Walking out of this World by Stephen Ford

Author:Stephen Ford [Ford, Stephen]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Cinnamon Press
Published: 2024-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

Founders Memorial Challenge

Sorcerers Copse featured on the route of the Far and Fast Walks Society (FFWS) Founders Memorial Challenge event held annually in mid-January, situated on the leg shared by the 30- and 50-mile routes a short distance after the 20-milers split off.

Surrey FFWS took delight that their event was held when weather conditions were toughest. Other FFWS branches observed it was only in a soft southern place like Surrey such an event could be in January. In the Scottish Highlands, Cumbria or the Yorkshire Pennines, conditions would not only have been harsh but logistically impossible.

Conditions for the event were typical. The temperature hovered around freezing point, with light snow and patches of freezing fog. Some snow was settling on the higher ground, hardened by frost, ice making the soil slippery. On the lower sections, the earth was slightly warmer, above freezing, resulting in a thick quagmire of sticky mud overlain with a slush of melting snow.

In the late morning before the arrival of event participants, Sorcerer’s Copse was a quiet, peaceful idyll within the tranquil woodland, the ground and surrounding trees blanketed under an immaculately thin dusting of snow, looking decorative enough to feature on a Christmas card.

The perfection of the scene was sullied by the panting figure of the first runner slipping and heaving up the main track, normally used by timber handling machinery. His every step broke through the thin layer of snow and frost, embedding his foot deep into the wet sludge. With gasping effort, every stride compelled the runner to haul his foot out strenuously from the clinging clay. Each time his foot popped from the muddy cavity, clods flew off his sodden trainers, spraying brown stains across the formerly unsullied surface of the snow.

The runner continued, leaving the scene quiet again, its virgin cleanness now besmirched by a dark trail of footprints and brown spatters.

The scene did not remain quiet for long. Within a minute, two more of the fastest runners appeared, loping ponderously and competitively side by side, making further deep indentations and muddy stains on and beside the path.

Larry and Karen were among the event’s runners on the 50-mile route, vying to be among the overall leaders. To their chagrin, despite both being super-fit, they would never be the first home. Invariably, the front runners were the elite athletes, whose lives centre around touring ultra-marathon races, iron man competitions, and fell-running events across the country and beyond.

Once Larry and Karen arrived on the scene ten minutes behind the lead participant, more than a dozen previous runners had trampled over the course, leaving a trail of pockmarks along the route like the ravishes of a virulent disease.

In common with most of the more seriously competitive participants, Larry and Karen were clad in tight-fitting Lycra, their footwear consisted of lightweight trainers, their tiny rucksacks crammed with skimpy, eye-wateringly expensive versions of the safety gear insisted on by the FFWS: waterproofs, compass, map, navigation device, hat and gloves.

Larry, slightly in front, lumbered on without stopping, focussing on keeping up with and hoping to overhaul the elite athletes at the front.

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