It has been a great weekend and it will hopefully be shown in some of the footage in the upcoming video at the 12 stage relay. I went up to the team hotel on the Friday and went straight to Mr Pollard's room for a cup of tea and chat and was then joined by 'Sharpy' in his running kit, Shaun Moralee, James Kelly and Neil Speaight. They all went for a run while I had some lunch and gave my roommate Steve Davies a ring to find out where he was.

All the team bar Mark Miles (lives close to the course anyway) turned up for the pre-race dinner and the service was so bad even Steve Davies who was half hour late made it in time to order and get his food the same time. Lots of banter throughout the dinner but was let down when we decided to leave before deserts (well it was 10pm and had only just had dinner) O well at least we got back to settle in and watch a bit of Jonathan Ross before bedtime.

8am a few of us went for an easy run while others stayed in bed, don't personally think either or is better its up to the athlete really. Buffet breakfasts are always a pleasure and even sleepy sp8y made it time to listen to the great speech from team Captain 'Sharpy'...can't give anything away but it was inspirational even if he did forget a few things!

After laughing quite a bit on the way to the course with young gun Goolab (while pollard did his weekly shop at Tesco on the way!) over the famous 'Bruno the dog' I felt the buzz of the race as we entered the park and the nerves started to arrive in the belly. Unfortunately we had to wait for the delayed start due to north teams being stuck in traffic. I am a bit torn in that people should leave a good amount of time to arrive for the race start and most road races wouldn't wait but it is a big team event and thought they made the right decision to give them an extra 45minutes.  

I watched James Kelly come in on leg one and then did my own thing while catching a few other guys on the course while warming up.

After the race I joined a few guys for a warm down and tried to give all the guys a shout on the course and enjoyed the fact the team was out in front and then it was time to pick up the medals before we got ready for the after party!!

New team Captain 'Sp8y' was throwing out the orders and dinner was booked along with taxis into town. It was barracuda bar to start and we ran into Birchfield athlete Jean Ndayesenga who was looking sharp and obviously out to enjoy the nightlife. After a couple of Malibu and Pineapple juice it was off to Oceania club where Miles turned into a dancing machine, Sp8y was doing his best impression of Jimi Hendrix and pumped up Russell.... well Russell is just an absolute loon!! It didn't take long either for Sharpy's shirt to come undone as he sang to every song in the 80's room. It was a great night and think well all did well just to stay awake after a very long day.

All the guys staying at the hotel close to the park made it up by 8am for a run around the course which was now empty but still held the good memories from yesterday.... as stated on the run though, that long leg doesn't half go out a long way and how long has there been a golf course there!!

Simx