Headline news this year is that nothing went wrong! Yes, all our runners turned up at the right place at the right time… and, just as importantly, ended up in the right place in about the right time too.
Highlights included our A team’s fourth place, meaning £100 of the race proceeds will go to Breast Cancer Care, our chosen charity. Very fitting, as our teams included Alison and Cath.
As this race isn’t 100% serious, (to put it mildly), quite a few chose to run more than the required distance, in order to get in the long Sunday run. Fiona and Bev had baked copiously to fuel the extra miles, though Santosh took the biscuit – pardon the pun – by running four legs. (That’s over 21 miles, and he looked remarkably unfazed by it at the end, though he did admit to eating four pieces of cake). Other doublers-up were Annette, Cath, Malcolm, Simon and James – last seen running his leg in reverse, to collect his car! Even travelling reserve Fiona managed two stages.
It was good to welcome Anne Price in her first outing as an ESM member. And it was Barbro’s birthday, though she did keep that rather under her hat – first year in the W55 category too. She says there was a jazz band playing half way along her leg, so she did get a bit of a fanfare after all.
Most of us ended up at the Hawker Centre for refreshments at the end, waiting patiently for the presentation to be announced. Well, OK, that was something that went wrong – we were so busy chatting at the picnic tables that we missed it!
Our results are below, showing where our three teams finished, where the teams were placed at the end of each leg, and individual times.
The featured photo shows Manish handing over to Sarah. More photos are on our Facebook page.
Thanks to the support crew: driver Claire, reserve runner Fiona , support bike John, Olov & daughter Evelina.
ESM results summary (82 teams ran):
4 That Ealing Feeling: 2:46:43 (3 Santosh Rai 32:02, 2 James Steel 29:13, 1 Manish Kunwar 37:58, 3 Sarah Richardson 33:31, 4 Rob Brown 33:59)
56 The Ealing Comedians: 3:39:56 (56 Simon Turrell 44:21, 63 Alison Turrell 41:50, 50 Malcolm Woolsey 45:10, 52 Barbro Julin 42:11, 56 Anne Price 46:24)
59 Cinq Without Trace: 3:41:54 (69 Sophie Pesticcio 46:40, 65 Cath Gunnewicht 9:55, 56 Jav Sondh 47:34, 57 Annette Galloway 43:01, 59 Bev Packwood 43:44)
Full results on the Stragglers event page