Kent Fitness League 2017/18: Swanley Park

Following my disastrous start to the 2017-18 Kent Fitness League season, I headed over to Swanley Park to take part in the second race of the series, hoping that I'd have a better race without a repeat of the stomach issues that ruined the season opener at Knole Park.

I started the race on tired legs that had already run a parkrun and raced the Foots Cray Meadows Kent Cross Country League race the day before. The course at Swanley was the same as it was the season before, you can read about it here, so I won't go into great detail about it.

A year beforehand, I had got a brilliant start and completed the course without encountering any hold-ups. This time around, I found myself pinned into the middle of the pack at the start and encountered a great deal of congestion throughout the first few kilometres.

This was topped off by coming to a dead stand still as the pack filtered through a narrow pinch point just over a mile into the race. This poor start meant that I was already way off where I would have expected to be (probably 40 seconds adrift after the first two kilometres).

The rest of the race consisted mostly of reeling people in and overtaking them (which was fun), but no matter how hard I pushed there was no way for me to regain the ground I had lost early on. I finally crossed the line in 136th position in a time of 38.22, which was 59 seconds slower than a year earlier.

A change I did make for this race was that I wore my trail shoes instead of my spikes, which I had regretted wearing during 2016's race. Swanley Park had not suffered much with the recent rain and the grass/dirt areas were generally pretty firm. I was much happier in my trail shoes, so was happy with that decision.

My Results:

• Position: 136 out of 566
• Gender position: 126 out of 379
• Time: 38.22

Links:

• KFL Swanley Park 2017 Official Results
• KFL Swanley Park 2017 GPS data
• KFL Swanley Park 2017 course fly-by video
• KFL Swanley Park 2016 blog post
• KFL Venue Guide

Swanley Relays 2017

The Swanley Relay race (4 x 1 mile) is hosted by Swanley and District AC, usually on the first Wednesday of July, every year in Swanley Park (aka New Barn Park) in Swanley. I've run this race once before (2014) and subsequently, whilst injured, organised teams for another (2015) during my time at SLGR.

This time around, a few of us got together to create a team. However we were not all from the same running club (1 Dartford Road Runner and 3 Dartford Harriers), so we needed a team name to run under. I had spent some days trying to come up with a decent one, but it had eluded me until, a few hours before the race one of our team was seriously considering pulling out due to a sore hamstring.

After a bit of a discussion, he decided to proceed and that lead me to proposing the name 'Hurty Hammie and the Hoops' (Hoops being the nickname for Dartford Harriers). So after a bit of post-work rushing around we finally arrived at the venue and headed for the registration desk.

'hurly hommie and the hoops'

We paid out £10 entry fee and began to discuss which order we should run in - this discussion always comes up in relays and over the last few years, I have become a big fan of starting with the predicted slowest runner and getting progressively faster, finishing with the quickest. We all agreed that it was a sound plan and we went ahead with that method.

With our name recorded incorrectly on the official paperwork, for the evening we became 'Hurly Hommie and the Hoops' which sounds a bit like the name of a 1950s/60s band. We all actually ended up liking it despite the spelling errors. The race start time was scheduled for 7.15pm and at around that point the first set of runners from all 28 teams were despatched...

On lead guitar and vocals was 'Hurly Hommie' himself (richey), and while he held back a bit to protect that hamstring, still put in a respectable time of 06.52 (team position 23). He handed the imaginary baton over to the rhythm guitarist (me) for the second leg of the race.

putting in the effort with about 100 metres to go [photo: brian page]

I managed to pick off seven runners on my way around the course, which is mostly on grass and is generally flat-ish, but it does have a little incline and bumpy trail to deal with about half-way through. I went around in 05.47 and was happy to have achieved my goal of running under 6 minutes.

With the race half-way done, we were sitting in 16th position. I handed the virtual baton over to our funky bass player (adam). With a time of 05.21, he had managed overtake six runners and moved us up into 10th position.

Our grand finale was left in the hands of our man-on-the-sticks (jon) who smashed out an amazing drum solo and left the crowd mesmerised with his 04.56 effort. In the process, he had picked off another 3 runners and brought us home in 7th position overall.

The full results were online a few days later and our combined time was 22.56. I did of course record the GPS data of the course and you can view it on Strava: Swanley Relays 2017

Kent Fitness League 2016/17: Swanley Park

Round two of the 2016/17 Kent Fitness League cross country season took place on Sunday 13 November 2016. It was my first time running at this particular race and doing so meant that I have now run at all of the current venues [more info on venues here], albeit over three different seasons.

I had spent the week leading up to the race avoiding training as my chest had been a little congested and I was worried that I could be getting a chest infection. However, on the morning of the race, things felt fairly clear so I felt that it would be fine to go with a full race effort.

swanley park

I had also been a little concerned at a strange sensation I could feel around my right knee which started after the previous day's Dartford parkrun. On the morning of the race, the sensation was there but wasn't too noticeable when running.

Although the weather had been fairly dry during the weeks leading up to the race, the day beforehand had seen quite a prolonged period of heavy rain. With this in mind, I had arrived at the venue with a selection of four different pairs of shoe options; my old trail shoes, new trail shoes, light trail shoes, and my spikes.

course map and start [photos: 7t / valentino]

There are two car parks - the largest of the two is accessed from New Barn Road and the smaller one is found just off the side streets near the town centre. Once I had spent some time wandering around, I registered my attendance with my team manager and popped into the gents, which are next to the cafe, and then went off to get changed. Even though the ground was still fairly firm, there was a layer of water on the grass which was a little slippery. With this in mind I picked my cross country spikes.

Being remembrance Sunday, the 11.05am race start time was preceded by a minute's silence. This was followed by a second period of silence for the two members of Aldershot, Farnham and District AC who were tragically killed in an accident during a training run a few days earlier.

around the course [photos: 7t / becca]

I got myself into a better starting position than I had at the first race of the season and made a fairly good start with no hold-ups or congestion to worry about. The route weaves around quite a bit, crosses a few paths and the railway track as it progresses through the park.

At the 2016 race, the route was adjusted slightly from the previous year and consisted of one shorter lap of the main body of the park, followed by two longer laps which took in the far west side of the park. The west end of the park features a more natural-type of terrain and a short section through some woods.

around the course [photos: becca]

Very soon after starting, I realised that going with the spikes was probably not the best decision and that trail shoes would have been the better option. My race was incident-free and I was pretty happy with my relatively even paced splits.

Despite being passed by a few people on the way round, I did end on a high when I made back a couple of places during the last kilometre. I finished the race in 103rd position out of 469 finishers, which was again a little disappointing, but it's all I have in me at the moment so it's a fair reflection of my current fitness level.

the final few metres (it felt like a strong finish to me) [photos: valentino / 7t]

I recorded the course using the Strava app on my phone (I still haven't got a computer that is compatible with my Garmin) and you can see my GPS data, including the route and the hill profile in detail, here; KFL Swanley Park 2016.

The full results were available online the day after and my official finishing time was 37.23. I was the 92nd male over the line, which is an improvement on the first race of the season (I'll take what I can here). However, due to the lower amount of runners overall, my score/rating was a little lower at 71.11.

hoooops [photos: 7t]

The morning after the race, my calves were in absolute agony and I'm putting this down to wearing my spikes on ground that was too firm for them. So I'm going to have to keep that in mind for future races and I think my policy is going to be that I wear trail shoes unless the conditions are so bad that they I'd be sliding all over the place without spikes.