We went to the BKO Concorde Chase event at Upper Start Posts today. It was our first event of 2010 (just squeezed in to January) and the first time we’d done split starts with two children. It didn’t look like a promising start with sub-zero temperatures as we left home but thankfully the parking/assembly area was in a sunny clearing. Emma walked all the way round the string course whilst Christine was out on her course and I had Duncan in the BabyBjörn.
I was running Black/M21 which, at 10.8km was theoretically on the short side but plenty long enough for me. The going was fast with the bracken having been killed off by the snow and ice so generally there was no excuse not to go straight except for the odd minor deviation to take in to account the short sharp inclines (Star Posts is one of the few areas in the South East where you can actually navigate by the contours). Extra interest was added to the course by the addition of a film set (Harry Potter supposedly) and coming across a mountain biker being tended to by paramedics which had been joined by an air ambulance the next time I passed.
I had only a couple of minor wobbles: following everyone else straight out the start rather than turning 90 degrees left and then number 7 where I wasted a bit of time in the series of gulleys. I was glad to catch Alan Cherry towards the end and, with the addition of Joe Mercer speeding past, this provided some incentive to keep my tired legs going. As the results show, Joe whopped me by around 10 minutes but I’m still fairly happy with 5th place and it would seem that also makes me SCOA Champion! I forgot my GPS but I’ve drawn my route up here.