Race for the Wild (or Bluebell Run)

With Gary G nursing an injury, it was only Tom (recently returned from a stint setting Alison up in Glossop) and I (nursing a recalcitrant Achilles’ tendon) who turned up for this charity run, starting from Rectory Field (as the championship race the day before). Confusion over the start time meant we arrived an hour and a half before the race, and then we confused ourselves further over the likely route of the race, since there was also a fun run marked out, and the markings from the previous day. At the ‘gun’ (in fact a trumpeter) we set off up the first steep slope, together with bears, monkeys and various other animals. The sheep soon got sorted from the goats (to mix metaphors). Tom and I were more or less neck and neck on the downhill to Little Stretton, and then through the campsite until we started on the steep climb up a valley under Yearlet. I’ve done steep before around the Long Mynd, and I know I’m not too fit, but this seemed the longest yet, and it got even steeper nearer the top (I reckon it was a climb of about 800ft). From there though it was mostly downhill, down the Town Brook valley, but with unpleasant rocky breaks in the path every now and then. Finally into the wood above Rectory Field (the reverse of the Morning After race) and a scamper down to the finish. The corrected results removed yesterday’s ‘winner’, who supposedly finished in 24 minutes, 8 minutes ahead of Darren Fishwick. I guess the unattached runner had in fact run the fun run. Today’s corrected positions show me as 20th (out of 46, a number of whom had run the previous day or were handicapped by wearing fancy dress) in 46.32, with Tom 24th (48.14).