Chris Moseley & Claire Seymour
We were pleased to be able to fill 4 teams (a total of 40 runners) for the Ridgeway Relay on Sunday 28 June. And after a few last-minute changes, it all came together on the day!
Please read on to find out how the teams got on…
Mostly Ladies team (by Claire Seymour)
After a rather warm week leading up to the Ridgeway Relay, our runners were grateful for slightly cooler conditions and not the 35°C experienced earlier in the week. Although it remained warm and humid from early on and throughout the day, thankfully it was slightly more manageable for our runners.
As always, it was an early start at 7:30am on Leg 1 from Ivinghoe Beacon. Our mostly ladies team included a few first‑timers to the Ridgeway relay this year which was great to see, with the first of these being Tom Knight on Leg 1. Tom had a strong run, getting the team off to a great start, handing over to Sarah Dooley in 13th place.
A regular runner of Leg 2, Sarah had a good run, handing over to Izzy Hester in 17th place overall. Izzy, also a first‑time runner to the relay, had a solid run on Leg 3, handing over to Betsy Palmer on Leg 4 in 18th position.
Betsy enjoyed her first relay run, maintained 18th place, and ran slightly quicker than her predicted time before handing over to Laura Nagi on Leg 5. Laura, a regular on this leg, had a great run and handed over to Anna Balogh on Leg 6 in 19th place. Leg 6 includes a tough climb out of Streatley, and Anna navigated this well and enjoyed her first run at this event, bringing the team to the end of Leg 6 in 23rd place overall.
Next up was Dawn Godwin on the mass start for Leg 7, Dawn finished in 11th place on her leg, while gaining a place for the team and moving them in to 22nd overall. Pete Rennie followed on Leg 8, gaining another place handing over to Pip White in 21st overall.
Pip had a strong run on the long, navigationally challenging, tough Leg 9, handing over to Chloe Lloyd in 23rd place. A regular runner of Leg 10, Chloe finished off the day with a great run, bringing the team home in 22nd place out of 44 teams in a time of 12:36:04! (this was slightly quicker than last year) the team also finished as 5th ladies’ team overall.
The team had great camaraderie between them throughout the day and are already looking forward to next year’s event. A few team members have even hinted that they might tackle the same leg again! 😉 Thank you and well done to you all!
B team (by Claire Seymour)
Following on from last year, we were pleased once again to field a mostly men’s B team, which, like the ladies’ team, included several first‑time runners at this event.
In this years event, Mark Allen led the team out on Leg 1 fully aware of the signage issue experienced last year from another event, Mark enjoyed a great run and handed over to Sam Whalley in 36th place. Sam also ran well, noting the challenge of the final hill (or “ski slope”), and passed to Ben Phillips while maintaining 36th position.
Ben had a great run on Leg 3, finishing 11th on his leg and moving the team up to 30th place before handing over to Peter Higgs. Peter enjoyed his run on Leg 4 and handed over to Harry Smith on Leg 5 in 34th place. Harry, taking part in his first Ridgeway Relay, ran strongly and passed to James Cust, also a first‑timer to the relay in 33rd place.
James continued the team’s steady progress on the tough Leg 6, maintaining 33rd position into the next handover. Gary Clarke took on the mass start for Leg 7, running well and completing his stage handing over to Katie Rennie in 34th place, with Katie having stepped in at short notice travelling from Bristol to run Leg 8 for the team, Katie ran well given the circumstances, arriving earlier than expected at the Leg 9 changeover and gaining a place to move the team into 33rd! much to the surprise of Phil Hine, who fortunately was ready to set off, encouraged by Katie’s “Go, go, go!” 😁
Phil had a strong run on the challenging Leg 9, gaining another place and bringing the team into Leg 10 in 32nd position. On the final leg, David Walkley, a regular Leg 10 runner, brought the team home in 33rd place out of 44 teams, finishing in 13:52:02. This marks an improvement on last year’s time of 15:41:03 and 39th place, and the whole team was delighted with the result.
Vets team (by Chris Moseley)
We had a few new faces in the over 50’s team this year, as some of our regulars were unavailable or injured. But on paper at least, it looked a decent team. Adrian Cull took on Leg 1 for the first time and got the team off to a great start. He handed over to Sam Briggs who successfully ran the short but hilly Leg 2, without having had the opportunity to recce the route. Then it was over to Tony Page, running Leg 3 for the first time in a few years. He had a solid run and gained a few places before handing over to debutant Nigel Ely. Nigel overtook a couple more teams on his run to Swyncombe, taking the team into 30th place.
Next up was Belinda Tull, back on leg 5 after a few years absence and running almost to her predicted time. Alan Nesbit went even better on the tough Leg 6, running over 2 minutes quicker than anticipated. So far, so good and no reports of any major diversions from our runners!
Lance Nortcliff started Leg 7 in a mass start and ran well before handing over to Dave Parton. Dave hasn’t been running much recently, but showed he hadn’t lost any of the competitive spirit as he ran an excellent Leg 8 in the 6th fastest time of the day. Gavin Rennie took on the tough Leg 9 up to Barbury Castle, and showed he’s in good form, running 7 minutes quicker than predicted.
Mike Worsfold did the final leg, also faster than predicted, bringing the team home in an excellent 25th position out of 44 teams, 23 minutes quicker than last year and 3rd placed vet’s team.
A team (by Chris Moseley)
With Matt Kimpton on the first leg for the A team, we knew we’d have a strong start. But it was still a nice surprise when the message came through that he’d finished his leg in 1st place, and over a minute clear.
He passed onto Sarah McDade who we’d finally managed to persuade to do The Ridgeway. She’s in good shape and managed to maintain the race lead before handing over to me on Leg 3.
I had no idea how much of a lead I had (c3 mins), so just ran as hard as I could. I glanced behind a few times and seemed to be clear, only to hear footsteps behind me as I was tiring with 2 miles to go. A Newbury runner flew passed and gained a 2 minute lead before I finished. I gave everything I could, and was bang on my predicted time, but was a bit disappointed to give up the lead.
Nikki Gray was next. She had a great run: the 3rd fastest out of the 44 runners on that leg.
Chris Lucas was back on Leg 5, running the fastest leg 5 on the day. But more importantly he closed the gap on Newbury and gave us a slender 30 second lead at the halfway point.
But then Newbury smashed Leg 6, quickly closing down Matt Sarjent and pulling away to an 8 minute lead by the time Matt handed over to Tom Griffin. Tom had an excellent run, narrowly missing out on another stage win. The gap to 1st place was still 8 minutes, but 3rd place were now 27 minutes behind us.
Despite the best efforts and a strong run from Simon Rumsby, Newbury’s lead increased on Leg 8. Callum Evans brought the lead back down to 10 minutes with the fastest Leg 9 on the day, a challenging stage which included a headwind and a long final climb.
Dave Boulton was on the final leg again and had successfully chased down the lead last year. But this year the gap was just too much. Newbury finished first in a time in a time of 09:39:34 with Reading Roadrunners A team just 5 minutes behind. Fantastic running all day and just a minute slower than last year. Most other years that time would have been good enough for the win. It wasn’t to be for the A Team this year, but it was good fun and we’ll be back!
Thanks to everyone that ran or supported on the day. As far as we know there were no significant detours or wrong turns from any of the 4 teams. This is quite an achievement given how tricky some of the legs can be. We hope everyone enjoyed it and look forward to doing it all again next year!
Team Captains – Chris Moseley and Claire Seymour