Serpie Planner - event reports
Picnic Marathon (02 Jul 2005)
A small off road marathon held at 2 in the afternoon
in the middle of summer featuring 6000ft of ascent and
6000ft of descent. All sounds pretty daunting so much
so the organisers claimed it to be Britains hardest
marathon and I'm not going to challenge their claim by
running any similar race in the near future which
could serve as comparison (except maybe Davos next
month).The course was 2 mostly well marked 'out and
back' laps of the Midsummer Munro Half Marathon which
started at 4pm the same day. After a confident climb
up the side of Box Hill things went rapidly downhill
and after having to cross a stream on
stepping stones we were faced with a 350ft staircase,
there was a smaller 250ft staircase 4 miles later so
on the 'double out and back course' we climbed about
1200ft of stairs in all. The terrain varied from
narrow tracks along the side of fields to climbs and
descents through woods and my enduring memory of the
day was a hill with a traffic cone at the bottom which
you had to run round before climbing back up, this
hill was itself a deviation from the main route so you
had climb it 4 times at around the 3,10,16 and 23 mile
points of the race. Marathons are all about even
pacing but it was impossible to keep any consistency
when powerwalking up a hillside or hurtling down
through the forest at 800m race pace and although
mentally challenging the out and back nature of the
course meant you were continually faced with your
fellow marathoners and the half marathon runners whose
support was fantastic. There were water stations with
jelly babies every 1.5 miles and lucozade pouches
every
6.6 miles. The winning time was 4:34 followed 3
minutes later by yours truly, I would usually expect
to run a marathon at least 90 minutes faster but was
pleased to have come second in a race and put my high
placing down to the fact that there weren't many
normal people around that day except maybe the
marshals who were very pleasant.
Conditions: grey skies, dry, slight breeze - as good
as running weather gets.
report by Gavin Edmonds
Picnic Marathon (23 Jun 2007)
Entry to this race was a result of unstoppable human instinct. My every encounter with a wet paint sign has resulted in me leaving a finger mark on the gloss. Every time I hear
Picnic Marathon (20 Jun 2009)
Absurdly hilly marathon 6000ft+ of climb (run simultaneously with a half-absurdly hilly half marathon that does just 1 of the 2 laps).
Highly recommended - not cheap entry free, but loads for your money - great support, good refreshments on route, nice technical t-shirt, medal, carrot, cup for breaking 5 hrs, loads of sarnies and cake. Disturbingly large number of tight-fitting union flag shorts.
Picnic Marathon (18 Jun 2011)
Rob came 2nd
Picnic Marathon (21 Jun 2014)
Carla Denneny - 'F1 - 3rd overall - wow: Missed course record by 107 seconds, on a HOT day. Respect!' From the Organiser!