Birmingham Uni Reunion Race

On the 15th May 2010 25 ex-Birmingham University athletes met up in Marlow to remember a good friend Angela Deegan, reminisce about the good old days 30 odd years ago and enjoy each others company! The team including Olympic athletes Andy Holden, Ray Smedley Chris Benning, and British record holder Mike Kearns who decided the first tactic was to find a pub with good food and stay until closing time.

The food was excellent and the conversation even better as we eventually rolled into our respective hotels and B&Bs around midnight. Having raced the day before at the National Vets relays at Sutton Park, I was out for a 10-minute jog at 7am on Sunday to survey the damage to my legs. Verdict not too bad, I pinned my number to my racing vest not my t-shirt, and got a text from Jill Harrison around 9am saying she was up for racing too!!

So as the 11 o’clock start approached on Sunday 16th, only 2 of us stripped off to vests and shorts (Ronhill of course), as the rest stayed in limited edition reunion t-shirts. A field of 700 set off and I decided just to see how I felt & not check kilometre splits. First 2km felt easy so I decided to race and broke away easily at 4km to win by 22 seconds in my fastest over 50s time to date 34m 16sec.
Moral of the tale; forget the watch, just race!

Only 90 seconds later my best man from 1982 and uni flatmate Mike Longthorn arrived in 35m 47s. I hope he isn’t planning a comeback or I am in trouble. Then Mike Kearns out kicked Jill for 16th place overall 38m 03s to 38m 06s, who is still as competitive after all this time. Eventually everyone made it back including Steve Lawrence and Paul Rowland, just recovering from knee surgery but determined to finish in Ange’s memory.

Back to Junes for showers and a BBQ before the long goodbyes. We had packed a hell of a lot into 24 hours and now it was time go back to reality. What is it really time to go? Can’t we stay a bit longer and remember great times in the Gun Barrels, having destroyed Loughborough in the BUSF XC Champs yet again, 1973-77 straight?

Yes, work beckons, but we've had a magical moment remembering good friends Angela Deegan and Ian Logan who left us too soon, and raised almost £12,000 for Cancer Research UK.

Maybe we should do is every month!! Will we ever do it again? Get Kearns over from Pittsburgh, Gilmour from Melbourne, Longthorn from Zurich? Maybe but if its going to take another 30 years it will definitely be a 5km next time, and a battle of who has the fittest carer pushing the wheelchair!!

Just Giving - Birmingham Uni Run to view full results and photos of the event.