A case of where there is a Will there is always a weight

Unlike the other lightly-laden competitors, he wore army boots, belt and fatigues and carried a 40lb pack - a clear case of where there's a Will there's a weight.

It's called speed marching, back packing for tough guys, and not to be confused with the quick march - walking pace in the military.

The initials, it will have been noticed, are the same as sado-masochism.

Competitors are also allowed to run, and Cpl McLennan of the 1st Battalion The Highlanders ran all the way around the 13 mile course to record a time of 1-40-28 - more than three minutes better than his previous world record.

Corporal punishment? "I couldn't eat a thing for two days afterwards," he says. "The best way to describe it is like a severe hangover, very sore, just not capable of anything."

He's 35, a proud Scotsman, lives with his wife and three young children within amplified earshot of the Infantry Training Centre at Catterick Garrison.

Poor bloody infantry? Basic training might seem like a stroll through the Elysian fields compared to the agonies that Will McLennan endures.

Already a national Army representative at cross-country skiing, orienteering and triathlon, he'd seen speed marching on Record Breakers and at once decided to tackle life in the fast lane.

Now a Guinness World Record certificate hangs in the McLennans' sitting room, too.

He hopes to break the world record for a speed marching mile, presently 5mins 35 seconds, at Catterick at the end of May and thinks that in time he may be able to slice up to 20 minutes from the three hours 56 minutes marathon world best.

"It's about belief," says Will. "If you're a boxer you've no chance if you don't believe that you can win."

Were he a boxer, of course, he'd be in the heavy weight division.

A solider since 1987 - "the Army has changed a lot since I joined, but I enjoy it a lot" - he ran his first unencumbered half marathon in 1990, has a personal best of one hour 14 minutes and caught up with speed marching two years ago.

The pack usually contains a sleeping bag, lest anyone fancy a nap halfway round.

"The constant pounding on your back and the strain on the top of your neck muscles can really take its toll. It takes an awful lot out of the body and can seriously damage the spine. You have to have a lot of upper body strength."

Representing Swaledale Road Runners, of whom he's captain, he created his first Redcar world record despite a lower leg injury.

This time he was fitter but less well prepared, having heard just a month before the race that his friend and rival John Hunter - from Civvy Street in Scarborough - was planning his own attempt on the record.

He back packs three times a week - up to 11 miles on the shorter training runs, 15 when he's putting his back into it - insists that anything more could lead to burn out.

"A couple of times in the Redcar event I was struggling, but it was sheer determination that got me through. Other runners were encouraging me as they passed, and the crowd at the end was fantastic."

His little lad, the one in the Local Hero T-shirt, wanders in to make some point about his Playstation. As a good Scot might, Will advises him to remember Robert the Bruce and the spider. "Just keep on trying."

Whilst clearly he can bear a 40lb pack, however, can he bear an explanation?

"It was just a challenge, something that I thought was achievable," says Will.

"There are times when you're going through a bad patch when you wonder what on earth you're doing there but I've never had to give up yet

"At the end, when it stops if you like, the feeling is just incredible."

He hopes it'll be another five years before finally getting the weight off his shoulders. After that, the extraordinary Will McLennan might finally pack it in.

You read it here second, a story of bribery - if not necessarily corruption - involving Darlington FC chairman George Reynolds.

It comes from Shildon lad and Sunderland fan Colin Randall, now somewhere near the top of the pole at the Telegraph and one of those who knew George when he had nowt - or next to nowt, as the narrative may suggest.

Colin, in the late 1960s in the Bishop Auckland office of the Northern Despatch, was sent by his dictatorial chief reporter to cover the opening of the Dolphin Milk Bar in Shildon, named after George's Alsatian and one of his first daylight enterprises.

"Just make sure you give me a good write-up," said George, pressing a ten shilling note into the wet-eared cub's paw.

Ever impecunious, Colin spent his unexpected bonus on sweets and cigs - "50p went a long way then" - before returning to confess.

The chief reporter, another Shildon lad, went pious, quoted codes of conduct, may even have orated Humbert Wolfe's famous dictum:

You cannot hope to bribe or twist

Thank God, the British journalist

But seeing what the man will do

Unbribed, there's no occasion to.

"A ferocious bollocking," recalls Colin, ordered to catch the next bus to Shildon and to repay the milk sop forthwith.

Trouble was, he'd already spent it and had about twopence ha'penny to last the week. The chief reporter had not only to lend him the ten bob but the number one bus fare as well.

Funny thing is, I don't ever recall being repaid it.

Colin's latest interview with the former milk bar kid is in Wear Down South, the magazine of Sunderland's London based supporters' association.

George was himself a Sunderland fan, born within sight of Roker Park, recalls (not for the first time) a difficult childhood. "Backward, mentally deficient and illiterate was what they called me. They hadn't discovered dyslexia."

He also remembers watching the great Shackleton. "I once saw him chase the ball upfield, then run past it and take the opponent with him before going back to get it."

Bob Murray and Peter Reid, George adds, are doing a wonderful job. "The old ground was falling to bits. If they'd stayed at Roker Park they'd be in the third division now."

uncharacteristically downbeat, the Sunderland fanzine The Wearside Roar recalls the season they really were in the third division. "I've never been so disappointed in my life as I am now, not even in the infamous McMenemy era," claims one of several lachrymose contributors.

There are suggestions that they should have tried for the Inter-Toto, that the number of enthralling games this season can be counted comfortably on the fingers of one hand, that the bottom third of the Premiership is the lowest of the low.

"Our football has been dull and uninspiring with little or no pattern," writes Roker legend Gary Rowell.

Still, Sunderland did at last have a chance of winning a game when a group of TWR competition winners took on a nest of Magpies in a paintball exercise in Kielder Forest.

For some reason, the magazine fails to mention the result.

Like Sunderland, Shildon may be said to have under-achieved of late. It's 30 years since our lads last won anything and only then because the team which beat them in the Durham Challenge Cup semi-final was found to have played a wrong un.

Much joy on a balmy Wednesday evening at Ironworks Road, therefore, when the Railwaymen reached the Albany Northern League Challenge Cup final by beating Tow Law 3-1.

Second division Shildon face either Durham or Whitley Bay - the second semi was being decided last night. More final thoughts later.

Our familiar friends from Darlington Greyhounds have also been in a semi-final, and no matter that it was their first game in the Darlington and District League Invitation Cup.

After 90 minutes they stood 3-3 against the Grammar School Old Boys, after extra time it was 4-4. It took 18 penalties before the match was decided in GSOB's favour.

Subsequently, however, a team sheet check revealed that two of the Grammarians had broken eligibility rules - more wrong-uns - by not having played in three previous matches.

The Old Boys have been before the beak and are expelled. Without winning a match the Greyhounds (president: Backtrack) are finally in the last two.

Des Coulson, an Albany Northern League referee who also runs the line in Premier Reserve League games at Middlesbrough - and elsewhere - has been onto the Premiership dutifully to declare an interest.

Des's catering company provides the sandwiches both for Boro's training ground at Hurworth and for the workers at the Riverside Stadium.

Premiership officials told the Northallerton based official that he'd nothing to worry about, however. It was his bread and butter, after all.

The two top performing Test cricketers of the 1990s (Backtrack, April 2) were Alec Stewart with 6,407 runs and Shane Warne with 351 wickets.

In view of possible events next weekend, readers may today care to name the teams who contested the last all-London FA Cup final, and the year in which it took place.

More capital investment on Tuesday

Published: Friday, April 5, 2002

Published: ??/??/2002