Flitch Way Half Marathon 2015

Flitch Way Half Marathon

I love the Flitch and as it is right on my doorstep it forms the base for most of my regular daily runs, I obviously run plenty of other places but my regular base mileage is on the flitch usually first thing before work.
This is why I want to have a series of trail races on it to cater for all runners in the area who want a race to run on a pretty and safe trail route with minimal navigation.

So Sunday the 14th of June was the date of the planned inaugural Flitch Way Half Marathon, we had take a steady trickle of entries on the run up to the event giving us a total of 70 runners entered. This is a lot less than the 250 entry limit but the summer is busy with events and it will take a while for an event like this to become established in the calendar.
I ran the route the night before to mark it with tape and a few signs to try to prevent anyone getting lost or missing a turn and thought I had put out lots of markers and surely no one will miss a turn!

Up early on Sunday I went out and placed a few more signs and checked the tape was still there on a couple of the important turns as you never know when someone out for a late walk will mistake the tape for litter and remove it. all was in order so I got to the site at GT Notley country park at 8am just as it opened and met my team and started to set up the event.
once I had my team of marshals for turnaround we drove off and dropped them at the turnaround under the A120 just before Dunmow, I needed to drop the kit off to them as they could not get cars down the muddy byway and through the ford. They could walk back to their cars when the water had ben used and all the supplies eaten but it was too much to expect them to carry it there.

Lee Pickering 1st overall 1:21:40

I returned to the site just after 9am to find all the registration running smoothly as usual and expected, all run by my lovely team on registration. So I chatted to a few people and set up the start and parked my car back on the top of the hill of doom.



Nicholas Gilmore 2nd place 1:25:02

9:45 and I started the briefing, being my usual not very witty self with rubbish jokes and a bit of heckling towards some I knew. it was great to see so many new faces at one of my events and lots of people doing it as their first Half Marathon. I obviously pointed  out the lovely uphill finish and they all screamed with delight and anticipation to be running uphill to the finish especially as it made the course a little longer than 13.1. But I do not charge for the extra distance or training benefit of the hill at the end.

At exactly 10am off they went to the sound of the air horn blown by my daughter Laura, they disappeared into the distance hopefully to return at some point later.



Richard Jones 1:32:02 for 3rd place

We then set up the finish line and sorted all the medals and prizes and for the first time the Buffs we were to give away at the end. We normally give t shirts for all our long races but have decided to give away buffs for all races less than a marathon. They look really smart. We will ad the option to have a buff or t shirt at all our longer events too as some people prefer them or already have a few t shirts from a particular event if they have done it a few times.

So back to the race, I had a text to say that the first runner was through turnaround in 37minutes and on his way back which was a pretty good pace and we expected him back in about 1:15 depending how much he slowed on the way back.



1st Lady Danni Evans in 1:47:18

It was nice too see a few friends and family walking up the hill to support their runners and watch them finish. It was not long before we saw Lee Pickering coming up the hill to finish in a great time of 1:21:40 a good benchmark course record. First lady was Danni Evans in 1:47:18.

All in all some great performances and it was great to see so many runners I know and watch at parkrun each week achieving so much on the run, hopefully it will inspire them to realise how much more they can do. Special mention must go to Michelle Edney who only really started running recently and has improved so much recently she should be very proud of herself. The hard work really does pay off if you put the effort in.
We had lots of great feedback and only a few people missed the odd sign and done a few “bonus” miles in.
This report is the last piece of admin I have to do after this race and I can go off and concentrate on my next race to organise, an epic 250mile non stop race. www.thamesring250.moonfruit.com

A big thank you to all my volunteers who make this race happen.

Maxine, Ginny and Laura on Registration
Tish and Harry on marshalling and food at finish.
Nicki, Brian and Gemma at turnaround.

A big thank you to my sponsor http://www.ultramarathonrunningstore.com for donating race belts from Innov8 for each of the male and female winners. go look at the shop the service is outstanding. anyone who enters a race of mine gets 15% of anything online too.

Great work guys.

See you all soon at another event, have a look at www.challenge-running.co.uk