24th May 2026 – RACE REPORT BY NARNI
A record breaking scorcher of a bank holiday you say? A pale, pasty and freshly tattooed club secretary you say? What can possibly go wrong?
I knew I was in trouble the moment my thighs touched the leather of my car seats and I heard a sizzle; despite it being 7am I swear you could have cooked an egg on them then and there. Air con set to ‘arctic’, I swooped towards Manchester with blue skies above and ELO on the radio. I applied my trusty factor 50 at every traffic light I could on the drive over, hoping to build up as much protection as possible; I now need to buy shares in Nivea. Parking at Hardy Farm was not an issue, and I carefully followed a trail of likely looking lads in lycra towards race HQ; a nicely festooned gazebo with some friendly ladies inside. As per usual, I self-declared that the number I’d been assigned (36) was a lucky one. For once, the race director agreed with me; how auspicious. Given that the Sun was already hammering us we were allowed the choice of an 8.15 kick off or an 8.30; keen to get things underway and to try and beat the main heat I scurried forward for the 8.15 start. I had my trusty hydration sack carrying a litre of dilute watermelon trailwind left over from the M2L ultra – plot twist readers, it still smelt and tasted of urine, but I made a mental note to drink every 0.5km.
Plenty of cheery faces as we tootled along the river Mersey, and scenes were looking awfully familiar as I reckoned this stretch had in fact been part of the route for the aforementioned ultra. I checked Strava afterwards and it was; no more extra purple map capture for me, booo. A very nice and sweaty gentleman in white declared he was trying for 10 laps, and we made a pact to keep each other in sight as we were running at a similar pace. I told Mr White I didn’t have the stones for 10 but was hoping for a respectable 6. He agreed with me that 6 was indeed, very respectable. Each lap saw you pick up a scrunchie from race HQ, with your total laps at the end being totted up by virtue of how many scrunchies you had accumulated. I was deathly afraid of loosing one and not having a lap count, so I took to double looping them around my wrist and forearm. Unfortunately 3 laps in and I’d not only cut off the circulation to my thumb but also made my arm look like a strange ribbed condom. I resolved to tie them to my running vest for future laps.
Lap 4 hit and I was starting to sweat buckets. The marshals were absolutely delightful despite no breeze and no shade, including one at the halfway point who had a most joyous purple tambourine and an absolutely delightful lipstick on; very cheering. Race photographers could be spotted and I quickly got the heel click in before I drowned in my own sweat. Heart rate was looking suspiciously high for my cruising pace, and with temperatures pushing towards the high 20s and beyond I resolved to make lap 5 my last, and live to fight another day. I also really really didn’t want to drink any more urine sorry tailwind. Swooshing in to race HQ for the final time I announced dramatically “I am finished, un-scrunchie me” to a bemused race director, and I had my 5 scrunchies counted and verified. Mr White came sashaying in for a pit stop, and was distraught to find all the orange ice lollies had gone. I gave him the last half of mine; anyone who did 10 laps in that scorchio deserves as many ice lollies as they want.
All in all a really pleasant event run by some lovely women, with a community feel and a really high quality medal to boot. This was the first Phoenix event I’ve done but I can’t see it being the last. Hardy Farm, it was a pleasure. A boiling hot pit of Hell, but still, a pleasure.
