Scaife can only watch as rivals threaten record
9:11am Saturday 9th August 2008
FIVE-TIMES winner Martin Scaife will be a spectator at tomorrow’s 21st Darlington 10K – but he will be back next year if anyone breaks his course record.
The former baker is now manager of sports shop Up and Running and he will be doing promotional work in the town centre while a record 1,100-plus field gathers for the start on Northgate.
“It’s my home-town race and I’ll be a little sad to miss it,” admitted the England international, who has won his last four 10Ks.
“If someone breaks my course record and throws down the gauntlet I’ll be up for it next year.”
Favourite to challenge Scaife’s record of 30 mins 21 secs – and earn a £150 bonus – will be the in-form Thirsk and Sowerby Harrier Gary Dunn.
The 39-year-old Yorkshireman, who has a pb of 31 mins 25 secs, has won eight of his last ten road races and was fourth on his marathon debut in Edinburgh in May. He set the early pace in last year’s Middlesbrough 10K before finishing fifth in 31.49.
The women’s race promises an intriguing head-to-head between defending champion Claire Robson and former double British Universities 10,000m track champion Alyson Dixon.
Robson, who won the North-East 10K road race championship when she ran a pb 36.47, finishing runner-up behind Kenyan Cathy Mutwa at Middlesbrough last September, is going for a hat-trick of victories.
Chester-le-Street’s Dixon has a pb of 33.43 from last year and ran 34.23 for England in the Marseilles International 10K in May before finishing fifth in the 5.7-mile Blaydon Race. Dixon could well have her sights set on the £150 prize for breaking the course record of 35.49 set in 2002.
■ Chester-le-Street’s Scottish 4K cross country champion Freya Murray, whose 16 mins 13 secs victory in the Sunderland 5K Road Race took her to the top of the UK rankings, competes today in a British Milers Club 5,000n at Eton as part of her preparation for the Scottish 1500m Championship.
■ North-East veterans cross country champion Brian Rushworth, 45, won the Sunderland Sport in the Parks multi-terrain race, beating Morpeth Harrier Neil Wilkinson by 14 seconds.
■ Former World Junior Cross Country championships international Nick Swinburn (Morpeth) won his club’s annual 10K road race in 32 mins 24 secs.
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