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Colin Young: alumnus of Glasgow and Edinburgh Universities and a regular competitor for the Atalanta Club has  provided some programmes from his days at these Universities and they can be seen at the links below.

1959 (Westerlands)   1961 (Aberdeen)   1962  (Craiglockhart)

1962’s Championships were held in Edinburgh at Craiglockhart.   Again it was a slim programme of eight pages but the meeting itself was as good and as competitive as ever.   The results are at the foot of the page.

The Universities championships had played an important part in Scottish athletics since the end of the nineteenth century.   Every season was different with new athletes appearing on the scene and some old favourite athletes returning to their club, or indeed to their own country in the case of foreign students.   You can read about the seasons of 1961 and 1962 at   this link  .

The programme was only half the size of that from 1959 with many fewer advertisements.   They were held in Aberdeen and again there were many easily recognisable names across the afternoon.  Again the programme was provided by Colin Young.   Results at the foot of the page.

The Universities championships were hard fought and the ‘four ancients’ were still to the fore in the 1950’s and early 1960’s.   The championships of 1959 were held at Westerlands  in Glasgow, pavilion above) and the standard of competition was very high indeed right across the card.   For a glimpse of the universities track and field  season 1959season follow this link .  

Hurdler Colin Young showed us the programme.   Bigger than many programmes, it ran to 16 pages and included many (paid for) advertisements.   Results at the foot of the page.

Unlike the handbook for 1962/63, this version recognised the women’s side of the sport – note the ‘new’ affiliation to the SWAAA on the front cover where the previous one had only the two men’s governing bodies.   There are other differences that will be obvious as you go through it.   The handbook is courtesy Colin Young.

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This handbook was passed on by Colin D Young who was a noted sprinter and hurdler with Victoria Parl Glasgow University, Edinburgh University and the Atalanta Club.   The booklet is interesting mainly because of the detail involved , the definition of amateurism (which required a high degree of literacy to be understood) and the omission of anything to do with the ladies side of the sport – note the affiliations on the front cover.

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Is Lawrie Spence (above) the best all round endurance runner the country has ever produced?  Look at the statistics below and reach your own conclusion.     But we should take things in order and we all know who we like – Dave McMeekin, Frank Clement, Hugh Barrow, John Robson, Graham Williamson, Graham Everett, etc.   Half milers are included here too because many of them were also 1500m runners and the milers had to run the half mile too.   So who were ranked?   There is a wee problem in that so many talented distance runners (a) need to run below distance and over distance on occasion; and (b) many enjoyed and performed really well at distances other than their perceived specialism.   We’ll come back to Lawrie in a moment but Ian Stewart, for instance, was a sub 4 miler as well as national and international medallist at 5000m.   Here is the order in which you viewed the pages.  NB: It is not a merit ranking.   It is the pages that have been read most.    Three are seen mainly as 800m specialists, one as a 5000m man and the rest were top class milers.

Men first

1.   Tom McKean – 738
2.   Frank Clement – 463
3.   John Robson – 448
4.   Graham Williamson – 343
5.   Ian McCafferty – 320
6.   Paul Forbes – 289
7.   Hugh Barrow – 284
8.   Peter Hoffmann – 279
9.   Ian Stewart – 270
10.   Alan Gordon – 240

Frank Clement, John Robson and Graham Williamson

It is difficult to see why Tom is so far ahead of the others in the event: he was certainly a very successful athlete indeed with medals at national, GB, international and Games levels and his career is marginally fresher in the minds of current generations but the trio above were so good at what they did – Frank’s victory in the Europa Cup at Meadownbank and his run in the Olympic final were outstanding, John Robson has so many top class times to his credit, Graham was one of Scotland’s best ever 1500/Mile specialists and also one of the most unlucky, not only in terms of injury but several times at the hands of Scottish or British selectors.   The two childhood friends who became world class 400/800 runners – Peter Hoffmann and Paul Forbes, both coached by the wonderful Bill Walker – are still high on the Scottish all-time ranking lists.   It is also gratifying to see Hugh Barrow up there – his pages on the website are all very interesting reads and there are several links from his profile page to other items of interest.   Many thought he would be the first Scot to break 4 minutes for the Mile, Graham Everett (whom I would have liked to see up here) was one of them.   The only Scot ever to hold a world record for the mile, Hugh held world age bests as a youth and Junior.   Alan Gordon is a very interesting character who has never really received the credit that was his due.  Please have a look at his profile – his running in and just after Bannister’s acclaimed four minute mile was of the very highest order.

Lawrie Spence was a sub four minute miler and a 2:16 marathon man with every distance between  of a similar standard.   He also captained the SCCU team in the world championships as successor in the role to Jim Alder.   All he needed to cement his position was a single outstanding performance in a Games or international championships.   One of our best ever in terms of times.   Click on his name at the top for the whole story.

Carol Sharp (61)

Women:

1.   Carol Sharp – 340
2.   Palm Gunstone – 320
3.   Yvonne Murray – 236
4.   Moira O’Boyle – 205
5.   Lynne McDougall – 134
6.   Rosemary Wright – 132
7.   The McMeekin Twins – 124
8.   Ann Purvis – 100
9.   Margaret Coomber – 94
10.   Molly Wilmoth – 91
11.   Dale Greig – 90

This is possibly one of the most fascinating for me.   The list is led off by Carol Sharp who was a top class 800/1500m runner who ran for Scotland and for GB, mainly at 800m.   A popular athlete who is now a very good coach in her own right catering for some talented athletes.   By far the quickest highest rise of any newcomer was that of Palm Gunstone ,  ‘way up there in second place.   Palm won medals in the SWAAA Mile and cross country, ran internationally on track and cross-country before becoming a top class road runner. Her total was given a boost when her club posted a link to the profile but there were still numerous visits when it appeared.  It also includes the remarkable Lynne McDougall – Olympic 1500m finalist in Los Angeles and a 2:36 marathon runner.   All the distances between were national top ten ranking times for her.   Excellent athlete.   Christine and Evelyn McMeekin were two very good athletes indeed  with excellent times from 200m up to 1500m.   They had separate careers with Christine doing really well at 800/1500m and Evelyn at 400m/800m.   Unfortunately Evelyn’s career was cut short by injury but it’s clear that there is still a real interest in them.   Molly and Dale were followed in the ‘readings’ by Aileen Drummond – three women who dominated the sport through the 50’s and into the 60’s.

The Scottish cross-country team in Monza, 1974: Palm Gunstone on the left, Margaret Coomber next and Moira O’Boyle second left

As with the men there are several runners who were known for longer distances – Moira O’Boyle was the outstanding example of that.  Yvonne was very good at all distances from 800m up and will be dealt with in another page.   A Scottish internationalist as well as an Irish internationalist later in her career she was a top athlete over the country too.   The generation before that one is well represented by Molly and  Dale who are known throughout the UK with Dale being the first ever women’s world marathon record holder.    The two 800m runners – Rosemary Stirling and Ann Purvis – are well worth their place in the top ten and their careers are well known to the athletics supporters of the 21st century.   Margaret Coomber , who started out as Margaret McSherry, ran for most of her top class career in the United States and was one of Scotland’s best ever milers.

Longer Track Distances:  Women

1.   Leslie Watson – 1,036
2.   Liz McColgan – 398
3.   Karen MacLeod – 257
4.   Yvonne Murray – 236
5.    Christine Price – 140
6.    Karen Hutcheson – 184
7.    Sandra Branney – 100
8.    Judith Shepherd  – 80
9.    = Hayley Haining – 74 , Penny Rother – 74
10.     Susan Partridge – 59

Every one a Scottish international, at least six GB internationals, one an internationalist on track, road and cross-country who later opted to for the triathlon and distances from 1500m to marathon covered.   Click on the names for the full story – Olympians include Liz McColgan, Yvonne Murray and Karen Macleod,  The amazing career of triathlete Penny Rother  really needs to be read as does Sandra Branney’s tale of running at home and abroad.   Hayley Haining really should have had an Olympic vest – after she had ostensibly qualified, the selectors gave Paula Radcliffe who had been injured the choice of whether she went to the Games or not.   Who’s going to turn down Olympic selection?   And Hayley missed out.   Karen Hutcheson has been almost forgotten by Scotland – after starting with Jimmy Bryce’s Lochgelly, she moved to England and was a Scottish international with a great run in the Commonwealth Games 10000m.   Susan Partridge was a very good marathon runner who represented Scotland and GB and was of a very high standard.   Judith Shepherd was a Glasgow AC runner who went on a scholarship to the USA and developed from a very good standard athlete who excelled at 1500 and maybe especially at 3000m events.  

Nat Muir, SAAA 5000m, 1983

Men

1.   Eddie Knox – 681
2.   Lachie Stewart – 667
3.   Jim Dingwall – 558
4.   Jim Brown – 392
5.   Ian McCafferty – 328
6.   Allister Hutton – 306
7.   Tommy Murray – 303
8.    Nat Muir – 302
9.    Ian Stewart – 270
10.    Robert Quinn – 260

Another interesting collection of runners reflecting the interests of the site visitors.   As you would expect from 5000/10000m men they are all versatile with most running on track, road and over the country with at least two of them being hill running internationalists too.   Nat was unquestionably the country’s best cross-country runner for a considerable time; as a track runner he took on the best and often enough defeated them.   He was unfortunate in that he never won a medal at a major Games which would have sealed a wonderful career.     Eddie Knox and Jim Brown were both world cross-country champions as Junior Men and both were also very good track and cross-country runners indeed.   Lachie Stewart, Ian McCafferty, Ian Stewart and Allister Hutton were all Commonwealth Games runners and all represented GB .   Allister is probably best known for his London Marathon win in a very fast time, but he was also a track runner of note and competed in the 10000m at Edinburgh in 1986.   Jim Dingwall won the SAAA Marathon Championship in a record time but he had a top class career as a track runner (one of the class known as ‘Head Waiters) before taking to the roads).   Tommy Murray and Robert Quinn were great rivals on the track, on the road and over the country before they both ran in the World Hill Running Championships.   

Gordon Rimmer

Steeplechaser

1.   Gordon Rimmer – 172
2.    Tom O’Reilly – 151
3.    Tom Hanlon – 134
4.      Ian Gilmour – 133
5.     Alistair Blamire – 126
6.     Gareth Bryan Jones – 90
7.     Graeme Croll – 80
8.    =  Bill Ewing  54;   =  John Linaker  54
9.     Bill Mullett – 30

There is quite a range there too – TP O’Reilly (Springburn) appeared on programmes for track meets, cross-country events, hill races and road races for decades.   Winner of the very first SAAA 3000m steeplechase championship Tommy was a credit for any team he ran for.  He was also the man who got Danny Wilmoth into the sport!    Tom Hanlon coached by Ebglishman Gordon Surtees was possibly the best ever steeplechaser and a regular in GB teams for a spell.   They were all very versatile and top men over a range of distances with RAF man Gordon Rimmer being most read. Graeme Croll was his team mate at Cambuslang after starting out with East Kilbride and was a very good domestic Scottish runner – with no advantages that were not enjoyed by any runner in the country, he was the top ‘chaser for a number of years.     Gareth Bryan Jones Alistair Blamire and Ian Gilmour were of the same generation and all widely respected – Bryan Jones went into orienteering after his running career was over and Alistair Blamire had been a member of the BMC and one of the Edinburgh University Hare and Hounds squad in the 1960’s.   His book ‘The Green Machine’ covers the period and should also be read.    

That’s the top ten steeplechase runners but note that an Irishman’s page has been visited more than any of them:  Peter McColgan – 340 visits.   

Lawrie Soence (78), Lachie Stewart (127) and Alistair Blamire

Several of the most popular athletes are here with Eddie Knox and Lachie Stewart on the extreme right.

The website has been running for several years now and the number of visits has increased year on year.  A kind of Oscars for the site – the DotScot Awards.  The biggest number of hits on a single day was over 700 but this year the highest number was almost exactly 600.   There have been 98,471 page views over the last 12 months, the highest monthly total was 5,549 in April 2019 and the top 10 categories were as follows:

1.   Who’s Who of Distance Running – 2, 409
2.   Marathon Stars – 1,392
3.   Elite Endurance – 1,382
4.   The Milers – 951
5.   The Fast Pack – 702
6.   A Hardy Race – 625
7.   The Veterans – 582
8.   The Chasers – 522
9.   Marathons – 493
10.   The Professionals – 451

These are the categories but we can look at them more closely.  Bear in mind however that the pages with most links on them will, or should have, most views.    eg Elite Endurance has many more names on the page than The Milers and that would probably cover the difference of less than 400.  Bearing that in mind, the relatively high position of The Chasers is perhaps a bit surprising.   Who’s Who is comparatively recent in appearance so it’s dominant position says something about what the readers want to see.  The most popular individual page for the Who’s Who was the letter C with 542 visits, followed by B (486), Mc Alinden to McParland (429) , VWY (390) and S (389).   The most popular Marathon Star was Leslie Watson with over 1,000 views with Donald Macgregor 400 behind (640) , Donald Ritchie (559) and Jim Dingwall on 557.   On the Elite Endurance page, it was Eddie Knox top on 684, followed by Lachie Stewart at 664 and Liz McColgan on 356.   Most popular miler in the overall rankings  was 800m runner (?) Tom McKean with 735 views.   Carol Sharp and Graham Williamson were second and third most popular over the year.

Lesley Watson wins the Luddon Strathkelvin Half Marathon.

Individuals:

1.  Leslie Watson – 1,034
2.   John Freebairn, Coach – 753  
3.   Tom McKean –  735
4.   Eddie Knox – 684
5.   Lachie Stewart – 664
6.   Donald Macgregor – 640
7.   Stuart Hogg, Sprinter – 599
8.   Donald Ritchie – 559
9.   Jim Dingwall – 557
10.   Mel Edwards – 535

Leslie Watson is by far the most visited of the individual profiles, almost 300 more views than John Freebairn and Tom McKean.   A good athlete as a teenager with SWAAA titles and international vests, she came into her own when the marathon boom started and she became probably the most prolific of the top class runners produced by Scotland at that time.   Like all the others, just click on her name above to go to the page and see just how good she actually was.

Number two among the individuals is an interesting.   John Freebairn was a very good athlete indeed as a youth but he was blacked as an amateur when he chose to play professional football because as a student he really needed the money.   After several years as a pro athlete he was re-instated as an amateur and became an international coach and veteran athlete.   A really outstanding athlete he would probably have competed for GB had it not been for the rupture between Pro and Amateur athletics.  His pages were all well visited with his next most popular page being  John Freebairn – In the Beginning which had 485 visits.  There were three other pages – As a Professional (107), As a Veteran (125) and As Others See him (201).

Stuart Hogg in seventh place was another who wanted as a boy to run in the Olympics but had to race as a pro because he lived in an area known as a hotbed of professional athletics and because he lived three bus journeys away from the nearest club.   It is kind of strange that three of the professional athletes that we profiled – and the three which were most viewed – had not wanted to be professional in the first place.   Be that as it may, Stuart’s other pages were visited as follows : As A Coach (243),  Career Achievements (127),  Athletes (159), Talking About Stuart (71) and To the Top (56), 

Tom McKean topping the Milers was a bit of a surprise, I think, because he was an 800 runner.  However wherever he was placed he was the subject of a lot of interest as a runner – and as a runner he was much better and more successful than many suspected.   Six of the top ten are no longer with us, having died in the past year Eddie Knox, Donald Macgregor, Don Ritchie, Jim Dingwall and Mel Edwards as well as John Freebairn.   All top class athletes, all highly respected and all really missed from the scene.  Lachie of course, El Lachie to our Spanish friends, is one of the most respected athletes of all time and we were all saddened to hear of his recent amputation of part of his left leg.   The good news is that he is progressing well and his recent video on BBC testified to that.

A non-Scot of interest is Bobbi Gibb, the first woman to run in the Boston Marathon.   When they were writing up Kathy Switzer as the first woman to run in the event, and the Press was almost vilifying Scot Jock Semple, it seemed about right to point out that it was Gibb not Switzer who was first – and was congratulated by Jock afterwards.   That particular post has been read hundreds of times and continues to be read several times each month.

John Freebairn

Having had a look at the various categories there was a vast range of events in which the athletes competed = road, country, track, hills, etc and the preferences seemed to go with what might be expected with three long distance road races in the top four.

Events:

1.   Glasgow Marathon – 1,283
2.   Two Bridges – 815
3.   The Rangers Sports – 552
4.   Aberdeen Marathon – 393
5.   Dundee Marathon – 453
6.   Edinburgh to Glasgow – 417

Just click on the link – the name of the event you want to see – above for the story of each event.   It is probably true to say, though, that the one which produces most correspondence is the Two Bridges Race although it is a close run thing with the Rangers Sports.  

Glasgow Marathon 1985

The next page to go up will be the top three in each category – the top three Milers (men and women separately), the top three Steeplechasers (men only – the website deals with the period 1945 to 1990 and there was no women’s steeplechase at that time), the top three marathon runners (men) and top three marathon runners (women).

Graham Crawford

Lyn Harding