Boswood defends Altra West Highland Way title – Allen first woman home

Rowan Boswood delivered a dominant performance to win his second consecutive Altra West Highland Way Race – and meet his pre-race target of beating his 2019 winning time.

The Carnethy Hill Racing Club runner led the field from the second checkpoint onwards and finished a full hour ahead of second placed Robbie Dunlop.

In the women’s race, Lynne Allen saw off a strong field to take top spot for the second time and secure a top-ten overall finish.

This was the first running of the Altra West Highland Way Race for three years. It is one of the oldest established ultra-races in the world having first taken place in 1985, and the 95-mile route takes runners from Milngavie (just north of Glasgow) to Fort William in the Scottish Highlands.

Increased training pays off

In the lead-up to the race, Boswood had told RUN247 that his training had gone well, saying “I am a faster runner than I was in 2019 and, in the last year, I have been able to significantly increase my training volume – both milage and vertical gain, while retaining speed, so hopefully this will translate into a good run,”.

But despite that, he wasn’t over-confident. “I am certainly not confident in being able to defend my title,” he said. It isn’t even a goal of mine, it is really important to set goals that are controllable and attainable, so my only goal for the race is to run faster than I did in 2019. If that results in a win, then fantastic.”

So his time of 15:09:49 was doubly satisfying for Boswood as, not only did it secure the win, but it was nearly five-minutes quicker than his 2019 time of 15:14:32.

Billy Gibson finished in third place.

Second West Highland Way win for Allen

Lynne Allen’s time of 18:46:26 beat her 2017 winning time by more than two minutes and delivered an impressive ninth place overall thanks to a strong finish. She was followed by Saki Nakamura in second (11^th overall) and Jacqueline MacIntyre in third place ) 12^th overall.

Mens

1^st Rowan Boswood 15:09:49

2^nd Robbie Dunlop 16:09:56

3^rd Billy Gibson 16:39:09

Women

1^st Lynne Allen 18:46:26

2^nd Saki Nakamura 18:59:42

3^rd Jacqueline MacIntyre 19:22:52

The full result is available here