Wirral Summer Trail Series

It was like an unintended rock-paper-scissors game. Nick put his arm out and I raised my palm to shake his … fist bump. Then he opened up his hand, and I closed mine. A complete failure of communication on my part. But I hope he forgave me, as I was desperately trying to squeeze some air through my catarrh-filled pipes by that point, so I plead mitigating circumstances.

Despite my lack of coordination, I still managed to fumble across the line for the end of the inaugural race of the Wirral Summer Trail Series. I probably shouldn’t have run it, as I was at the back end of a cold – as in, generally past the sneezing stage and now giving a passable impersonation of the detective Columbo. However, I’d given myself two days of rest, and a trail run is one of my favourite types of runs, so it was too hard to resist.

The Wirral is a small rectangle of land sticking out just between the waters of the Dee and the Mersey. We’re a stone’s throw from city life in Liverpool, the wild Welsh hills and the history of Roman Chester, but you don’t need to leave our borders to find a terrific variety of terrain. We have hills, beaches, woodland and cliff trails. And all of these were given to us last night in this race.

As a new fixture on the calendar, there are bound to be a few hitches. The initial route in Royden Park was not allowed by the Council for some reason, but luckily Thurstaston was, so just under eighty of us congregated on the grass in front of the Whistle Stop Café, which had kindly kept the café and loos open in the evening, especially for us. 

The glorious sunshine that we had had for a few weeks decided to scarper behind several layers of ominous clouds making that initial temperature a bit on the parky side. I kept my jacket on for at least the first mile, but once I had warmed up, it was perfect for running. I did feel a few spots along the way, but it only began to make us wet after the last people had crossed the finish line, so it was all good.

I began with the tail runner for this race, Ellie, who was recovering from the Llangollen 17-Mile Fell Race over the weekend. I figured I would be fine if I kept it steady with her and the back-of-the-packers, but after that initial lap of the field, I did begin to overtake a few people. And then we got to the beach, and a big flight of rather pretty steps back up the cliff, so my initial vim was wiped out. 

The plan is to have five of these races, once a month over the course of the summer. The route will be the same, roughly five miles or eight kilometres, so you can measure your progression across the year. It’s a similar concept to the Wirral Seaside Runs, but on the trails, and I think it will be a great addition. It could just do with adding one or two more direction flags, so that people like me (or was it just me?) don’t end up accidentally in people’s driveways.

It was Nick who had shouted me back luckily. He wore the red club vest of Wallasey Athletics Club and we’d already done a little passing of each other here and there, and had the odd chat, when I found a little extra available breath. There was barely a handful of people behind us as the vast majority were ahead, but we were both enjoying the terrain and beautiful scenery despite the overcast skies. We live in such a beautiful part of the world, and it’s rather nice to get out there and fill the lungs (partially constricted or otherwise) and enjoy it.

In the second to last section on the Wirral Way, I had caught Nick back up after my diversion, and I did think that I was going to keep the upper hand, but it was not to be today as I had nothing left in that final dash over the field, and he eased passed me like a pro while I just worked on staying upright.

On the minus side, I may have made my cough a bit worse, but on the plus side, I have got a baseline time to have another crack at improving next month. Be ready to get taken down Nick!