Two Tunnels Run March 2019

I made a terrible decision today….

I’d fancied having a crack at the two tunnels run last year, but hadn’t managed to make the dates work. I’m not sure I’d ever been to bath, but the idea of a 10k run (they have a number of different distance options) where around 4k is completely underground was really appealing. It takes place along the two tunnels greenway opened in 2013, and raises money for sustrans, with some of each entry fee going to them.

Bath is about ninety miles from home, and although I usually would have driven this is one of those races that is a little bit logistically complicated – to drop runners on the path, the start is in a field with no public parking nearby, so competitors are asked to use the train, or the nearby park and ride, with dedicated shuttle buses ferrying everyone in. Working out that the train, although involving two changes, would also take around ninety minutes, I decided to ride the rails and relax both ways.

If you are guessing you now know what I got wrong, you’re definitely right. A forty five minute delay on my second train meant I was going to miss the third, and the next service wasn’t for an hour after that. I was definitely going to miss my wave, so had to bin my travel plans and leap in a taxi at Bath Spa station to try to get there in time. Any relaxing went out the window.

We’d also been having a glorious and unseasonable warm and sunny week so it came as a shock to arrive on the start/finish field with cold bleak skies starting to unload in intermittent heavy showers. Relish Running had set up an impressive set of tents in the field, but it was all for official use (registration, bag drop etc) and there was no cover at all for the athletes waiting for the waves to start.

If you are running this race in either mid summer or early spring bear this in mind and make sure you bring some cover from either rain or sun – it could have been a lot worse today, but was still unpleasant – something which didn’t seem to stop all the competitors I saw being up beat and really chatty and friendly. Looking at the recreation field in front of me, which was now getting quite wet and slippery, I was cursing my choice of lightweight road shoes with no grip at all; some of the other competitors reassured me that once off the field it was tarmacked the whole way.

Registration was painless, and there were a couple of burger/coffee vans so you could maintain their fuelling – there was even a small onestop supermarket at the entrance to the field. There was a big queue for the bag drop but it moved fairly quickly – this did mean I couldn’t drop my bag containing my warm stuff quite as last minute as I would have liked. Fortunately I’d grabbed a light rain jacket at the last second and decided I’d run in that.

Although the event isn’t chip timed (where each athlete triggers timing devices as they cross the start line or finish line) but is run on what is basically a ‘parkrun’ type system – it seemed to work well as each wave seemed to be somewhere between twenty and sixty runners so it didn’t take long to cross the start line. The starting process was well organised – your wave was given a safety briefing time and we were pretty close to hitting that. It was nice to see the organising team checking that everyone was in the right wave as we made our way to the starting pen and after a couple of minutes talking through the course, we switched to a four/five minute warm up and then we were off.

After a couple of hundred yards around the field everyone slowed to a crawl to negotiate a very steep, very slippery bank down onto the path – in the safety briefing they had explicitly warned us about this and told us not to wreck a 10k event for the sake of 20m which was sensible advice followed good naturedly by everyone. If it’s wet, unless you’re in front don’t bother to sprint the start as you’ll only be held up here for a few seconds.

Once onto the track, the reason for the small waves became obvious – the path is basically a single track road and the route is out and back, so each direction had half the width to work with. What this meant was that the usable space was effectively two runners wide each way, and early on with everyone quite bunched up, overtaking could mean judiciously picking your moment and putting on a burst of pace when there was a gap coming the other way. It really didn’t seem to be too much of an issue for anyone (I’m assuming the waves were organised by expected finish time) and by the time you hit the big tunnel for the first time, everyone was nicely spaced out.

So… the tunnels. The first mile or so is a steady, gradual climb – the sort that doesn’t slow you down much but needs a little bit more effort. Then you hit the first tunnel, which is about 400m long. I wasn’t sure what to expect and as we ran up to it, it looked very dark indeed. As soon as I hit it, I relaxed. It is lit, but very dimly – you can clearly see the runner in front of you, but would struggle to read your garmin, and anyone wearing sunglasses is likely to be in trouble; footing however is not an issue as the tarmac laid for bicycles along the whole route is very smooth and even. The tunnels themselves were a bit warmer than running outside had been, and of course shield from the wind, and I was quickly able to relax and listen to the echos of all the footfalls and the breathing around me.

Bursting out into the sunlight again (again, not an issue as you see the daylight coming from quite a way away) there’s another K or so of gradual downhill before you enter the 1600m long tunnel. I was convinced this part of the course was flat and was running a really strong time so was getting very excited about smashing my PB at this point – exiting the tunnel for a little less than a K (Also downhill) I rounded the turnaround point and pushed to get back to the tunnel only to discover my impression of flatness had been illusory – I’m assuming caused by the lack of visual cues underground. It came as a shock when I had to work much harder on the way back. Once again reaching the end of the tunnel I knew I only had around a quarter of the course left and one of the marshals, who had been without exception friendly and encouraging despite being on the course for over four hours at this point, yelled ‘It’s all downhill from here – easiest PB you’ll ever do!’.

That wasn’t entirely true, but mostly so, with most of the last two K being run at a really good pace with the final 400m including a savage, if short, kick up that killed any chance of a sprint finish for me.

Racing into the finish funnel, times noted, unusually there’s then a short walk to the ‘Treats’ tent where there was an excellent selection of chocolate bars, fruit, brownies and a medal that builds up into a spectacular set if you complete all the races in the series (and it appears relish let you collect any you may have missed with virtual races after the fact so you don’t miss out). The team working this tent were congratulating each athlete with genuine warmth and again, everything felt very friendly.

I do think the joining information given wasn’t ideal in one respect – Bath station is around 2 miles from the race, so the organisers recommend taking a 3 minute train to/from Oldfield Park, which is still 800m from the park. When I’d finished and collected my gear I realised I had 55 minutes to the next hourly service – I decided to walk into central bath instead but after a couple of hundred yards I found myself on the main road with a bus stop opposite and buses running every five minutes right to the railway station. I think I’d recommend this for anyone not heading back to the park and ride. The bus would have kept me on time on the way in as well, and been a lot cheaper than the taxi.

Considering the grim weather I really enjoyed this race – very different from any other 10k and everyone was working hard to make sure we all had a good time; I do think it’s probably more fun when it’s not wet and cold but who can guarantee the weather? There were some surprises in the big tunnel and it’s pretty cool to be running right underneath Bath itself. I’m not sure how accurate my sportswatch was in tracking underground, but with 93m of climbing it certainly wasn’t flat, but the gradients were so gradual I found myself delighted with a new PB for the distance. The marshal wasn’t fibbing after all.

If I do go back in the summer though, the train can suck it. I’m taking the car.