27 Mar You spin me right round! ‘Unique and awesome’ Going Round in Circles proves to be just capital
Sometimes you get a feel for how an event is going to go. That small comment or little hint that you may have a hit on your hands.
One sure sign of imminent success is when you’re setting up for a race that has a relaxed 10am to midday start time and runners are ready and raring to go a full hour beforehand.
That’s what happened this Sunday at our first ever Going Round in Circles run. As I started unpacking the trackers and race numbers for the event, I was accosted by friendly runners keen to start pounding the streets of London in search of tube stations.
Such a desire to ‘go underground’ is not normally what you’d expect, but Going Round in Circles is anything but a regular race. In fact, it’s not really a race at all.
The simple aim of the event is to run between every underground station on the Circle Line (the yellow one!) – all 27 of them. Participants can head off in an anti-clockwise or clockwise direction, running individually or in teams of two with the only rule being that a selfie of a least one team member must be taken at each tube station.
The idea was to create a really relaxed, non-competitive run which allowed people to get some decent mileage in – up to 16 or 17 miles for the full Circle Line route – while enjoying the sights and sounds of a busy Sunday in our capital.
As I enjoyed watching the competitors trawl into our base for the day at The Volunteer Pub in Baker Street, I couldn’t help but notice an unusual vibe among them. These were runners who looked like they were about to take on an ultra or trail run, backpacks strapped on and Tailwind – who kindly supplied their own form of vital running energy for all our competitors – to the fore. But they were about to run on the most ‘roady’ of all running surfaces and courses available.
Was it possible we’d stumbled across a race that would unite trail and road runners together at last?
Whatever the case, each runner set out to enjoy tourist sites such as the House of Commons and the London Eye, coupled with a range of posh London houses and somewhat less salubrious areas.
One of the interesting aspects of following a route forged by an underground line which has origins dating back to 1863 is that it has no pretensions to show off the best or most famous parts of the area it serves. Instead, you simply get what is on the route, for good or bad.
Runners encountered everything from roadworks to fire engines attending an emergency at Cannon Street Station, the historic glory of Tower Hill to the shadows of towering skyscrapers.
But was it the success I felt it would be?
Judging by this review from ‘Average Joe’ on Instagram, the run did not disappoint: “This was my most fun race to date! It was a long one at nearly 25k, but I hardly noticed the kilometres racking up due to having to navigate myself to each station, get selfies, and dodge traffic and pedestrians.
“Can’t wait for next year. I’ll definitely be doing it again.”
Well, we’ll definitely be back ‘Going Round in Circles’ again next year, and, who knows, perhaps beyond – after all the Circle Line is only one part of the underground network.