If you have read my Thoughts for 2024 post, you'll see I had some aspirations of starting to race with Pippa, my Jack Russell Terrier, in canicross events this year. So far we have completed two races and potentially have two remaining for this season.
CANIX WESTONBIRT
Our race debut began with a rather crisp and frosty cold spell at the beginning of March with a Canix event at Westonbirt Arboretum. The Day 1 races were cancelled because of the snow at the beginning of March (it wasn't even a light dusting) but luckily all Day 2 races went ahead. After taking Pippa for a little walk to keep her calm, we headed to the race briefing at 9am; this included details of the route, race rules regarding overtaking teams and the signage colours. Some canicross races have staggered starts of 10-15 seconds and your time is calculated at the end through subtracting your start interval.
I went for a warm up and Kieran took Pippa for a little run to make sure she didn't get too cold before the race (I think the temperature was still negative numbers). I'd emailed in advance to request we start at the back (we ended up having one speedy team behind us), as I was unsure of how Pippa would cope with the busy atmosphere and lots of dogs around her, but she really surprised me. To start with, credit where credit is due, canicrossers are really respectful and give dogs appropriate space as they seem to understand dogs' needs better than your average dog owner. More credit goes to Pippa though, who took everything in her stride and relished in the atmosphere.
When we got to the start line Pippa was eager to get going. As we set off into the race Pippa tugged all the way up the hill… yes there was a hill within the first 2 metres!! We caught a team at the top of the hill and despite being overtaken by another team, we continued to make progress overtaking other teams along the way.
Pippa was brilliant, she had blinkers on and just chased teams down, weaving in and out of the public, offlead dogs, moll hills and trees in the arboretum. The route itself wasn’t too challenging. There were some technical turns on route but it was mainly just ensuring we didn’t run into the public out for their Sunday morning dog walk, coffee cup in hand. The only slight mishap we did encounter along the run occurred when Pippa saw Kieran taking photos of us… she beelined for him instead of running past him!! Lesson learnt; Kieran has to hide behind trees better!!
Overall we came 9th female! A really solid effort considering there were some really speedy teams, forever humbled by the team work and bonds of canicrossers.
RELISH RUNNING BATH SKYLINE
The second race we took part in was the Relish Running Bath Skyline, one of our favourite training routes. This route is quite technical with a nice mixture of woods, bark chips, slippery exposed rocks, open meadows, mud, mud and more mud, puddles, uphills, downhills, a short section with traffic, steps and finally tight turns with teams running in the opposite direction. All of this makes for such a great route. There’s even a chance to test your jumping skills with a fallen tree trunk and a slate stile.
For this race, we didn’t start at the back, but still in the back end 50% of the 5 km runners, behind the 10 km runners. We had a speedy start and within 400 m we caught 4 teams, so after the narrow bridge we overtook and then kept on chasing up the hill into the woods. We took the woods nice and steady as they are a bit of mind game for me- slippy exposed rocks and big drops to your right (scary!) so we stuck behind 3 teams and then once out in the open meadow we had more space and a nice run! The views out over Bath are stunning from here too, an added extra for this insane race route!We went onto the puddle jumping section and Pippa decided she’d go for a swim to cool off 🦆 the hill from Sham Castle felt like a slog but we set a PB for this segment so must have been doing something right!! I had to help Pippa over the stile as despite being a Jack Russell she’s not very bouncy 😂😂 and we were onto the final km which involves a few tight turns and 10 km teams running past you the opposite way.
Super proud of Pippa taking it all in her stride, barking lots at the start (wouldn’t expect any less from her😂) and completing her second canicross race!! Overall we came 7th female out of 21, another great result in a field of super fast runners. I believe Pippa was the first small dog so that’s another mini success for her.
We are aiming to compete in two more races before the end of the season. One race is the Canix Furnations running for Team England and the other is a postponed race taking place mid May. Â
Â