REDWAY RUNNERS TREASURE HUNT 2016

The Redway Runners posted a few weeks back regarding a ‘treasure hunt’ on the Sunday instead of the regular club runs. There were several rules:

-Your team will be called to the start line 2 minutes before your start time for a short briefing where you will be given a laminated ordinance survey map divided into grids. 11 grids will be highlighted in red pen and at each grid location there will be hidden a letter (Black letter on green A4 card). To help locate the letter, each grid will have a short clue on the reverse of the map. The letter may not necessarily be on the location, but in close proximity, either HIGH or LOW. It may take a bit of searching to find it.

-The route that your team takes to each location is entirely up to you and can be visited in any order. However, you MUST NOT cross any busy (Grid) roads unless by means of a footbridge or underpass.

-Once your team has located the letter, we will require a ‘selfie’ of all team members with the letter.  This will also help you remember the letters found as they will form a word which must be declared at the finish line along with the 11 ‘selfies’. Any missed letter selfies or an incorrect word will incur time penalties.

-You had to return with the full and correct word

Route

The route started around Willen East lake but headed towards Woolstone area, as we were following a map, we did get to pick our own routes. We started at the bottom of the map and worked our way up to the top as the top area was around Willen and we knew our way around this one.

Very flat, the only hills was the horrible pagoda hills and we took the shortcut up them to get to the bench!

The run

The run itself was great fun, I had a great group. They were very supportive and Phil was awesome with his map reading. Admittedly by the 3rd letter we knew what the word was but we made sure we grabbed them all and got selfies with them.

The leaves have started to turn orange and fall off of the branches, it was lovely to hear the crunch under your feet as you ran. Running down the canal, it was nice to be back and running in MK.

We are all part of the Z2H group and so this was part of our training, the other two have clearly been doing better than I have. I was slacking at the back, ever since I got ill the other week my running times have taken a hit, I’ve really slowed down and struggled with running. Towards the end of the run I was really struggling to just put one foot in front of the other! The other two had to stop and wait for me which sucks because I wasn’t at that pace before. Hopefully this will improve as our training goes, if not I’ll just have to accept that’s my pace from now on.

We started getting towards the end of the letters and we realised we were coming up to 7 miles, for some of us that was the furthest distance we have ever run. Although I struggled a little towards the end, my body is getting more and more used to the distances, my body doesn’t ache as much which I’m enjoying.

After speaking to others and listening to others I need to find a way to cross train, to find another sport to mix in with the running in order to give my legs a break!