Socially Distanced Racing
Socially distanced racing is a concept I don’t think many people would even have thought of, let alone participated in before March 2020. However, for those of us who wish to get back to running races, it seems to be the only viable option.
On Saturday 15th August, I ran a 16km (just under 10 miles) trail race along the Jurassic Coast near Swanage, Dorset. The event was put on by Maverick Races who specialise in trail running events.
When I first saw that they were hosting events as early as August I was sceptical to say the least. I was also intrigued so I had a look on their website for details of how it would work. You can find a link to their Covid precedures here.
What they put in place is relatively simple to be honest. They had 4 starting time slots, 09:00-09:30, 09:35-10:05, 10:10-10:40 and 10:45-11:15 and runners would set off 15 seconds apart from each other in a rolling start. You also had to make sure you were registered within half an hour of your starting slot to ensure you were allowed to race. I decided this sounded like it could work so signed up for the middle distance.
Arriving at the event
After a wet and foggy 2 hour drive to the event HQ, I was surprised at how busy it was. I had run a Maverick event last September in the Cotswolds and didn’t remember Bath racecourse being as busy. Any fears I had about the lack of social distancing were quickily allayed when I saw people queuing for the toilets, all of them were keeping their distance.
Once parked up I joined the queue, the joys of the runners tummy on race days! We were soon asked to move the position of the queue by one of the marshals who was guiding cars in and what an obedient bunch of happy trail runners we were, everyone moved in unison whilst still keeping their distance.
With the toilets safely navigated, I made my way to race registration. In this section they made it mandatory for masks to be worn and for each runner to be carrying hand sanitiser. Another stipulation I soon found out was that once you had your number, you were not allowed out of the starting area. This was something new to me but makes complete sense as it keeps the runners gathered together in one place for a shorter period of time and stops people coming and going before they start the race.
So I went and got myself ready and warmed up before returning to get my number. It was only about 09:55 at this point with my time slot not due to start until the earliest of 10:10. I was told when I got my number that once ready, runners could go and start earlier than their time slot. So I went over to the start and after a few others were counted down I was given 15 seconds and then told to go. The watch was started and I was off.
Passing on the trails
I set off feeling good and was soon overtaking runners and seeing others who had started the short distance early returning to the start/finish area. At this point it was mostly fields so it was easy to keep your distance as you passed people.
There are obviously going to be pros and cons of staggered starts. The main pro being avoiding mass starts but one of the cons is that each runner is running their own race so is going at their own pace. This then becomes a bit of an issue when you catch other runners on narrow trails, of which there were many.
Nearly every runner I came up behind moved aside for me to pass but in a lot of cases, probably most, it was physically impossible to stay 2m apart. Thankfuly the passing of runners only takes a couple of seconds so I guess its not so bad. There were also quite a few walkers about but the situation was much the same, both parties letting the others pass as safely as possible.
The race itself was awesome. The views were restricted due to the weather which was a shame, but what you could see was gorgeous. Plenty of sheer drops to the left and views of the cliff edge make the Jurassic Coast not the best location for the faint hearted!
When being competitive gets you lost!
There was a one brutal descent and immediate climb which I’ve since been told is called Chapmans Pool. I love a fast descent and was even cheered by a marshal for going flat out downhill earlier in the race but this was not runnable. I know because I tried! Lose your balance or gain too much momentum and you’d be rolling down it. The climb back up the other side was also the toughest part of the race.
That climb aside, I felt great and was flying along. So much so that in the last couple of kilometres I was hurtling down the hilly fields passing people. I could hear other runners doing the same behind me so the race was on!
I kept on pushing and stayed ahead of them until I reached a gate that I struggled to open and one went past and the other stayed with me. We then raced across a field only to realise we couldn’t see any blue tape or arrows on the next gate.
A group of about 5 of us then wasted a good 5 minutes or so working out where we went wrong and ended up adding at least half a mile to the course. It was a little annoying but not the end of the world.
Once back on track I crossed the finish line to collect my medal and, as always with Maverick events, a free beer. It was here that the social distancing perhaps wasn’t quite as good but people were still staying apart which was good.
Final thoughts
For me, I think Maverick put on a great event, as per usual, and got the Covid measures pretty bang on. I will be interested to see how other race organsiers do their events after this.
Does this mean road races can return? Probably not in my opinion. Theres a big difference in logistics and the number of people, both runners and general public, when it comes to road races. Trail racing tends to be in more remote locations with a smaller number of particpants.
However, my overall feeling is that it’s down to the runners themselves to make these events successful. If they can follow all the measures put in place by event companies and race organisers then I can see trail events continuing to go ahead as planned. At least the smaller ones anyway.
So runners, we all need to do our part if we want to race this year. If you’re not happy to take the risk of going to events just yet, which is totally understandable, there are still plenty of virtual events being done. But I can say that I thought this event was handled very well and it bodes well for the future of racing, even if this is the new normal for the foreseeable future.
