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Cleveland Way Relay

The Relay that nearly never was.

Travelling back from Glasgow on the Thursday, I handed over the driving to my colleague, and decided to check my answering machine at home.

A message that had me swearing into the night greeted me. Someone had dropped out the relay leaving a gap between Kildale and Saltburn (2:20 – 4:40am). I only had a few phone numbers with me in the car, luckily one of which was Andy S who sprung into action and started phoning round. By the time I eventually got home at 10:30, following further phone calls with Andy, I knew that the relay could still go ahead.

Richard had agreed to come straight from a dinner engagement and run the first leg with Astrid whilst the Andy’s W and S would run the missing third leg. Waiting in the pub for Richard to arrive, the Andy’s arrived at plan 59 Revision C/D for how to get back from Saltburn, I think they must have settled on something because they did manage to get back, but with that planning, I don’t know how.

11 o’clock struck and Astrid and Richard sped off up the road, pausing only to run down the photographer. This was the last occasion that the relay was on schedule.

Neil, Jean and Emma took up the SOC woolly hat at Clay Bank and attempted to regain the time lost, but we were still behind when they handed over to the 2 Andy at Kildale. Further time being lost trying to find Pete who had their map.

On through the night they ran, over field and fell, through bog and wood until they arrived to hand over the SOC Woolly Hat to Keith and Trevor at Saltburn for the longest leg of 17+ miles to Sands End. Unfortunately, time still slipped away from us, and Steve and I did not set out for our run to Robin Hoods Bay until we were running 1½ hours behind.

Now with full daylight, perhaps we would pick up some time. But no, after some of the hilliest “flat” running I have ever done along the coast path, we managed to lose a further 10 minutes before we handed over to Kevin, Liz and Steve at Robins Hood Bay. With cries of “We could have had longer in bed” ringing in my ears, I watched them speed off with the woolly hat heading for Scarborough. Dodging the Police speed traps (I went through 8 during the relay) I found Andy and Brian waiting patiently on Scarborough seafront along with the rest of the cyclists. A few phone calls, and at least everyone now knew that we were running late. My intentions of running the last leg evaporated at the same rate that my legs seized, so it was back home for a shower and some food before picking up Harry and Brian in Osmotherley and taking them to Sutton Bank.

Back to the relay, Brian and Andy took up the challenge of trying to regain lost time on the way to Filey, where, being the hero (or fool) that he is, Brian jumped straight on to his bike to lead the cyclists the first 6 miles out of Filey. Swapping back to the car, he left Gary, Roland and Valerie to cycle the remaining 40 miles into Helmsley. Some time had at last been pulled back as we were now running only 1:35 late. Unfortunately, this meant that Johnny had to abandon plans to run and return home leaving Paul and Alison to carry the hat on to Sutton Bank. Alison protesting all the way that she does NOT like running up hills as the 2 of them proceeded to pull back a further 15 minutes arriving at Sutton Bank at 19:50.

Unfortunately, this is where the relay ended. Because of the anticipated time for Brian and Harry to run the last leg completely in the dark, reluctantly the three of us took the decision that they should set off before the hat arrived. As it was, it took a full 3 hours to complete the last leg finishing in the Queen Catherine at 10 to 10.

OK, so it would have been nice to have completed the relay, but looking on the good side, we all had fun, no one suffered any injury, and we did manage to relay 144 of the 155 miles. On the day, we just were not quick enough.

Next Year?

The relay will be moving back to May, probably to the 3rd weekend when there is a full moon. Which route? I don’t know yet, but some ideas are forming, or if you have any suggestions, please let me know.

Geoff Kensett

Last Modified: 7 May, 2003