Runners from local rivals Belgrave and Herne Hill fully supported the cancellation of the Southern 12-stage road relays due to the Coronavirus pandemic. But with athletes still getting out on solo running activities, an idea sprung up between the teams’ runners to keep a sense of socially-distant community in our sport.

A virtual 12-stage road relays mob match, contested over the weekend of the cancelled SEAA relays. These were the rules:

1. TIME: Competition starts 9am on the Saturday; runs must be completed by Sunday 3pm UK time.

2. SOCIAL DISTANCE. Must be solo runs. Current government advice states: You can also go for a walk or exercise outdoors if you stay more than 2 metres from others.

3. PROOF: Upload to Strava with Virtual Road Relays in the title. If it isn't on Strava, it didn't happen. Extra points for photo at location in club vest.

4. DISTANCE: 5k

5. ELEVATION: Let's not complicate this. Just don't be a dickhead?

6. TEAMS: Any numbers can run, we'll score the 12 quickest.

In total 15 Belgravians and 14 Herne Hill Harriers completed a run this weekend. Using the fastest 12 runs from each side in chronological order, this is how the race unfolded:

Leg 1

Belgrave Harriers: Christian Smith 15:44 (around the Arsenal stadium)
Herne Hill Harriers: Andrew Grigg 16:46 (Tooting)

The very first run of the competition was HHH’s Andrew Grigg. New coach, new training routine involving dancing up stairs, clearly new to isolation. Very solid solo run. Then Christian Smith kicked things off for Belgrave with a lightning 15:44 around the Emirates stadium in north London. It’s his first club competition since joining Belgrave and his TMs are delighted.

Bels lead by 1:02

Leg 2

BH: Arne Dumez 17:22 (Battersea)
HHH: Simon Coombes 16:44 (Tooting)

Arne Dumez registered a very solid 17:22 as the first chunk of a meaty threshold session in Battersea Park. Herne Hill stalwart Simon Coombes, Mr Consistent, ran a 16:44 in Tooting to cut Belgrave’s lead by 38 seconds.

Bels lead by 24s.

Leg 3

BH: Ben Hurley 17:16 (Bushy Park)
HHH: Jeff Cunningham 16:57 (Tooting)

Ben Hurley joined Strava to take part in this competition, the GPS-watch denier recording his run on the phone app. He had been hoping to use the Milton Keynes road relays for the first runout of his new Vaporflys. Instead, Bushy Park was treated to a carbon-plated 5k which had a 17:00 moving time with a 16-second break to tie some tricky new laces. That sounds like a -1.6% effect to us. Meanwhile the ever-dependable Jeff Cunningham “fired up the diesel engine” to sneak under 17 minutes and reduce the gap to a tantalising 5 seconds.

Bels lead by 5 seconds

Leg 4

BH: Ben MacCronan 15:53 (Canberra, Australia)
HHH: Jack Dickenson 16:51 (Malvern hills)

Ben MacCronan had planned to fly to London from his native Australia to compete a spring racing season including the road relays, the London marathon and the Vitality 10k, as he did last year. That was not to be this year, but he still got to compete in the road relays replacement service… a mindboggingly-impressive 15:53 considering it was run on grass and came after a 30k warmup. Meanwhile student doctor Jack Dickenson managed to find a flat(ish) loop some 20 miles from his home in the Malvern Hills to record a well-above-average 16:51.

Bels lead by 1:03

Leg 5

BH: Steve Gardner 16:05 (Battersea Park)
HHH: Arlo Ludewick 15:33 (Dulwich Park)

Belgrave TM Steve Gardner had struggled to find motivation this week with all racing called off, recording just one run and shaving his head with a beard trimmer, Britney style. So a 16:05 around Battersea Park blew the cobwebs away a little. Youngster Alo Ludewick, an extremely exciting prospect, came off a brilliant XC season to record the second-fastest run of the competition with an awesome solo 15:33 for 4.99km around Dulwich Park.

Bels lead by 31s

Leg 6

BH: Will Stockley 15:50 (Poole)
HHH: Henry Brown 17:02 (Dulwich)

St Mary’s student Will Stockley has had his classes and exams cancelled for the academic year so is out in the Westcountry and pounded out a fantastic 15:50. Henry Brown left his allotment to run himself into the ground at Dulwich Park with tasty 17:02.

Bels extend lead to 1:43

Leg 6

BH: Patrick McDougall 17:56 (Hampton Hill)
HHH: Simon Messenger 17:49 (Europe)

Patrick McDougall has had a torrid year of stress fractures and achilles injuries, and this sub-18 caught his teammates by (very pleasant) surprise. We should point out, as well, that a 53-year-old 17:56 would be age graded to a competition-besting 15:25, if that was a thing. Across the channel, Europe correspondent Simon Messenger cut through the fake news to bag a cool 17:49 to gain 7 seconds on Belgrave.

Bels lead by 1:36

Leg 8

BH: Callum Stewart 15:28 (Chichester)
HHH: Jack Brotchie 16:33 (Cambridge)

After a breakthrough season including a 15:03 at the Armagh 5k, Callum Stewart ran the day’s fastest leg in a net-uphill route near Chichester. Initially more interested in setting up a fantasy virtual XC league to fill the running void, Jack Brotchie had a last minute change of heart and completed his first race effort since a trip to the altitude of Iten, Kenya, recording a creditable 16:33 in Cambridgeshire.

Bels lead by 2:41

Leg 9

BH: Matt Welsh 17:12 (Wales)
HHH: Marc Geraghty 16:31 (Tooting)

Bels coach Matt Welsh was another to upload his first ever Strava run to take part in the historic SDVRRs. The longtime lurker, first-time poster recorded a nice 17:12 as part of a threshold session out in Welsh Wales. HHH’s Marc Geraghty has found isolation particularly tricky. On one hand he hasn’t been able to socialise and was apparently left in tears when St Paddy’s day was cancelled. On the plus side, he ran a 30 second 5k pb and has realised that other people simply slow him down. #animal

Bels lead by 2:00

Leg 10

BH: Alex Mills 18:30 (Battersea)
HHH: 17:48 (Tooting)

Alex Mills has been struggling with hamstring problems this month but was convinced/unfairly pressured into do a 5k ‘pain tester’ and his efforts are very much appreciated. We’d not normally pressure injured runners to get out but with literally no races in the calendar…

Eric Dol is running PB’s in everything he does at the moment. He was dragged away from his strict training schedule of 120 mile weeks to put out a strong 5k and reduce Belgrave’s lead by 42 seconds.

Bels lead by 1:18

Leg 11

Business time.

BH: David Walsh 17:37 (Fulham)
HHH: Robin Jones 18:04 (Tooting)

Two vets went head to head on leg 11 - David Walsh had been hoping to compete in the World Masters later in the year, and just pipped Herne Hill’s Robin Jones who turned in a solid 18:04 at short notice.

With one leg to go, it’s gonna take a huge run from HHH captain Angus Butler if this is gonna turn around…

Bels lead by 1:45

Leg 12

BH: Garret Lee 16:51 (Denver, CO)
HHH: Angus Butler 16:44 (Tooting, WAndsworth)

Garret Lee came 67th at the US Olympic marathon trials last month, and has enjoyed an extremely beery few weeks since then. He rolled out of bed just in time to sneak in a 16:51 with a full hangover-snow-altitude trilogy of excuses. Angus, struggling with a flexibility injury, logged a 42k bike ride before sneaking a 16:44 in a concerningly-busy Tooting Common.

Angus got 7 seconds on Garret, but it wasn’t enough to reduce the defecit.

BELGRAVE WIN BY 1:38

Full results

Note: James Nutt ran 16:16 but we did not include his time here as it included a stop to help a fallen cyclist by the road. Man these rules are brutal.

Organisers’ note

SDVRR co-founder Angus Butler said: “It’s absolutely fantastic to see our clubs compete whilst also clearly showing a respect for the current situation. For those that aren’t runners it can be confusing to hear that running is a team sport. Add to that the more obvious cancellations of huge landmark races that runners spend months of their lives preparing for, it’s clearly so important we try to retain some normality in our routines for physical and mental wellbeing. #upthehill” [He said the hashtag out loud.]