Spitfire Scramble 2017

The Spitfire Scramble was exactly 4 months to the day after my ankle operation…

I’d signed up as part of the lovely Scrambled Legs team almost a year ago, and obviously had no idea that when I got to the start I would have done almost no training due to injury, in fact quite the opposite, I had vowed to train and train well for this event. Best laid plans hey?

But on Saturday I started this event with some of the most amazing ladies I know, and I knew that whatever I managed would be accepted as ok, so there was really nothing to lose.

We had signed up as a team of 8, so that meant that following each lap we would have between 6-7hrs to recover whilst the others ran.

I was 3rd to go in our team so I started at about 1.30pm. I was quite apprehensive, I have only run a handful of times since my operation, and 5km had been the longest distance, each lap of Spitfire Scramble was just over 9km. Almost double the distance I had tried to run since the op.

I started my lap and had only gone a few hundred meters when someone shouted ‘is that you Helen?’ And running up behind me was Dave Sherman! He had completed a full distance triathlon the previous weekend at Challenge Roth, so I was quite surprised to see him out running an event so soon. Dave decided to run my lap with me, I was so glad of the company as I really wasn’t sure I could run a whole lap, but at the same time I didn’t want to slow Dave down. He is a very fast runner (super speedy when compared to me) but he reassured me that he didn’t want to go too fast as he was still recovering, so on we went.

The route was slightly different this year as they had moved the camping field to a bigger one. This massively improved the camping area and also made the run seem a bit easier as the section at the beginning was the bit I had found tough when it was at the end last year, getting it over and done with early suited me.

Running along next to Dave, chatting, taking awful looking selfies and not thinking too much about whether I could or couldn’t make it meant the lap past quite quickly for me, and just under 53 minutes later I was back in camp! Lap 1 completed successfully! No one could have been more shocked than I was!

A few hours of eating, relaxing with the girls and cheering people on and some glitter application later and it was time for lap 2…

I was super lucky with my lap times and lap 2 coincided with sunset. I managed to keep up an almost identical pace during my 2nd lap which shocked me, I had been prepared to be a lot slower, apparently not! Towards the end of the lap there is a hill, described by our team as the hill that keeps on giving… this is because it climbs and turns and climbs and turns and climbs and turns again… you get the idea? Evil as this may be the hill does provide some stunning views once you get to the top! And I managed to take some photos of the view during this lap…

Gorgeous hey? Following the hill it was approximately 1km mostly down hill back towards the start/finish area.

After my 2nd lap it was time for some more food, and to try and get some rest as without any the early morning lap would be super tough. Turns out sleeping in a tent when it’s warm and lots of people are running or waking up to run isn’t actually that easy, but I managed a 2-3hours of snoozing before getting up at 3am!

I started my final lap at 4.20am, just as the sky was starting to lighten and I finished it just under an hour later. This time the view from the top of the hill was the sun rising and it truly was a beautiful sunrise!

This was my running done for the day as there wouldn’t be a need for me to run a 4th lap, I was quite pleased about this as my third lap had been a few minutes slower than my previous 2 due to me walking a few sections and I am sure a 4th lap would have resulted in more walking than running! 2 amazing ladies in our group (Danielle and Sophie) did run 4 laps however, and they are incredible!

As a team we completed 26 laps during the event and this put us in 6th place in a very tough field of 13 all female teams. We are all very proud of ourselves and each other.

After the camp was packed away I had a long nap yesterday afternoon, this was followed by a lot of food from Dominos!

This was then followed by a very early night, I was in bed by 7.30pm! But I woke up this morning feeling surprisingly ok and still very happy!

The Spitfire Scramble is done… Until next year of course!