Author: smoggypaul

This was Simon Funnells idea – what a great way to spend a morning, not ankle deep, knee deep or even ‘just’ waist deep in thick, smelly, mud……oh no, fuelled by recent rain the mud was chest deep in places (depending on your height, where you placed, or misplaced, your feet, and whether you kept your balance!). 8 of us were ‘persuaded’ but after 2 late withdrawals we were a ‘team’ of 6 (Simon, Simons friend Colin, me, Danielle, Fabian and Amanda). In practice this was really 2 ‘teams’ of 3. I say ‘teams’ loosely because teamwork wasn’t necessary apart from the odd helping hand – sharing the ‘fun’ was what it was more about!

The Brutal doesn’t have man-made obstacles or any ‘assault course’ content – its a straight 10k run, but on a course chosen specifically to take participants through the worst of the terrain, rather than around it. With lovely names like Grunge Alley, the Birdbath, and Dead Mans Bog you kind of know what you’re in for!

And, we did indeed get very, very muddy! And interestingly, the mud did indeed smell. Quite a lot. I still think a bit seaweedy, but with a good whiff of rottenness in it too. Simon brought along his Brut body spray but trust me, that smelled even worse! And, of course, there are no washing facilities afterwards – rub it off with a towel and pop something less smelly on, but that’s as good as it gets! Oh, and a burger van – of which full use was made!!!

10K times, in fact times in general, are really irrelevant on something like this – when you’re chest deep in (the weather was kind, NOT freezing but certainly Cold!) muddy water you aren’t really thinking too much about ‘sub 60 minute 10K’s’ – just not about slipping and going under!

There was lots of good humour- people who complain a lot or are a bit ‘precious’ tend NOT to do these things, so everybody (and the field was over 400) just jumped and and got on with it. It was great fun and I’ll be back next year.

Well others may have done this before but as a newbie this was all new and fascinating to me, and I was not alone in that as quite a few of us were ‘Clarendon Virgins’ – popping our cherries in communal fashion! Big thanks due to Mark for encouraging and organising (and Mandy too hem hem!)

06:30 on a Sunday morning was definitely early, and that was meeting at Marks, so we were all up at about 5.30 – Hugh and I having selected the ‘whisky afore ye go’ form of soporific to get to sleep the night before! And it was COLD! We found Mark with the minibus engine running, trying (and failing – thats the thing with hired minibuses, they’re never exactly state of the art!) to get the windscreen heated up, with Mark frantically scraping the windscreen. Why on earth are we doing this? After touring the village picking up little knots of lonely Joggers at various points, we set off to Partridge Green to pick the rest of our gang up – 13 of us in total, so a good job we had no superstitious people on board! (Actually I counted wrong, we were 14, but it sounds better this way!)

And off we roared to Chichester, frosty fields to each side. Stopping off at services on the M27 Jackie looked askance as the lure of McDonalds was too much for some of us…….Marcus tucked into his Bacon n’Egg McMuffin looking bemused that anyone would consider that unhealthy (see below for his Marathon time – clearly he should have had the Sausage!). A quick planning meeting of who does what legs in the Relay, and off we went again, pitching up at the start point, a school, with about 20 minutes before the first start. Hugh, Mark and Marcus went off with the relatively small group at 9.30, while the Relay teams had to wait another hour before heading off with the mass start at 10:30 – Richard and Fabian sprinting off into the morning sun. Then it was back into the minivan, me taking over the controls and Andy R navigating as we hurtled to the mid-way point, Kieran, Amanda and Jackie literally flinging themselves out to register and start the Half Marathon with only 15 minutes to go, while we shot back to the first Relay changeover point, hoping that neither Richard nor Fabian got there before we did (we could only guess what their reaction would have been had we not been there!). Fortunately, we made it (with a loo break to spare) as the running sisters Louise and Nikki took on the batons for Leg 2 – no competition with that head to head eh!

So for the 3rd time in an hour we barrelled up the roads back to the halfway stage, too fast really as we got there way ahead of ‘the sisters’. As I was tucking into some coffee and a roll, it dawned suddenly that I was running in an hour – I’d forgotten about that bit! Lorna and Andy picked up the pace and shot off – we looked for Hugh, Marcus and Mark but realised that they would have gone through the checkpoint ages ago. So I handed the van keys to Richard, with Fab taking on the navigation to the 3rd, and most difficult to find, checkpoint. Knowing Andys pace we had a real concern that we might not make it in time, but Richard pushed anyone stupid enough to come in the opposite direction off to one side……..brief panic when Andy R and I jumped out of the van when we saw marshalls, shouting to Richard to leave us and go park up, only to find it wasnt actually a changeover point and having to catch the van before it disappeared, leaving us stranded over a mile from where we needed to be! We made it!!!!

At Checkpoint 3 Andy M came tearing up to set Andy R off, and right behind him came Mark and Hugh – pretending to break out into a run when they saw their cheering fans! They’d ‘only’ run 20 miles at this point but looked fresh. After a quick chat with them, they carried on and Lorna then came through to set me off on the final leg. Suddenly, 7 hours after setting off that morning, I had some work to do – ‘why didn’t I do Leg 1’ was all I could think of! But it was great fun – not sure how the Marathon runners felt but I was elated as I ‘shot’ (hem hem) past the people who had been running for 3 or 4 hours! “Well done” they kept shouting as I ploughed ahead………I did shout back that I had only just started but eventually ran out of breath so some people must still think some idiot had started late and was just catching up!!!

And so to the finish……..everyone had finished when I came through, I had hoped to catch Hugh or Mark but they must have heard me and put a spurt on – or I was just too slow of course!!

Marcus had shot ahead, leaving Mark to carry his music paraphernalia which wasnt working- no party-party on the go for him….clearly the lighter load benefited him given his time! And Jackie and Amanda, having come through to the finish ahead of all the main groups, were invited to accept awards for the winners……..TWICE they had to explain that they had started ahead of the main group and while flattered that anyone thought they could run a 1:15 Half, were not the superwomen that they were seen as!

All the photo’s from the day are in the Gallery here:

Thanks to Richards ‘brisk’ driving by 5pm we were all in the White Hart reliving the day and re-hydrating. All in all it was a fabulous day and one that we should repeat next year – the range of options suits all of our runners and it really was a great day out – none of us knew where the time went!!! As only the marathon runners saw the ‘whole course’ its difficult to say what stands out, as everyone else only saw ‘their’ part – so I’ll let Hugh take over (Results are at the bottom):

I approached this event with some apprehension. I am always nervous before a marathon – even after over 100 – but, for various reasons, I have never been less well-prepared. However the camaraderie from being part of such a friendly group makes a big difference and I forgot all about my nerves on the way there.

Mark, Marcus and I started with the slow runners and walkers, so there was no pressure, but I couldn’t shake off my lethargy or doubts that I could actually complete the marathon. Marcus soon disappeared into the distance and I actually looked forward to the first and subsequent hills as a reason – not an excuse – to walk.

It was a lovely day, dry underfoot and Mark and I kept up our usual chat, so the miles ticked by. He was very encouraging and kept telling me we were running much faster than he would have done with Terry Smith. As time went on I was feeling better and better – there may be a tipping point after 6 gels and Neurofen – until we reached the checkpoint at just over 20 miles and once again saw the friendly faces of the Joggers.

I was not looking forward to the last few miles, when I got cramp last year, but at that point a lady, called Jane, caught us up and asked whether she could run with us to the finish. It would have been ungallant to refuse, but after a short while I realised Mark was not with us. I felt uncomfortable about this, but obviously couldn’t desert her, so with new found vigour we ran together until that hill a mile before the finish where she left me – just like Brian did last year!

All in all it was a great day and roll on Beachy.

Hugh

So a fabulous weekend in Bournemouth for the Bournemouth Marathon Festival . Saw Martin Yelling busily sorting various issues with the race crew etc ..
We hired a fab little beach hut so we could really enjoy the ambiance ,sea views and sea air to the full. The weather was great yesterday afternoon and today .. Just totally perfect running weather with clear blue skies and the very gentlest of breezes.

The weekend kicked off with Junior Races on Sat afternoon followed by the Supersonic 10k at 4pm along the Prom . Super flat course and super fast runners.

Next came The Speed of Light 5k at 7pm and wow what a spectacle. Loads of runners in hi viz brightly coloured kit , streamers in peoples hair with coloured lights , LED hairbands, necklaces, and people with coloured lights draped around them. All runners were given LED wristbands so the sight of the runners on the pier was wonderful .. Totally amazing to watch the pier light up with runners.

Then this morning ( Sun) brought us the Bournemouth Half Marathon with its 8am start followed by the Bournemouth Marathon at 10am . The half marathon course is wonderful with perfect views but I understand the full marathon course is rather boring and dull due to repeated loops and twists.

However I just can’t praise the organisation enough and great spectator support is always so welcome . Put that with a perfect day for racing and Wow !! Today and yesterday afternoon we had clear blue skies and the gentlest of breezes . Lets not discuss Sat am when I had to go and buy a rain mac!!!

So as for me .. I did the Half .. Pacing strongly and felt great to mile 10 when I met my old friend Mr Piriformis who decided to re organise my pace and finish time for me! Pretty cross he scratched out 1:56:00 and replaced it with 2:02:23 . However bearing in mind my ankle injury 4 weeks ago and a difficult week with a shin splint I wasn’t totally disheartened. For anyone thinking of a great weekend away running racing and spectating Bournemouth takes some beating ..
I’ll be there next year .. Oct 3-4th 2015 .. And yes there’ll be a beach hut again /)

Fiona Turton

So, me (Katie) and Millie survived the major series! We signed up for it about a year ago, not really knowing what to expect and it exceeded any expectations we may have had. Stamina is required, it’s very hilly – there’s one hill that just keeps on going, which unshamefully we didn’t manage to run up! The obstacles are as they’re pictured on the website http://www.majorseries.com/obstacles …. Our favourites include the Edmund’s electric jumps (funnily enough, the marshals forgot to tell us they were electric so we found that one out the for ourselves), the stench trenches – where you wade through thick deep muddy gloop which they describe as a free all-body cleansing mud treatment, and not sure what this obstacle is called but you had to make your way over to the other side of again thick waist deep gooey mud… my approach being, YOLO and sprint across, which worked well up until 4 strides in where my foot got stuck and consequently I face planted. However the ultimate obstacle was the finisher – Sander’s slide –basically a mud/water slide, where you gain quite a bit of speed – but you’ve just got to GO FOR IT! There’s marshals around every corner shouting at you military style and camera men – so don’t forget to smile :). As well as the adrenalin, they provide water stations and gummy bears to keep you going!

I definitely recommend this run or one similar (there’s plenty around, all over the country) to be on your bucket list! An experience to be had by all. It would be great to do with a big group although you’re alright if you’re on your own as you’re surrounded by like-minded but friendly nutters! The energy is high – the vibe is buzzing – a festival-like atmosphere! Defo grippy trail trainers required or otherwise you have no hope and a hot chocolate afterwards eases the pain!

Me and maybe Millie will definitely do one of these again next year!

I know what you’re saying, do we NEED a schedule? After all, it’s ‘see you at Henfield Leisure Centre’ from now until the next Pub Run season in 2015 isn’t it?

Well, no actually. Hugh has thrown in a handful of teasing ‘dark night’ Pub Runs just to keep our running palates fresh during the darker months. The routes will all need a torch, of course, so make sure you’re prepared. And they will all be carefully selected closer to each event to be sure that the terrain is passable, depending on the prevailing weather. But there is no reason why we can’t get out of Henfield every now and then and have a new sensory experience. We hope they’ll be just as popular as the Summer versions.

Picking up on Hughs comment (below) it’s well worth noting his statement that these runs are very different from those we do in the summer. Not only we will be running in the dark, but the routes are along country lanes and farm tracks, so they should be easy to follow and the opportunities to get ankle deep in mud will be very limited!

Check the list on our Find Us page.