Ah, you know what? This is a proper guilty pleasure; something to savour and enjoy; tormenting your quads; brutalising your white Quakers vest; having a cracking time and most of all reddening your face. I was struggling to think of words to describe the Harewood House 10 Mile Race. I asked Anthony for some ideas and he came up with damp, incessant, giggling, hysteria and beer! I think that’s my thoughts too, what a race!

This is the fourth time I’ve ran the race and each time it surprises me with its great terrain and a big stupid hill at nine miles! The Harewood House race takers place in Emmerdale country. This year the rain joined us and it fell constantly during the hour and twenty minute drive down the A1. It was extremely wet and there was a lot of umbrellas and coated people running around at the start. Signing up was done in the village hall and there was ample cake, tea and bananas all for sale – my friend resisted the urge of the girl at the sign up desk to join the Valley Striders (although I wasn’t asked) – good to see them trying!

The warm indoor toilets were out of bounds and there were portaloos in the field near the start, many found the bushes closer and drier!

The race set off promptly at 10:30 and it led straight onto a wet and muddy trail. The runners spaced out well and there was ample opportunity to avoid the puddles for the first two miles. However it was soon redundant as the other, more hardy runners went for the straight line approach, completely soaking me! We flew through fields, trails and tracks with lots of mud and water, trudging up hill. Although the rain was soaking me there was never a point where I didn’t enjoy it!

After coming off the trail we went downhill onto a road, my heart leapt at the chance to speed up and not get bogged down in mud! As I sped down to the reservoir I suddenly remembered what it was like last year – flooded. Needless to say, I was not disappointed to be running for a good couple of miles in an inch of water which completely covered the trail! I felt somewhat holy to be running on water and it was great splashing and forgetting about trying to stay dry!

Coming out of the water we hit the field and the mud really hit here, I actually laughed out loud looking at a torrent of water streaming down hill! X-Country this wasn’t! We trudged through the final three miles of mud and rocks before coming onto the road for the final mile!

I had bigged up this hill before the race to anyone who’d listen and I heeded my own words! The final mile is pretty much all uphill and was a good final challenge before getting a sprint finish into the field where we started!

There was no goodie bag, no lucozade, no medal, no chocolate, no banana, no bags of microwave pasta (I’ve had this before) and no coffee... there was beer though! And to be honest that’s enough for me! A bottle of Harewood Trail Ale for everyone who finished - which was brilliant!

Overall, this was a brilliant race which was well worth the drive! Wet or dry, it’s a great challenge and one of my favourites! The Quakers were mentioned at the end of the race, during the presentation for turning out in good numbers for the Championship!

Pros

• Beer
• If you like mud and water, mud and water.
• Emmerdale

Cons

• If you don’t like mud and water, mud and water.
• That stupid hill!