After a few weeks at Heaton Park, Graham and I took the opportunity whilst some of our more illustrious colleagues from Team Armstrong were otherwise engaged (Broken Leg, On Holiday, Coming back from Injury, CBA getting out of bed...) to engage in a little bit of parkrun tourism.
At over 8 months since I last visited, it was nice to return. The beast of a hill (X2) was still in my thoughts as I drove in, but there had been a whisper of a course change and an additional hill. I was a little apprehensive, but how bad could it be?
Bolton parkrun is set in Leverhulme park which is not far off the M66, it's easy to get to and it's a nice size. The course takes you over a number of terrains including running track, dirt tracks and tarmac, and hosts Athletics and Football
Starting on the Running track means you get a nice easy first 450 metres, but believe me, you're being lulled into a false sense of security, even after the the running track everything's either flat or downhill until just after the 1K to make you think it's easy.
You leave the running track (1) and turn right, dropping downhill a little and heading around the 5 a side pitches on a dirt track, then after avoiding the wooden posts (2) you head through a relatively steep tree covered downhill stretch. I'm not the fastest of runners, but this section is quite tight and I got stuck behind a few people which didn't allow me to stretch out downhill as much as I would have liked.
When you reach the bottom of that hill (3), you wave at the marshall and turn right to start the first of two loops. You drop a little further and hit 1K (4). this is the lowest point of the course. From here you run along another dirt track through some fields. at the end of this path there is a hill looming. The first time I did Bolton, I'd been warned about the ascent, but until you see it, there's nothing which can prepare you.
So at the other end of the field, you turn left. The terrain here is a cross between steps and uphill (5), they're awkward and hard to navigate, but then at the top of the steps you turn the corner left and see this...
This is THE hill which people talk about, and the picture does not show the entire hill, just what you can see as you turn the corner. as you get to the top of what is shown in this picture, the steepness continues with a twist to the right and a bear to the left as it levels off again (6). What I didn't notice whilst running is there was still snow on the ground at the top.
You then continue on the flat, there's a nice chicane (7) which you try to traverse whilst your legs are still recovering from THE Hill. you then reach a left hand turn (8) and it's down a hill again. This one is quite awkward as the gradient is quite steep and the ground is a mixture of broken tarmac and dirt track and footing can be difficult. at the bottom, you reach point 3 again. The marshall is still there cheering people on, and you're pointed in the direction of another full loop from points 3 through 8, if you through that THE Hill was sapping the first time, the second time is even harder, then as you drop down from 8 to 3 the second time, you're directed (by marhalls performing like those on a runway with aircraft) back up the hill to point 2. Climbing this hill was a lot harder than I expected. Due to having to hold back on the way down, I hadn't adequately assessed it's steepness, so by the time I got to point 2 again, I was really struggling.
At this point you head off to a T junction (9) and turn left back onto Tarmac. I know this bit from last time I ran at Bolton, it's an out and back, you stay to the left and watch people who are in front of you coming the other way as they close in on the finish.
You reach the furthest point (10) and turn around. at this point I should have been comfortably upping the pace for a good finish, but the three hills had really taken it out of me and I was struggling to just keep going, it's always good at this point to try and encourage those running the other way to keep going. Back at point 9, there's a small uphill and a turn back onto the running track at point 1.
From here it's about 200 metres to the finish on the nice even surface.
I can honestly say that Bolton was hard on the old course, but with the new extra hill, it's tougher, as the parkrun show might even say, it's yorkshire tough (Except it's the right side of the Pennines) I thought Oldham was hard recently, but Bolton was the hardest I've done... Yet!
My thoughts on Bolton parkrun, probably come across as quite negative, this is down to how tough I found it. I suppose if you're running it every week, it becomes a bit easier. I don't think I'll ever complain about Angina Hill ever again. It's rare that I'd say 'never again' but this morning I did.
As always my thanks go to the Run organisers and the marshalls who did an excellent job and made everyone feel welcome.
Woodbank Parkrun next week.
Posted with Blogsy
