North Downs Run 30k – Race Report –

In 2021 (see above photo) there was a strong turnout from TRAC for this tough race.

This year just one person (Andy Stevens) came back for more…

 

 

 

 

Here is his race report:

 

 

It’s always a good sign of a quality race where it sells out in advance year on year.

 

This was the 40th anniversary of North Downs 30k – a race which has been a mainstay in the Kent summer racing calendar for many runners. For those who work in miles, it equates to around 18.5 miles.  

 

It was the 3rd time I had taken part.  I have run it when the course was waterlogged following days of heavy rainfall and also when the sun was beating down for the entire time.  Thankfully this time the conditions were as good as it gets in the summer; not too warm with a bit of a breeze and light drizzle near the end.

 

For those who haven’t run this before, it’s a multi-terrain race which seems to include every big hill across the North Downs as part of the route.  The race HQ is in the Cyclopark in Gravesend which was big enough to deal with the runners without queues for the toilets and collecting race numbers.

 

I entered a few weeks ago.  After a couple of weeks out injured following the Milton Keynes marathon I was looking for a summer race to build some endurance where I could just enjoy the route rather than worrying about mile splits.  In reality, it is very difficult to maintain consistent mile splits anyway over the 30k route due to the challenging course profile.

 

 

 

 

 

 

What can I say about the route ?  The downhills were very steep, quite often on technical trail littered with stones and rocks.  I was so paranoid about aggravating the previous injury that I took these downhills very, very cautiously.  Some of the uphills take your breath away.  Literally.  Big old lumps carved into the countryside where it was just one foot in front of the other until you reached the top. There were sections along gravel roads, through apple orchards, through dark woods, across open fields.  It has a bit of everything.  For a course that was completely bone dry I did manage to find the only bit of ankle deep mud with a less-than-optimal racing line through the woods at Mile 11.  Everyone else seemed to finish with clean shoes apart from me.  The marshals were absolutely first class.  Plenty of water stations and plenty of support on the way round. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There’s a real sense of camaraderie in this race and runners who were having issues or looking like they were pulling out were asked if they were ok or needed anything from other runners around them.  It was nice having a chat with different runners on the way round for a change.  

 

Despite not going after a time, I was 2 minutes quicker than I had run the course before and finished in 2.31.  Much more importantly though, it was a solid, endurance building run where the previous injury didn’t flare up so definitely job done.  

 

At the finish there was a huge table laden with different cakes.  Those who have run this race before will tell you about the quality of the t-shirts on offer and it was great to have a race medal with the course profile included in the design.  Yes, the hills were that bad.  Just over 2200 ft of elevation gain overall.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I would thoroughly recommend this to anyone who likes running off road and likes hills.  Around 90% is on trail so just don’t worry about the time, enjoy the scenery and it’s good for us all to remind ourselves why we do this sport in the first place !

 

Andy. .  

 

Well done Andy and thanks for the great race report!

 

Thanks Chris Brenchley for the below photo which came from the same race but in 2014…