We’re into race season proper, now – not that the English weather would have you believe that… I must take part of the blame for this week’s changeable conditions, with my words about the start of summer in last weekend’s report!

As usual, the week began with more top notch coaching from our tireless coaching crew, with those hot and humid laps in Chopwell Wood – Adele even joined in with a session “for the first time in well over a year” – in her own words. We had great numbers on both nights; thank you all for your efforts and enthusiasm.

Thursday was a welcome return for our RunTalk evening – big thanks to John Kirby for sorting out a great route and location… and even the weather, as we got to sit and ‘rehydrate’ outside the Boathouse pub. Very enjoyable night and if you can make it, it’s a really good opportunity to chat and get to know everyone – especially ones you might only see in the thick of a training session!

Moving onto races, we had Laura Peacock and Eleanor Shotton in the DVRC vests, across in the Lake District for The Lakeland Trails Staveley 18km

Fuelled by fruit pastilles, gels and lots of laughs, the two of them crossed the finish in 2:09, 125th and 126th position – out of 324! A result not to be sniffed at in that heat! Great work from both ladies!

Meanwhile, Susan Chambers, Jenny Yeo and Peter Storey were in Llanberis for the UTS 50 and 100k Ultra Series.

Jenny completing the 55k route, with 3486m/11437ft of elevation, in 10:33, to finish 4th in her category – clearly that backyard ultra was just a warmup for this… hats off to you!

While Peter bowed out of the 100km race at halfway due to heat related issues – he certainly wasn’t the only one, we hear… and it’s not a surprise in those temperatures, with that elevation!

Susan toughed out 37km and over 9000ft of climbing, before taking the experience of what she’d achieved away for another day… We’re sure she’ll be back for more!

Over at ParkRun, we had new course PBs for Lauren Smith and Sue Urwin at Tyne Green, in Hexham, while Matthew Scott and Kirsty Robson claimed course PBs at Chopwell Wood – where we also had Beth Ramsden and Tony Robson volunteering. We also had other members running the courses of Tyne Green, Prudhoe Riverside, Town Moor and Chopwell Wood.

Sunday brought the delights, once again, of the Sunday Social, as the gang hit the trails of Chopwell, in more glorious May sunshine…

This week sees our return to the track in Blaydon, with Mark Marchant delivering what will undoubtedly be another hugely enjoyable session – see you all there at 7pm!

Wednesday night sees us head to the Steelworks relays – teams are now in place with our thanks going to Mark and Hazel Marchant, Neil Frediani, Kirsty Robson and Carys Watts for acting as reserves.

	Team 1	Team 2	Team 3	Team 4
1st leg	Chris Hewitson	Ian Maddison	Matthew Scott	Claire Thompson
2nd leg	Bex Hewitson	Simon Hutchinson	Al Rook	Claire Knox
3rd leg	Paul Brugner	Vicky Parker	Laura Peacock	Rob Peacock

	Team 5	Team 6	Team 7	Team 8
1st leg	Charlotte Bowes	Eleanor Shotton	Duncan Marshall	Andrew Walton
2nd leg	Vanessa Armstrong	Alex Fiddes	Jill Lee	Megan Williams
3rd leg	John Kirby	Terry Owens	Lauren Smith	Sally Ann Greenwell

And you didn’t think we were going to end this without mentioning the Chevy Chase recce, did you? If you’re in our members Facebook group, you know there were a few of the club headed over to scope out part of the route…

At this point I’m just going to hand over to Matthew Scott to let you enjoy what happened.

I was hoping to be able to file something sharp and snappy in time for Chris’s weekend roundup print deadline, but I’m afraid I can’t stop giggling for long enough to get any serious thoughts down.

What a day out. In one sense, it was successful – we completed our recce of CP3 and CP4 of the Chevy Chase, no ankles were harmed, and the conditions were perfect. We climbed up from Langleeford to the Cheviot Knee fairly uneventfully, and the slow slog up to the top of Cheviot was fairly enjoyable. There were only a couple of bog induced stumbles between us, and just one of any note – Vicky’s shoe, thankfully, escaped the clutches of the peat monsters that had initially tore it away from her heel.

From there it was all downhill – and I don’t just mean the Cheviot descent, which Nick absolutely flew down. From there, let’s just say the climb up Hedgehope made the Wallace and Gromit episode A Close Shave look like an episode of Countryfile, and our decision to stick our feet in the stream when we got back to the car via the crags turned out to be extraordinarily unfortunate. Moments later, after a weird but seemingly innocent shudder, the car display was flashing warning lights and telling us to stop – something about a tyre problem? “It’s probably just knocked the sensor”, came Chris Morris’s reassuring voice from up front, a statement which turned out to be as accurate as a boxer with no arms.

The left rear tyre was blitzkrieged. We were still in the Harthope Valley, somewhere underneath the southern face of Cold Law, with no phone signal, no spare tyre, no alternative means of propulsion, and sodden wet feet. Around three hours later, aided by a messiah in a blue Ford Focus, an exasperated, slightly nonplussed recovery driver turned up in a van and announced he had space for all of us but one and the dog. He softened when he seen our predicament, and we all piled in to the back of his truck like we were after some obscure Guinness World Record for most humans and canines in a truck covered in peat. Our sole canine companion was soon out for the count, stretched across our increasingly crampy legs in the back, and before long we were deposited in the car park of a random pub in Alnwick, where we made pleading phone calls for our other halfs to come and collect us. As we waited for rescue (again), we took our wet feet inside and ordered alcohol.

I departed first, with my feet covered in hairnets (genius Kirsty!), and got into the car with a grumpy better half who sped us home down the A1. I got home and immediately headed for a shower, only to discover that our hot water was off. And off it remains as I type this, contemplating the merits of a cold shower, and wondering if it’d be easier and truer to the spirit of our day to clean myself by going and rolling in the back garden like my dog does.

What a day though. If this is a recce, who knows what the Chevy itself will bring? And best of all, I think we’re doing it all again in two weeks, if we’ve recovered from this one…