Results

Position	Name	Time
16	Owen Harries	2:37:59
45	Emyr Morgan	2:53:48
75	Sally Gilbert	3:03:38
164	Becky Mulley	3:25:45
193	Trevor Gregory	3:32:46
298	Hannah Spink	4:01:39

364 Finishers

This popular race was billed as "A near 20 mile multi terrain race around the Meon Valley. This is a tough event with a time limit of five hours". Well none of the Team Southampton entrants found it an easy race but none were in any danger of missing the time limit either. The course started and finished at the top of Old Winchester Hill in the Meon Valley and made full use of all the hills in the area including a climb of Butser Hill at 15 miles. By the finish my gps had recorded in excess of 2,500 ft of ascent and a distance a fraction under 21 miles. Near 20 mile obviously didnt mean quite what I thought! Conditions were ideal on the day, slightly chilly to start with but once running things soon warmed up. Scenery was superb if you could drag your eyes up from looking at your feet.

As well as its reputation for being a tough event the Plod is also well known for the refreshment stations along the course. In addition to the normal water the tables were laden with Jelly Babies, Mars bars, bananas and cake. The station at the top of Butser hill was also offering tea, coffee and also apparently rum!! If this was such a good idea is open to question though as the track afterwards was a steep rutted downhill. The excelent catering was continued at the finish where tea, coffee, soup, and further mountains of cake were provided. A quote/query from one of out runners was "do you think 7 slices of cake is OK?". It actually seemed to be the norm.

Thanks should also go to Portsmouth Joggers for the organisation of the event and providing such cheerful and supportive marshals & HQ staff.

For a GPS trace of the route and to see the elevation profile see Here

Please Note:
Any problems with names / times / positions then e-mail boardsbikes@yahoo.co.uk