Round Norfolk Relay News

C&C AC were able to enter 2 teams into the annual Round Norfolk Relay 2022, an iconic race around Norfolk consisting of 17 stages over 198 miles. Stage lengths range from 5 to 20 miles and consist of sand, shingle, trails with fantastic views, then move into the night with the longer road stages. Below are the race reports from our two teams:

C&C Masters
For the first time we entered a competitive Master’s team for the annual tour of Nelson’s county, with Paul Veitch setting off from King’s Lynn on a fine breezy morning. Simon Brightwell took the baton for stage 2, and ahead of schedule at mile 7 of his 14-mile coastal stage, suffered a debilitating calf tear that meant he couldn’t continue. RNR rules dictate that a DNF incurs a time penalty based on the slowest time of the same stage in the previous year. At Burnham Overy Staithe John Morley continued our journey, setting off at our scheduled time to avoid logistic problems later in the race. We used the time penalty as a motivation, and the great team spirit shown by all resulted in Jeremy Hutchison-Krupat bringing the baton home, at 09:21, a full 47 minutes ahead of our scheduled time. This wiped out the 46 minutes time penalty for the stage 2 DNF, but was not enough to take 1st prize from St Edmund Pacers Masters who completed the race 33 minutes ahead, and we had to be satisfied with an honourable 2nd place. However, taking part is far more important than winning prizes, and the main challenge of the RNR is
safe passage of the baton for the 198 miles and so special thanks to the support crew of Paul Veitch, Sarah Wightman, Simon Brightwell, Alastair
Hodges, Andrew Shields and Neil White: we couldn’t confidently enter a team without you. And so to next year for some unfinished business…

C & C Allcomers
The C&C ‘Allcomers” were this year’s model of the B team for the Round Norfolk Relay. Traditionally the more inclusive team, we benefited from the Master’s recruitment for Team A leaving us with some seriously speedy youngsters to pull along seasoned RnR vets like Fiona & Alex Downie, Kris Semple and Peter Bennet. Conditions were glorious, apart from a wicked coastal breeze on the early legs, although it did not deter doughty Joey Colley from winning the Stage 4 prize. Polly Keen also won the morning Stage 17, in her first race in a C&C vest. Nice warm up for the relays, Polly. The race tends to be won or lost on the longer night legs and the running from Tom Rogers, Matt Slater, Becca Frake, Sandy Rogers and late recruit Fred Krylander was stonkingly strong, Matt in particular overtaking with the zeal of a Norfolk pirate. A minor blip at Feltwell was overcome by strong teamwork, and we finished 18th of 53 clubs, only 5 places behind our Master’s colleagues, and 7th of 27 clubs in the Open category. Great to see the impact of young blood, both running and supporting, on the Allcomers performance. The perfect finale was Kris Semple’s final leg. Kris organised the logistics and managed the whole show from before dawn on Saturday. He still had the wit to take us to the tape after mimicking a wrong turn as a tribute to the great Glyn Smith. Classy work from all the Allcomers. Here is a link of some fantastic drone work: https://youtu.be/eNwK-5hnUQo