M 
Having watched the Olympic Games on television and been excited by many events and disappointed by others – for instance Megan Keith’s performance in the 10,000m where her own PB is faster than the winning time was (check the stats) being lapped, a feature that none of the so-called pundits picked up on – I was delighted to see Glasgow’s Beth Potter win two medals in the triathlon. How many club members at present know that we have a GB triathlete in the club? A man who has competed in Hamburg, Lausanne, Cancun and Edmonton for Britain? I speak of Jim Shields who won his first such honour in 2001 as a 55 year old veteran after being 40 years in the club – our club. Venues and performances:
22 July, 2001: Edmonton, Canada. 5th finisher out of 40 starters and 1st British finisher out of 11 taking part.
9th November, 2002: Cancun, Mexico. 24th out of 61 and 4th out of 18.
20th August, 2005: Lausanne, Switzerland. 1st overall out of 17 and 1st British out of 4.
2nd Sept, 2007: Hamburg, Germany. 11th out of 79 and 4th out of 19 GB.
There was also an international Duathlon in Edinburgh where he was 9th finisher in a field of 19.
All excellent performances, especially in Lausanne, and maybe it’s not too late to recognise them. If we do have a 140th anniversary dinner, silverware on show and all the old timers present, it would be a good time to do it.
