My Event Ratings

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

In short: Great PB potential
In full: The start wasn’t too busy and was nice and chilled out. There were a couple of hills, but overall the course was flat. I achieved a new PB for a 10K, will definitely be back next year to beat my time.
The organisation was superb.

Date of review: May 16, 2013

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Overall score		100%
Would you do it again?		Yes
Details:
Scenery		60%
PB potential		40%
Atmosphere		60%
Organisation		80%
Value		80%
Beginner-friendliness		80%

In short: Great Value for Money
In full: The start of the race was very well organised. Last year there was a bit of a bottleneck at the start, however the organisers dealt with this by opening up both sides of the Headrow this year.

There was course generally was undulating and there was quite a steep uphill part for the first 4 miles or so. Throughout the course there were enough supporters cheering everyone on. I think that the lack of supporters mentioned were only in places that could not easily be accessed by the public. The Police were even cheering runners on at one point. The finish was well placed and there was enough room for my family to get a good spot near the finish and take some decent pictures.

This is the second time I have done this race and I achieved a new personal best. For a half marathon, I think that this race is excellent value for money and I will definitely be coming back this year. My only criticism is that there were no energy drinks this year, however I am not sure if Asda were one of the sponsors this year as they provided the drinks in 2012.

Date of review: May 13, 2013

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

In short: Too many runners
In full: I did the Abbey Dash last year and thoroughly enjoyed it; however this year was ruined as there were far too many runners. The starting and finishing area was badly organised for the volume of people and I couldn’t get out once I had crossed the finish line, so I had to resort to jumping over the railings. Although I did get a personal best this year, I spent most of my time trying to get past lines of slower runners. I have done a 10 K in training on a more hilly terrain in sub 50 minutes, but due to the number of runners this year I was not able to complete the race in under 50 minutes. I will not be running this race again as it will only become more crowded and am disappointed that the organisers have sold out.
Date of review: November 18, 2012

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

In short: Good race
In full: This was the first half marathon I had run, having run the Edinburgh Marathon and various 10k’s. Having done most of my training on very hill terrain in Huddersfield, I didn’t find that the course was too hilly. There was a good mix of support from the locals and the overall atmosphere was very Plenty of water stations, also offering sports drinks. The goody bag was a nice touch and the t-shirt was very high quality, I’ll probably wear this again when training. I didn’t expect to receive a medal either and this was a nice surprise discovering this in my goody bag later on.
On the downside, the start of the race was a bit disorganised and we were all led into a confined area. This caused the start of the race to become bottlenecked. This meant that we were walking over the start line and it took a while to get going, which meant that I lost some time. Perhaps a slight change of the route and pens would eliminate this problem next year. Also, there were not enough toilets. The Abbey Dash in Leeds had portable urinals for the gents to use.

Date of review: May 14, 2012

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