Cross Country Hatred: Earthworms, Mountains & AWESOME Spectating

Rain is pelting down and our feet are sinking into the already sodden grass. Huddled in the Club tent, we try to stop the worms getting into our bags. Actual wriggly worms. And as we’re all wearing spiked running shoes, it’s going to be worm-kebab time when we start running on the mushy grass. Poor Jim. 

Northbrook post-race legs. Spoiler: We all survived.

However it’s not all earthworm-death and torrential rain, I get some good news too. 

The race is 4 miles long, not the 5 miles I’d thought. So just once around the fields, a bit of a trot up a hill and then a cup of coffee. It’s sounding pretty good. Apart from the rain. And the worms. And the having-to-run.  

There had better be cake afterwards. 

Waiting until the last minute due to the downpour, I miss my warm-up. I’ll be fine. I’m sure I’ll be fine. It has to be better to warm up on the run, than be out in that freezing rain? In fact, running in that would be more likely to be a ‘cool down’ rather than a ‘warm up, right’? Huddling in a nice warm tent is much more sensible, I tell myself. I ignore the little voice that tells me ‘You realise you’re talking crap, right?’

It’s time.

The girls all pour out of the tiny Northbrook gazebo like clowns out of a tiny car. The men’s race is half an hour later so they’re staying in the warm and dry. I don’t blame them. I’d stay in the tent too. If someone removed the worms for me that is.  

It’s nice though at the start. Despite the rain. There is a sea of green and gold sunburst vests. The feeling of camaraderie makes me forget, just for a moment, that very soon I’ll be running around a field, covered in mud and feeling like hell. 

The girls at the front in their tiny pants and crop tops, bend forward for a good start, the ones in the middle including me, try to coordinate our starts so we don’t get mown down by the over-enthusiastic girls behind us. The girls at the back put on their best ‘mowing down the girls in front’ faces. We all look serious and dedicated and as though our very lives depend on getting a good start.

Then the gun goes off and the entire crowd of ladies do a very girly “Oooh!”. It would have been highly amusing if I wasn’t running for my life, trying to avoid being trampled into the mud by the girls behind me wearing spiked shoes. 

The whole field rushes past me. Like the WHOLE field. Did I miss some sort of energy drink given out at the start? Maybe there’s something really special at the end? Maybe they’re giving out free trainers to the first 50 finishers or something. Or maybe it’s just the thought of finishing quickly and being able to stop running through ankle deep mud. 

I try to run a bit faster but my legs aren’t having any of it.

Picture by the lovely Sarah McNaney

I try to think of excuses. My legs are tired from bike ride yesterday. My spikes aren’t spiky enough. Maybe I’m ill. (Tries a fake cough). Maybe they’re all going too fast and then I can overtake them all at the end. I didn’t warm up because it’s raining. Also I’m not wearing clothes that make me look as though I’ve forgotten my PE kit and am being made to run in my pants and vest. Everyone knows that crop top and pants are the best thing to race cross country in ...  

Ah crap. I’m just going to have to get on with it. *Puff, pant.* This SUCKS.

How can I enjoy trail running, but not cross country? Maybe it’s the spikes. I must be allergic to spiky shoes. That’s it. That must be what’s slowing me down so much as well. Stupid spikes. 

This course is fairly flat, although I am slightly suspicious of the fact that we are running towards Beacon Hill. Beacon Hill which has its own name and is so stupidly steep we have run hill repeats up it. And it has a freaking massive beacon up the top. I can remember Lord of the Rings. You remember that MASSIVE mountain the hobbits had to run up to light the beacon? It was EXACTLY like that. But without the hobbits. 

But I overtook a few people going up the hill. Ha ha! I thought. My hill reps here in the past have helped! I am like Queen of the Hill! I bounded up the hill, wearing my imaginary crown shooting scornful looks at everyone else. I am WINNING at running up hills! 

But the girls I was overtaking? They knew something I didn’t know. They knew we had to go up Beacon Hill TWICE. 

The second time? I wasn’t overtaking anyone. Queen of the Hill? More like Over the Hill. I plodded up, doing what can only be calling ‘running’ by the generous minded. 

I dragged myself around the field, mud up my legs, earthworm murder under my shoes and despair in my heart. Why are the miles taking so long to go? I check my Garmin ... how can I ONLY have gone that far? I’ve got MILES to go before I finish. 

Run ... Run ... Run ... 

I check my Garmin again. 0.06miles have gone past since I last checked it. Oh this is rubbish. At this rate I’ll be here ALL day. AND there isn’t even a medal at the end. There had better be cake or I’m going to be REALLY grumpy. GrumpIER. 

Then the ground disappears.

There’s a ditch. A massive ditch. Filled with mud. The taller women in front are jumping it. Some are landing in it. This doesn’t bode well for a vertically-challenged girl like me. I summon up my best gazelle-like leap and throw my arms out at the same time, pushing the girl over next to me. 

Whoops.

I land on the other side of the ditch and a quick glance shows me, that luckily my accidental push-ee made it over too. Phew. I probably wouldn’t have waded back in to save her but I WOULD have shouted an apology. I’m thoughtful like that. 

Picture by the lovely Sarah McNaney

Run up the hill and back onto the trails and there’s slippery mud everywhere. It’s like ice skating, but dirtier. My spikes are thoroughly clogged up and I can’t claim the grace of Bambi-on-Ice but I manage Bog-Monster-Emerging-From-Toilet. It’s carnage, people are slipping all over the place, my legs are skating around but I manage to avoid the one thing I’m most scared of in cross-country ... stepping on my own foot in spiked shoes. I don’t even get trodden on by anyone else’s spiked shoes.

Am obviously over-achiever. 

We emerge from the slippery mud and back onto the grass and leaves of the playing fields. We circle the field. This is promising. This is towards the finish! ... And past the finish. 

Stupid cross country. 

And guess what. Just to top off the muddy, mucky horror, we get a 2^nd go at the ditch jump. 

2 goals: Don’t fall in. Don’t fall in. 

I can’t quite manage my gazelle-leap of before, making do with a cat-startled-by-hoover jump but am grateful not to have ended up in the dirt soup. I’m on the last muddy, grassy bit now, just one more corner and it’s the final straight. It’s not been my race and my legs – and heart – just haven’t enjoyed it.

But it’s nearly done and ... hang on! The girl I’ve been leapfrogging with the whole time has just put on a burst of speed to try and overtake me in a sprint finish! Can’t have that! My legs, thoroughly unimpressed at the whole cross country thing, decide that they DO have something left and whisk me along to the finish chute ... a hair ahead. I hope it’s not ditch-jump-pushed-girl or she is going to beat me to DEATH with the finish token at this final injustice. 

Northbrook ladies. I'm on the far right. (Pic source unknown)

I am relieved to be finished, but am disappointed with how I’ve done. I UNDERSTAND that I can’t be good at things I haven’t trained for. But I don’t have to LIKE it. 

I’ve trained for ultras this year. This involves running really, really slowly, eating snacks and by staying entertained by bushes. And not murdering chickens. I can’t expect to go from that to running like a mud-crazy-cheetah in spiky shoes. They’re opposite things but with running.

Like expecting to be good at bobsleigh because you’ve practised sitting.

I know I can’t EXPECT to be good. But I want to be. Dammit, Running Gods!!! (Howled)

So I take my sulky self and my over-expectations-of-cross-country-running over to spectate the mens’ race. Now this is where cross country makes up for all previous ills. This made up for the rain. This made up for the earthworms. This even made up for running up Massive-Stupid-Mountain-Beacon-Hill twice.

It was carnage.

There were men falling over in the ditch. There were men sliding into the ditch on their bottoms. There was even one poor man who lost his shoe in the ditch.

In fact, I felt so sorry for him, I videoed it. And I definitely don’t watch it when I’m sad just to laugh at this poor man and his hopeless eyes as he searches or his missing shoe.

Cross country running to watch this?

TOTALLY WORTH IT. 

Leamington Parkrun: Knot Tying, Hill of Death & Pushing 10 Year Olds in the Hedge

This was to be my first time running at Leamington parkrun. I had no excuse except laziness – it’s just down the road and was no further really than Coventry parkrun. I call Coventry ‘my local’ parkrun despite the fact it’s about 20 miles away and doesn’t serve beer and peanuts. To my way of thinking anything I describe with the word ‘local’ should have a colourful name such as the “Tippling Philosopher’, “Golden Lion”, “Bold Dragoon” and serve drinks of a wobbly nature. And not involve running.

It wasn’t just distance that had put me off trying this parkrun though. It was something worse.

The Hill.

Capitals deserved. I hadn’t seen this gravity-defying oxygen-mask-requiring mountain but every time I mentioned visiting Leamington parkrun, this part of the route always got a mention by someone in the know. Of course, this shouldn’t matter. Hills are fun, right? Flat routes are boring routes. And if you ask me, I’ll tell you that I run parkruns for the fun of them. I don’t always run to get a new 5k PB.

But, secretly? Of course I do.

I would like to go for a sub-20 time but on this course I appreciated that this probably wasn’t terribly likely unless I was allowed to exchange my trainers for rollerskates on the downhill parts. I was however looking for a sub-21 time and ideally knock a few seconds off of my last parkrun time. A girl has to have goals, right? And all that speedwork had to count for something ...

The first sign that things might not go to plan was during my chat to a marshal. I’d asked him about the route and mentioned how pretty it looked. He agreed. Then looked me in the eye and said this course was the “worst in the midlands for speed” Oh. Maybe I’d better change my time goal to sub-30 minutes ...

We all lined up at the start and as I looked around, all I could see was pretty hedgerows, a nice flat playing field and a couple of lost golfers. I decided that the Hill of Death must be a tall tale to stop parkrun tourists from visiting and eating all the good cakes.

We set off in the usual parkrun start rush of flying trainers and accidental elbowing. I was feeling fresh, comfortable and had my heart set on a good time. The Running Gods knew this. And they decided to give me a kick up the arse for my optimism and sneakily untied my shoelaces about 200m in. Just before the first corner.

I decided tripping myself up on a trailing shoelace and falling on my face wasn’t the best strategy for a PB so stepped out of the stampede and retied my shoelace. I’d given myself an additional task now; make up the time lost and weave around the hordes of enthusiastic runners who had overtaken me while I’d been practising my knots.

The parkrun itself was lovely. The start was on grass but the main route was made up of narrow, pretty paths which wound and twisted between hedges and around a golf course. The paths narrowed in places and there was a fair amount of congestion as runners of a similar speed were running shoulder to shoulder, but the atmosphere was a good one and camaraderie ran high. The hedges occasionally opened out to show gorgeous views and on a sunny morning it was a lovely run.

Well. Most of it was a lovely run. The slight uphill which turned into a vertical slope - down which I fully expected skiers to come hurtling – dashed any expectations I might have had for a PB. Twitter buddies had told me that it was as fast to walk as it was to run but I decide that as I was out for a run I may as well try. I overtook the woman in front of me and a 10 year old boy who were walking up it. I made it to the top in triumph having run all the way up and just as I paused to adjust my victory signs and try to gain control of my heaving lungs and spasming calves, I was overtaken by the boy who had walked up the hill.

While fully supporting the valuable work of the NSPCC, I determined to push him in a hedge. If I could catch him.

The next section was all downhill. A fact I tried desperately to take advantage of, however my legs were having none of it. Having been pushed to run up the side of a mountain, they were now firmly telling me that if I was expecting anything below a 7 minute mile I was most definitely “having a laugh” and could “sod right off”.

Fair enough. I tottered along the rest of the route with wibbly legs and wished I’d had enough foresight to invest in some of those trainers with wheels. While I might not be able to run at speed, I was pretty sure I could roll downhill like a champ. Despite my lack of leg control and inability to control my soaring heart rate, it was a lovely parkrun and running on trails was a nice change from the tarmac and roads I would otherwise be running on.

Coming along the final section of path, I thought my body was shutting down and my eyesight was failing. (Although this is a pretty standard feeling for me at the end of a 5k) From what I could see, there were woolly sheep on the path in front of me. Squinting and hoping I wasn’t about to be trampled up by a flock of woolly creatures – bearing in mind I was in the middle of rural Warwickshire, I got a bit closer and realised it was two ENORMOUS Labrador retrievers. They looked confused at the crowds hurtling –  or in my case, trundling – towards them but the owner obviously felt our 5k fitness would be improved with hound-hurdling and not-tripping-over-a-dog training in the final 200 metres and left them to wander in the middle of the path. I appreciate his thoughtfulness in attempting to improve our training, but couldn’t help feeling that maybe I could return the favour by giving him a being-throttled-with-a-dog-lead Krypten Factor style challenge.

Everyone is a coach.

Reining in the murderous thoughts, I realised I was on the final stretch and tried for a burst of speed. My legs rebelled and flailed about as though I was at a Riverdance audition but I put my head down and focused on the fact that I could have a massive steaming cup of hot black coffee and possibly a slice of cake at the end. This did the trick. I aimed my body in the general direction of at the finish funnel and managed a finish like an octopus doing a Mexican Wave.

I finished and clasped the parkrun token in my sweaty hand. And was clapped by the 10 year old who had finished several minutes earlier. I reached out to push him in the hedge but had no strength left and managed only a half wave.

He waved back.

Recovering at the thought of a coffee and cake, I got myself moving in the general direction of the cafe and met up with some of my lovely Twitter buddies. I was relieved to note they were real people although I wasn’t sure how they escaped from my phone. Laura (@TheLozzatron) was fab! And just as lovely in real life as on Twitter which was a relief as she does triathlons and would be quite capable of using her super-triathlete strength to beat me up if I wasn’t polite to her. Chris (@Rock_and_Droll) had been marshalling and cheering  on the people at the bottom of the Cardiac Hill, safe in the knowledge that he didn’t have to climb the thing this week. It was lovely to catch up with them both and a relief to find out that neither of them appeared to be mad serial killers masquerading as runners. Although maybe they save the axe murdering for the 2^nd parkrun visit.

Results:

21:11

33^rd / 235 people

4^th woman /69

1^st in age group

But 32 seconds slower than PB ... I had fully expected to knock a few seconds off of this but a combination of things meant that I was slower than I’d expected. However, it was a lovely route and really friendly group of people. Sometimes it’s not all about the times.

Goals achieved:

Sub 20 time: nope

Sub 21 time: nope

New PB: nope

Children pushed in the hedge: 0 (but only because I couldn’t catch him)

Massive hills found for hill reps in future: 1

Real life friends made: 2 (waves at Lozza and Chris)

I reckon that’s a win.