The Royal Botanic Gardens Kew hosted Run-Fest’s annual “Kew The Run” running weekend on Saturday 28th and Sunday 29th of March this year, with the 10k event on the Saturday and the Half Marathon on the Sunday.
The Half Marathon usually sees runners complete a lap of the gardens before heading down the Themes path to Richmond and then back. However, due to issues on the Themes path this year, the course was changed so that it was run completely in the gardens. The meant that some sections of the course were repeated to make the distance up.
Due to the course change bringing the start forward 30 minutes, coupled with the clocks going forward that morning, the Half Marathon runners were treated to what felt like an ungodly early star on the Sunday.
Other than the early start, the weather was very favourable for the race. The early morning coldness that the 10kers experienced the day before wasn’t there on the Sunday and the morning was bright without being overly warm.
Only 1 GRC member is known to have been on the starting line – Ross Warden. Having placed himself in front of his target time pacer, he ran almost entirely to plan, with only a small fuelling error around the halfway point. Being a flat course and having his run go largely to plan, Ross finished with a time of 01:42:04 (319th out of 2316 finishers) – knocking 4 minutes and 38 seconds off his PB!
First male over the line: Ollie Garrod (Belgrave Harriers) – 01:10:27. First female over the line: Lisa Bailey (The Stragglers Running Club) – 01:20:11
