After a 15 minute walk-in from the car park (a farmer's yard!), I rounded the corner of the main street in rural Osmotherley to see a mass of runners and walkers outside the village hall. Planet Fear had set up their stall next to the hall, the Summer Games were being set up around the corner, the good ladies of the village were making the finishing touches to their cakes and the organisers seemed to be doing a roaring trade in last minute entries (they counted 68 on the day entries making 282 people in the event).
The Osmotherley Phoenix is traditionally started as the church bell chimes 9am. This year we started a little late as one of the long standing competitors was presented with a birthday cake (and a cheer from the crowd) on her 70th birthday. Naturally, she took part in the race.
And then we were off. The course started gently uphill through the village before breaking off onto tracks through forests on the Cleveland Way, heading north towards the big hills and banks of the North York Moors. Paul Hart set the pace right from the word go, with Team Vasque in hot pursuit some 100m behind. Within 2 miles, Paul and a runner in a red shirt had broken away from the rest of the field. However a pack seemed to form that looked like it was racing for third place. This pack consisted of Steve Pyke, Matt Davis, Martin Beale, Stephen Watts and Steve Lang.
By checkpoint 2 the lead pair were out of sight and the chasing pack were running pretty much together. The running from checkpoint 2 to 4 was glorious, along the mighty northern escarpment of the North York Moors. The hills kept coming as we ran on excellent trails around one hill and over the next. By checkpoint 4, I was really quite sad to be leaving the escarpment and heading south into the heart of the North York Moors.
Spyke and Steve Lang seemed to establish a 2 minute lead going away from checkpoint 4 and this lead seemed to be pretty hard to break down until the water stop at checkpoint 5 was reached. It seemed that some advantage could be gained by carrying enough water to avoid having to stop at these checkpoints and the pack was able to reform somewhat at checkpoint 5.
A brutal hill and then a narrow path through the heather led on towards checkpoint 6. Along this path, Spyke was showing the form that won him the Vasque series championship in 2006 and he powered away from the rest of the pack. We had heard at checkpoint 5 that the lead pair were maybe 4 minutes ahead, so there was still everything to play for. Unfortunately, Spyke took a wrong turn just before checkpoint 6 and he was back to square one with the rest of us - it was a real shame for him after such a good piece of running.
The route changes character at checkpoint 6 and follows small paths through fields of sheep and cows. Navigation looked like it would be desperate in this section and it was. Matt could just see me in the distance, I could just see Steve Lang and Steve could just see Spyke. The trick here seemed to be to keep in visual contact with the runner ahead. This became quite nerve wracking at times as you would turn a corner and have to scan the fields for the runner ahead. There seemed to be no time for map reading and everyone was just assuming that Spyke knew the way and that the runner ahead was following him. We carried on like this for three miles until close to Mount Pleasant farm. Here the four of us seemed to bunch together and took a collective wrong turn. Realising that we weren't on the path, but crossing the fences at stiles (which spoofed us into thinking we might be in the right place), we just headed south towards the Hawnby road, finally reaching the isolated New Hall farm which seemed like civilisation compared to where we had been.
The pack of four seemed to arrive at checkpoint 7 together, 7 minutes behind the lead pair, but we seemed to leave separately. This again seemed to be down to whether people needed to fill up with water or not. I didn't need to fill up and was able to run off with Spyke, but Matt and Steve were behind. The hill out from here was the psychological breaker in the race. I was with Spyke at the base of the hill as he said to me "Let's catch them". He just ran up that hill as though it was flat. I didn't have that left in me and was happy just to keep ahead of Matt's blue shirt behind me. I left it to Spyke to catch the leaders and the way he was running, I was confident that that would happen.
A wide track hemmed in by limestone walls led off into the distance. Spyke's orange shirt was heading off into the distance, but Matt's blue shirt was disconcertingly close to me. This track was hard work. Although only very gently uphill, there was a strong headwind and it seemed like a disproportionate effort was required to make progress. A strong rain shower started as we were battling into the headwind. This was good for me as it cooled me down and by not stopping to get a waterproof on, I think I managed to get enough of a lead over Matt and Steve to be safe in fourth place.
We turned the main corner to head northwards along the Hambledon Hills. In the distance I could see Spyke passing Paul Hart and the runner in the red T-shirt. It was great to see Spyke running so well. He seemed to be unstoppable. I also felt a bit sad for the lead pair as they had essentially led for the first 28 miles, to be overtaken with the finish almost in sight. The Hambledon Hills seemed to be attritional: they seemed to go on forever. Even when the track turned to go downhill, it seemed to be difficult to pick up any speed: the legs weren't responding very well after 30 fast miles on the hills.
At Square Corner, the 33 mile runners met those on the 17 and 26 mile courses: they looked somewhat fresher than the 33 milers! We headed down to reservoirs and fields and the run in to Osmotherley. This section seemed pretty critical to the race. With a couple of short, but sharp hills, some places were exchanged at the head of the field. I moved into third place with a mile to go and Stephen Watts must have had a good finish to the race as he came in fifth (not bad for someone who had run the Bob Graham the weekend before).
The finish was an excellent sight. We rounded the corner of a pretty Osmotherley street to see the village centre alive with activity. The Summer Games were in full swing at the top of the hill with wellies being tossed, greasy poles being fallen off, coconuts being knocked off poles and that comforting smell of fish and chips and beer being enjoyed by the locals. "Ee, you haven't just run 33 miles on't moors have thee lad?". For the runners, the best sight was the finish. It felt like such a relief to me to have my tally card cut from my neck: peace at last....
Spyke won the race in a new course record of 4h36m. Paul Hart was second, Martin Beale third, Matt Davis fourth and Stephen Watts was fifth. Everyone who finished is probably proud with their achievement.
The Osmotherley Phoenix was a fantastic race that exceeded my expectations. One of the best aspects of the Vasque series is that it gets you out to places you would not normally go to. I, my sister (completing her first ultra-race - well done Ali) and 280 other people had a great day out on the North York Moors - somewhere very beautiful that I would not normally have the excuse to go to. Many thanks to the organisers and the Vasque series sponsors for another great weekend.
