_Gatliff 50km Marathon Overview (24th tyre marathon)
Organisation: Very good and a generous cut off time.
Type of race: Route description, self navigation
Course: Trail, up and down hills, up and down stiles and thru kissing gates. Very pretty in the light; awesome in the dark! Need a headlamp if you are slow.
Volunteers: Very good
Check point: About every 5-7 miles with biscuits
Food Stops: Lunch stop in a village hall and food served at the last 2 checkpoints/end. Sandwiches, bananas, biscuits, sausage rolls (veggie and meat)
Start Time: 7am
Weather:  @ 9-12 degrees celcius, a little rain
Route Description: 97% well written. Had a description of a broken stile that had been replaced with a gate; an ambiguous line had about 15-20 of us scratching our heads together; one wrong direction a lethal time wasting "turn left" when it should have been "turn right"

Since coming back from Tanzania, TG's alter ego has been muttering about trying to get her accounts together to sort out her corporate tax and done zero training over the last 2 months. Landy and myself have been left outside collecting rain water and leaves, looking after spiders, slugs and earthworms. So surprised when TG decided to clean me and bucket up for a 50 km marathon.

05:30am: Uncle Wayne drove us to the venue. TG is rubbish in the morning.
07:20am: We were off, TG managed to complete a couple of miles running before changing down a gear to walking.

TG appeared to lack energy so after "poodling" on the ground for a while, decided to keep myself entertained by clearing the paths of leaves, after all there were a lot of untidy paths. TG was not amused and cleared out my collection of leaves, carrying me over some of the leafy terrains.

Wasn't too happy when TG chucked me back on to some muddy paths. TG said it wasn't as bad as the stuff my brother Rec was dragged through last year in Steppingley Steps, nonetheless the showers during the day had made the ground sticky and was making me a little dirty. But I could see that if I grabbed hold of mud in my treads, I could build up a nice layer of dirt to slow down TG. TG picked me up, kicked off the mud build up, and voila she became my porter. It was easy playing with TG today!

LOST
Throughout the day we met a group of runners who continually lost their way. We also lost our way 3 times, adding time and distance, however the instructions were mostly well written. As night began to embrace our day we met up with the "lost group" one last time. TG appeared to be on a high and her energy levels had increased as the route directions appeared to now fall easily into place. She tried to encourage them to follow her into the now darkened woods, but they refused to come with us calling it madness.

It was an awesome run being wrapped in the darkness and silence of the forests and I could dance on the leaves and trail. TG appeared to easily find her way. We soon had one last sentence on the route description to help us reach the last checkpoint before the finish. It should have been a fast leg for TG but upon entering a large field, TG could not see the exit point in the dark and so added more mileage by going round and round the field, adding an hour in time looking for a bridge and stepping into a very boggy marsh. She then understood how I felt about being dragged in mud! :-)

TG had a slow day taking nearly 12 hours to complete 50 kms. Slow in comparison to last year when she completed 50 kms in 5-4-3-2-1 in 8hrs 39 mins.

Thank you to everyone who donated on the day. Your funds will be donated to Earthwatch.

Onwards now to the next marathon on the 27th December, a Christmas Challenge, after 2 days of feasting.