On Saturday I should have completed my personal Swimathon challenge. Unfortunately, due to an elbow injury I had to postpone my 1500m swim. After putting in a lot of training I was feeling devastated. I felt that I’d let the Swimathon #BlogSquad down. I then realised that thanks to SimplySwim I’d be able to complete the 1500m in April. Watch this space!
Yesterday I completed the annual 7 Pools 10k cross-country race around Sutton Park in the not so awesome time of 64:44. Although my time was far from impressive, the 7 Pools Run is one of my favourite local events.
[Photo: 7 Pools Run]
The 7 Pools Run cost me £12 to enter (£15 on the day), was extremely well organised with friendly race marshals and volunteers. The route around the seven pools located within the boundaries of Sutton Park (Wyndley, Powell’s, Longmoor, Little Bracebridge, Bracebridge, Blackroot and Keeper’s Pool) was undulating, muddy in places and challenging. Perfect!
[Photo: Ron Reynolds]
There were no fancy personalised race numbers, no timing chips and no goody bags. Cotton t-shirts (available in a range of sizes) and cups of orange squash replaced medals and bottles of water at the end of the event.
[Photo: a lovely runner from Kings Heath Running Club]
Personally, I love these smaller local events and try to support them.
Results (I finished 241/307) and (free to download) race photographs were available on the evening of the event. Some of the larger and more commercialised events could learn a lot from these smaller events.
[Photo: 7 Pools Run]
The only negative aspects were the lack of distance markers (I’m pretty unobservant but I doubt that even I could have missed them all) and the lack of a drinks station on the course.
Next year when my legs won’t be stuck in marathon training “plod mode” I’ll make sure that I put in slightly more effort. I’ve never finished a challenging 10k race feeling so fresh and so full of running. I’ll also make sure that I remember to bring some money.
Not being able to buy a post-run ice-cream was pretty devastating!
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I’m sorry to hear about your elbow injury! Is it swimming related? Thankfully you can do your Swimathon in April! Good work on the 10k! Think of all the people you beat just by getting to the start line. 🙂
I think my elbow injury is a combination of many years of violin playing and getting carried away with my swimming training! I’m now feeling slightly more positive about the 10k run. Not having to take a sneaky walking break shows definite running progress!
The smaller events are so much better than the big ones- usually cheaper and more friendly too.
Definitely! I just worry that the larger more corporate events will eventually overwhelm the smaller events. I’d hate for runners to be left with without a choice.