Friday, 25 May 2012

BHF Canary Wharf Jog 2012


The British Heart Foundation Canary Wharf Jog this week was a complete contrast to the Tower jog back at the start of May. The sun had been beating down on London for a couple of days, and by 6:30pm on Wednesday evening, the Tower lined streets of Canary Wharf were at least a little shady, but still very hot indeed.

The weather brought a good turnout of runners, with well over 1,000 people taking part.
Timing chips were available for the first time, but the BHF’s organisation was slightly lacking in other areas; quickly running out of pins for race numbers and running out of cups and water midway round the lap during the run itself. Another water point was quickly set-up at the lap start/finish to keep runners going.

Team GGFit started at a very quick pace led by Phil Canale, a recent London marathon runner and Canary Wharf 10k regular. 5 fast laps flew by, but the pace soon took its toll and Phil left us behind. Dodging drinkers along the Thames path was much harder than previous years – austerity measures do not seem to be affecting city workers, other than making them less inclined to make room for charity runners. A few familiar faces cheered us on or prompted us to start running again as we left the bottlenecks.

Water was taken on board on almost every lap, and the tenth and final lap was soon completed, much to our relief. More water was available along with free bananas in the finishing area, and then we decamped for further refreshment to the Slug & Lettuce with Phil for an old school catch-up and to wait for the Jubilee Line to sort itself out (which it didn’t).

All in all, another good 10k done, no photos, as too sweaty/blurry! The next scheduled event is in September, but if you have any suggestions, please add to the comments below, or check out our sponsorship total on www.justgiving.com/guygriff

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