The Weekend We Walked 100km Part 1

Well, this was it. We had been in training since the beginning of the year for this one weekend. Trailwalker weekend.

The distance doesn't look too bad like this...

It started with a trip to Queen Elizabeth Country Park (QECP) on Friday night to register for the event. Support crew Jeff and Julie met Gubbs, Jo and Josh at the park and they were joined by support crew Gem and Anna.

While on route we were already discussing the conditions that would await us on the course as we had been already made aware of the news from Trailwalker HQ that due to waterlogging, the conditions of two checkpoints (CP3 & CP4) were closed to support crew vehicles.

On arrival it was clear that the car parking at QECP had also been affected by the mud with long queues to the entrance. We decided to make our way down to the QECP visitor centre tarmac car park and walk up to the field instead.

Gem makes some friends

What' the plan Jo?

The welcome tent had a white board showing that a further checkpoint (6) was also closed to support crew now also. We rushed through registration, got our tracker tags and on to get a tasty pasta meal.

Then we were given our safety briefing, proceeded by a fantastic display by the Gurkha's marching band. They played some funky tunes too! The safety briefing had too many mentions of this being a race and participants being referred to as runners... er, yeah, not bloody likely!

Then it was off home to get some much needed sleep in our own beds rather than at the wet and muddy camp site provided. Not that it made much difference though, with most of the team not getting an ideal amount of sleep due to their excitement.

Returning to QECP on Saturday morning we were there for a 8am start with the first support crew car packed to the absolute brim. Josh's girlfriend Lucy joined Gem and first support crew Jeff and Stewart to see us off. It was an emotional moment for Gem and Gubbs with Gem having to pull out with a couple of months to go, she really wanted to be doing this with us.

The team and 1/2 the support crew

We said our last goodbyes and headed into the competitor pit where we met our Twitter friends The Red Harrows and Paul from Jon, Paul, Tom & Olly for a quick chat. It was nice to meet these guys face-to-face finally after many months of sharing tips, stories and banter.

The bagpipes set us off after a motivational speech by an officer of Queens Gurkha Signals (sorry did not catch the name), with the weather looking dry for the moment.


A moment we had been looking forward to for a long time. We walked along with The Red Harrows as the crowd entered the forest.


We knew that the first stage would not be too affected by the inevitable mud due to the number of metalled roads we'd be covering. The 8am crew were a big bunch though and it took some time before we had space to gain our normal stride.

We got through to CP1 Harting in 1 hour and 49 minutes, which was spot on with our plan. Jeff & Stewart, were in charge of support for the first few checkpoints and they kept us fed up with snacks and water, parked up next to our friends the Red Harrows.

The crowd on Beacon Hill

We set off on to stage two towards Hilltop Farm, Cocking after a 15minute break and as we did a light rain started.


We headed up Beacon hill, though this time very different from training due to the swarms of other Trailwalkers climbing at the same time. In those slippy conditions one faller could have taken out most the pack of trailing walkers!


At the top the rain got harder and the rain covers went on the bags. The paths were a lot muddier here, and were a sign of things to come. A little further along we had our first comedy faller of the day, Josh. Not satisfied with one, he managed to slip on his arse a second time in a space of 15 seconds. Poor Josh.


We walked down to the checkpoint with the rain not letting up. We could see the cars all parked at the edge of the field and it looked messy. On arrival we checked-in and found all kinds of vehicles slipping around in the mud, that's if they could even get going.

Josh and Gubbs went to one driver's aid and almost immediately regretted it when a spray of mud went up into their faces! Oh well, the driver was very pleased to get out. On to Jeff & Stewart where they had made up a makeshift shelter that did a great job of keeping us out of the rain, which was now getting heavier. Thunder sounded overhead too. This wasn't what we signed up for - the distance would be enough of a challenge on it's own thank you!


We had a tasty hot meal here for lunch and waited for the worst of the rain to pass before heading out onto stage three after a 38 minute stop.

Onwards to Littleton Farm and we reached the checkpoint after 1 hour and 50 mins. A quick stop here for a stretch, cup of tea and a toilet break before heading on to meet Jeff & Stewart by the car park on Bignor Hill due to the checkpoint being closed to support crew cars.  The rain really hammered it down as we approached too.

This was the last time we'd be seeing Stewart, who had also been a victim of a mud spraying too while helping Jeff out the second check point.

Jeff would be staying though to the next checkpoint as he was going to attempt to see us at as many checkpoints as possible.

We set off to Houghton which was another checkpoint closed to support crew and we could tell why on arrival. The puddles in the field were huge and maybe some of the muddiest paths so far.

We continued along the trail to meet new support team Gem and Anna waiting for us on High Titten, joined by Jeff. They had the car stereo on loud which was apparently being enjoyed by many of the other teams going by.

CP 4 makeshift shelter 

They even had time to make us a hot meal here with all that air guitar; a nice pasta meal to keep us carb-ed up.


Josh and Gubbs took the time to do their first sock change of the day, Jo and Julie having been more regular with their changes already. Apparently the stink under the shelter was something else, the boys didn't seem to think so...


Leaving this checkpoint we headed onto stage 5 knowing we were a bit behind our schedule. The conditions meant that plans had pretty much gone out the window.


It was just about finishing it now.

See Part 2 here...