Sunday 23rd February 2025

A wonderful account by our Head Coach Annette 💚💚💚

The Nice Work, Hadleigh Park legacy 10k (plus a bit!) is so called owing to being run on the jumps and berms created for the 2012 Olympic mountain bike course ⛰️

I did the event in 2021 and got slightly lost so when I saw it was taking place on my Mum’s birthday weekend with an upgraded course billed as ‘exceptionally challenging’ I had no choice but to head to my homelands and give the new course a go.

I decided it was a great opportunity for a XC sandwich 🥪 to get the miles in for my Isle of Wight ultra-however this meant doing one of the beastly hills on my way out and during the race-at least I got my revenge on the way home.

I hadn’t ‘raced’ for a while and it felt so great to be clad with race number & my HH vest whilst charging down the first long downhill-I was genuinely beaming from ear to ear! It didn’t last long as the hills were relentless and the mud-when it appeared- taking a fair few victims, but I managed to stay upright. After a while there was some level gravel track which was a welcome relief before the mighty hills returned-one of those events when you know the welcome down hill will have a mighty sting in its tail-the event clocked up a rather thigh busting 750+feet of ascent!!! 🤩

Anyhow,  I crossed the finish line & peeked at my watch feeling fairly pleased with my time on that bonkers course and then grabbed my running vest and got back on the trails as I had to head on back to my Mum’s pronto as my Bro was heading back to France from his flying visit.

I always feel it’s bad form to head off prior to the prize giving but sometimes you can’t fit it all in-however later that day I found out I was first in my age group-can’t see that happening too often these days and possibly helped by the usual Essex crowd being tempted by London Winter Run up the road! Whatever, I’ll take it 🙌

So, if you’re considering Pett XC,  go pull on your trail shoes next Sunday, this is one of those events when you’ll be brimming from ear to ear as you conquer the downhill descents and forested hills as you enjoy a day out with your team mates and the XC season finale! 🖤❤️

🎤 Omg this sounds beastly, but nothing our head coach couldn’t handle and with an age category win too 🏆 amazing work Annette! You’ll be storming around the Steyning Stinger 🦂 after those hills.