner-up to Ray Smedley and spoke to Ron Marshall afterwards.   “Smedley’s runner-up on Saturday, Jim Brown from Holytown, was more than half a minute behind and had no intention of vying with the Englishman for a 5000m place.   [in the 1976 Olympics].   “It’s the 10000 I’m after, but between now and the final Olympic trial in June I’ll run only one – and that’ll be at the trial,” Brown said after the race.    Was he disappointed at having finished so far behind Smedley?   “A bit, though I’m doing three track sessions a week at Crystal Palace (he finished physical education studies in London in the summer) and I think my track preparations are clashing a wee bit with grass running.   It would have been nice to win because that was my last chance in student competition.”  

Missing the National, he was selected for the international at Chepstow where 24-year-old Brown was twenty ninth – twenty places better than in 1974, as the press report kindly reminded its readers – and first Scot to finish.

Summer 1976 was Olympic year and Jim was running very well indeed.   As he says above, he thinks his most disappointing race must have been the 1976 Olympic Trial at Crystal Palace.   Previously he had been ranked third in Britain due to the fast 10000m the previous year.   It was Jim’s final year at College, he was due to sit the Physical Education finals and although his training, especially speed work, had been going well, the competitive work outs that year had been much less good.   In the race itself, he just went for it and reached halfway in just over 14 minutes.   He says, “I recall the elation of thinking that I was nearly in the team but it was short lived as I tied up and finished the last half running backwards.   I don’t think I have ever been so depressed or disappointed after a race.“

His own club’s 5 Miles Road Race was in mid-September and he was second to Jim Dingwall.   Having completed his studies in London, Jim was out in the McAndrew Relay on 2nd October.   Shettleston won but Jim had the fastest time of the day – 13:24 to Andy McKean’s 13:29.   He had also taken up a position as coach at the brand new Coatbridge Outdoor Centre.   Came the District Relay Championship on 6th November at Greenock and again Shettleston won, but this time, although ‘Brown gave a great display of power running as he lifted Clyde Valley eight places to fourth’ he had to be satisfied with second fastest, Nat Muir being two seconds quicker.    The big one in November was always the Edinburgh to Glasgow Relay.   Clyde Valley finished fifth with Jim on the long seven mile sixth stage where he moved up from sixth to fifth with third fastest time of the afternoon.  When it came to the Scottish championships,   Jim for probably the first time ever, dropped out of a race, the National on a snow covered trail at Glenrothes, but suffering from the after-effects of ‘flu he might not normally have run at all.   The selectors understood and he was picked anyway for the international.    The event was held in Dusseldorf over a 7.5 mile trail round a racecourse.   Probably too short for most of the Scottish team which was led home by Allister Hutton in 14th with Jim 36th, Laurie Reilly 41st, Andy McKean 49th, Rees Ward 62nd, Paul Kenny 68th, John Graham 80th, John Robson 94th.

On 9th May, 1977, Jim was third in the Lanarkshire 1500m championship behind John Graham and Nat Muir in 4:03.3 – Graham’s time was 4:02.2 and Muir’s 4:02.8,   Seven days later at Gourock, he was again third.   This time it was in the 3000m at the Highland Games behind Lawrie Spence and John Graham.   “Brown, who was not all that happy about the soggy, rutted nature of the track (“they should add it to the cross-country calendar,” he observed) now turns his attention to a classy 5000m field at in Wednesday’s Phillips Electrical meeting at Crystal Palace.”  The race spoken of was a 5000m on 18th May at Crystal Palace against Africans and some of the very best Europeans.   Eventually it was won by S Nyambui of Tanzania in 13:34..6.   Jim hung on for as long as he could but fell away t finish 17th but ahead of such good men as Grenville Tuck, Jon Wigley, Steve Kenyon, Gerry Hannon and Merv Brameld.    On 5th June, in an international between Scotland and Greece at Meadowbank, Jim won the 10000m easily in 29:18.04 in a match the Scotland lost –   99 points to Greece’s 112.   By the end of the summer 1977 his best marks were 3:49.8 for 1500m (16th), 8:06.6 for 3000m (8th); 13:48.0 for 5000 (4th) and 29:18 for 10000m (6th).

The winter of 1977-78 started minus Brown, McDonald and company in the McAndrew Relay but the following week they defeated the winners of that race, Shettleston Harriers) in the Lanarkshire relays at Motherwell with Brown on the third stage running second fastest time behind Nat Muir.   On the country in the District relay championships on 5th November Clyde Valley was sixth with John Graham being second fastest on the day and Jim being fourth fastest.   In the Edinburgh to Glasgow on 19th November, he was on the second stage of the Edinburgh to Glasgow Relay and picked up two places, from fourth to second, with the third fastest of the day, only Nat Muir and Andy McKean being faster.   On 8th December at Bellshill, Jim won the County championship on a course so bad that several refused to run on it: this was not just a problem for Lanarkshire, however, as Andy McKean was criticising the course at Stirling used for the inter-area race on the same day.   On 10th December he ran in an international race at Crystal Palace but finished down the order for a Scottish team that finished fourth.   Missing from the early 1978 races such as the Nigel Barge Road Race and the Spanish invitations, it was said at the District Championships late in January that Jim had some important races coming up.    In the National championships at Bellahouston Park in Glasgow, Jim Brown was fourth behind Hutton, Ward and McKean, on the same time as Phil Dolan and in front of Ian Gilmour, Frank Clement and John Myatt.   Selected for the international later that month, Jim had a real off-day and finished outside the first hundred.

That summer Jim began with a fast 5000 at Carluke in the Lanarkshire championships where he won in 14:02.0.   On 14th May he ran in a Scottish team in Athens against Greece, Wales and Luxembourg and justified his selection with first place in the 10000m in 28:36.4 from Allister Hutton in second on 28:37.1.   The SAAA 10000m championship was held at Grangemouth two weeks later on 27th May and Jim was second to Allister Hutton.   The report read: “Hutton must wait a fortnight to find out if his winning time, 29:07.8, taken into account with other performances this year, finds approval with selectors.   Both Hutton and Jim Brown, his runner-up nearly half a minute behind, have run much faster (28:36 and 28:37 in Athens), and Hutton was third in last year’s British championships.   I have the feeling that our respectable traditions in middle-distance running might just win the day for Hutton with an outside chance for Brown.”   When the team was announced on 11th June, 1978, there was no place for Jim Brown.  This was despite the fact that there was only one second between them and the run at Grangemouth had cost him his place.  He was not alone in his disappointment – there were several others, such as Graham Williamson, with good claims to selection who were left off the list.   The most egregious was the omission and selection on the same day of high jumper Brian Burgess, SAAA Champion!   Not selected for the team which was announced on the Sunday morning, he leapt 7’2″ that afternoon and was selected before bedtime.   That didn’t help Jim at all who missed another Games.    Nevertheless by the end of summer 1978 he was ranked fifth in the 5000m with 14:02.0, and topped the 10,000m list with 28:36.37 ahead of Allister Hutton (28:37.08 and Jim Dingwall (28:45.25) with the next man outside 30 minutes.

Jim (black vest, running second) in Glasgow Marathon, 1985

A Graham MacIndoe picture

At the start of winter 1978-79, Jim ran a very good leg of the McAndrew relay lifting Clyde Valley from sixteenth to first on the second stage and running the fastest time of the day (three seconds faster than Nat Muir) – team mates Brian McSloy (fastest Junior) and Willie Marshall (fastest over 50) also took individual honours although the team could only finish fifth.   A week later, another relay and Jim again beat Nat for fastest time – this was in the  Lanarkshire relay and Clyde Valley were second this time.    Nat beat him to it in the District relay at Bearsden seven days later with Clyde Valley third.   The rivalry continued into November and the Allan Scally Relay at Barrachnie on the fourth of the month, organised by Nat’s club, Shettleston Harriers.   The headline on the report read:

“BROWN IS FASTEST AFTER RE-SCRUTINY

One runner had reason to feel aggrieved on Saturday after the results of the Allan Scally Relay had been worked out and the prizes awarded.   Jim Brown had looked fast but the results sheet thought not.   After a third-stage run round a course of nearly five miles at Baillieston, Brown pushed Clyde Valley from seventh to third place and was given a time of 22 min 42 sec.   The award to the fastest individual eventually went to Nat Muir (Shettleston) whose last leg of 22 min 23 sec looked invincible.   Brown was confident enough to query the decision, knowing that four or five others separated him from Muir according to the paper calculations and such has been Brown’s level of performance this season, that he was shocked to learn how far back he was listed.   All was put right yesterday (Sunday) however after a re-scrutiny revealed a 20 second error in Brown’s favour, so he actually pips Muir for fastest award by just one second.”   Edinburgh Southern Harriers won the race from Shettleston and Spango Valley.   Jim chose to miss the Glasgow University Road Race on 11th November, won by Nat Muir for the third successive year, but ran an outstanding second leg of the Edinburgh to Glasgow where he pulled the club from twelfth to second in the fastest time of the afternoon, then on the last Saturday of the month finished twentieth in the international races at Gateshead.   |Having been racing almost without respite, Jim won the Lanarkshire Six Miles Cross-Country Championship on 2nd December yet again but missed the Nigel Barge at Maryhill and the Western District Championships, held in driving sleet and rain in Bellahouston Park in mid January.   The Scottish championships were held at Livingston an frozen, rock hard, traditional cross-country trail where the mud had been frozen into ridges and rocks cemented into the ground.   Nat Muir was the winner with Lawrie Spence second, Half a minute down, and Jim Brown third, a further 23 seconds back with Jim Dingwall fourth.   The team for the international cross-country in Limerick two weeks later was not announced till 4th March and Jim was in for the sixth successive year – as were Allister Hutton and Laurie Reilly.

Summer 1979 was the year that Jim started on his marathon running career – obviously not to the exclusion of  track running – by the end of that season he had best times of 8:13.4 for 3000m, 14:00.5 for 5000, 28:58.0 for 10000 and 2:22:22 for the marathon.   They ranked him 8th, 8th, 1st and 11th in Scotland.  He started the season with his second win in the Tom Scott 10 Miles Road Race in April.  The report this time was short – he had beaten Graham Laing of Aberdeen in a field of 72 runners in 48 minutes 04 seconds with Laing on 49 minutes 19 seconds and Martin Craven third.   He then won the 3000m at Carluke on 2nd June in 8:48.4 and the following week had an interesting double at the East Kilbride Games – he won the 6 miles road race despite taking a wrong turning at one point and then won the 3000m on the track just ten minutes later.   In the SAAA Championships on 16th June, Jim was third in the 5000m behind Nat Muir and Allister Hutton where the winner ran 13:57.4.         It was not until 16th September though that Jim made his marathon debut – running in the Norco Aberdeen Marathon he finished second to another marathon debutant – local boy and future SAAA marathon champion Graham Laing, who won in 2:21:40 with Colin Youngson third in 2:27:44 and a whole host of experienced marathon men behind him, eg Willie Day, Doug Gunstone, Colin Martin, Evan Cameron and Alastair Wood.   When asked why he had taken up the marathon, and whether anyone had advised him or suggested to him that he do so, he replied that he just decided to do it – it was of course a time when the event had a very high profile world wide and many, many other runners were taking the same line and ‘giving it a try’.   Very few had his success in the event though.

That winter, 1979/80, he started his campaign with third fastest time of the day in the McAndrew Relay when Clyde Valley was second to Shettleston in the team race.   He then missed the Lanarkshire and West District relay championships but came out in the National event on 27th October when the club won with Brown himself turning in the fastest time of the day.   Into November and Clyde Valley won the Edinburgh to Glasgow Relay by two minutes from Edinburgh AC with Edinburgh Southern seconds.   It was a very good team – Farquharson, Graham, Agnew, McSloy, Devlin, Brown, Marshall and Fox – with Graham, McSloy and Brown running the fastest times on their respective stages.   Brown held and extended the lead given to him by Eddie Devlin giving David Marshall a three minute cushion over the EAC runner.   On 1st December, Jim won the Lanarkshire Cross-Country title, and ran the following week in an international match at Crystal Palace in which he was unplaced.   On 5th January, 1980, Jim and Gordon Rimmer of Cambuslang were contesting the lead when they took the wrong turning at Canniesburn Toll, going 100 yards off course, and let Jim Dingwall get past.  By the end Rimmer won from Dingwall but Jim was off with Rimmer and Graham Clark of Spango Valley the next week to Elgoibar.   Jim was third in the Spanish classic, only six seconds behind the winner John Wild of England.   A week later he travelled back to Spain with a small Scottish squad led by Nat Muir to race in San Sebastian.   Muir was an excellent third with Jim Brown fifth and Lawrie Spence 15th to give Scotland second place in the team race.

Jim was eighth in the National with Clyde Valley finishing second team and on 16th February, 1980, the headline read “BROWN WILL CAPTAIN WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP SCOTS”.   A headline that most Scots, whatever their sport, would give their eye teeth for.   Jim had been announced as the team captain for the world cross-country championships to be held in March.   It went on : “Scotland’s team for the World Championships next month in Paris followed predictable lines when the selection was made yesterday in Grangemouth.   The selectors held their final trial for the Junior team just before lunchtime and as brief a conclave to find the nine seniors and six juniors as has been held in recent times came up with no surprises.   Jim Brown, long-toothed at this level of competition, captains the seniors of whom Nat Muir, the National champion, will be expected to set an example to the others at Longchamps racecourse on March 9th.   The other seniors selected – Graham Clark (Spango Valley), John Graham (Clyde Valley), Allister Hutton (Edinburgh Southern), Brian McSloy (Clyde Valley), Gordon Rimmer (Cambuslang), John Robson (Edinburgh Southern), Lawrie Spence (Shettleston).”    

In the International itself, the team did not run up to expectations, Jim finishing 31st, with Nat Muir tenth and John Robson in fifty second.   The next race is always the important one, and Jim headed for the summer, 1980, track and road racing.

Jim with Alex Robertson: Tom Scott Road Race 1985

Graham MacIndoe

The second running of the National Six-Stage Road Race was held at the end of March, 1980, and Jim almost fell out with the club selectors when he requested a short stage rather than one of the six-mile legs – because he wanted to race at Berwick the next day.   He ran Stage Five, producing the day’s fastest time of 18:15 opening a gap of 46 seconds over the second club.   By the end of the race, Clyde Valley was second to Edinburgh Southern Harriers and 8 seconds ahead of Falkirk Victoria.  Jim ran the next day in a 10 mile race at Barrow-in-Furness – and won from a strong English field in 46:55.

On April 14th 1980, the headline and article read:

“LEG WORK PAYS OFF FOR BROWN

Jim Brown (Clyde Valley) retained his title in the Tom Scott Memorial Road Race from Law to Motherwell on Saturday.   He was in excellent form, just failing to break his own record by one second and finished 400 yards ahead of Allister Hutton (Edinburgh Southern Harriers) who was running over the ten miles distance for the first time.   Brown, whose winning time was 46 minutes 34 seconds, has been doing high mileage training of 120 miles per week preparing for the AAA’s marathon championship at Milton Keynes in three weeks times.   This heavy schedule is paying off for Brown as he looked and felt very fit.   He said after the race that he had intended waiting until the seven mile mark before making his effort, but he felt so good that he decided to go at three miles after he had been in the leading bunch with Hutton, Dingwall, Martin Craven (Edinburgh Southern) and Colin Farquharson (Clyde Valley).”

Although not placed at Milton Keynes, by the end of the summer Jim was ranked in four events – the 3000m, the 5000m, the 10000m and the marathon with the 10,000m again being his best event going by the rankings.   Times and places were 8:14.9 (10th), 14:09.8 (5th), 29:27.9 (2nd) and 2:19:03 (5th).

In the McAndrew on 4th October, 1980,  Clyde Valley won the race very comfortably and Jim only had to run round the course to ensure a Clyde Valley victory over Edinburgh Southern Harriers and Shettleston.   In the District Relays there was no Clyde Valley team but they made up for it in the National Relays when Jim Ran on the second leg for the team which finished second.  In the Edinburgh to Glasgow on 16th November 1980, Clyde Valley were taken into a lead on the long sixth stage which they never lost and they took home the gold medals.   Jim ran the fastest time of the day on the stage 47 seconds up on second fastest runner, Eddie Stewart of Cambuslang.  When it came to cross-country running in 1980-81, Jim was in great form.  He won the West District Championships in January and the ‘Glasgow Herald’ made the most of it with the headline of “BROWN RECOVERS AND MAKES IT LOOK EASY”   above an article pointing out that he had been slightly adrift at the end of the first lap of Bellahouston Park buut when he went in front on the next lap, the issue was never in doubt.   In the National Cross-Country Championship in 1981, Jim was second – only two seconds down – to Nat Muir.   In dreadful snowy conditions they were both clear by 4 miles and just raced it out all the way to the finishing line.    The International Cross-Country Championships were held in Madrid but almost all of the Scottish party were stricken with a mystery illness and four runners – Fraser Clyne Graham Williamson and Jim Brown all had to drop out of the race.    In the National 6 stage relay in March, Edinburgh Southern were the victors with a weakened Clyde Valley (Jim on the anchor leg) finished fifth.

That summer he ran his best 5000m on 20th June at Meadowbank in the SAAA Championships where he could only finish fourth in 14:18.46 which ranked him seventh in the country at the end of the summer. He was undoubtedly running well and on 2nd August at Meadowbank  in the  International against Denmark and Eire he won the 10000m in 29:40.54 – his best for the summer and it ranked him third in the country at the end of the season.

At the start of winter 1981-82, Jim did not run in either the McAndrew Relay, the Lanarkshire Relay Championships the West District or even the National relays but did run in the Edinburgh to Glasgow in late November.   Jim ran, unusually for him on the shortest stage in the race, the third, and wasn’t even in the top four times on what was generally regarded as the ‘easiest’ stage (although ‘easy’ is a relative term, there were no easy runs in the E-G!).   Bearing in mind that Jim never gave less than 100% effort, he was clearly injured.   He was nevertheless back in action in the New Year when, after passing up on the Beith and Nigel Barge races, He turned out on 23rd January in the West District Championships, where he was second to Lawrie Spence, only two seconds down on the Greenock man.   In the National a month later he was sixth (two places behind Clyde Valley team mate Ron McDonald) .    So he’d be in the team for the international?  No, he wasn’t and the ‘Glasgow Herald’ correspondent explained that Jim wanted to concentrate on training for the marathon.     In April 1982 it was back to the Tom Scott 10 Miles Road Race – it was a race that he liked with three victories over the years.   This time he was second to Allister Hutton: Hutton ran a course record of 46:05 but Jim was also inside the previous best with 46:27 – 6 seconds inside his own old record.

In 1982 with the assistance of team mate John Graham who had won in an exceptionally fast time the year before, Jim ran a marathon in Rotterdam, and it was in general quite a good year for him.   There was the Scottish International against South Belgium and Luxembourg in Luxembourg) on 12th June in which Jim and Lawrie Spence both.  ran in the 1000m where Lawrie won in 29:04.22 and Jim was fourth in 30:38.33.   This was his best and only track ranking time of the year and placed him 13th.   His best marathon time was in Glasgow on 17th October when he was timed at 2:20:38.   That placed him fourth in the race and eleventh in Scotland.   Doug Gillon reported on the race.

“Forster (Glenn Forster from England who won the race) was always in the leading group but he gambled shortly before the halfway mark when the American Emil Magallanes attempted to break the field.   “Magallanes took a lead of nearly 100 yards but I decided not to go with him,” said Forster.   It was the top runner in the three-man Scottish team, Jim Brown of Clyde Valley, who set out in pursuit with Fleming.   Gradually they pulled in Magallanes whose break had proved indecisive.   Forster caught the two Scots and the three together finally nailed down the flagging American from Oakland by the 14 mile mark.

Brown and Fleming had a nine second lead over Forster at  15 miles, reached in 71 minutes 01 second.   By that stage Magallanes had drifted 16 seconds down on the two Scots and gradually drifted backwards through the field.   Fleming, running through Ibrox, his home area, was cheered from the windows, “You’re having a great race, Peter,” said Brown, aware that the 21-year-old was running only his second marathon, was well on schedule to smash his best time.   “I can’t slow down here, not in front of the neighbours,” came the reply.   By 20 miles reached in 1:44:19 Forster was back up with the two Scots, Bark having been 23 seconds off the pace at 15 miles, had closed to just 12 seconds down, mounting his challenge over the last six miles.  

“It was at 22 miles that I finally cracked,” said Brown, who had looked for long as though he could give Scotland a home victory, despite being bitten by a Doberman Pinscher on his final winding down training run on Wednesday.   “I wondered why you sprinted every time a dog barked,” cracked his team mate Evan Cameron who finished ninth.   Brown goes for a tetanus injection today.   His muscles would have been liable to stiffen up had the inoculation been given before he started the run.   But 30 year old Brown could not raise any steam when Forster began took up the running. “

The leading runners and times were 1.   G Forster  2:17:16;   2.   C Bark   2:18:36;   3.  P Fleming   2:19:40;   4.   J Brown   2:20:38;   5.   N McCarron   2:21:26;   6.   T Jordan   2:21:34;   7.   A Daly   2:24:41   8.  M Crowell   2:21:54;   9.   E Cameron   2:21:58;   10.   D Macgregor   2:22:06.

Jim the club runner: Six Stage Road Relay, 1986

Graham MacIndoe

The winter season in Britain usually starts in October and the marathon being run on the 17th October affected training and racing patterns for many athletes.   The West District Relays were on the day before the marathon and all teams were rather thin.   Jim missed all the relays up to the Edinburgh to Glasgow where he ran on the first stage, finishing third behind Nigel Jones (Edinburgh AC) and Don Macgregor (Fife AC) – 10 second down on Jones and 2 down on Macgregor in a Clyde Valley team that finished twelfth.   Other than that, Jim Brown was not seen in any of the major races over the winter of 1982-83.   Next summer he was not ranked in any event between 3000m and the marathon inclusive.    Injury was a constant problem for him at this point. and he was absent from all his favourite events such as the Tom Scott which he really loved racing in and in which, up to that point, he had three firsts and four seconds.   He did not appear in any of the major races that season and at the start of winter 1983-84 there was little sign of Clyde Valley AC never mind Jim Brown in the opening relays.   There were no club teams in the National relay at all but all the top men were out in the Edinburgh to Glasgow.   Jim again ran the first stage finishing sixth this time to be followed by Ron McDonald who picked up to fourth and the team went up and down the top four or five teams until the finally crossed the finishing line in bronze medal position.   Jim was clearly not in his usual form.  He continued to miss races – he did not figure in either the District and National Championships.  In the course of his career Jim had been plagued with injury – he had injuries to his calf and both Achilles tendons had surgery performed on them.   At this point in his career these injuries, as well as the growing business and family commitments, led to a restriction on his racing programme.   One race that was on the schedule however was at the end of September.   He was out again in the Glasgow Marathon on 30th September and finished eleventh in 2:19:08.   The race was won by England’s David Lowes in 2:15:31 with Annan’s Mike Carroll finishing in 2:16:24.   That time ranked  Jim 15th for the event at the season’s end.

By now Jim was racing only infrequently for the reasons quoted – injuries, career and family responsibilities – and in winter 1984-85 his first race was in the Edinburgh to Glasgow on 18th November when he ran on the fourth stage where his time was eighth fastest on the day and he maintained the club’s 19th position.  This was his only race that winter but he started 1985’s road season with second to Alan Puckrin in the Tom Scott, his time of 50:49, almost a minute and a half down on Puckrin but six seconds clear of Alex Robertson after outsprinting him in to the finish.   Clyde Valley won the team race with 28 points to Dumbarton’s 38.   He finished the summer with another sub 2:20 marathon when he turned out in Glasgow on 22nd September, finished twelfth and ran 2:19:59 – Mike Carroll was first Scot to finish (sixth) in 2:18:24 – on a day when the race was dominated by the English.

Start of Glasgow Marathon 1985

By October 1985, Jim was racing very infrequently and, almost as important, Clyde Valley AAC (originally an amalgamation of five local clubs) had disbanded and the runners returned to their local groups.   Jim was now running for Motherwell.    He didn’t turn out in the short relays, nor in the Edinburgh to Glasgow but did race in the Six Stage Road Relay in March 1986.   He ran on the fourth stage and pulled the team up two places from ninth to seventh.    And this is his last major appearance.

Unlike many other top runners, Jim did not gradually fade away, falling slowly – or not so slowly – down the field and down the ratings in slower and slower times.    He had a good job with the local council, he had a satisfying domestic life and he just stopped with that good run.     He had had a very good career indeed – he ran for Scottish Schools, Scottish Under 20’s, Scottish seniors and British Seniors; he won championship titles at Schools, Scottish and British level and was for some time among the very best in Britain and, indeed, in Europe.   Scottish athletics lost a lot when Jim Brown hung up his spikes.

 

Motherwell YMCA Harriers – who had had many good athletes all through their existence – went through a real ‘purple patch in the 1960’s.    They won the Edinburgh to Glasgow in 1962, 1963, 1964,  second in 1965 and third in 1961 and 1966.   They won the National Cross Country Championships in 1961 and were third in 1963 and won the West District Cross Country Championship in 1961, 1962, 1963, 1964, 1965, 1966, 1967 – seven times in all.    I haven’t mentioned any of the relays either but it was a quite remarkable spell.   They had many good or first class athletes and names like Bert MacKay, John Linaker, Ian McCafferty, Alex Brown (AP Brown)  and many others are very well known to all followers of the sport.    But the common opinion is that Andy Brown had more than most to do with it.    A natural leader he was also captain of the Scottish Cross Country team and was highly regarded by all in the sport whether officials or, especially, by other runners.   In this first section we can look at his rise to prominence up to early 1956.

Born on 11th December 1932, he was known on the programmes as AH Brown to distinguish him from his brother Alex.    So he was not the first A Brown to run for Motherwell – his father was a good class road and marathon runner and this was picked up by Emmet Farrell  in ‘The Scots Athlete’ of August 1952 as follows: “Father and Son Rivalry”   There’s a very interesting and friendly rivalry between the two A Browns, Junior and Senior of Motherwell YMCA H.   The son is a fairly prolific prize-winner on the track.   But his wiry, 47 year old father is not far behind him.   He has had several notable wins and places in road races and at Dunoon even managed to gain the scratch award.   Even though most of the notable road runners were absent it is still a remarkable feat to beat runners some nearly half his age.   That year he had run two marathons and finished in the middle of the field and at the Victoria Park Relays in October they both ran in the same team with Tom Scott and Bryce McRoberts making up the team with Andrew Junior being second fastest, 21 seconds slower than McRoberts.   The club had a team in the Edinburgh to Glasgow that year  but only one A Brown was in it and I’m assuming that it was Senior who ran the fifth stage but on the Midland  Cross-Country Championships it was AH Brown who led the club home with his twenty first place.   He was still a Junior though and in the National Junior Cross-Country Championships at Hamilton in 1953 he finished eleventh with his Dad being exactly 100th in the Senior race.   Later that year it was AH Brown who turned out for the Edinburgh to Glasgow Relay on the second stage and after taking over from Tom Scott in 17th place he handed over in 15th with the final team position being 18th.   He did however run the same time to the second as CD Robertson running for Dundee Hawkhill and they were equal seventh fastest.   For an Under 20 runner to do that running so far down the field is indeed commendable.   In the National at Hamilton in 1954 he finished third, having been eighth in the Midlands Championship, behind John McLaren (Shotts) who won in 32:42 and Adrian Jackson, a star English runner running for Edinburgh University, in 32:46.   Andy’s time was 33:01 and Emmet Farrell had this to say: Surely the best race of the day was on the Junior Championship over 6 miles.   The race between McLaren of Shotts and Jackson of Edinburgh was a classic.   With incredible grit and courage, McLaren fought off his renowned adversary to win with little to spare.   This race was an exhilarating spectacle and while McLaren deserved the spoils of victory – great credit is due to Jackson who moved up to the from from about tenth place.   AH Brown of Motherwell YMCA also had a grand race and actually assumed the lead with two miles to go.”

A year later and he was ninth in the 1955 National Cross Country Championships and had his first run for Scotland in the International Cross Country Championships.   Colin Shields in the official history of Scottish Cross Country remarked “In the early days of 1955 Andrew Brown won the Beith race having earlier been just nine seconds slower than Bannon in the Midlands Relays.   He was showing the benefit of the extra training he received during his National Service in the Royal Air Force and was beginning to display the form which was to gain him twelve international vests in the next fourteen years.   An interesting feature of this National was that the Irishman Cyril O’Boyle of Clydesdale Harriers finished in sixth place and the selectors debated whether to include him in the Scottish team.   The vote went against him with one of those opposed to O’Boyle’s selection being the Clydesdale Harrier on the selection committee!   In the International that year the Scots team disappointed but Andy Brown was fifty second and a counting runner in the event.   This was just a year after being third in the Junior Championship.

In the list of Scottish Best performances printed in the ‘Scots Athlete’ in June 1955, he was ranked third in the Three Miles with 14:40.4, a time run in Withdean in May that year.   the significance was that although these Best Performance Lists were published every summer every month this was his first appearance in the rankings as published in the ‘Scots Athlete’.   By the time new lists were published in August he was second to Ian Binnie with 14:12.6.   Before they came to the actual results of the SAAA’s Championships, Emmet Farrell commented – “A Brown Surprise: Ian Binnie retained his 3 and 6 miles titles creditably though not up to the best Binnie standards but Motherwell’s Andy Brown by his second place in both events revealed himself one of the most improved runners in the country.   In the 6 miles in particular he gave Binnie some anxious moments till the latter’s extra class prevailed and his time of 30:03 was excellent.”   Farrell went on in the same Commentary to report on the AAA’s of England Championships and had this to say: Brilliant too were the 4th places won by Don Gorrie in the 880 yards and Andy Brown in the 6 miles.   Gorrie’s time, unofficially assessed at 1:52 compares favourably with the winning time of 1:52.2, as does Brown’s grand 29:35.2 with Norris’s 29:06 in the battle of the heatwave.”     The results of the two races at the SAAA were Binnie first in both with 14:18.9 and 29:40.4 and Brown second in 14:31.1 and 30:03.

Came the cross-country season and the ‘Running Commentary’ in the ‘Scots Athlete’ said:    “Rise of Andrew Brown.   Motherwell’s Andy Brown is surely the most  promising and improved runner in Scotland.   Starting with his two seconds to Binnie in the Scottish 3 and 6 miles he ran the race of his life in the AAA 6 miles to finish fourth in 29:35.2.   He had other great races at various distances subsequently winning several mile handicaps in fast time.”

In the first two races of the winter 1955/56 season he had second fastest time in the Victoria Park Relays of 15:03 – only one solitary second behind Eddie Bannon of Shettleston; he followed this up with fastest time in the Lanarkshire Relays ahead of all the Shettleston runners who filled the first two team places.      The picture below is from the Scots Athlete of the time and shows Brown in the RAF running vest.

In the ‘Scots Athlete’ for December 1955 Emmet Farrell was saying that if there were an award not for the best runners of the year but for the most improved in the fashion of the E-G’s most meritorious award, he would have to choose between three runners of whom Brown was one.   In the Midlands District Championship that season Brown was second, six seconds behind John McLaren and thirteen ahead of Bannon.   In his annual preview of the National for 1956, Emmet Farrell predicted the first three as John McLaren, Andy Brown and then Eddie Bannon.   He reckoned that Brown seemed to be reaching his peak at the right time and might even start as a slight favourite before talking about the amazing advance  the ‘little Motherwell runner’ had made.   (the references to the ‘little’ Motherwell runner seem odd – I don’t remember him as particularly wee: that was Dunky Wright and Harry Fenion!)   As for the forecast – well he got one right!   The result was a victory for Eddie Bannon with Andy second and Tom Stevenson of Wellpark third.    In the International match that followed, Andy Brown finished fiftieth and out of the counting six for the team which was fourth, one point in front of Portugal.

Into the summer of ’56 the Scottish Best Performances at 3rd June had Andy fourth in the Two Miles with 9:23.4 and he had his usual good season culminating in victory in the Scottish Six Miles Championship in 29:47.6 and then being second in the Three Miles the following afternoon in 14:40.6.   The second athlete in the six was Pat Moy of the Vale of Leven in 31:10.2 so it was a convincing enough win over a Scottish cross country internationalist.  As usual Emmet had something to say in his review of the championships: “Much improved Andy Brown also deserves commendation for his grand Six Miles in the Championships on his versatility.”  

Winter 1956/57 began with Andy running 14:56 and picking up eight places on the third stage of the Victoria Park Relays and setting a new course record of 14:56, one second faster than Graham Everett of Shettleston only to see Ian Binnie take it away from him with 14:53 on the final stage!   In the Edinburgh to Glasgow Relay in November he ran the sixth stage and pulled his club from fourteenth to twelfth.  The final list of Best Performances for 1956 was in the January 1957 issue of the magazine and Andy was second in the Three Miles with 13:56 run at Pitreavie and first on the Six with 29:10.0 run at the White City in July.    According to the results as printed he did not run in the National Championships in 1957.   But a year later he recorded his only win in the event.

Colin Shields wrote of the Championships in 1958: “Andy Brown (Motherwell YMCA) won his first and only National title over a tough test of strength and stamina in which the course was extended to include the rough countryside between the Hamilton Racecourse and the River Clyde.   Brown finished three seconds in front of Graham Everett with newcomer Alastair Wood finishing in third position.”   This of course earned selection for the International Cross Country Championship in Wales and Colin reported on it.   “The 1958 International Championships, held at Portcanna Field, Cardiff, resulted in the now expected poor performances from Scottish runners.   Scottish National Champion Andrew Brown and John McLaren failed even to make the counting six for their country.”   (Andy when he won, but Andrew when he failed to count!)   In the 1958/59 season the report is from Colin Shields again.   “Andy Brown won the Nigel Barge Road Race in 23:02 but met his match in the Midland Championship when miler Graham Everett won the first of three consecutive titles.   Everett went into the lead at half distance and went on to win by 80 yards from Brown.”   In the National Alastair Wood won from John McLaren and Bertie Irving of Bellahouston.    (Bertie was said to have run only three races every season for four years – the E-G, the National and the International.   The records show that this was only the case in 1959, 1960 and 1962!)   “The feature of this race was the poor form shown by the previous year’s international team with six of the internationalists – Andy Brown, Des Dickson, Harry Fenion, Andy Fleming, Pat Moy and John Russell – all finishing outside the first dozen.”  

Regardless of the standard of running in the National and missing out on the International Andy had a good summer wiping Ian Binnie’s Three Miles record from the books by three and a half seconds with a time of 13:47.6.    Despite his relentlessly high standard of running and victory in the the Six Miles Championship no fewer than three times (1956 with 29:54.6, 1957 with 29>54.8 and 1963 with 29:53.8) he never won a national title at the distance.

Although by definition it takes more than one man to win a team title, one man is often a catalyst for great deeds done by a team and we can all think of men that we know who were in this category.   To everybody who ran in Scotland in the 60’s, Andy Brown was Motherwell, and this is not to decry the outstanding efforts of many members of their teams.   A natural leader He led his club to three consecutive victories in the Edinburgh to Glasgow Relay in 1962, 1963 and 1964, second in 1965 and third in 1961 and 1966.   There were also no fewer than seven Midland District titles, the National Cross Country Championship once – 1963, two National Junior Championships – Ian McCafferty in 1965 and 1966, five Midlands District individual titles – Andy Brown in 1962 and 1963 and Ian McCafferty in 1964, 1965 and 1970, Midland District Relay titles in 1961, 1962, 1963, 1964, 1965, 1966 and 1967 and many International runners over the same period:

AH Brown: 12 representative appearances; AP Brown 3 (1965, 67 and 68), John Linaker 3  (1963, 66, 68), I McCafferty 7 (1965, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70 and 72), B McKay 1 (1963), D Simpson 1 (1962).

Although they had had several internationalists over the years (Somerville, Fleming, Nelson and others) there had never been a flowering to match this before or since.    There were many other very good athletes turning out for Motherwell at this time such as long time member Johnny Poulton and Jim Johnston who joined from Monkland but the key figure was Andy Brown.   he was always involved – I was once at the two miles to go point on the Edinburgh to Glasgow relay when Andy appeared shouting to brother Alex – “Two miles to go, less than ten minutes running!”    Doug Gillon reported on Andy in the middle of Airdrie in the same race shouting at a woman to get her pram off the road to let Ian McCafferty through.    At the last Ibrox Sports I was on the same handicap as Alex (about 100 yards) in the Mile when Andy came across and told him to watch the starter and go on the puff of smoke and not wait for the sound of the gun: I used the advice as well.   At a New Year’s Day race at Beith I saw Andy telling the Motherwell runner not to do strides away from the start line – “they’ll start the race if you’re 30 yards behind the line; do your strides up the course, they won’t start the race if you’re 30 yards up on the rest!”    He was everywhere and that was as well as doing his own running.   Alex as very lucky to have such a brother and every club could do with and Andy!   Note that the 1968 International team had four from the club there – Andy, Alex, John Linaker and Ian McCafferty.   His own running was of such a consistently high standard – Colin Youngson has pointed out that his four runs on the fourth stage between 1962 and 1965 were quite outstanding – fastest time every time out by margins of 37, 70, 5 and 57 seconds and his record of 27:37 from 1965 was quite superb and lasted until the stage was altered.   His brother Alex had the fastest time on the same stage in 1966 – just a coincidence?

In the Edinburgh to Glasgow, Andy ran in 1956, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65 and 66.   From 1959 to 1966 they produced 20 fastest stage times and two stage records with 1964 being the most prolific with 5 fastest times of the eight stages and a stage record by Bert McKay on the seventh stage.   For those who say it was not all down to Andy, the reply is that there is never a single cause and there were a lot of good guys out there but three years after his last race they were out of the E-G for a few years and never produced anything like it again.  So what happened in 1967 that the team dropped so quickly from the E-G and Scottish Championships?   Well, in 1967 the new club of Law and District appeared on the scene and many of the Motherwell runners moved there with another small group going to the new amalgamation of clubs, the short-lived Clyde Valley AAC.    For Motherwell YMCA, I and many others would take a lot of convincing that Scotland’s cross country captain had not done a great job with a team composed almost entirely of local lads.

John Linaker to Bert McKay for Motherwell  in 1962 at the end of the sixth stage

In the 1959-60 cross-country season, Andy was second to Graham Everett in the Midland Championship and then won the Inter-District at Hamilton over 9 miles finishing ten seconds clear of Joe Connolly, only to be defeated surprisingly by team-mate John Linaker in the Scottish YMCA Championships by over 600 yards.   The National in 1960 is always remembered for the ferocious and sustained race between two Shettleston Harriers – Graham Everett and  Alastair Wood, but third place was Andy Brown a quarter of a mile back but back in the team for the International.   In the international Alistair Wood led the team to fifth place – a team which included Englishman Bruce Tulloh making the first of two appearances for Scotland  – with Andy in 34th..   Came 1960/61 and the first real trial was the Nigel Barge race at Maryhill.    Graham Everett triumphed, and in the Midland Championship he again won over Brown and Connolly.   When it came to the National Cross-Country Championship at Hamilton he was again third behind winner Connolly and second placed Everett.   In the International race at Nantes, Scotland was sixth with Brown 28th.

Colin Shields reckons that the next season was definitely Andy’s best of his career.   He says: Although Andrew Brown had won the National in 1958, season 1961-62 was definitely the Motherwell harrier’s finest year in his long and distinguished career in Scottish and International athletics.   He led Motherwell YMCA to victory in the Midland relay championship, the first of seven consecutive victories; won the Nigel Barge New Year race and the Midland championship at Renton which had previously been dominated by John McLaren (4 wins) and Graham Everett (3 wins) and led his club to the team championship – a title they were to hold  on four consecutive occasions and five times in six years .    Brown’s happiness was enhanced when his young brother Alec won the Youths titles in the Midlands and Scottish National Championships.

Brown was out on his own at Renton and, although challenged in the early stages by John Linaker – a new Motherwell recruit, he forged ahead by half distance to win by over 100 yards.    Linaker who had a bad accident clearing a fence in the final stages of the race was overtaken by Bert McKay but held on to take third place ahead of the holder Graham Everett to ensure that Motherwell became the first club in the history of the race to have the first three athletes home.    At the start of the season, Alec Brown on finding that Motherwell YMCA were short of a full Youths team, coerced his friend Ian McCafferty to join the club and make up the team.”

Bert McKay defeated Brown in the Inter-District championship at Cleland Estate but when it came to the National Brown was a clear favourite with Everett and Wood also in the field.      Glasgow University student Callum Laing set the initial pace but after the first two miles or so Jim Alder went into the lead.   Brown had a go at about half distance but Alder held on and won from Brown by about 70 yards with Laing third.   Motherwell had three runners in the first nine but the drop-off was so great that the team could only finish fifth.   Colin Shields points out that Brown had his revenge over Alder two weeks later in the British YMCA Championships in Manchester before going on to say: “Seemingly getting better as the season progressed, Brown kept his best performance for the International championship at Graves Park, Sheffield.   After a bad patch during the middle of the race, Brown was back in twenty fourth position at the start of the last one and a half mile lap of the race.   With a strong finishing surge he tore his way through the field gaining fifteen places to eventually finish ninth, just 29 seconds behind the winner Gaston Roelants (Belgium)   Scotland was fifth just 8 points behind the fourth placed Morocco.”

His great form continued during the summer and he broke his old rival Ian Binnie’s Native Record for the 10 miles with a time of 49:58.8 against Binnie’s 50:11.    He also won the Shettleston marathon in the

very good time of 2:25:58 and was looking good for the SAAA Championships.  He had been running on the roads with some success since the Clydebank to Helensburgh in April 1957 when he was second to Harry Fenion in the year when he was really flying and won the SAAA Marathon.   His progress on the roads thereafter is illustrated in this table which takes us up to the SAAA race in 1962..

Date	Race	Place	Time	Remarks
10/8/57	Carluke 12	1st	63:46	2. JM Kerr 63:51
7/9/57	Shotts HG 14 Miles	1st	1:14:48	2.   H Fenion 1:14:49
9/8/58	Carluke 12	1st	60:49	2.   H Fenion 61:38
6/9/58	Shotts HG	1st	1:13:34	2.   A McDougall 1:14:07
25/4/59	Clydebank to Helensburgh	1st	1:23:11	2. H Fox 1:24:06
8/8/59	Carluke 12	1st	60:39	2. J Connolly 61:42
15/8/59	Springburn 12	1st	67:00	2.   G Eadie 67:36
5/9/59	Shotts HG	1st	1:19:33
12/9/59	Dunblane HG 14.5	1st	1:19:24	2. J Connolly 1:22:24
18/7/61	Musselburgh 13.5	1st	62:57	2. N Ross 63:16
16/9/61	Shettleston Marathon	1st	2:40:04
7/4/62	First Tom Scott 10	1st	50:33	2. J Linaker 51:06
18/4/62	SMC 10	1st	49:58.8	2.Bert McKay 51:55
28/4/62	Clydebank to Helensburgh	1st	1:26:15	2. G Eadie 1:27:31
30/5/62	Shettleston Marathon	1st	2:25:58	2. JM Kerr 2:26:58

Alastair Wood also had designs on the 1962 title and they fought it out for almost 20 miles before Brown dropped out.   The splits were 27:29 for five miles ( a group of five running together at this point), 55:06 for 10 miles with the same group of five battling it out, 1:19:53 for 15 miles with Wood Brown and John Kerr running together.   Brown had to drop out and Wood won in 2:24:39 with Kerr , who had won the race in 1961 second in 2:26:54.   Andy kept on running on the roads that year with some distinction – in June 62 he not only won the Springburn 12 in 65:38 but also won the handicap award and in November 1962 he won the Brampton to Carlisle in 48:37.    There were other road runs and victories but there were to be no more marathons.

Motherwell, led by Andy Brown, won the Midlands Relay and team championships in winter 1962-63 and went one better than the year before by winning the National Cross-Country Championship.  Brown and Linaker had run almost all the way together in the Midlands until Linaker stumbled towards the end and Brown won by three seconds.   They did the same again in the National, ie setting the pace with Alastair Wood going with them.   They were well clear when Brown tried to break the others with a break at a mile to go but the others were fast track men and current track champions with the result that Linaker won, Wood was second and Brown third.   With Bert McKay fourth Motherwell won the championship with Johnny Poulton last counter in 44th.   That summer was another good one for Andy.    He won the Six Miles Championship in 29:53.8 and topped the rankings for the year with 28:53.8 which he ran in Glasgow in June.    Second in the SAAA Three Miles Championship behind Fergus Murray  (14:01.6) in 14:12.8 he was ranked fourth in the ratings with 13:57 run a month after the championships in Pitreavie.   He was also ranked at 11 in the Two Mile rankings with his best time of 9:09.4 – one place below young brother Alex who had the same time.

Winter 63-64 saw Ian McCafferty as a first year Junior win the Midland District Cross Country title for the first time with Alex Brown second, Bert McKay fifth, Davie Simpson sixth, Andy Brown seventh and George Henderson ninth for 30 points, well clear of Shettleston’s103 points.    In the National, Andy was fourth in a race won in commanding fashion by Fergus Murray with Jim Alder and Alastair Wood also ahead of him.    The International that year was at Leopardston Racecourse, Dublin, and the Junior race was won by McCafferty by a distance who was backed by Alex Brown, 7th, and Joe Reilly, 9th, for a second place in the team competition.       For the third year in succession, Andy Brown led the Senior team home when he was 29th, one place in front of Jim Alder and Scotland finished seventh.   Colin Shields adds: “The big disappointment of the day was the performance of Fergus Murray.  He started well, being up with the leaders in the early stages but drifted back as he ran without conviction or determination and eventually finished fourth team counter in fortieth position – the first of many poor races in the International where he never ran to his full potential.”    There was always something to detract from the Senior team performance.

1964-65 started with Motherwell winning their fourth Midland Relay Championship and McCafferty defeated Fergus Murray in the Nigel Barge race at Maryhill before winning the Midlands Championship with Andy Brown second.   New Motherwell recruit Dick Wedlock was sixth and they won the team championship – also for the fourth year in a row.   In a real cracker of a race at the National at Hamilton, Andy Brown finished fourth.  Let Colin tell the story:  “The National Championship at Hamilton Racecourse continued to grow in size and stature with 21 clubs finishing teams in the senior race, a record for the event, and seven former champions  – J Emmet Farrell, Andy Forbes, Andy Brown, Alastair Wood, Jim Alder, John Linaker and the holder Fergus Murray – lining up in the field of 350 runners.   Murray retained his title with a solo run throughout the seven and a half mile race.   In an unrelenting mood Murray set off at a gallop and by two miles had opened up a gap from the following group of Andrew Brown, Lachie Stewart and Jim Alder.   Alder set off in pursuit of the leader at three miles but made no impression on the flying Murray who eventually won by 24 seconds from Alder, with Stewart third a further eleven seconds behind and Brown fourth.”     Alder, fourth, Brown, eighth, and McCafferty, eleventh, had already won the Hannut international race in Belgium ahead of Belgium and West Germany.   In the International Championship that year in Ostend, Alder was first Scot in a team which finished sixth of the fifteen countries taking part with Andy Brown 43rd.    On the track in 1965, Andy was ranked eleventh in the Two Miles with 9:20 when finishing fifth in Glasgow in a race won by Ian McCafferty in 8:42.2, and eighth in the Three Miles in 13:58.8 at Ayr in the Land o’Burns Meeting.   The following summer, 1966, he was third in the Six Miles rankings with 29:04.2, a time recorded when finishing second in the SAAA Championship in Edinburgh.   He was also ranked fifteenth in the 3000 metres steeplechase with a time of 9:49.4 when finishing second to younger brother Alex at Ayr.

Motherwell won the Midland Relay Championship for the fifth consecutive year early in 1965-66 before Christmas and then the brothers, Andy and Alex, were third and fourth in the Nigel Barge race behind Lachie Stewart and Eddie Knox of Springburn.  Stewart and Knox were first and second again in the Midlands championship but Motherwell failed to  win the team title, losing to Victoria Park by 11 points.   Although out of the medals, Andy Brown again competed for the Senior team – finances made it a small team of seven seniors to Morocco where he finished 29th in a team which was sixth of thirteen countries – with Lachie Stewart twelfth, Ian McCafferty (who lost a shoe when leading at four miles) fourteenth, Jim Alder 16th – only 18 points behind third placed Morocco.

In the 1966-67 season,   Ian McCafferty won the New Year’s Day race at Beith with Lachie Stewart second and Andy and Alex Brown third and fourth.   McCafferty continued to dominate in the West of Scotland and in the Midlands championship at Bellahouston he won again, this time from Lachie Stewart with young Alex defeating big brother Andy for third place.      Three in the first four meant that Motherwell had their fifth title in six years.   In the 1967 National, there was a team of New Zealand athletes competing as guests prior to the World Championships in Wales.   Andy Brown was fourth but since the three in front were Eddie Gray (NZ), Lachie Stewart and Mike Ryan (ex-Scot, now NZ) he was really second Scot and again made the team for the International.

The big event for Motherwell YMCA’s cross-country, road and even track and field running section in 1967 was the founding of the Law and District Amateur Athletic Club.    We all knew about the connection between Motherwell YM and Law – one of their members throughout the Fifties and into the Sixties was Tom Scott.   Tom was an excellent athlete and marathon runner who had been in many teams with Andy Brown until he died in a car accident on his way to a marathon in the North of England.   Motherwell set up the Tom Scott Memorial 10 Miles Road Race covering the route that he ran every day to and from his home in Law to work in Motherwell.   From the very start it was a superb race, bigger fields than any (up until the 80’s marathon boom), better prizes and a top class trophy which attracted most of the top runners in the country.    When the Law team appeared on the scene in 1967, Ian McCafferty, Alex Brown, Andy Brown and several others who had run in the MYMCA colours in 1966, appeared in the Law and District outfit and right well did they do so.    But here’s a puzzle – in writing this I tried to get a contact address for Andy from the club and they didn’t have one and couldn’t help me.    The club records do not include any of the superb marks set by any of the men who were there in the beginning.    McCafferty’s wonderful times for 1500 and 5000 are not there nor are any of the others.   Motherwell YMCA linked up with Bellshill YMCA in 1991 to form Motherwell Athletics Club.

The formation of the new club and the change of vest however did not stop the good running done by the former Motherwell runners.   In summer 1967, Ian McCafferty won the SAAA One Mile Championship and led the Scottish rankings with 4:02.5 although Bert McKay was also listed under the Motherwell name – he stayed with the old club until the new Clyde Valley was formed by the amalgamation of five Lanarkshire clubs and then ran for it.   Andy Brown appeared in the Two Miles rankings (9:01.8) and the Six Miles (29:32.6);  and brother Alex appeared in the One, Two, Three and Six lists.   To continue with Andy though on the track he kept racing and recording excellent times although not of his own very high standard of previous years:.   Inn 1968 he appeared in the Scottish All Time lists for the Six Miles with 28:53.8 which he had run in 1963 and in the Ten Miles he was fourth with his 49:58.8 which had been a Scottish record when he set it in 1962.   For the 1968 season he was twenty fifth in the Two Miles with 9:12.4, sixteenth in the Three Miles rankings with 14:04.8 and fourteenth in the Six Miles with 30:18.2 but won no titles.  He put this right in 1969 when he won the West District 10000 metres championship in 30:51.4 which placed him thirteenth in Scotland for the year.

How did the new club do in the winter seasons thereafter?   Well the Brown effect worked so well that by November 1969 – one year after their first winter – they were running a team in the Edinburgh to Glasgow.  The team was ninth, then 17th in 1970, 8th in 1971 and 13th in 1972.    This last was the first time in all his runnings in the race all the way back to the late 1950’s that AH Brown had lost places in the event – he went from 11th to 14th on the second stage.   He did not run the following year and the Law & District team dropped out of the race after 14th place in 1973.    In summer 1968 he was twenty fifth in the Two Miles rankings (brother Alex was eighteenth), sixteenth in the Three Miles and fourteenth in the Six Miles in which he won the West District Championship with Alex in second place.   However, 1968 was the year when he was seventh in the National Championships and made the squad for the International where the Scottish team performed heroics with their points total at halfway being 172 and by the finish 137 and Colin Shields comment on Andy Brown was “35 year old captain Andy Brown drove the team onwards while pushing himself into the top 20 finishers.”  Ian McCafferty led the team home in tenth wth Lachie Stewart eighteenth and Andy nineteenth.    His appearances are in the table below.

Year	Position	Counter?	Comments
1955	52	Yes
1956	50	No
1958	54	No
1960	34	Yes
1961	28	Yes
1962	9	Yes	First Scot
1963	11	Yes	First Scot
1964	29	Yes	First Scot
1965	43	Yes
1966	48	Yes
1967	47	Yes
1968	19	Yes

He had been as inspirational a captain for Scotland as he had been for Motherwell YMCA and, briefly, for Law & District AAC and it is a rare gift.   So many top runners have such tunnel vision that they do not see the wider picture or have the gift of enthusing/encouraging their team-mates.   Even without it it his long and successful career on road, track and country would be worthy of the greatest respect.   Andy made a comeback as an M40 Veteran in 1981 and finished second to Martin Craven and with Bert McKay and Willie Marshall making up the Clyde Valley team they won the team race.  Not only that, when the Clyde Valley team finished second in the National in 1982, the six counters were Ron McDonald, Jim Brown, Brian Gardener, Peter Fox, Joe Small and Andy Brown.   Doing the sums we arrive at an age of 49 for Andy in that team.   One of his team mates that day describes him as ‘the hardest of hard men.’  He returned the following year and turned the tables on Martin when he was first and Martin Craven finished second.   He disappeared from the records for a bit and then as an M60 Vet in 1994 and won the Cross Country Championship in the Law and District AAC vest.   On the track the previous year (1993) he had  set the Scottish Masters M60 indoor record for the 3000 metres of 9:54.02 and in 1994 set the outdoors record for 5000 metres of 16:48.44.   However he had done his real running when it really counted, when he was a Senior athlete, competing against all-comers and his record, set then will last for a long time to come.    Currently an honorary life member of Law and District AAC he still lives in Motherwell and has agreed to present the prizes at the Tom Scott Road Race in 2012.

 

 

 

Sandra Branney was born on 30th April 1954 in Glasgow where she still lives.   She is also a member of a Glasgow club – starting with Victoria Park AAC, she moved to Glasgow AC and now that the two clubs have merged she is back with City of Glasgow Victoria Park.   She is identified with Glasgow every bit as much as Liz McColgan is with Dundee.      According to an article in the “Scotland’s Runner” magazine in November 1986, she took up running in 1983 on the prompting of her husband Donald and has had a most remarkable career since.   “When Sandra started running three years ago, Donald used to have to ‘drag her round the block’.   Now he has been left trailing gamely in her wake.”   Donald is clearly a major factor in her success and she admits as much when she says in reply to being asked about  anyone who has had an influence on her performances, “The one person who stands out is my husband Donald who, as he puts it, is ‘right behind me’.   Over the years I have read a lot and where possible spoke to people about training and competing.   When I decided to go back to track a few years ago, I joined John Montgomery’s group.  It was the best move I ever made and my recent track performances are down to John and the rest of the gang.”    Although others are mentioned and John is name-checked, Donald is the first mentioned and his importance stands out.  

She  really burst on to the scene in the Glasgow Marathon in 1985 with no background that anyone knew of.   At the age of 31 she ran 2:45.  

If ever the “What if …..” question were to be asked of an athlete, it would have to be asked of Sandra.   Clearly an athlete of talent, a gifted athlete, what if she had taken up running earlier?    We can’t answer that accurately, although there are formulae to calculate what her times might have been, but we can look at her career in a bit of detail and wonder.

*****

As a child between the ages of eleven and fifteen she was a competitive swimmer, she gave up for a few years and then took the sport up again when at University.  She started running after she watched the first Glasgow Marathons and she just felt that she wanted to be part of it.   She started running (very slowly, she says) just after the 1983 event and ran in the 1984 marathon in 3:40 or thereabouts.   After keeping going through the winter she started to get a bit faster and it took off from there.   When asked if she had any role models the name of Joan Benoit comes first – she had won the 1984 Olympic marathon when Sandra was just a self-confessed jogger.   In total awe of her, Sandra says she couldn’t comprehend how anyone could run so fast.   Everything was coming together to encourage her ambitions – The Glasgow marathons, Benoit’s Olympic success and the inspiration it generated and Donald’s support and interest.    The swimming background helped with her fitness and she was being coached by Ronnie Neilson at the time of the ’86 marathon.   Sandra comments “I ran ’84 and ’85 self coached.   I was only coached by Ronnie Neilson for a year or so – early ’86 until late ’87.   The quote below was after the ’86 Glasgow Marathon.    Her career as a serious runner probably began with that Glasgow marathon.    To quote again from the article in ‘Scotland’s Runner’: “Neilson is a keen supporter of the pre-marathon ‘bleed-out’ diet whereby the athlete is starved of carbohydrates for three days (eating mainly proteins) then starts ‘carbo loading’ for the final three days to give the muscles an extra top-up of the glycogen that fuels a marathon run.      Sandra, who normally weighs in at 7st 2lbs, had to undergo the withdrawal symptoms that a lot of athletes face during the carbohydrate -starving period.   “By the Wednesday morning before the marathon I felt terrible.   I was very irritable and didn’t feel much like running a marathon at the end of the week;, she says.   “But it worked”, says Neilson, “You only had to look at the way Sandra jumped over the line at the finish to see that she had everything right on the day.”   Although she wasn’t too sure about it herself, she says it worked and she incorporated a version into all her subsequent marathons although it was difficult for the overseas races.

Her talent was not limited to roads: track running has been and is a big part of her athletics and Sandra is a good cross country runner who twice won the Scottish championship.   Having made her debut in 1986 when she finished seventh there was a wee slip the next year when she slipped to eleventhn(“I had a cold but that’s no excuse!)    In 1988 at Irvine she won from Lynn Harding by over two minutes.   It was reported in ‘Scotland’s Runner’ as follows.   “Sandra Branney led Glasgow AC to a team victory despite the hazards of a poorly stewarded course.   The Strathclyde University librarian damaged a hip last autumn and had had only one track race – the Scottish indoor 3000 metres which she won – since October.   She sorted herself out largely thanks to running in a special jacket in the university’s swimming pool, and looks in good shape for the World 15K Road Race Championship in Adelaide where she will represent Britain.”    Not content with winning the Championship, she returned the following year and won it again.  This was the race that Donald thought might have been her best ever simply because of the pressure that she was under to win it again.   When an athlete wins anything twice, the question of ‘three in a row’ raises its head – unfortunately for Sandra a third win was not on the cards because she was injured and could not compete.   However she continued to race in the championships and remained a valued team member.

On the track, her standard of performance has been consistently high and her best times are also good.   These are shown on the table below – the road times are added to show the range covered in her early career and the times still stand as personal best performances.

Distance	Date	Venue	Event	Time
1500	July 1989	London	UKWAL	4:35
3000	July 1989	Glasgow	Scottish Championships	9:26
5000	June 1989	Jarrow	UK Championships	16:08
10000	September 1989	Stoke	WAAA	33:40
10K (Road)	July 1987	Inverness	Inverness 10K	33:36
10 Miles	August 1989	Millport	Round Cumbrae	54:36
Half-Marathon	September 1988	Glasgow	Great Scots Run	73:04*
Marathon	April 1989	London	London Marathon	2:35:03

(* The 72:22 from Ardrossan that appears on some ranking sites is an error.   My time that day was 77:22.   I have tried unsuccessfully several times to get this corrected.  SB)

She has run all over Britain and even further afield in her specialist track events and in all types of races – League Matches (in the Scottish Women’s League, the UK Women’s League, the UK League as presently constituted), Championships (Scottish and British), Masters/Veterans Championships (Scottish, British, European and World).   These track events have brought her some of her best moments in the sport and some of the worst too.   In the former category comes the National Track 3000 metres title in 1990.   She had been injured for quite a while beforehand and was lacking in confidence.   Any one of five women could have won the race and right at the start Annette Bell went off like a rocket and Sandra led the chasing pack.   They managed to close her down and with about 300 metres to go, Sandra picked the pace up a bit and got herself clear.  ‘ It wasn’t’, she says, ‘particularly fast (about 9:45) but as everyone would agree I don’t have much of a finish, it was quite a good run.’   Donald thinks it was possibly her best ever run.   Statistically she reckons her best run must be the W55 3000m record of 10:13.8 which has a score of 103.2% in the age graded tables.   It was also only 47 seconds slower than her personal best of July 1989.

As for the worst moment – well she is in no doubt about that!   “I was selected for a 3000m indoors in Athens which I think was a Small Nations International and it turned out to be the most brutal race I have ever experienced.   There was a lot of the usual shoving and pushing so I went to the front to try to stay out of trouble.   It was a temporary track and there was a drop of about five cm between the inside of the track and the floor of the arena and remember someone trying to push me off the track.   At one point a shoe went flying over my head!   When the bell went for the final lap, the others sprinted away (they were obviously used to this) and I finished scratched, battered and bruised.   I took a lot from this race and learned how to look after myself.

Unlike many who came into running via the mass marathons of the 80’s, Sandra has kept running and racing seriously and has now been competing on a very high level for over 25 years.    If there is any doubt about her continuing competitiveness or appetite for the sport, you only have to look at the table below.   It shows only her very best track results of the past five years.   Eleven first places and three seconds out of fourteen starts.   Some of the time she was injured or returning from injury: for example in 2010 she was not going to run because of time out but she went and passed on the 1500 metres because she was not fit enough to do that and the 5000 so settled for the 5000 – and won against the best that Europe had to offer.   But see for yourself.

Year	Age Group	Meeting	Venue	Event	Place	Time
2005	V50	British Masters		5K	12	18:15*
2006	V50	BMAF Championships		800	2	2:35.31
		“		1500	1	5:02.73
		European Masters	Poznan	1500	1	4:57.22
		“	“	5000	1	18:18.3
2007	V50	World Masters	Riccione	1500 SF	1	5:24.82
		“	“	1500 F	1	5:02.47
		“	“	5000	1	18:01.56
		“	“	10000	1	37:31.42
2008	V50	–	–	–	–	–
2009	V50	Scottish Masters	Glasgow	800	2	2:36.0i
		“	“	1500	1	4:57.58
		World Masters	Lahti	1500	1	4:58.52
		“	“	5000	1	18:38.82
2010	V55	European Masters	Hungary	5000	1	19:55.63

*The 2005 time was in the BMAF 5K in Horwich and it was an age group record.

She even managed better times than some of those above in Seniors races at home: in the 3000 metres she ran 10:13.8 finishing third in a SWAL fixture, in the 5000 she ran 17:52.82 finishing sixth in teh SWAAA Championships at Pitreavie and in the 10000 she ran 37:09.27 at Bedford as a guest in the Sheila Fairweather Memorial

Having established that Sandra Branney is a quality endurance athlete on track and country we should go back to her first events and what many regard as her best – road racing.  She has run in many races in all parts of Scotland from the north to the south and even off shore (in Millport on the Isle of Cumbrae).   The 10K races in the Polaroid series held every year in Clydebank, Dumbarton, Helensburgh and the Vale of Leven are among her favourites – especially the one in the Vale which is traditionally the last in the series with the biggest fields and best competition.    The picture above is from the Polaroid Race in the Vale in 2008 where she was fifth Woman and first in her category and she had the same position in the Dumbarton race.   However the flowers were for more than just two races in that single year – she has won the Women’s championship (which takes in all four races) no fewer than four times (1990, 1991, 1992 and 1996) and was first Lady Vet in 1993 and 2000.    She adds that she set a course record of 34:09 in 1992 which was broken only by Yvonne Murray whose time was only a few seconds quicker.  A quite remarkable record.

In half marathons, she has had no less distinguished a career with the top possibly being in a race she didn’t win.   In the Glasgow Half Marathon of 1998 there was a tough battle between three able and determined women for first place with Lorna Irving, Sandra and Sheila Catford battling it out for the first ten miles before Sheila moved away – not far but enough and Sandra took second place in 73:04.    She herself reckons that her best run might well have been the Balloch to Clydebank race when it was over a 12.25 mile course in 1988 in 67:27.   A non-standard distance these days her feeling is that it was worth about a 71:00 half marathon time.      And of course there are the UK rankings that can also be used to indicate the quality of her running.   The UK 10 Miles Championship that she won in 1988 in 55:32 is at number 71 in the UK All time rankings and the half marathon best has her at number 43 (although two lists have her at number 32 using the 72:22 time).

The first three marathons have already been covered (3:40 in Glasgow, ’84, 2:45 in Glasgow ’85 and 2:37:29 in 1986).   She went on to run in six countries on three Continents.    The first of the foreign races was in 1987 when she was selected, along with Fraser Clyne and Lindsay Robertson on the Men’s side, to represent Great Britain in the second World Marathon Cup which was to be held in Seoul over the course to be used in 1988 for the Olympic Games in 1988.   It was a long journey there – over 30 hours in all.   The teams had four men and four women and John Brown of the SAAA was going on a fact finding mission for the BAAB.   They did not travel directly to Korea – there was a four day stay  at the Nihon Aerobics Centre  south east of Tokyo and was to be used as a holding camp for Britain’s athletes for final training before the Games.   The set up was rather luxurious with swimming pools, jacuzzi, saunas, golf course, tennis courts and an outdoor 100 metre pool.   Their accommodation was in log cabins on the wooded hillside.   They then transferred to the Sheraton Walker Hill Hotel  in Seoul over looking the Han River.   The course for the race was straightforward with few if any difficult uphill sections.   Sandra finished twenty sixth in her first full marathon and her sixth marathon in all so far in 2:40:44 in a field of 78 runners.   The British team was fifth with Sally Ellis (18th) and Carolyn Naisby (22nd) the other counting runners.   Sandra remembers that it was cold (Fraser Clyne reports the temperature as being about 11 degrees), add in  problems adjusting to the time difference and she felt that she was struggling at the end.    Nevertheless she was third counter for the team and a reasonable run – after all the men could only manage eight team!   The Scottish team on the trip is in the picture below.