Spring Handicap
THE Stubbington Green Runners' handicap races are always an interesting affair. But what is the greatest handicap? Is it...
- Not having a watch
- The weather and terrain
- The dubious course instructions
- Misinformation from other runners - "I'm going to take an easy pace today"..five minutes later they sprint into the horizon
- Or just time itself?
The SGR Spring Handicap, which last weekend was based at Warsash, threw up its usual bout of controversy and incident.
Andy Lee won the handicap and the bottle of wine by being the Stubby who finished at the pink ferry hut closest to the 11.30am deadline.
Meanwhile the Kimbernator, Nick Kimber, was left with a thorny problem after cutting his forehead on route and apparently having a thorn embedded
There was further controversy when ardent Saints fan, Steve Wylie, tried an outrageous tactic of trying to stage his own handicap race to finish half an hour earlier, simply because he wanted to see the crucial Saints v Southend match which would decide whether the men in red qualified for the Championship play-offs.
Steve set himself the target of finishing at 11am so that he could scoot away to St Mary's, and claims that with Mike Bell in attendance he hit the mark. There is currently a steward's enquiry being held by the Fratton Park-based committee, but here is Steve's mitigation - by the way Saints won 4-1 to book their place in the play-off semis against Derby County.
"As an avid Saints fan with tickets for the last match of the season on the same day as the SGR handicap, I had spotted a problem. Aiming to finish the race at 11.30 with kick-off at St Mary's being 1pm was too close for comfort. One wrong turn could have left me at Hill Head and missing the kick-off altogether.
So I tried to get the message to Mike Clarke to say that I was going to finish at 11am instead of 11.30. However, I couldn't reach him by phone so trusted to an e-mail instead. The day came and I set off from the Rising Sun at Warsash at my early time.
I was fairly happy with the course having reccied it once. The wind along the coast was quite brisk and I was eyed by the usual 2 or 3 dogs, but no attacks today! As I left the Chilling Field a group of SGR runners were just approaching it which suggested my 11am targeting was about right. Back past the Rising Sun I approached the pink Hamble Ferry hut that denoted the finish line.
However, I could see no official time-keeper, nor any welcoming crowd at all! Then up from the beach dashed the ever fleet-footed Mike Bell to take a photograph of me as I crossed the finish. Although there was no official finish time, Mike's watch said exactly 11.00 which was good enough for me. My finish time may even be logged in Mike's posh camera?
Does this mean I won? No stranger to SGR Handicap controversy..I ran the closest finish time at the Winter 2006 Handicap only to be disqualified for running a different variation of the course from the popular interpretation!
As you'll see from the picture I wore my cup final (2003) Saints t-shirt on the premise that a very late shirt might compensate for a very early race finish?"