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Knacker Cracker 10K 2023

Records fall at Knacker Cracker

Trionium's tough 10K needed Plan C after heavy rain on Box Hill

There were 220 official finishers in the self-styled 'Britain's Toughest 10K' – the 2023 New Year's Day Trionium Knacker Cracker – in the 20th edition of the crazy race that features four summits of Box Hill at Dorking in Surrey, with 473m ascent and 335m descent within 10 kilometres.

Race Director Rob McCaffrey was forced into Plan C for the walking route to the start at the bottom of the infamous Burford Slope on the old Miltary Road to avoid overnight flooding of both the direct path (Plan A) and the indirect route (Plan B) via the usual footbridge.

The good-natured field of mainly fancy-dressed runners took the changes, including a revised course, in their stride but there was a perfectly understandable error made by the two leading men, Benjamin Hall and Patrick Wightman, resulting in them adding up to two kilometres to the intended 10K distance.

The winner, Nathaniel Booker (Macclesfield Harriers) set the fastest time seen on any of the various course layouts used for the Knacker Cracker over the years, completing the accurate 10K in 41:42. Hot on his heels was the defending and serial Knacker Cracker champion, M50 Steve Winder (Epsom and Ewell Harriers, 41:53) who was also inside the previous event record. Next to finish was the unfortunate Benjamin Hall (46:03) who made a magnificent recovery to finish third.   

The women's race – dubbed the Knicker Knacker – was won by Katie Lysons (Clapham Chasers, 48:40) from Kate Stillwell (Phoenix OCR, 49:53) and Fiona Blagg (Macclesfield Harriers, 51:15). The winner was dressed as a bee and improved her own course record set last year.

There were 19 runners inside 50 minutes and 62 beat the hour. The final competitor was through the funnel in 1:45:22. The course is exceptionally challenging, with hundreds of steps, tree roots, rutted and slippery tracks, and plenty of knackering hills!

You can get a feel for the atmosphere in this superb event video featuring the haunting sounds of the hilltop piper Roger Huth:

Results and previous news items at runABC South race listing here

Image courtesy Robert McCaffrey on Flickr

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