The West Highland Way Race 2019 – RACE REPORT

05/07/2019 / Iona / Leave a comment

The West Highland Way Race 2019

TIME: 22 Hours 15 Minutes and 58 Seconds

OVERALL : 55th/196 finishers

GENDER: 5th/45 female finishers

“It’s very unusual to have a dream race two years in a row…..”
These words still echo in my ears, as first as disappointment but now after a week of reflection I’m finally realising what I put my body through. What is there to be disappointed in?

The build up to this years West Highland Way race again hadn’t gone perfectly smoothly, but I’m starting to realise that’s probably just the norm? How many of us do have the perfect run up for months of training? After the race last year I was 100% committed I was doing it again and going to try and run it faster. If you look back at my 2018 race report, I pretty much did have the dream race and remember thinking to myself on several occasions I was well overdue a low spell. The wheels did eventually start to fall off as Jo dragged me across Lairig Mor at a pace I never knew was possible having already ran 81 miles, but finishing in just over 21 hours was more than I’d ever imagined I was capable of, and now I wanted to push more…..
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RACE REPORT – The West Highland Way Race 2018

28/06/2018 / Iona / 2 Comments

“I’m often asked what I think about as I run. Usually the people who ask this have never run long distances themselves. I always ponder the question. What exactly do I think about when I’m running? I don’t have a clue.”
― Haruki Murakami, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running

The West Highland Way Race 2018

TIME: 21 Hours 2 Minutes and 51 Seconds

OVERALL : 31st/198 finishers

GENDER: 4th/46 females

The West Highland Way race 2018 was a race unlike any other. Once again the magic of the race, along with 21 hours racing, being awake most of the day before added on to a few nights post race insomnia, has mangled my already fragile end of term brain. Trying to put it into words has been a struggle up until now, but I think the story is finally ready to fall out of my fingers…
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Guest Blog – WHW Race crewing 2018 by Joanna Murphy.

26/06/2018 / Iona / Leave a comment

One of my brilliant friends had written a blog post on her side of the West Highland Way race. Enjoy!
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The race from a crewing perspective!

I can’t remember exactly when I was enrolled to Iona’s support crew but I think it was shortly after the 2017 race. I knew for sure I wanted a year away from racing this myself but couldn’t bear not to be involved. Despite having run the race twice myself and enlisted the help of my own support crews, I have never previously been on the other side.

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The Highland Fling 2018 – RACE REPORT

06/05/2018 / Iona / Leave a comment

The Highland Fling 2018

TIME: 10 Hours 07 Minutes and 09 Seconds

OVERALL : 107th/673 finishers

GENDER: 13th/186 females

The Highland Fling 2018 was to be not only my first ‘A’ race of the season, but my first race of the season. My run training went downhill in January after a foot injury threw me off course and I wasn’t back to high weekly mileage until the end of February, which meant about 5 weeks of proper training before the taper began. What could possibly go wrong?!
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2016 – A year of adventure, thousands of miles and a million more smiles.

21/12/2016 / Iona / Leave a comment

I can’t actually believe I’m sitting writing yet another yearly review. They say that time goes by more quickly as you get older, and I don’t exactly class myself as old yet but that year seriously flew by and yet I managed to fit so much in. As has become customary, here’s a wee look back at another fantastic year.

JANUARY

The year started with the annual plod up the Ochil hills with some running club buddies on the 2nd of January. It was cold and misty but as an annual tradition to kick start the year, we braved the elements and had a great day out.