Today Beanie & Biggles both notched up their third road race. The East End 5K is a particularly good one – it’s an easy, safe course starting and ending at Tollcross Park, and though it’s primarily for humans, doggies are welcome and can even get their own number and T-shirt.
It was raining pretty hard on the way through to Glasgow (a sure sign that summer has arrived!) and because of that we were expecting a low turnout, but we couldn’t have been more wrong:
The road outside the park is flooded with runners, though not all are enthusiastic about the warmup!
The rain slowed to a barely perceptible drizzle just as we arrived, creating perfect conditions for running; nice and cool for the dogs, but not too cool for us. The only problem when the race started was the sheer number of entrants – we’d almost reached the 1km marker before we had enough space to break into a jog, and we still had to dodge and weave past walkers almost up to the final kilometre! Despite that, we had a great time. There were drummers, dancers and pipers dotted along the course to spur everyone on, and nearly every time we passed a group of spectators we heard “awww look at the little doggies”.
As in the previous year I ran with the Bigglet and Susan ran with the Beanster. Unlike last year, Biggles thankfully decided against getting into a woofing match with the big Rottweiler in a walled garden along the route, and neither Beanie nor Biggles seemed particularly bothered by even the most enthusiastic drummers. The 5K passed very quickly, though not quite as quickly as this brief compilation of clips from the race:
I don’t think Biggles quite knew what to make of the Master of Ceremonies cheering him on as we approached the finish. The guy looked very suspicious and didn’t have any treats. If we hadn’t been running I think he might have been on the receiving end of a Bigglewoofing!
Once my boy and me had finished we collected our two medals (the officials insisted on giving me an extra one for the Bigglet – I didn’t even have to ask) and found a good vantage point to watch for Susan and Beanie. When they appeared, Beanie was trotting along like a dressage pony and gazing into her Mum’s eyes. She probably looked like the best behaved doggie in the world, but in reality she was of course just waiting for another handful of chicken from Susan’s pockets!
Susan and Beanie finish the race in style!
Back in the park we bumped into runners from Dog’s Trust and an appropriate fuss was made of our two, and then we spotted another couple of Beagles who’d completed the race. One of them was Brodie, one of Newlin Waffle’s pups and therefore related to Beanie. He was a great little guy – wiggly, full of life and keen to have a nibble at Beanie’s racing number!
As we left the park, we were both enthusing about how great our little Beagley running partners had been. This conversation was interrupted when Bigglet had a bit of a tantrum because he couldn’t quite reach a half-eaten chip lying on the grass. This was rather cheeky on his part given that he’d nicked a sizeable lump of chicken from the kitchen worktop before we’d even set off that morning. Still, racing champions get perks and a small step towards the chip quickly resolved the situation.
