Red, green and Gold: When Henry met Rob!
Following his 79:58 PB at the National Half Marathon on 5th August Henry Hughes our London based, Westport native headed to Moscow for the 14th IAAF World Championships Moskva (Luzhniki), RUSSIA 10 – 18 AUG. ‘Our man in Moscow’ enjoyed the experience and has sent us some words (yes, ye ‘red’ it here first!) and pics. The highlight for Ireland was Rob Heffernan’s gold in the 50k race walk, and Henry was right on hand to support and cheer Rob to his historic win. Here’s what he has to say
” Hope all’s well with ye and training’s going well. Moscow was great craic altogether, especially with Rob Heffernan winning gold! It just so happened that I was out on the course which was the far side of the stadium to where my seat was. The other Irish lads had gone back to their seats on the near side with a lap to go, so I said I’d stay behind and run alongside Rob for the 200m or so back to the stadium, and luckily they let me into the stands without a ticket in the end to see him cross the line in 3:37:56. We celebrated in a pub off Red Square that night with Rob Heffernan and Brendan Boyce (Ireland’s other participant who finished with a PB in 25th place 3:54:24) . Rob was in great form and led the sing song! He was there till late despite having a BBC interview at 10 the next morning!
I’ve attached a few pics, didn’t take many in the stadium itself, the marathon course alongside the Kremlin was pretty fantastic. The others are from the pub with Rob H (the people working in the Irish pub hadn’t a clue what was going on when he went behind the bar. The police presence at the stadium (they were efficient in clearing out the stadium) lining up the half kilometre or so to the metro station on both sides was incredible.)Thank you Henry, for sharing that incredible experience with us..and good luck with your training.
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