Race report by Dave Phillips.
What a great event this is so well done Sphinx (Cov’s number 2 club!!) for putting on their 10th Coombe 8 and to Paul Bergin and Mitch Timms for their efforts once again.
The course is a real cracker with fields, trails, tracks, woods, lakes and of course the Abbey itself so what better way to spend a Sunday? That’s why I’ve done all 10. Around 250 took part on a beautiful sunny but cold day. What I really enjoyed was running in the woods with literally deep carpets of fallen leaves throughout. Apparently this year has been the “leafiest” ever and I agree. Simply stunning. That’s why I did 2 laps (believe that or not)! Also as we crossed the lake by the Abbey the sheer number of water birds was fantastic and being an ornithologist I tried counting the different ones-thus my slow time!! Any excuse.
Eventually the half way point had been reached with a water crossing that was nothing like as deep in other years but it added interest especially with Daniel Connolly shouting us on to “lift them legs”. At 5 we were back on that huge flat field that almost goes into Cov but at least at 6 we did turn round and head back to the Abbey. However this flat filed was not without its tricky places as we had to go in, over, up and down 4 large craters. The chap who was running with me thought these were geological faults but they are bomb craters! When Cov was bombed in the war the Luftwaffe had spare bombe in their planes and to make the fastest trip back to Germany they jettisoned all their spare bombs anywhere so the planes would be lighter and faster. Many fell at Coombe. So today’s score is Adolf Hitler winner 4-0.
Eventually the end was in sight with a long straight and flat finish. So a tee shirt and lovely soup after made it all worthwhile. Then I went upstairs to the prize giving (only red and white there) only to get 1st in my age category. This was a £20 discount voucher from Cov Runner so huge thanks Anne- Marie. See you soon then for more shoes!
Massey time: Dave Phillips 1hr 48 mins.