Kevin Deakes helped Great Britain claim the bronze medals in the World Master’s Championships in Brazil on Sunday and claimed fourth position overall.

The day started for Kevin at 4am to be ready for the half-marathon, due to start at 7am. After a quick breakfast at 5am he caught the bus across the city to the banks of Lake Guiba where the race was due to be held. It had been raining most of the previous day and overnight and as soon as the sun rose the temperature began to rise and the humidity with it.

Kevin went through his warm-up routine about half an hour before the advertised start time but it soon became clear that there would be a delay as there were many athletes still trying to get their timing chips as 7am approached.

The race began at about 7:15am and there was chaos immediately as a Portuguese athlete tripped and fell to the floor with lots of runners behind him. Kevin said: "I just managed to stay upright after catching his leg with my foot. After that I was able to get into some sort of rhythm helped by the fact that the course was pretty well flat. The out and back route followed a roughly north south path along the side of Lake Guiba in Porto Alegre heading south for 5 miles before returning past the start/finish and continuing for another 1 and a half miles or so before turning around to finish."

The first 6 or 7 miles were at about 5:55 pace but as the conditions began to take their toll it fell back to about 6 minute miles. Kevin went through 10 miles in 59:30 before the pace really began to drop off more than he had hoped for with his final time being clocked at 1:19:43.

"I had gradually picked off several runners in my age group over the first half of the race but it wasn’t until the last turn that I could see which position I was in as I saw the bibs of the athletes ahead of me heading to the finish. Unfortunately I counted 3 M50 ahead of me all of whom were too far away to realistically catch so I finished in the dreaded 4th position, just outside the medals."

All was not lost though because two of his GB teammates followed him home fast enough to claim the Bronze medal in the team event, just as they had done in Finland last year.

After returning to the stadium for what was meant to be a medal ceremony at midday, there was a long delay before it finally took place at around 4:30pm, by which time Kevin’s said he was on his last legs having to hang around in the heat waiting for the results to be posted and then the ceremony itself.

Kevin concluded: "After the months of training towards getting it, the medal was worth the wait."

M50 Half Marathon
=======================================================================
    Name                     Age Team                    Finals  Points
=======================================================================
Results - Men 50
  1  2785 Grassi, Gianluca   M51 Italy               1:16:02.00  
  2   703 Eror, Milan        M50 Austria             1:16:42.00  
  3     3 Alem, Ahcen        M53 Algeria             1:17:01.00  
  4  2475 Deakes, Kevin      M52 Great Britai        1:19:43.00  
  5   552 Villafane, Francis M51 Argentina           1:23:44.00  
  6   463 Roldan, Hugo       M53 Argentina           1:24:03.00  
  7   314 Kreiker, Ricardo D M52 Argentina           1:24:39.00  
  8  1310 Silva, Odilio      M51 Brazil              1:27:00.00  
  9  2480 Doxey, Steven      M53 Great Britai        1:27:23.00  
 10  1994 Sotelo Herrera, Ru M52 Costa Rica          1:27:56.00  
 11  1748 Vargas Uribe, Osva M53 Chile               1:27:59.00  
 12  1750 Veliz, Antonio     M54 Chile               1:28:00.00  
 13  1455 Aguila Aguila, Mig M53 Chile               1:28:03.00  
 14   892 Da Conceicao, Joao M52 Brazil              1:28:53.00  
 15    96 Biroccesi, Jorge L M51 Argentina           1:29:16.00  
 16   156 Clerice, Julio Ces M53 Argentina           1:30:23.00  
 17   292 Gutierrez, Toribio M54 Argentina           1:31:20.00  
 18   414 Palermo, Julio     M50 Argentina           1:35:03.00  
 19  3244 Ticona Nunez, Clem M50 Peru                1:39:11.00  
 20  1665 Pena, Chester      M50 Chile               1:40:40.00  
 21   118 Calveyra, Aldo Jav M53 Argentina           1:41:04.00  
 22  1578 Gonzalez, Orlando  M50 Chile               1:44:13.00  
 23   527 Trilla, Oscar      M50 Argentina           1:46:55.00  
 24  1251 Rotta, Andre       M53 Brazil              1:49:19.00  
 25   377 Mira, Jose Luis    M54 Argentina           1:49:43.00  
 26  1745 Vallejos Jeria, Ro M53 Chile               1:50:54.00  
 27  1735 Umana, Norbelto    M50 Chile               1:51:58.00  
 28  1659 Oyarzun, Jorge     M53 Chile               1:52:25.00  
 29  1629 Matus Spinelli, Fe M54 Chile               1:54:20.00  
 30   499 Serraino, Juan Ado M50 Argentina           1:56:51.00  
 31  1971 Calderon Camacho,  M53 Costa Rica          2:01:30.00  
 32  1106 Lozano, Joao Batis M51 Brazil              2:11:00.00