Thursday 29 September 2016

The SEAA Road Relays – The long and windy road

6am, Sunday morning. The alarm goes. This can’t be right. There must be some kind of mistake.

As nice as it was to have the Southern Road Relays on one day for the first time in living memory, the wake-up call to Bedford was a brutal reminder as to what in reality this actually meant. The unknown location of Bedford Autodrome was a;so a worrying factor. Was the venue up to scratch? Was it going to be any more forgiving than the short sharp painful hills of Aldershot that always kill me off? These worries would have to wait. The more pressing issue of getting there on time was far more important, and as such the meeting for the coach was 7.45am. I was extremely worried that some of the group would miss it. I was sadly proven correct.

With two members of the team going to be far too late, we had no choice but to leave without them. Never an easy choice that, but if we’d waited the Under 13 Girls would have missed their race.
As you could imagine I was cool calm and collected in this scenario, if by calm you mean spitting feathers and collected you mean banging my head against my all weather clipboard. Having (wrongly) written them off, the call came through that the two of them had met up and paid for a train to Bedford. Fair play to them, many others would have gone home back to bed. They later tried to walk to the venue from Bedford station…that’s nine miles. Thankfully we sourced a lift for them.  

Arriving at Bedford, it wasn’t long before I was pining for this event to be back at Aldershot. For a start the toilets were a country mile away from the actual start-line. I glanced at the portable loos as we sprinted over to get the numbers…it would be closest I would get to them for the next three hours. Add to that the lack of catering (an overpriced burger van doesn’t count), audio PA system and as the day wore on actual results, it was easy to see why so many people complained about this event afterwards. Jess Judd is on record as saying it was a terrible event and that Chelmsford wouldn’t go back if it was ever held at Bedford again. It was hard to disagree.

When the young athlete’s races were over, I rewarded myself with a one-mile hike to the loos. And perhaps all too predictably, there was a massive long queue. If I'd waited any longer I would have been pissing in wind (Boom tish, here all week…).

The discussion of said wind was proving a popular topic. In a completely unsheltered field, it had played havoc with every single race so far. At least it was the same for everyone then. In fact when we were discussing said element, a heavy gust scooped up Cambridge’s tent next to us in the air where it proceeded to nearly decapitate half our team.

Some of our team helping with Cambridge's runaway tents
Come 4.15pm, six hours after I’d arrived at the venue it was my turn to race. The mass start for those who hadn’t yet set off on their last leg awaited. An official popped over and drew on my number. 

“THE CROSS OF SHAME” one of my fellow mass starters shouted.



Lining up, I was hardly confident, I normally get thrashed in this event and today would be no different. The gun went and the rest of the field were extremely unsporting….they all ran off into the distance. I’d be on my own for the entire run.

The wind was the most outrageous I’ve ever experienced. My number was clinging onto my vest for dear life, while my eyes watered trying to see where I was actually going. It was also peculiar running in the vastest most cavernous space you could ever wish to see. It was like Omar Sharif’s introduction in Lawrence of Arabia…but in reverse.

At 2km I could barely see the Chiltern runner in front of me so small he was in the distance. Thankfully another team member Kieron had walked over quite considerable distance over the fields to cheer me on and indeed up.

“Got ‘em on the ropes now Kieron!” I spluttered. He laughed. Thank God he did, it was just about the only thing keeping me sane by this point. The rest of the run remains a painful windy blur. I gained no ground on the Chiltern runner, who was 2nd to last out of our group of a dozen last leg runners, despite him being a 2:55 marathoner. Peter cheered me on at 4km that was about it in terms of the capacity crowds. In truth, it wasn’t the greatest spectator course. It was an odd feeling knowing I was the last one out there. Memories of being stone cold last in school races came to the forefront of my mind. Anything to distract me from the pain. A similar thing happened in 2012, when I was lapped in this race which was also the first competition my now wife saw me run at. Needless to say she hasn’t returned to spectate since.   

After what seemed like an eternity, I finally entered the home stretch. Barely anyone batted an eyelid. Although having said that, there could have been rapturous applause, it was hard to tell in the hurricane conditions. The time to my complete shock for the 6km course was 24:37. So roughly a 20:06 5K which is about right for me. A ParkRun this certainly is not.  

As I knelt on the floor wheezing and being consoled by my team’s young athletes, an official approached me.
“I don’t mean to be rude Matt, but were you the last one out there?”
“Yes” I mustered, and then I fell on the floor. The young athletes were so concerned with this development they went off for a selfie with Andy Vernon.

It is nice to know for a change where I finished in this competition. Never before has there been an actual list of times in ascending order as hard as that is to believe. It must have taken forever to type up. Scrolling down to the last page, I was 365th…out of 380, one second slower than my teammate on 5th leg. On the plus side this now means I can ask him “Have you got a second?” every training session for the next year.



One of the people that I was ahead of, is one of my all-time running heroes namely Ian Graham of Bournemouth. Things didn’t really click for me in my running until I went to Uni. I remain so grateful to Bournemouth for everything they did for me. The sessions were arduous, I was often at the back, but was always involved and made to feel welcome. Ian was always supportive, telling me politely to “put in some effort”, my usual response being “I’M DYING”. Rob McTaggart, was also very supportive while I was there. He is an incredible athlete, today he was 43rd. It was nice to catch up with them and grab a pic. I’ll never forget the support they showed me in both racing and training.




As for this competition? Bring back Aldershot, all is very much forgiven. 

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