LEITH BUS TRIP REPORT

We all gathered at the Dunedin Railway Station on Saturday morning at 9am to take the Otago Explorer Bus to Alexandra. At least most of us did, except for Jim Flynn who got rather confused and ended up at the Ariki rendezvous instead and realizing his mistake headed out to Caversham in his speedy vehicle to intercept our bus. He did this with much success and managed to be aboard the bus by the time we hit the State Highway.

Pretty much an uneventful trip up with the obligatory stop at the Lawrence corner shop later to be the scene of the infamous Undy 500 finish line. It is strange how we always manage to intercept the Ariki bus at this point (if only Jim had known). After the usual purchasing of carbo loading stuff and loads of caffeine we were on our way to the Alexandra.

Got to Alexandra at 12 on the dot and the driver parked the bus in the large sandy parking lot opposite the finish area while we sorted out entries and race numbers. Everything went remarkably smoothly and by 12.45pm we were on the bus again and headed to Clyde. We had a ten minute stop in Clyde which is a great little town with a main street full of original preserved buildings. The sun was shining through some threatening looking clouds as we headed to the dam wall to wait for the 2pm race start.

The weather on the dam wall was a lot colder with misty cloud cover and a chilly North Wester blowing. Most had by now collected their race numbers. Rod McCall, Kirsty Morris, Peter Nees and Mark O'Donnell arrived in due time to collect their numbers and it was only Marc Doesburg we were waiting for. In end the bus he was taking up from the finish was delayed and he was unable to pick up his number before the race started. However, this was later sorted and he was accorded official finisher status.

We watched the walkers leave at 1pm and by gum the leaders looked to be going faster than we were anticipating to run. Eventually, the time for us to get out of the bus for a short warm-up arrived, and some looked rather reluctant to venture out. Finally, the 2pm start arrived and after last minute safety instructions, we were off.

It was the usual mad scramble across the dam wall with some slower runners at the front getting trampled, and deservedly so, by the faster runners behind them. It is still a mystery why some slower runners feel the need to stand at the front of the field where the sub 35 minute runners gather. But hey, they have that right.

By the time the entire field had hit Clyde from the downhill, most had also hit PBs over the one kilometre distance. This also impacted on PBs over the next three kilometres or so, giving some false hope of a PB over the entire distance. Many were rewarded by the frenetic first rush, while others had obviously overextended themselves and hit the wall in dramatic fashion.

The weather was glorious with lots of sunshine and a tailwind for the runners. This made for a real hot run after the cool conditions at the dam wall. The Leith contingent did very well with Glen Ferguson our top performer finishing 5th overall and first Master Man 40. Kirsty Morris ran an intelligent race by not going too fast at the beginning and building into the race to finish strongly to be the third woman across the line in a huge PB. Others to shine with PBs were Neale McLanachan, Andrew Lonie, Alan Funnell, Mark O'Donnell and Grant McDougall.

It seems that everyone from Leith had a good run and enjoyed the conditions. Some had a shower and/or swim afterwards to soothe sore muscles before heading to the famous feed and prizegiving. Some Leithians were rewarded with some good spot prizes and podium prizes. The organisers really put on a great race and an equally great feed and are to be congratulated.

At 5pm after the prizegiving the bus left for the Beaumont Hotel for a planned tea. All orders had already been phoned through so ti should have been plain sailing, but the pub was filled with half of Central Otago and we squeezed in and watched the All Blacks wallop the infringing Wallabies while we drank loads of beer, paid for our meal, waited for our meal, tried to find the hidden toilet doors and got our vocal cords ready for some Karaoki.

The final whistle arrived which signalled celebrations from Dave McLean for winning the draw for most accurate score prediction. The food arrived, then not long after that Ariki arrived, which resulted in one of the most raucous Karaoki sessions that the pub had ever experienced. Luke Hurring after his dramatic 29 min 25 sec PB winning effort decided that he was a rock star in the making by joining QRew and co. for great renditions of "Sylvia's Mother", "Brown-Eyed Girl", and some other great songs. The Leith girls singing band, which included a transformed Meredith Molloy, Karen Hartshorn and Jacinta Neilson, sang "Dancing Queen" with gusto.

Wayne Allen announced that the Ariki contingent had to get to Lawrence for the Undy 500 and we were determined to meet them there for the annual race. However, trying to separate an Irishman from his beer is almost impossible if not downright dangerous so they got to Lawrence before we did. However, we still got there with some of their slower runners still getting off their bus, so we were able to beat some of them to the corner shop. The Ariki bunch had woken up the locals so by the time we were running down the streets there was great support from an inebriated crowd. We have no idea who won.

We joined the Ariki crowd to wait for our bus to pick us up but it sailed passed us and seemed to be headed to Dunedin. However, it finally stopped and we climbed aboard for the final leg to Dunedin. There were thoughts of making a stop at another pub, but time was running out for Malcolm the driver as he had to get back by 11pm.

Nothing much happened after that apart from weird sounds at the back of the bus and some equally weird jokes from Jacinta Neilson.

It looks like everyone had a great time and got home safely in the end. Now to start planning for next year.

We may add some more to this report as we get contributions from other club members. Hopefully, we can add a photo section too. So watch this space!