Piece of String

My Piece of String “fun run”   Part 1

I entered this race after watching the drama unfold online last year, and got accepted by email while running a 100 mile trail race which I subsequently got my first dnf through sickness or was it just shock of getting a place in this most pointless race?

Training was going well leading up to the race so I entered the Clarendon Marathon on October 6^th but I wanted to make it more interesting so decided to do the double and run back cut a long story short I got lost on the way back and ended up doing 60 miles 8 mile with a very painful shin so 4 weeks on crutches.

Wind forward to Thursday 28^th November I set off to Goring on Thames got to the B&B and chilled out for a couple of hours until Rich arrived then we met up at the Swan Hotel with Tom and Kate had some food and a couple of drinks and then retired for an early night .

Friday 29^th November “fun run day”

We were stood outside of the Morrell room when James started handing out The Thames Path maps 12 maps 13 runners ,James asked has anyone got a spare map with them, yes I said in the van , run back and get it then , so off I ran back to the car park grabbed the map and thought what if they start without me that wouldnt have surprised me at all, so I sprinted back as fast as I could ,still there Phew. With that James said follow the path north so off we went for 100 yards or so round a corner and stopped to be told to get in the minibus that was parked up. What the hell were they doing to us, we drove aroud the lanes of streatly for a while before eventually ending up on the M4. Minibus Dave was indicating to turn off at some places trying to wind us all up ,i looked to see if they had a satnav but alas no.A big cheer went up when we passed Swindon (nobody wanted to go there) Bath was next and I thought no please not the Cotswolds again after my dnf in September. On we went towards Bristol and then eventually stopped by a industrial estate. Poor Rich he only lived a few miles away from here.

After another brief and given some dodgy sheets of A4 paper with a map on it we were told to head off and keep going ,after about 4 miles we were met by Drew who stopped us and gave us a better map (well a tourist map) and told to head to Bath.

Although I live in Poole I know this area quite well and had a good idea what we were in for. But with both James Adams and James Elson running the show anything could have happened.

Kate and I hung back and got into a nice comfortable pace and let everyone else go ,we had decided we were in it for the “long haul”!!!. There was an area with a few tricky crossovers which I thought we managed quite well, we were on one of the bridges of the old railway line when we saw Ian down below on the other side shouted down to him and he made it up to us then Sam and the others appeared behind us ,they had taken a wrong turn somewhere. So off we all went again only to go wrong again sometime soon after . I am convinced Sam Robson does this on purpose so he can record more miles than anyone else in the race .

We carried on to eventually end up at the Bath aid station where Nici was waiting she told us to stay on the Kennett and Avon canal, so my thoughts about the route were correct so far.