Fraser Stewart won’t give up his Scottish title without a fight when he lines up in Sunday's Inverness Half Marathon which has attracted a capacity entry of 2,940 runners with an additional 1,300 taking part in the accompanying 5K. The 36-year-old Cambuslang athlete posted the fastest time of his career when striking national gold in the Highland capital 12 months ago, clocking an impressive time of 1:05:24, and he believes he's in shape to match or improve on that performance when the championships return to Inverness this weekend.

He said: "I'm confident, but I know it's going to be hard. There are guys who can beat me, but equally I know I can beat them. You want all the top men to be there, so, it'll be a good race as there could be six or seven of us in contention on the day. There's a lot of us at a similar level and hopefully we can push each other along. That's exactly what you want at a national championship race.

Stewart’s Cambuslang clubmate Ryan Thomson had hoped to bid for the title but doesn’t feel sufficiently recovered from setting a lifetime best of 1:04:40 when taking seventh position in the Napoli half marathon a fortnight ago. “I’m still feeling a bit tired so I need to get myself ready to go at the London marathon in April,” he said. But another Cambuslang athlete, Michael Christoforou, is planning to compete, with an improvement on his 2022 personal best of 1:05:41 being the target.

In the women's race it is Mhairi Maclennan (Inverness Harriers) who is favourite to lift the Scottish women’s title in the absence of title-holder Natasha Phillips (Dundee Hawkhill Harriers) who set a course record 1:11:56 last year.

Edinburgh-based Invernessian Maclennan, who hasn’t raced seriously since her fine performance in Denmark last year, has overcome recent health concerns and is keen to test herself over her home town course. She said: “I haven’t raced seriously since Copenhagen last September. In the autumn I was really ill with respiratory problems and I had to take medication to detox my body from mould spores which came from the flat I was living in. Fingers crossed that’s sorted the problem as I’ve been struggling with it for the past five years.

“I started training again in December and everything has gone well since then. I had a little run out in the London Winter 10K a couple of weeks ago and that went very well. I started off at half marathon pace and built up from there. In the end I was only about 20 secs outside my PB but I felt very relaxed and chilled."

Metro Aberdeen’s Ginie Barrand, who set a personal best time of 1:14:00 when taking the bronze medal behind Phillips and Fionnuala Ross (Shettleston Harriers) in last year’s race, is expected to be one of Maclennan’s closest challengers this weekend. The Banchory-based runner hasn’t raced since setting a PB 2:35:25 in December’s Valencia marathon, although she showed sharp form when clocking a parkrun 5K PB of 16:29 at Aberdeen last month.

Race Director Malcolm Sutherland is excited about what promises to be another wonderful occasion. He said: "It's shaping up to be a fantastic day of racing with so many top quality athletes coming to Inverness. We are proud to be hosting both the Scottish and North District championships once again this year, which adds a bit of extra spice to the proceedings.

"It will be interesting to see if Mhairi Maclennan can break the excellent course record set by Natasha Phillips in 2023, while any one of a number of runners could threaten Robbie Simpson's 2018 men’s record of 1:04:27.
 
"We are delighted that we have capacity fields for the half marathon and the accompanying 5K and entries for both had to close early. We have a record 1300 runners in the 5K, more than 40% of whom come from local schools, sports clubs and youth groups.

“We can assure everyone that they’ll receive a warm and enthusiastic welcome. There's a fantastic level of support along the route and the atmosphere in the stadium at the finish is always enthusiastic and heart-warming. Every finisher is treated like a champion.”

If you'd like to know more, visit the Inverness Half Marathon website.

Image: Caledonian Concepts/Inverness Half Marathon