Saturday 28 July 2001

Despite the 4:00 a.m. start the annual trip to Le Touquet has now achieved the status of "firm favourite" with a sizeable section of the Club. Perhaps this is due to the Gallic charm of the race, or the opportunity to top up the tan on the beach, but more than likely its simply because it only costs £67 for the weekend.

This year saw quite a few changes to the usual format. The date had been switched from mid August to late July, whilst the ambitious 5, 10 and 20K race programme had been dropped in favour of a single 10K on a new two lap course. This was followed on the Sunday morning by La Course des Oyats - a multi terrain event around the sand dunes. By combining the finish times of the two events, competitors were given rankings in the Paris-Plage Tour. Unfortunately our tour itinerary prevented us from competing on the Sunday so we can't comment further on it.

As ever there was a strong representation of UK clubs in the 10K. The official results list 998 finishers of which 258 were British. So despite the venue, the race has an almost  domestic feel about it.

Even with a 5:00 pm (ish) start it was hot, but mercifully the new course is very shady. The winner completed the course in 30:02. We weren't too far behind: