Pirates' Week 5k 2017

The evening was ideal for a 5k with a light breeze and temperature dropped for the kick-off of Pirates’ Week with the fun run/walk starting the long weekend of activities. The race as always sets of on Harbour Drive in front of Bar Crudo, Guy Harvey’s Restaurant and Harley Davidson (who also contributed by way of sponsorship) with runners heading out of town to South Church Street with a left turn to Websters around the cone and back to town the way they came. Initially it was Will Edwards, Patrick Harfield and Sam Kepford in the leading group as the pace went out very quickly leaving the rest of the pack in their wake. At the turn round these three were 12 seconds ahead of the next runner Juan Pablo Valerio who was 45 seconds clear of Toby Bowles with Matthew Harkness another 15 seconds behind and all there were there in less than 10 minutes. A bunch of runners turn just over 10 minutes include Dale Avery, Roberts Schloegel, James Crooks, Charles & Pierre Sokohl and first female runner Kiara McLaughlin. The next two females were running together Molly Kehoe and Ava Hider and pushing each other for a quick time. On the way back is a real test of strength as runners push into the headwind and aim to return in a faster time than they went out; this is called running a negative split and trying to achieve this into a wind is very tough and is often where those who went out too hard in the first half are found wanting on the way back. An so it was for Will who was the one setting the pace but in his own words he was more focused on running a quick time rather than the race. Realising the pace was tough, he decided to ease back and save his energy for another day. This left Patrick Harfield in the lead and he was able to pull away from the next runners and win in an impressive time of 17:13. Meanwhile, behind him Juan Pablo gradually closed the gap with Sam Kepford and they had a ding-dong battle resulting in a final sprint through the finish-line that Mo Farah would have been proud of. Sam managed to fend off Juan Pablo with just 3 tenths of a second between them for second and third place both finishing in 17:58 seconds. Toby Bowles earned 4th with Matthew Harkness 5th place. Very well done to Rowan McLean who had very consistent splits and his very strong finish earned him 6th place. In the ladies race, it was Kiara McLaughlin who won and fended off any challenge from Ava and Molly who she would have seen how close behind they were at the turn-round, and both worked together back to the line but this time it was Molly who pipped Ava for second and third place. Every improving Mikaeyla Dacres ran very consistently moving up the field on the way back to earn 4th ahead of Emily Harrison in 5th place. For the full results, please see below. In addition to the companies listed above who contributed towards this event, we would like to thank the Sports Department of Government (the official title is much bigger, but you know who I mean),  Island Supply, Red Sail Cayman, Pirates’ Week Office, Tourism Attraction Board, 345 Athletic Club and all those wonderful volunteers that give up their time for your benefit. Finally, on day registration increases the risk of data error and we apologise to the couple of runners who were not placed in an age group. We checked with the registration team and sometimes one simply forgets to mark their entry form indicating their age group, or human error entering data under time pressure and consequently the results system could not place in an age category.  Pre-registration minimizes this and I urge more people to register via www.CaymanActive.com for future events.