If there is anyone out there who is following this blog or following me on Strava you will know that I have been doing quite a lot of walking over the last three months. This was so that I would be ready for a marathon length walk on Saturday 1st April. This was the Mammathon based at the Shropshire Hills Discovery Centre in Craven Arms.
Early in March, my niece Gemma was also able to secure a place in the event and had travelled from Switzerland on Friday. On Saturday we were up at 0530 to drive over to the Centre for registration and the start of the event.
I had been impressed prior to the event with the detailed description of the arrangement, detailed kit-list etc and that these would be stringently checked at the start so that no-one left unprepared. I had even ordered two whistles on Amazon on the Thursday so that we would not be turned away from the start, as detailed in the handbook.
We should not have worried. There was no equipment check at all and we were just given a card to clip at the different checkpoints. We were then given an event tracker. This should have been our first warning that the event was not as well organised as it had appeared in the lead up.
We had a coffee and made sure that all our kit was OK. At 0745 we went outside for the briefing for the event. This took place at about 7:55 and consisted of two warnings. It had been raining for a few days (as evidenced by the frantic email the day before to say that one of the car parking fields was unusable) and therefore it might be “slippy” in places. The second warning was about the “road crossing” which would be marshalled. That was it.
At 8:00, the 250 participants for the event set off. Knowing that we would not be in the fastest group we did not rush. This proved to be a mistake as the first mile or so of the walk included several “bottlenecks” – narrow footbridges, field gates etc. The ground was very wet and progress was slow as we had to wait for the other participants to pass through.
Just outside Craven Arms we crossed our first road. No marshall? We then walked along a road, through some very wet fields, more gates (queues each time) and into the country. As indicated in the handbook the route was not marked but was easy to follow.
Then we reached the ford at Strefford and began our ascent through Strefford Wood. This was in a drove and was the first sign of how really poor conditions were. Gemma and I were fortunate that we were using walking poles but we were soon struggling with the depth of mud and running water funnelling down the drove. All around us people were struggling and we had to wait behind them as they made their way up. Very slow progress. We emerged from the drove but made slow progress on the uphill track which was extremely treacherous.
We emerged onto the road and could see the first serious climb of the day – up to Flounders Folly. A section on track and road enabled us to increase speed. We passed a refreshment tent and then embarked on the ascent through the woods to the Folly. In doing so we turned off a very muddy but gentle climb to an extremely steep climb up through the woods. People all around us without poles (not on the recommended kit list) were really struggling and only managing to climb by holding onto trees etc. The pace became very slow as we all had to wait as each person inched forward. At one point I had to plant my pole in the ground so another walker could hold onto it. The climb took the best part of 25 minutes to cover half a mile at 15% gradient. We were very relieved to reach the top and check. We then followed the route to discover that we descended a much more gentle route which although extremely muddy (remember 450 people had passed through here) was much easier to negotiate. We were forced to wonder why one of those at the refreshment stand (or even one of the organisers) had not thought to advise participants to use this far safer route? Again poor organisation.
To be continued
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