Falkirk’s Callendar Park hosts Falkirk Parkrun as well as the Scottish Cross-Country championships, but this week it was in use for an event that has not been here before – the British National Cyclo Cross Championships.

Yesterday the élite racers were on the course, today was mostly juniors.

The park is great for the event, with its steep hills as well as expansive flatter sections, providing the cyclists with a variety of surfaces on which to test themselves. The hilly areas are mostly in the remains of the Antonine Wall – a defensive structure built by the Romans starting around 142AD, and which stretched from Old Kilpatrick to Bo’ness. It was built as two raised areas with a deep ditch between them – today’s race made it clear how hard it would be to charge up the embankment while taking incoming ‘fire’ (stones, arrows etc) from your enemy.

While there I got a few decent action pictures, but I wasn’t sure which to go for. In the end I chose this slightly more pedestrian photograph because it shows Callendar House in the distance as well as a cyclist racing across the scene. This cutting in the Wall is normally on of the main access paths into the park, but today formed one of the calmer parts of the cycle route!