21st June 2026 – Race report by James
21st June. Father’s Day. A day I had been looking forward to for many reasons but I’d not felt this nervy about a race for a long time. 5 and a bit weeks after fracturing my ankle and dealing with what is 99.99% a bout of returning pericarditis, my first proper run in 6 weeks found myself lining up for an 8km trail run through the grounds of Harewood House.
The journey up from Sheffield had been a pleasant one on a clear but increasingly warm Sunday morning. Car charged to the max for my first motorway run with it, tunes on but somehow not yet hunted down by SRC’s most prominent dad rock enthusiast in her Mustang, I parked up in a field alongside the ever growing queue of runners and wandered off towards the little event village.
The walk up the field whilst doing incoming cars allowed me to spy the trundling Mustang, warranting a pause whilst waiting for its pilot. A little wait, fist bump and away we went to get signed in.
After waving off the 22km group (wahhhh this should’ve been me, but was thankfully allowed to drop to the much shorter distance), I had a 45 minute wait or so in some shade until the 8km distance set off. Time whiled away, the 13km group shuffled forwards and set off, then it was our turn.
Some reassuring words and metaphorical shoulder shaking had helped calm me down and somewhat ironically gave me heart that everything would be ok.
5,4,3,2,1 and we were off. A small loop of a wide open field gave way into some thankfully shaded woodland where the first climb was to be found. Jeffing required to try and allay my climbing heart rate. The leader of the 8km group had long since bounded away as well as the chasing top of the class, leading to in parts what felt like a quite lonely race.
A steady, twisty downhill followed, mercifully kind underfoot so I had one less ailment to be concerned about.
We had been advised at the start that the course split was at approximately 6km; the right hand fork for the 8km, left hand for the others.
“I’m 8k so I’m going right” was said out loud to try and spur myself on. 2km from home, the second hill arrived. I’d slowed down accordingly to try and bring my heart rate back in line, but living in a hilly city has it perks as I was cheered on by a fellow 8km chap who had been thwarted by the ascent.
1km of the same starting field to go, determined to finish. Pipped on the line by a 13km runner who I took some delight in telling he’d chased me down for no reason, and that was it.
Everything held together. A decent goody bag, and a Garmin saying 96 hour recovery time. I’m giving it a week, but I’m going back to Harewood for more.
