Thunder Run 2016

We had 5 Teams at this years Conti Thunder Run, a 24 Hour continuous Off Road Relay for teams of 8, 5, 2 or (for the really crazy) solo!

Teams start to arrive from 8am on the Friday, set up campsite throughout the day and then depending on how seriously they are taking the event either eat pasta and get an early night or join the queue at the double decker bus bar!

We had a team of 5 Ladies (Amy, Hannah, Sue, Lisa and Lorraine), a Mixed 5 (Martin, Deb, Rachel, Kevin and Chris), a Mixed 8 (Dave, Laura, Mark, Paul, Ian, Nicola, Steph and Julia), a Mixed Pair (Joel and Emma) and Charles running Solo.

The course is an undulating mixture of parkland, woodland single track trails and stoney paths, which becomes trickier as it goes dark and you get tired! each lap is just under 10km and you have to have someone from your team out on the course at all times with the snap band/baton.

We were ‘blessed’ with hot weather this year which meant temperatures of 25°c+ for the first few legs, this meant it was actually more comfortable to run as it went dark and at night. As it was hot again on the Sunday morning the person who did best out of the whole event was the local ice cream van!

Joel and Emma were looked after by Darren and Maria on a different part of the site which was closer to the start/finish. Charles opted to camp with the rest of the group (after he’d worked at 3am on the Saturday morning). The other teams were looked after by Katie who stayed up all night to make sure we all knew when we needed to run and that we got there – Thanks Katie!

All our teams results are below the photos taken by Darren – Thanks Darren.

It was another great turnout from our club members at this sell out event – so if you fancy it next year get your name down for a place on a team well before entries open at the start of October!

Newcastle (Staffs) AC Elite Endurance Squad 1 – 20 laps 24:02:23 11th FF

 Newcastle (Staffs) AC Elite Endurance Squad 2 – 25 laps 24:36:38 18th 5X

 Newcastle (Staffs) AC Elite Endurance Squad 3 – 22 laps 23:59:11 143rd 8X 

 The Thundergods – 13 laps 18:07:35 143th 2MX 

 Staffs Fire – 11 laps 23:52:59 31st Solo M