The 2023 Scottish Master Marathoner Award – Rob Souter comes good – again, just like 2022.
Rob Souter, one of the most frequent and high-quality performers on the Scottish Marathon scene got his just rewards for the best age-graded performance by a Club member over the last year – 01/10/2022 to 30/09/2023. We did not need to make too many changes to last year’s introductory paragraph, because he did the very same thing as last year.
2023 Award
Rob’s best age-graded performance of 81.89% came last year at Rannoch, on the very day of the SVHC AGM.
That was just enough to edge him ahead of Mark Gallacher whose 2:54:01 at Edinburgh gave him a grading of 79.06%.
Third place went to serial marathoner Gerry Craig where his 03:07:52 at the Track 105 Series in East Kilbride earned him a 74.55%.
The New Award
2022/23 saw us bring in an additional award for the best performance by a member of the opposite sex to the winner. This goes to Siobhan Evans who ran 03:26:12 at Run St Magnus 2023 on Orkney.
Early Pointers for 2023/24
The first day of the new Marathoner year brought the Loch Ness Marathon with it and had the perennial Gerry Craig show up well with 3:06:43 and 75.01%. Some way ahead of that was an excellent run from David Gardiner of Motherwell AC with 2:49:33 and 82.61%. A good target for the rest of us for the year ahead.
The Award Rules
Will be awarded annually to the best age-graded performance (using WMA Tables) recognised by the SVHC Committee in a Scottish Athletics permitted marathon run in Scotland by a member of SVHC over the age of 35.
For the purposes of this Award the year will be 1st October to 3oth September.
To be considered for the Award athletes will require to have been in fully paid membership of the SVHC on the date of competition.
Winners of the Award will receive a commemorative medal and a cash prize of 100 guineas (£105) and have their race success featured in the Club magazine
While the Committee of the SVHC will keep a watching brief on race results it will also be in the gift of individual athletes to bring their performance to the notice of the Club’s handicapper for ratification.
The decision of the SVHC Committee in deciding on the Award will be final.
While the SVHC will underwrite the Award for at least 20 years, this will not preclude us seeking sponsorship for it to support masters athletics in Scotland.
As of the 2023 Award we have added an additional category: the best performance by a runner of the opposite sex from the winner. The Master Award will still go to the best age-graded performance, but an equal 100 guinea prize will go to the best performance in that category.
Background
The genesis of the Award came from discussions following a £2,000 legacy left to the Club in 2015 by Bob Donald, late Honorary Life President.
Bob was a keen marathoner and long-time supporter of Masters athletics and the SVHC felt it fitting to recognise one outstanding performance annually in an event which is sometimes focused on big city marathons to the detriment of other races.
As of 2023 that was added to by the application of Dale Sheldon Grieg’s £5,000 legacy left to the Club in 2021. Dale was one of Scotland’s finest female runners of her generation of early marathon adopters as part of the early 1980s races.
Previous Winners
Here, for posterity, is the roll of honour of previous winners. A lot of high bars to get over!
Year Race Runner & (Age) Time WMA Grading
2017 Stirling Andy McLinden (66)
3:03:05 88.91%
2018 Stirling Rhona Anderson (54) 3:09:56 84.47%
2019 Stirling Rhona Anderson (55) 3:12:08 84.62%
2020 Loch Ness Katie White (38) 2:42:03 84:35%
2021 Strathearn Neill Kelly (58) 2:49:47 85.92%
2022 The Meadows, Edinburgh
Rob Souter (57) 2:45:28 86.99%
2023 Rannoch Rob Souter (58) 2:58:56 81.19%
2023 SCOTTISH MASTER MARATHONER AWARD
