Starting from left to right...You walk beyond the barrier at the old church and you will see Ballycotton National School on your right after about 300 metres.
There will be a large Marquee here which can be used for changing or for leaving your gear if you so wish. There will also be toilets located here. Womens changing is usually in the squash courts. Up in the school, there is a hall which will have...
1) A help desk in case you forgot your number / chip or have some other issue
2) Ballycotton '10' merchandise for sale
3) Refreshments after the race...usually tea and biscuits
4) Prize giving
By the way, you don't have to go into the hall. You got your race number for your singlet in the post and that is all you need for the race. There is no requirement to go in and register or anything like that.
From here, it is about 800 metres to the start line. As you approach it, there will be a barricade across the road.
Only elite runners are allowed beyond the barrier and they will use that area for warming up prior to the race. The majority of runners will take the small road right and up the hill....orange arrows on map above.
You will pass through a small housing estate and at the end, there is a tarmac area where you can leave your gear. Please note that this is a change from previous years.There should be someone there handing out plastic bags with labels.
This is probably the best area to leave your tracksuit tops / warm gear. Remember, you will want to wear something warm for after the race as you walk back towards the school / buses.
From here, it's down a small hill and join the field for the start of the race. You should try and be here for about 1:15pm.
This is the start of the Ballycotton 10...narrow and packed! Once you get to the start area, you will see that they have it split up into the various estimated finishing times. You should go to your zone early and stay there. If everyone did this, it would be ideal as the faster runners would get away first leaving plenty of space for the runners behind.
Note that chip timing is used so your time doesn't start until you pass under the start line gantry.
Once you finish the race, you will be handed a bag with the famous Ballycotton race mug and you will be directed back up the hill to the road where the gear is left. You will be offered water, bananas and Mars bars here before you get to the gear area..
You now return towards the National School / Buses, staying well in on the left so that you don't impede the slower runners coming in.
3 comments:
Hopefully the final results will actually go by chip time this year instead of clock time! I'll be too far down the field for it to really matter to my result but still, seeing someone listed ahead of you with a longer chip time isn't right. It should be classified in the correct position by chip time since they're going to the trouble of using them!
I think it's standard practice to list the results based on gun time. All the prizes are based on who crosses the line first i.e. their gun time and not their chip time.
With the numbers involved and the narrowness of the course that's a fairly antiquated practice. It would be nice to see where you actually finished based on the time it took you to do the course (i.e. chip time), but it's not the end of the world either. This is only really of particular importance to the top 100 runners or so I'd say.
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