I thought I knew my geography, but I had never heard of Porto Santo before I went there. It is an island just over 6 miles long and three miles wide, with a permanent population of about 6,000, situated 27 miles from Madeira. A strange place to hold an athletics championships! The organisers of the European Non-Stadia Championships find it difficult to get host towns or cities. Masters events cannot take place without the support of the host city and national athletics body. Those are two reasons why such events have not been held in the UK for a long while.

Madeira has hosted a lot of Masters championships recently, looking to extend their tourist season, and Porto Santo is part of the Madeira semi-autonomous region of Portugal.

Tourism is the only industry in Porto Santo. It boasts one of the best beaches in the world, stretching for almost the entire 6 miles of the south coast. It’s a nice place to holiday, provided that you can get there. There is one direct flight per week from the UK, otherwise you change planes at Lisbon or get the ferry from Madeira. The relative remoteness was probably the main reason why the number of participants was far less than usual.

I look the easy option and booked a package holiday using the direct flight. My first beach holiday for decades. The island has an Atlantic climate, surprisingly cool given it is further south than Tunis. The weather was changeable, cloud cover being very patchy. One moment a cool north wind – the next minute sunny and hot. The sea was okay for swimming, but I was one of the few taking the plunge.

The European Masters Athletics Championships Non Stadia has a packed schedule consisting of a 10k road race on the Friday, a cross country relay on the Saturday and the half marathon on the Sunday. If the races had been spread out over a week, I would have done all three. Unfortunately, these days I cannot train two days in a row on the road, let alone race on consecutive days, as I get too stiff and sore. So, I just did the half marathon which is usually my best event. With hindsight I could have done the 10k instead, but there are no team medals in the 10K. There was also a full programme of race walking, held in a different part of the island.

The half marathon course was based on the coast road, going back and forth with three turning points, which meant that one could spectate and race at the same time. It was gently undulating. The day started cool and wet but by the time we started it was mild and humid and in the second half of the race, it became very hot. The M75 field was small but of a decent standard. The Estonian who won the World Masters Half Marathon last year in Poland could only finish 3^rd here behind two Italians. I was 4^th M75, in my slowest road half marathon to date of 1:57:03. I consoled myself with the thought that I beat all the M80’s, so if I can hold it together for another year, I might become competitive again.

There are team medals for the half marathon in all the age groups, with three to score. No country had sufficient runners in M75 to make up a team! For team scoring, I dropped down to M70 and led in our team to 3^rd place. Our other M70 runners were Des White and Andy Murray (no not that Andy Murray!).

Great Britain & Northern Ireland were not well represented in the younger age groups. Our most successful runner was my old nemesis Martin Ford who won the individual 10k and Half Marathon in M80. He led our M80 team, including Ken Black and Phil Brennan, to gold in the cross country relay (1^st of two teams) and half marathon (The only M80 team).

Geoff Newton