A RUNNER has shared his dismay at the organisation of a recent event held at Buttermere - which was described by another participant as a 'shambles'.
Stephen Taylor travelled from London to take part in the Trail Pursuit event at the weekend. Having completed long distance courses before, Stephen said that it has put him off events for life.
He said: “Just before the event the course had to be changed as the National Trust said that they couldn’t use their land for the event.
"The elevation of the track went up about four times than it should, and the entire distance increased from a 21km run to 26km, but organisers didn’t mention it.
“After a couple of kilometres it turned into a mountain-style hike and we ended up in marshland where people were slipping and had to hold on to the roots of the marsh to stop themselves from essentially falling off the cliff.
“The water station was meant to be at the 10km mark, but it was more at 14km, and all they had were buckets of water that people would fill up with their hands.
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“My legs started to seize because I wasn’t expecting to be running over six hours. The marshals were saying that the only way I could get down was by going over the mountain but I just couldn’t walk.
“I was around a mile from the finish and saw a marshal ahead but he wouldn’t come to help me, I was forced to crawl down the mountain on my bum. It took a couple of hours for volunteers to come and get me, it was getting dark and temperatures were dropping.”
The festival had a number of price points, from £68 for the half marathon (no camping) to £118 for the full marathon with camping.
Comparing the event to Fyre Festival, the fraudulent luxury music festival held at the Bahamas, Stephen said: “The toilets were disgusting, it was so low budget. There were 2,000 people there and we had paid to use showers but you weren’t asked for proof of identity to get your wristband, anyone could have walked in.
“There was nothing from the organisers at the end of the course, they gave me a can of Coke.”
The event’s Facebook page has been inundated with negative reviews from participants.
One said: "A totally unsafe event, route changed with short notice and definitely more elevation than initially advised. A very technical course, poorly-marshalled, poorly-planned and damaging to the environment."
Another read: "Not much opportunity to run, more of a long strenuous hike. Disappointing experience for a first trail run."
"A complete and utter shambles," said another.
In a lengthy social media post, Trail Pursuit founder Ed Flood acknowledged that the delivery of the event should have been managed better.
"In light of our trail race festival over the weekend I would like to sincerely apologise on behalf of Trail Pursuit," he wrote.
"We acknowledge the delivery and safety of runners on the routes should have been managed better and to change the routes at such short notice, significantly increasing elevation, became dangerous for trail runners who had limited fell running experience.
"You should not have been put in a position where you were struggling."
He finished by listing the changes they will implement going forward and added: "We are going to spend the next few days responding to messages and view this as a steep learning curve."
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