Kent Fitness League 2014/15: Fowlmead

After my disappointing debut in the Kent Fitness League cross-country at Oxleas Wood just one week earlier, I arrived at Fowlmead Country Park, in Deal, feeling hopeful that I could find some kind of improvement in my second race in my Dartford Harriers vest. This race was hosted by Deal Tri Club.

fowlmead country park [photo:7t]

Fowlmead is a 200 acre country park on the site of a spoil tip from the Betteshanger Colliery which was the largest of Kent's four successful coal mines and closed in 1989. For 11 years the site was unused until the South East England Development Agency (SEEDA) acquired the freehold and the land started to be developed, which included the planting of 130,000 trees and shrubs, as part of the National Coalfields Programme.

The park was opened in 2007 by Sir David Bellamy and is now primarily a place of leisure with the park being very popular with runners and walkers, but even more so with cyclists due to the mountain bike paths and the 2 mile long tarmac cycling track. The area also boasts many acres of established woodland where bushcraft and fossil collecting are popular activities.

i think at around the 4km point

There is an onsite car park for which there is a £2 charge via a barrier system at the entrance which does not give change, so bring the correct money with you. Toilet and shower facilities are available free of charge in the visitor centre (funded by SEEDA and Sport England) and the onsite cafe is open from 9.30am.

I met up with the rest of the Dartford Harriers team in the cafe where there was plenty of discussion about which shoes would be the best for the course. I had the choice of my old Adidas TR3 trail shoes or my brand new New Balance MT610 trail shoes. The TR3s have a more aggressive tread but are much heavier than the NB, so without really knowing exactly what to expect underfoot, I went for the New Balance because they have a much racier feel to them.

approaching the finish

The 2 lap race was started at 11am sharp and off we all went. It had a nice wide start line which extended from the gravelly path across onto the adjacent grass, which was handy as it gave the runners plenty of space to jostle for position along the opening stretch. The majority of the race took place on these gravelly paths, with only a few short sections on some trails - there was one twisty trail section that was a lot of fun and really stands out as a highlight of this race.

I am happy to say that despite being overtaken by a large amount of runners during the opening stretch, I managed to have a much better race than at the previous week's KFL fixture. I started the 8.5km race at a decent-but-not-reckless pace, and once all of the eager beavers had got about 500 metres down the path and settled down into a more appropriate pace, I started to work my way through the field.

screenshot from my gps readings [strava]

Although the course was generally flat, there were a few extremely gentle inclines that had the potential to slowly wear the runners down without them realising. Then there were also a couple of short, but steeper inclines. However it wasn't the uphill bits that were the tricky part, it was the downhills. There were only one or two, but they were steep and slippery, plus it would have been easy to misplace a foot so required a certain amount of caution.

There were a few wooden bridges to cross en route and they were a bit slippery. I almost lost my footing on one of them and after the race I heard reports that some runners had actually slipped over. By the end of the first lap I was feeling pretty exhausted, but as the second lap progressed I continued to catch and pass people and I felt like I must have had a second wind. So the last few kilometres turned out to be very enjoyable as I caught and passed a few more runners.

post race

One of my Hoops team mates was once again was the race winner, so that was brilliant! I finished in 35th position out of the day's 343 runners and was the fifth Dartford Harrier to cross the line, which meant that my efforts contributed the team's overall score (wohoo!). This was partly due to less Dartford Harriers runners being present and partly due to me putting in a much better race performance this week. After getting changed into some warmer clothes, it was on to the cafe to have a cup of tea and watch the post-race presentations and raffle. The full results were published later that day.

Dartford parkrun 18 - Strava and parkrun become partners, a better performance and a freedom run on a possible 'b' course

This week marked the official announcement of parkrun's partnership with Strava, which allows a link up between a runner's two accounts. Once activated, the main thing you'll notice on your parkrun profile is that there is now a button link to your Strava profile on your personal results summary page and another, smaller button link at the end of result within a venues result page for the event you ran at.

parkrun / strava [photo: strava]

There is also now a Dartford parkrun 'club' on Strava which is open for all users to join and hopefully this will have the effect of creating new friendships and strengthening our little community. I've been a user of Strava since early 2013 and I really love the social side to it. However the feature that initially drew me towards the app/website is the segments. If you run the Dartford parkrun course and upload your data to Strava you will see that there are already some segments that I have created on parts of our course that you can have some fun with.

Onto event 18, and even though there were three of us setting the course up we somehow managed to forget to put one of the arrows out. Fortunately it wasn't in one of our significant spots so it didn't cause a problem. The overall number of runners was down, but there was something special about the event that I can't quite put my finger on. It was probably the community spirit.

The trail section is still wet and the corner at the bottom of the incline seemed to be a little more slippery than the previous week. That said, it didn't stop our first finisher from setting a new course record, so it's clearly not causing too many problems at the moment. As you can see from the image below, my GPS readings were all over the pace this morning, which was odd, but as you can see from the results I did manage to improve on some of my recent weeks' times.

wibbly-wobbly gps readings from this morning (standard course) [image:my strava map]

With the conditions on the trail in mind, we have been working on a 'b' course that we can switch to when the trail section starts to become a real safety hazard. So after the official parkrun we (me, Richey and Terry) went for a slow paced jog around the proposed alternative course to check its length and work out where the start point would need to be in order to have the finish outside the clubhouse. It looks like we've sorted it - more info will follow through the official channels.

With all that done it was time to jog back home. Throughout the course of the morning I probably ran a little further (14km) than I had originally intended to run. I was supposed to be saving my legs for the following day's Kent Fitness League cross country race at Fowlmead Country Park, near Deal in Kent.

Kent Fitness League 2014/15: Oxleas Wood

The 2014/15 Kent Fitness League season consists of a series of seven 5-6 mile cross-country races over the winter months and is only open to non-elite runners who are members of one the 18 affiliated clubs. My first claim club, SLGR, are not one of the league's affiliated clubs, but I am able to take part in the series by running for my second claim club, Dartford Harriers (Hoops!).

the famous 'hoops' vest [photo:7t]

The 2014/15 series had started before I had joined Dartford Harriers so I was not eligible to enter the first two races (Knole Park / Swanley Park). So the third race of the series, hosted by Plumstead Runners at Oxleas Wood became my first appearance in the famous hoops vest! Oxleas Wood is one of the few remaining ancient deciduous forests in the Royal Borough of Greenwich and is nestled onto the southern face of Shooters Hill.

On the day, I arrived at the venue, parked on Rochester Way (the old A2) and headed up towards the cafe, which is where the rest of the Harriers had planned to meet. The weather was a bit nippy, but actually quite mild considering this race was held in mid-November. And it rained non-stop for the entire morning.

I had my name added to the official list of Dartford Harriers runners that were competing on the day and after a quick pit-stop in the toilets behind the cafe, I joined some of the other Hoops for a warm up on part of the course within the woods. Returning to the cafe covered in mud, I dropped off my completely non-waterproof jacket and headed down towards the start line.

The start was at the lowest point of the wide triangular shaped grass area called Oxleas Meadows which conceals an underground reservoir that provides fresh water to the local area. As I looked around and saw a lot of runners wearing spikes, I did start to worry that I could find myself on the wrong end of one of them in the stampede through the waterlogged grass that followed when the race was started at 11am sharp.

the official colours of the eighteen affiliated clubs [image: swanley and district ac]

With this thought in my head, I probably took too much of a cautious approach at the start and as the course took us all to the top of the hill before swinging us around and sending us back down it, I found that I was miles adrift from where I thought I might be in the pack.

A minute or so later the course crossed over the footpath and into the western half of the wood which involved everything you might expect to find on a course that goes through the woods. There were tree roots, stones, logs across the path, branches and twigs trying to poke your eyes out. There were slippery paths that went up and down as well as twisting all around. There were mini streams running down the inclines, there was even some steps to run down, then there were puddles and plenty of MUD - this is cross-country after all!

The first half of the wood contained a few steep inclines and eventually the course popped out of the western half of the woods, up another incline, and round the back of the cafe before heading down into the eastern section of the woods. This section featured more of the same features and after lots of splashing (some of those puddles were a lot deeper than they looked!), twisting, sliding and weaving, the half-way point was reached.

Rain and glasses don't mix very well (I really should try wearing a cap) so I found myself with reduced vision due to them being covered in rain water. Common sense probably suggests taking them off, but the world is just as blurry without them. So I ended up just leaving them on and doing my best to negotiate the course without falling over and hurting myself. As the race progressed I was slowly moving through the field, but not quite enough to give me a great finishing time and position.

part way through lap 1 (let's not talk about my facial expression!) [photo:brian page]

The second half of the race was a repeat of the first lap, and it was back onto the waterlogged grass for second helping of the opening hill (which felt steeper now that the fatigue had begun to set in), down the hill and back through both sections of the woods with the other tough incline in between them. Once reaching the exit of the eastern woods for a second time, a friendly marshal pointed in the direction of the finish - at least I think they did, I couldn't actually see much at all at this point.

Somehow I managed to find my way towards the finish, but I was really just winging it and hoping for the best! I made out an image of what looked like the finish area so headed straight for it. Thankfully it was the finish and once across the line and in the funnel I was marked in and handed a raffle ticket with my finish number on. I had to give this to my team captain so he could collate our results.

I met up with a few of the other Harriers runners and headed back up towards the cafe to retrieve my jacket. By this stage I was covered in mud, shivering uncontrollably and putting on a dripping wet, completely non-waterproof jacket didn't really help much. So instead of hanging around for a tea and chat, I sensibly got myself back to the car where I put the heating on full blast and got changed into some dry clothes.

It turns out that one of my Dartford Harriers team mates won the race [results] in what must have been quite an exciting finish as the top three were separated by only 3 seconds. We were also first placed team overall. My own run was somewhat disappointing as I finished way back in 82nd position out of 384 runners. Such is the strength of the team, I was way off being in with a chance to actually contribute to the team's overall score.

post-run in the car trying to get warm (it took twelve attempts to take a photo that wasn't blurry due to me shivering)

It was great to finally be able to participate in the league and I really felt a sense of pride in wearing the team's colours - it's difficult not to feel this pride when you consider the history of the Dartford Harriers goes back to 1922 and has produced some amazing athletes. I really hope I can make it to the rest of this season's Kent Fitness League races and I hope that I can improve on this performance as the season progresses.

#Hoooops!

Dartford parkrun 17 - grey skies, the mayor and the dartford half-marathon 2015

At Dartford parkrun event 17 I was feeling a little under the weather. I had had a few days off after catching the world's worst bug. Some people probably wouldn't have run, but this is me and it was parkrunday, so of course I just got on with it.

It rained, it stopped, it rained, it stopped. 9am came around, we ran the course. The rain held off, but came down a little heavier just as the last few runners were coming back in. Then it stopped again. My jumper which I had hung on the fence was now pretty wet.

The mayor of Dartford came along to run at the event and wore a Dartford Half Marathon t-shirt to help to promote 2015's event. I've never run the Dartford half, but I have signed up for the 2015 event and I can't wait! It is usually held in the summer, but from 2015 it will take place in March, which should work well for anyone training for the VMLM.

There is a little article on the dartfordonline webpage about the mayor's visit which also gives some more details about the half marathon.

Goudhurst junior parkrun (#1)

When I heard that there would be a junior parkrun in the attractive village of Goudhurst my initial reaction was something along the lines of ‘but that’s in the middle of nowhere!’. While that is true, it does sit quite nicely in between a number of established Kent 5k parkrun venues. Tonbridge and Tunbridge Wells are both only a 20 minute drive away, Maidstone is a little further at 27 minutes, while Ashford is furthest of the four at about 40 minutes.

typical tudor building in goudhurst [photo:7t]

Travelling by public transport alone is virtually impossible. There used to be a train station in Goudhurst but this was closed in 1961 and demolished a few years later. The closest remaining train station is Marden (Kent), but it is over 5 miles away from Goudhurst. The main problem is that the two bus services that run through Goudhurst (the 26 and the 297) do not run on Sundays. So unless you live very close, you'll have to rely on your own vehicle or look into the possibility of getting a taxi from Marden or Tunbridge Wells train stations, which all seems a little extreme for a 2 kilometre run.

the church tower [photo:7t]

We drove our 4 year old junior runner and her two cousins in the car from Dartford and it took about an hour door-to-door. The officially listed car parking facilities are as follows; behind Goudhurst Village Hall or at Goudhurst Primary School. There is also some space to park on Back Lane, but it is pretty narrow. Goudhurst junior parkrun takes place on The Glebe Field. This open grass area is adjacent to the grounds of St. Mary's Church, which sits at the highest point of the village.

the church [photo:7t]

The church records date back to 1119 but it is thought that the church itself dates back further than this. It is also the most prominent landmark of the village and the church tower is open on weekend afternoons between Easter and mid-July where visitors can admire the stunning view across the Weald of Kent. There are toilet and café facilities in the Church Rooms right next to the field.

ready to go? [photo:7t]

An important point I will highlight again is that Junior parkruns, while all on Sundays, do not all have the same start time and not all venues put on events every week. The point I'm trying to make here is to spend some time checking these details on each venue’s website before you travel. Goudhurst junior parkrun starts at 9.45am, which is probably better than 9am as I imagine most runners will be travelling from outside of the village and the extra time will most likely be appreciated.

and they're off [photo:dani]

I would usually have had a freedom run before the event got underway, but we were a little later than I had planned due to the A21 being closed for roadworks. So we spent a bit of time taking photos - my daughter even had a go with the DSLR and produced a couple of great photos of her cousins. The run was preceded by a short briefing and a warm up. My daughter really seems to enjoy the warm up, so I'm pleased that they take the time to do it.

looks like fun [photo:dani]

The course configuration produces the most laps we have encountered to date on our junior parkrun tour – this one takes place over four 500 metre laps all within the boundaries of the field. The advantage of this is that it is very compact and parents are always within around 100 metres of their children. The downsides of this layout are; keeping track of how many laps each child has completed; and keeping the younger (or slower) children motivated to complete all four laps when they see that the other children have already stopped running.

i don't always receive an invite to run, but when i do i always accept [photo:dani]

The course is flat but smaller legs may notice the tiny change in gradient along the length of the football field. It takes place on a mixture of grass and a gravelly path, so is likely to be a bit mucky during the winter months, but we all like playing in the mud, right? (I do). It also worth noting that the ground underfoot is very uneven and bumpy whilst running across the football pitch, and in the winter months you'll probably get wet feet so take a spare pair of shoes and socks along.

pretty much spot on with our synchronised strides [photo:dani]

When viewed from the air the course looks a bit like a curvy Pac-Man (do kids these days know who Pac-Man is??). The field itself is only just larger than the child sized football field that occupies the centre of it. The 2k route starts on the southern edge and weaves its way along and across the football pitch and around the posts of the western goal before moving onto the northern and western footpaths until they lead back around to the start/finish area.

it's sometimes nice to just have a bit of fun [photo:dani]

I was lucky enough to be issued with an invite to join Matilda on her run today. Once we started the second lap, the small cones marking the route became objects that we had to hurdle which was great fun. About two-and-a-half laps in, she needed a short walking break. She soon got going again, but when she reached the end of lap 3 and saw that most of the other children had finished running, she also wanted to stop. After a bit of encouragement, she continued with the final lap. Towards the end, she found a huge burst of energy and sprinted away in the direction of the cheering volunteers, runners and parents at the finish funnel.

her seventh junior parkrun (sixth venue) complete [photo:dani]

After the run, I managed to squeeze in my freedom run while my daughter, wife, niece and nephew headed off to the Church Rooms where there were complimentary drinks and cakes for all of today's participants, parents, supporters and volunteers. The Church Rooms boast a fantastic view across the Weald of Kent and the results were processed while everyone took the opportunity to socialise over the fantastic chocolate brownies.

the view from the church rooms [photo:dani]

It's a lovely little village and it really feels like it's going to be a very close knit community - and maybe even more so than some other events because of its rural location.

Dartford parkrun 16 - my little helper, pacers and the elite athlete

This event marked Dartford parkrun's first 'pacer's day', and it started in the usual way except that I had brought my nephew with me to assist in the course setup. Plus when we turned up we had a new setup companion in the shape of the current second fastest SLGR parkrunner, Adam. So we headed off and left Richey (ED) to focus on the organising pacers.

stones corner [photo:dani]

I don't know how many people noticed, but I actually forgot to put one of the course arrows in place. Luckily we had a marshal on hand who was in position to direct the runners. It was another slightly disappointing run for me today; yes I stayed under 20 minutes, but I'm a about 40 seconds off the times I was running before my recent foot issues.

After the run, I took up my usual role of barcode scanner and once everyone had been accounted for, I handed over the scanner and tokens to the very able post-run team while I coordinated the signage collection and packed it away our lovely storage container, all ready for event 17.

seeing this makes me so happy [photo:dani]

Meanwhile, over at the Dartford Harriers track, everyone was a little excited by the presence of Commonwealth Games 2014 double silver medalist and European champs 2014 double gold medalist Adam Gemili. He was in town for an appearance at the Dartford town centre Christmas lights 'Big Switch On' event and was doing a spot of training at the track beforehand.

Then, just after the results had been processed, the chairman of Dartford Harriers AC called me and Richey over to have our photo taken with him. He was in the middle of a training session, but was very happy to spend a little time posing with us.

richey estcourt, steven stockwell (me), adam gemili, tony durey [photo:anoushka johnson]

This week's event marked a new record in efficiency - We had all the kit packed away by 10am and the results were processed and uploaded by 10.10am. It feels like we're getting pretty slick with all this (apart from me forgetting to put that arrow in the ground - whoops!). :)

Gravesend Floodlit Series 10k - November 2014

I first heard about the midweek Gravesend Floodlit Series of races, which are held at the Cyclopark (Gravesend, Kent), last year (2013/14 series) and I had always intended to enter one. In the end I never managed to build up the enthusiasm to leave the warm house to run in the cold, wind and rain on a dark Thursday evening.

the runners forming at the start [photo:dani]

By the time the weather had started to improve, the series came to an end and I had missed that season’s opportunities. So I made a note to make an extra effort to attend when the 2014/15 series came around. This series started in October 2014 and as I was a little bit injured, I sensibly sat out the first one of the series. By the week of race two, I was fit enough to run. So a few days before the race, I put my entry in via the runbritain website and paid the affiliated entry fee of £8 (unaffiliated was £10 in advance). The series features two different race distance options; the 5k or the 10k. As I have run 5k around the track on many occasions, I decided to go for the 10k.

On the night, I arrived at the Cyclopark and parked in the onsite car park (£1) and continued into the Cyclocafe to pick up my race number and meet up with the rest of my So Let’s Go Running (SLGR) team mates. A lot of runners had been delayed by the terrible traffic jams caused by a number of incidents on the roads around Dartford throughout the day, so some of the runners that had intended to run the 5k (7pm start) had gone for the 10k (7.30pm start) instead – while some other delayed runners had run 5k but started at the 10k start time. So at 7.28-ish the 72 10k (and a few 5k) runners formed on the start line – the big difference with this race to any other that I had done here was that we were running anti-clockwise; in the past I had only ever run it clockwise, so as well as running a new distance on the track, it was also like running a completely different course.

arty 01 [photo:dani]

I had lined up a few rows back from the front of the grid and after a few brief words from the Race Director, Martin Burke (of Nice Work), we were sent on our way. The 10k race consisted of four laps of the track and although my fitness was a bit off what it had been a few months earlier, I decided to approach the race with an optimistic attitude and set my sights on running under forty minutes. Another thing I had never done at the track was run on it in the dark.

The main start/finish area is very well lit and this continued down and into the first couple of bends, however when reaching the extremities of the course, the lighting was not quite the same – at best we were guided by some small beacons at the edge of the track. Fortunately I had been pre-warned of this darkness and I had brought a torch with me. Admittedly, it wasn't very bright but it threw out just enough light to help me to see the edges of the track where they border the grass.

arty 02 - it is me btw [photo:dani]

The weather conditions were good for November, but the Cyclopark suffers from being in quite a windy spot and it was blowing quite a bit at some points on the course. I ran lap one with a few other runners in close contact, however by the end of the lap it had dwindled down to just two of us and we passed the start/finish line in 9.43. The SLGR club chairman, Brian Page, was at the start/finish area to give all of the #TeamSLGR runners a boost every 2.5 kilometres and as I passed he also advised me that I was in sixth position.

I stayed tucked in behind the other runner until we reached the hardest of the inclines where I moved into fifth position and began to pull away. By the end of lap two I was running alone, but had somehow let the pace slip a little (I wonder if I had got caught up in running at the other runner’s pace rather than my own during our time together) and went past the start/finish in 19.53. I was still just within the window for a sub-40 finish, but my speed had dropped below the required pace. From this point the only other runners I encountered were the ones I had begun to lap.

arty 03 [photo:dani]

I came back around to the start/finish at the end of lap 3 with the clock showing exactly 30 minutes. I was still in fifth position and there was around a 40 second gap between myself and the runner in front of me, and the runner behind me was over a minute adrift. So I knew my finishing position was secure. This just left my own personal goal, I had completed the first three laps in 9.43, 10.10, and 10.07 but I now needed a sub-10 minute final lap to get a 39.xx time.

I got my head down and throughout the last lap caught up with more and more of the slower runners and had to weave through them (sometimes taking the corners a little wider than I would have liked). I came around the last hairpin bend and had about 200 metres left to go, soon after, the timing clock came into sight. I was running as hard as I possibly could at this point and as I reached the crest of the final incline I felt the course profile change to a slight downhill and I continued, now sprinting towards the ticking clock; 39.55, 39.56, 39.57… I was giving it all I had at this point. I crossed the line and as it was downhill I carried on for another 20 metres or so before I could break my momentum and stop. The clock was showing either 39.59 or 40.00 as I passed it, but I didn't know exactly which one it was as the last few metres were a blur.

some of the slgr runners that ran and our club chairman [photo:from dawn annett's camera]

Once all of the runners had finished, we headed into the Cyclocafe for the prize giving ceremony. We had a good turnout of SLGR runners (10 in the 5k and 6 in the 10k) and one of our team (co-founder of SLGR, Dawn Annett) won one of the women’s prizes (a bottle of wine), she looked very thrilled when she heard the news and it was great to see one of our club come away with a prize. The official results were online very soon after the prize ceremony and my official time was 40.00. Not the sub-40 that I was hoping to run, but still respectable and it has given me a short term goal to focus on before the next race!

Gravesend junior parkrun (#2)

As I understand it the second Gravesend junior parkrun event was thrown into chaos when the team arrived at the Gravesend Riverside Leisure Area to find that the fun fair that had been in town had churned up the grass and left all sorts of obstructions around the course. Fortunately the team reacted quickly and found a suitable route for the keen youngsters to get their weekly 2 kilometre parkrun fix. For a full account of this you can read the Gravesend parkrun news page for their account of the day.

such fun, not fair [photo: dani]

For the first time ever, the junior runner and her mum had gone to a parkrun without me. Where was I, then? Well, I had headed off to the Castle to Castle 5k (6.8k) Run in Chiddingstone for a little muddy adventure in the countryside. The eager parkrunner and her mum had taken the train over to Gravesend. It's a pretty straight forward journey and only takes about 15 minutes from Dartford. She has some proper running kit, but at the moment she is having a phase of picking out various random costumes for running - last week it was the pink tutu, and this week it was the Adventure Time onesie.

the 29 eager runners [photo:gary bignell]

So instead of running the normal two-lap course, the children ended up running the modified version which I'm told was roughly two-and-a-half laps using a slightly different route around the riverside leisure area. Matilda did get a little confused at having to take a different route, but after a prompt and a lot of pointing, she got herself back on track. She always says that she loves to 'run with the other children', and this week she spent some of the run running with two of her SLGR team mates.

go #teamslgr! [photo:gary bignell]

I was still in Chiddingstone when her results text message came through and I was over the moon to see that she had run another 2 kilometre personal best, which now stands at 16.21 and her age grading has risen to 48.93%. This is a 50 second improvement over last week's time at the same venue. She had taken her brand new Australian parkrun barcode disc (barcode options) along this week, which she tells me is now her favourite!

adventure time [photo: gary bignell]

It was a great turnout as far as SLGR goes - This week there were five SLGR junior runners, which means that 17.24% of the runners were from our little friendly black and orange club. There were also two of our adult runners on the volunteer roster, so a really good showing all round! SLGR juniors are currently (November 2014) top of the club list at the venue (bear in kind that if you click on the link years from now it may have changed completely).

approaching the finish (with dani taking a photo in the background) [photo: gary bignell]

After reviewing the results in a little more detail, I saw that Matilda was the most experienced junior parkrunner on the day, which is a great achievement at the ripe old age of four years, 2 months and 22 days old.

having her australian barcode disc scanned [photo:dani]

That was Gravesend junior parkrun event 2 as best as I can make out. Sadly her 100% attendance record will be broken next week when we head off to sample another venue. But, we will be back (again)!

Dartford parkrun 15 - gate scaling, a milestone run, and it's getting slippery on the trail

After a week’s break due to the annual fireworks display, it was great to be back in Dartford’s Central Park in the fairly mild autumnal conditions to start setting up for event 15. A big change since the last Dartford parkrun has been that the refurbishment works on the athletics track have finally started, which is great news, but as the rear part of the Dartford Harriers car park is being used for storage etc, it does mean that there will be reduced car parking capacity for a while.

parkrun [photo: richey estcourt]

The car park gate was locked upon arrival and I had to scale it in order to grab our bits and pieces from the storage container. Myself and Richey got on with the course setup as usual, but by the time we had finished, we were running a little later than usual. Thankfully this wasn’t a problem because when we arrived back at DpHQ most of the other small pre-run jobs had been taken care of.

ivy leaf corner [photo:7t]

For me, today’s run marked a significant numerical point. It was my 100th parkrun outside of my former parkrun home venue, Riddlesdown. So I had a little celebration inside my head at the end of the run for reaching that milestone. The temperature was pretty much spot on for a good running performance, however the stronger winds that had arrived blew away (see what I did there?) any chance of me getting under 19 minutes, but I did manage to stay under 20 minutes, which was nice.

central park athletics track [photo:7t]

The trail section is starting to soften up. There are two particular points where underfoot is getting a little slippery – The bottom corner as you turn to run up the trail incline, and again at the very top of the incline where you turn back onto the grass. The parts in between are covered in leaves and some of the tree roots are quite difficult to see. I didn’t take any photos in that area this week, but I will get over there and get some for a future blog entry (next week, perhaps).

i'm pretty sure i was supposed to be barcode scanning at this point [photo:dani]

Everything post run went really smoothly. Tessa had the results processed by 10.05am, and all the course signage had been collected by marshals and runners, which meant that all I had to do was pop it all into the storage box. Next weekend’s event is going to our first ‘pacer’s day’ – Richey has put a lot of effort into this and I’m looking forward to seeing how close the pacers can get to their chosen times.

Castle to Castle 5k (6.8k)

The inaugural castle to castle 5k (which turned out to be 6.8k) was held on 9 November 2014 in aid of the Bethany Gaia Memorial Fund. The story behind the fund is heartbreaking. 17-year-old Bethany Freeman was tragically killed when a tree fell on a caravan she had been sleeping in. She was a keen sportsperson and from chatting to a few people at the event I found out that she was a remarkable person. I never knew her, but I think being a father myself, the story compelled me to enter the event to try to help in some way - even if it was only a little money through my £10 entry fee.

chiddingstone castle

The event itself was not really publicised that heavily. I only found out about it when I saw a tweet (or a Facebook update) about it, and even then I found it very difficult to find any more information. The booking process was handled by the bookitbee website and the description of the run was just a few simple lines of text on that page;

'Starts at Chiddingstone Castle and follows a country route through stunning countryside to Hever Castle grounds and footpaths back to Chiddingstone Castle.'

course map

From that text I figured that it must be offroad and that trail shoes would be required, so I left home with my trail shoes in one hand, a bunch of bananas in the other, and a change of clothes in my backpack. I programmed the sat nav app to take me the Chiddingstone Castle and off I went. It took about 40 minutes to reach the venue from Dartford and while standing in the car park I wondered if I had turned up in the wrong place or on the wrong day.

start line

Fortunately, one of the marshals for the day arrived shortly after me, made a few phone calls and pointed me in the right direction. Once in the centre of Chiddingstone I headed into the village hall to pick up my number, where I also spent some time chatting to some of the volunteers. Also picking up numbers were the other entrants, a good proportion of whom were kitted out in their full rambling gear. In order to be as inclusive as possible, the course could be covered as a runner or as a walker. Dogs on leads were also welcome.

an early part of the course

The weather on the morning was glorious. You could describe it as a perfect autumn morning. It had been raining in the week or two leading up to the event and the ground was pretty wet. At this point I suspected that I could be in for a pretty muddy run, and after the 'run manager' had given us all a very indepth course description, he confirmed that it was indeed muddy out on the course. Shortly after this, and in a very relaxed manner, we were sent on or way.

a section across a field

The run started by running through the grounds of Chiddingstone Castle and within a minute or two the first signs of mud had appeared as all the runners did their best to stay upright as we approached the first of the wooded areas. The run continued on slightly undulating terrain through fields, country paths and across a marshaled country lane until reaching the boundary of Hever Castle. Here it was case of opening (and closing) the gate (I got a little confused here) and continuing over a wooden bridge - there were a few of these bridges throughout the run.

this is mud

The grounds of Hever Castle consisted of a lakeside section, a tight, twisty section on tarmac through the formal areas near the castle itself and then long slippery incline that lead the participants back out of the grounds. Shortly after this, there were some pigs, chickens and alpacas to say hello to as the route took the participants down a narrow single track section. The course got even muddier here, and further along this section there was a stream of ankle deep water running across the path - great fun if not a little cold on the feet afterwards.

just over halfway (i think) possibly still within the grounds of hever castle

There were some steps shortly after this and then more even more mud on a long downhill section. The countryside was indeed looking very pretty, especially as the autumnal colours were out in force. As the final section of the run was reached, the course took to one of the undulating country lanes which lead all the way back to the Chiddingstone Castle where a sharp right hand turn lead the runners up the access road towards the car park, past the castle and the across a bridge and over the finish line.

alpaca

The run was so chilled out and there was no official timing or medals etc, so once across the line I grabbed a drink, posed for a photo with the two very fast youngsters that had finished just before me and had a little chat. It was at this point that I decided that I fancied running the course again. So off I went, this time I ran a little slower and used it as an opportunity to take some photos for the blog. One of the marshals gave me his copy of the course map in case I got lost - fortunately I didn't and I was able to hand it back to him as I passed him towards the end.

run route

By the time I arrived back at Chiddingstone, it was almost 11am. So I stayed around to observe the 1 minute remembrance day silence. Somewhere in the distance I could hear the a bugle player playing the last post. After this I had to leave, but as I understand it, there was a service in the local church that most of the participants, family and organisers went to. When I arrived back at the car, I realised that I hadn't brought a towel to dry my feet AGAIN. I always forget. I really should just leave one in the car.

post run snap

As far as the run was concerned, it was a great cross country course with a few ups and downs, and lots of mud and puddles. It wasn't clear whether this would be a one-off event or something that could be repeated in future years. I hope it does continue because it was such a great run and I would love to do it again. Either way I am glad that I was lucky enough to have had the opportunity to be a small part of this event.

the first really muddy run of the winter season

For the record:

6.8k cross country course
completed in 29.35 (I had a pit stop on the way round and got confused at one of the gates, so lost about a minute in total according to my strava 'moving time' of 28.34. I also lost quite a bit of time in congestion at the start)
Finished in third place overall (the two junior runners in front of me were really, really quick!)
First adult finisher