Saxons, Vikings & Normans

The Ranscombe Autumn Triple brings you three different Challenges, each with a time limit of eight hours to run as many 3.8 - 6.5 mile laps as you can or want!! The Ranscombe Autumn Challenge follows the 'classic' Ranscombe loop of around 3.8 miles, hopefully with the addition of beautiful autumnal colours on a lovely late October day! There are hills, the North Downs Way crosses part of the reserve, and being totally on trail there is the chance of a bit of mud, but well stocked aid stations, a unique custom made medal each day, and a goody bag that actually contains goodies, will make the undulations and any mud more than worth it. (It's chalk downlands which do drain pretty well!)

We've had the nice wide cycle track at Betteshanger Country Park officially measured so that its a now a certified road marathon course and we thought that it would be nice to have one marathon a year that is specifically aimed at those runners who aren't the quickest and can't make usual road marathon times, are intimidated by quicker road marathons or simply prefer the smaller, friendly type events rather than more competitive ones.

We want to see people achieve things. To use us as a bridge to bigger and greater things or simply to stay in the game that one year longer. To do things that they thought that they never could or could do no more. The reality is that some folk are a bit slower, a bit older, a bit less confident than others. This is their marathon. It's about as straightforward as it possibly can be, it's not easy. No marathon is easy, its always 26 miles 385 yards, it's a long way. But the Betteshanger Marathon has an aid station every 2 miles, a line painted on the track to follow if you're worried about navigation, is pretty flat and has a near perfect wide tarmac surface.

A high quality trail run on the Kent Coast between Thanet and Sandwich lays a big bay called Pegwell Bay which is famous for two reasons, firstly because of the nationally important Sandwich and Pegwell Bay National Nature Reserve and secondly for the Viking Ship, The Hugin, that rests there in all its recently restored glory. We've been fortunate enough to have been given permission to hold an event on part of this area known as the Pegwell Bay Country Park.

The Hugin holds a special fondness for myself as it was one of the favourite places that my late father would take me to as a child, in the dim and distant past you could climb on the ship, eat your ice cream and be a Viking! Sadly these days clamboring over such things isn't allowed, but it has been nicely restored in the last decade or so and is well worth a look, a good few times in fact as the route will go past it twice on each lap! The event will have a six hour time limit for you to run as many, or as few laps as you wish. With a timed event, as long as you complete one lap, then you are an official finisher!

30th November is St Andrews day and although we're in one of the furthest possible points of the UK from Scotland and we're about as Scottish as something that's really not very Scottish at all I do like shortbread and we do have a number of Scottish exiles who run with us quite often and would be rude not to mark the date as we have an event on it!

This is going to be the first event on a new route for us at Ramsgate, using a stretch of the Viking Coastal path and a bit of park and not much sea wall ,which might be a welcome break for some runners! There is a bit of a hill, well, a cliff, to run through, yes through (there is a tunnel) and it'll be a little bit convoluted to get the distance right, but it will be well signed and its on nice wide tarmac paths in the main. The course is 100% good surfaces with perhaps about 500' of climb for a marathon distance run, so slightly hillier than our usual coastal routes but nothing too severe. 4.42 mile loops.

The reality of long distance running though means that the scene changes from year to year, runners come in, runners slow down, do less events, others do more, some move to ultras, some get injured, some lose motivation and I recall well all the people I ran a lot with three or four years ago who we don't see so much these days, if at all. Which is sad, as there is little to remember them by.

What we thought would be great is if we had one event a year where these usual suspects are identified and immortalised! How you ask?

Well, we're going to make the medal unique, very unique in that all the runners names are going to be on it! Actually inscribed on the medal and we feel that would be a lovely way to commemorate the "Class of 2018" so to speak. So basically all the entrants will be on the medal and in years to come you'd be able to look back at this and remember all the folks who in that year were the "usual suspects" and perhaps over the years to come they'll be a changing scene and the names will change, but the spirit will remain.

The medal therefore will be awesome, because basically it's made by the runners! It'll be huge, unique and brilliant! Ah, you're thinking, what about if I'm injured and can't run? Well firstly its a challenge event, just one lap earns you the medal, but in this case as the medal is personalised and so unique, if you don't run for some reason, we'll still get the medal to you, one way or another. As its as much a souvenir of the scene in 2018 as it is of this particular run.

Having completed lots of marathons and ultras we believe we know what it takes to put on an enjoyable event for the fit, the dedicated and the hardcore long distance runners. And for those, like myself, who fit none of those categories, we'll do our best to get you round!

Come and join us in December for a jaunt along the Saxon Shore Way where it winds its way up the coast at Deal. The Saxon Shore Marathon will be running for the 8th consecutive year along the sea front. The course is very flat, with a few tiny undulations, the surface is very good indeed, all hard surfaces and will be mud free and even the most navigationally challenged amongst us will be able to get around the course without getting lost. Promise!

A marathon at the lovely seaside town of Ramsgate
The coastal path known as the Viking Coastal Trail runs around Thanet and a section runs along the seafront at Ramsgate which forms part of a popular route that we have here.

The route is 4.37 miles and runs both along the top and bottom of the cliffs on gentle slopes, don't worry the cliff isn't too high! The upper and lower sections are joined by a little "grotto" which meanders through the cliff.

This will be a marathon only event for the lovely Viking Coastal Marathon medal. Six laps will make up the 26.2 mile course!