The Ponty Plod

Yesterday I took part in the Ponty Plod, a 11 mile, multi terrain race organised by Pontypool running club, running on roads, across muddy farmers fields, through woodland trails with more sloppy mud, and plenty of hills.

There were ten of us from CRC taking part, and for a few of us it was our first time at this event.

The race begins at the Llangdegfedd Visitor & Watersports Centre, then it immediately heads up a steep road before leveling out, and then after about a mile we were marshaled off the road and across fields.

This was my first proper trail race and I learned a very valuable lesson from the cross country race I took part in only the previous week before, and that was not to try and gingerly negotiate the pools of thick mud but, to go ploughing through it at full race pace. This I did and I found it so much easier, but also I was able to pass a few people who were gingerly making their way through the mud. Two of these were my own club mates Rebecca and Michelle. Once that mud had been negotiated, there was a short hill where I stopped once I reached the top to allow the girls to catch up, but Becca called out for me to carry on and that they would catch me up. That was the last I saw of them until the end of the race.

Further on I could see I was catching Sean, who was definitely slower running in his road trainers on the off road sections, and in fact I caught him just as he was getting up after a fall in the mud through some woodland forest. Later, Sean was to overtake me on another tarmac stretch, but he was never more than 100 metres in front of me.

With less than a mile to go, we were running down the steep hill that we had climbed up originally from the start, and slowly but surely I was catching up a Pontypool runner. A sharp right hand turn at the bottom of the hill left about 200 metres to run and I caught Mr Pontypool and went past him but, I could hear his pace quickening and I glanced over my shoulder and he was there, right on me, so I quickened my pace again. I was actually very surprised that after 11 miles I still had a sprint finish left in my legs, but I did and I was running at full pelt and finished two seconds in front of him.

I have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed that, running on different surfaces, across fields and through woodland. And boy was I glad I had deep studded trail shoes on as they afforded me so much more grip than some others had.

I finished in 121st place out of 173 participants, which I was happy with. My official time was 2 hours 2 minutes, although my watch recorded 1hr 59 mins, but then I didn't start my watch until I crossed the start line and not from the starting pistol.

CRC runners after the race

The route

Elevation