Delighted to have taken the win at the 2nd edition of the Essex Way Ultra. Horrendous overnight conditions (race started at 9pm Friday) added a great deal of difficulty with recently hard packed off road sections muddy and slow. Gutted it out and ran strong in slightly improved conditions through Saturday morning to take 15 minutes of the previous 'FKT'. Worth mentioning a local legend, Sean Ketteridge, ran 13:58 in 2010 in the pre Strava / FKT era. I do believe I could go sub 15 on this course with the right conditions and with an AM start rather than running overnight as however good your head torch it will always cost time on trail. Sean's 13:58 could be beaten but it will take a very fine ultra runner to do it on what is a deceptively difficult route, despite lacking elevation it has a knack of breaking your rhythm with it's array of stiles/gates to negotiate and difficult underfoot conditions.
Athletes
Route variation
Standard Point-Point
Multi-sport
No
Gender category
Male
Style
Supported
Start date
Finish date
Total time
16h
11m
34s
Verification
GPS track(s)
essexway2024_35 (1).gpx129.78 KB
Report