Events

Overall score		80%
Would you do it again?		Yes
Details:
Scenery		60%
PB potential		80%
Atmosphere		60%
Organisation		80%
Value		80%
Beginner-friendliness		80%

In short: slick organisation,water stations could be more proactive
Date of review: March 12, 2006

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Overall score		60%
Would you do it again?		Yes
Details:
Scenery		60%
PB potential		80%
Atmosphere		40%
Organisation		60%
Value		60%
Beginner-friendliness		80%

In short: Well organised half, but with some traffic issues
In full: Ok the good things first! Lucozade bedore after and at every drink station was great. Most of the marshalls were friendly enough and for the most part did a good job. Great use of OU campus for ample parking and good toilet changing facilites. Great Medal.

Ok now the few bad things. The race is advertised as completely flat. It isn't although to be fair the undulations although frequent are minor. Worse though was the marshalls at some of the junctions didn;t really have controlled of the traffic and at some points you were fighting a stream of cars.

On the whole though it was well organised but I wouldn't make the 200 mile round trip again.
Date of review: March 12, 2006

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Overall score		60%
Would you do it again?		No
Details:
Scenery		60%
PB potential		80%
Atmosphere		60%
Organisation		40%
Value		60%
Beginner-friendliness		60%

In short: Indifferent marshalls, too much traffic on course but better scenery than I expected
In full: After Wokingham's cheering friendly marshalls in the pouring rain last month, I was very let down by the marshalls in this race. With a few notable exceptions, they were grumpy and indifferent. To top it off, the marshall at the 13-mile marker (yes, 100 yards from the end and within seconds of achieving a pb!) tried to get me to STOP SO THAT A CAR COULD GET THROUGH!! I was gobsmacked and told him to P!$$ off! Not impressed with the bottleneck in the freezing cold at the end and won't be doing this one again. Only highlights were that MK is much more scenic than I expected and all the Lucozade was great.
Date of review: March 12, 2006

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Overall score		100%
Would you do it again?		Yes
Details:
Scenery		80%
PB potential		80%
Atmosphere		60%
Organisation		80%
Value		80%
Beginner-friendliness		80%

In short: Good start to the year
Date of review: March 12, 2006

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Overall score		60%
Would you do it again?		Yes
Details:
Scenery		80%
PB potential		80%
Atmosphere		40%
Organisation		60%
Value		60%
Beginner-friendliness		60%

In short: Good race with massive PB potenitial, only problem was the queues at the end.
Date of review: March 12, 2006

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Overall score		60%
Would you do it again?		Yes
Details:
Scenery		60%
PB potential		80%
Atmosphere		60%
Organisation		60%
Value		60%
Beginner-friendliness		60%

In short: A proper baggage store would have been appreciated, and you need to sort out the delay at the finish.But the marshals were top bananas!
Date of review: March 12, 2006

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Overall score		80%
Would you do it again?		Yes
Details:
Scenery		60%
PB potential		80%
Atmosphere		60%
Organisation		80%
Value		60%
Beginner-friendliness		80%

In short: Well organised. Good opportunity for a PB.
In full: Lots of parking. Lots of space on the way round. Not too sure how the organisers could have done better than they did. Lots of encouragement from the marshals and spectators, too.
Date of review: March 12, 2006

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Overall score		60%
Would you do it again?		Yes
Details:
Scenery		60%
PB potential		80%
Atmosphere		60%
Organisation		60%
Value		40%
Beginner-friendliness		80%

In short: 400 runners and chip timing!
In full: Drink stations were good with a choice of lucozade and water. Start was very busy and could have benefitted from expected pace start gates. Most marshalls were good, although in one or two places there were none. The finish is the most problematic with long waits for a medal and a drink in the cold. If race had chip timing it would sort a lot of the problems out. But still i had a good fast race and will be back next year.
Date of review: March 12, 2006

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Overall score		80%
Would you do it again?		Yes
Details:
Scenery		60%
PB potential		80%
Atmosphere		60%
Organisation		40%
Value		80%
Beginner-friendliness		40%

In short: Sharp race with very promising pb capability
In full: An extremely enjoyable half marathon with a fantastic pb capability. Portions of the course were very scenic, portions not, but 13miles is a long way to find perfection! Overall it was a thoroughly enjoyable race and a definate permanent ficture on my future race diary
Date of review: March 12, 2006

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Overall score		80%
Would you do it again?		Yes
Details:
Scenery		80%
PB potential		80%
Atmosphere		60%
Organisation		60%
Value		60%
Beginner-friendliness		100%

In short: Quick course - definite PB potential
In full: Having read some of the other reviews I can understand the frustrations at having to wait in a queue to finish.
My major gripe about this race was that for a race of this size with such a high profile sponsor I would have expected chip timing. This would have totally negated the need for all the queues at the end. Fortunately I finished early enough to miss these problems. The course was not as flat as I was led to believe and had numerous sharp turns but still turned out to be surprisingly quick making it definite PB potential (I knocked nearly six minutes off my PB). This was also quite a picturesque course - not what I was expecting in Milton Keynes! and 90% traffic free.
Date of review: March 12, 2006

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