Report by: Stuart Jones

Race Date: Sunday 22^nd December 2024

McTaggart Trot (Relay) in Eppleby, near Richmond, North Yorkshire

How do you explain the popularity of a race that has no podium, no prizes and therefore no presentation? It has grown, over its ten years, from just 37 runners in 2015 to 300 entrants in 2024, raising over £20,000 for St Teresa’s Hospice in Darlington in that time. It was windy and cold this year, yet every entrant turned up to claim their place on the start line.

How would I explain it?
It must be something to do with…

• Timing – the Sunday before Christmas, and a few hours away from buying more stuff that neither you nor a recipient needs.
• Fancy Dress – from inflatable Gingerbread man to knitted Christmas Pudding outfits, jingle bells on hats, and many a naughty elf.
• The ‘Team Sprint’ format – all three runners in each team set off together. All three completed the first lap but one stopped there. Two from each team continued for lap two, and only one runner from each team completed all three laps.
• The bountiful cake stall – mostly home-baked.
• An easy route – a fairly flat 5km-ish road lap, in a quiet corner between the A66 and A1(M).
• The staggered, but not handicapped, start – teams were started in waves one minute apart. We had no idea where we’d finished until the results came out the next day – the fastest team had set off 21 minutes after the first wave!
• The atmosphere – it was a joyful bit of fun, run for the enjoyment and the cause rather than for the win.

The team I was in (cunningly named ‘Teesdale AC Team 5’) finished 15^th overall. We placed our three runners sensibly, so that we could speed up for the second and third legs. Anna matched her parkrun pb over the first leg, at a fraction over 28 minutes. I picked up the pace a bit then, taking Ben and me round the same triangular loop in 24 minutes 23 seconds. (I had, therefore, run just over 10km in 52 minutes 46 seconds.) Ben scooted round near his best for a 5K, with the back 10k of his three laps being his pb for the distance! That showed how a steady but lengthy warm-up can really help.

The stopwatch and paper results get typed up into a handy spreadsheet – my team were in 34^th place after leg 1, 17^th after leg 2, and finished in 15^th place after all three legs (out of 100 teams that finished the course) in 1:13:36.

We are planning a more coordinated fancy dress for next year across the five TAC teams; either the full nativity or the 12 days of Christmas.

I am in this photo – Santa hat with sleigh bells, reindeer jumper, shorts, starting my watch and singing ‘Let it snow’.

For the record, first place went to Darlington ‘Blitzen’ Harriers – Oliver Curran, Michael Harcourt and Rory Hart – in a combined 0:54:25.

First all-female team was ‘Amy Naomi Ella’ (also of Darlington Harriers) – Ella Harcourt, Naomi Hall and Amy Pickworth – in a combined 1:08:43.

Well worth the £12 entry

We picked this off the road on lap two, near where my sleigh bells fell off.

Results – on Paul Cook’s Facebook: McTaggart Trot 2024 (under the discussion thread)