When trying to balance running and family life I often try and find races in places were the kids will enjoy themselves while I’m running and we can have a day out so we get the best of both worlds. So Dalby Forest ticked all the boxes and I’d seen a few others had done it and said it was good fun so I thought I’d give it a bash. NO EGO the race series is called and that sounded like it was made for me – men of my stature don’t usually have egos, we leave that to the people who aren’t as good as us…

I didn’t really think much about the race until race week as with the summer league and triathlon season I seem to be racing every week at the moment and my thought process was I’ll just see how it goes and take it in my stride. I may have under-estimated the course ever so slightly… and I realised this within about a mile of the race when I’d already cockled numerous times on varying terrain, cut myself running through ‘gaps’ in the bushes and was already sweating buckets in the tropical heat. It’s a Forrest for Christ sake how are we not in the shade? How can you constantly run up hill and never come downhill? How on earth is that lady running up every hill effortlessly like it’s the travellator on Gladiators? After realising the magnitude of the event I really enjoyed what was my first real trail race and loved the unpredictable nature and the challenges that came with it. Running through bogs, climbing over logs, jumping fences it’s a completely different animal to the road races I’m accustomed to and I’ll definitely look to do some more in the future.

After the race finished and I’d drank about 8 pints of water as I seemed to be sweating it out faster than I could pour it in and checked the route on Strava and there was over 1000 foot of climbing. It doesn’t get tougher than that. Then I saw that at the same time a few Harriers had run Everest half marathon which had 3x the elevation some had done the full and a few of my mates were in the middle of doing Ironman Bolton. That is why I always have and always will run with No Ego… I prefer the humblebrag.

Big props to Jason Moss & Matthew Robinson who also did the half & Laura, Matt Shirley and Nippy who tackled the 10k.