The River Run 12 Oct 2009 (Cantab HHH)

Ten half pints celebrated (of courxe) with a few rounds

I have said before that, as regards hashing, I’m not a big fan of dead (pre-laid) trails, but I have to admit that last night’s Cantabrigensis HHH trail is an exception to that rule.

Twenty hashers met at the St. Radegund on King Street, Cambridge and were transported by taxi to the start at the Blue Ball in Grantchester where we were treated to a half pint of a dark ale. But, no sooner than each glass hit the table the member of the pack hit the trail, some in great haste.

I didn’t note any trail markings but I have to admit it was fairly dark out. Fortunately, the pack didn’t spread out too much and I followed a few of them into the Red Lion (also in Grantchester) for what turned out to be another rapid beer stop before heading out to the Grantchester Meadows and following the public footpath north to Newnham where we dashed through the Hat & Feathers to find yet another half pint awaiting us. God bless the hares and may He keep them safe and warm!

This trail continued in this way through a total of 10 beer checks including one each at the Red Bull (Newnham), Granta (Cambridge), the Mill (Cambridge),the Pickerel (Cambridge), the Old Spring (Cambridge), the Fort St George (Cambridge), then back to the Saint Radegund. I believe this map shows True Trail for the evening:

map linked to Gmap for detail

With the pub approximate spacing as follows:

Blue Ball, start
Red Lion, 0.30 miles
Hat & Feathers, 1.80 miles
Red Bull, 2.00 miles
Granta, 2.34 miles
Mill, 2.58 miles
Pickerel, 3.27 miles
Old Spring, 4.07 miles
Fort St George, 4.30 miles
Rad, 4.669 miles

All joking aside, the event was remarkably well planned and executed especially seeing as it was organised and perpetrated by hashers. A pub crawl in the middle of last week got the pubs to donate the racers’ beverages so that most of our £15 entry fee (about the price of 5 pints anyway) could go to the recipient charities: Parkinsons Disease Society and Afrikids.

'It is not clear that intelligence has any long-term survival value.'--Stephen Hawking

Volunteer umpires were stationed at each pub, one to make sure the liquid found its target and the other to keep the glasses of both umpires damp with their own beverages. They also made sure the 20 half pints for the contestants were lined up in advance of our arrivals.

Crowds of other spectators (more hashers…of course) showed up and followed us around or cheered our foolhardy behaviour as we passed through. Unlike the 30 Pack Marathon, most of the onlookers seemed to have homes (other than cardboard) and showers to use. Also, I believe everyone staved off the impulse to purge until after the finish (although there was a shower of beer delivered to the car park of the church across from the Rad soon after certain finishers time was taken). I am informed there was gambling involved, as well.

I’ll post the results if someone sorts that part out. I think I was in at 38 minutes so the run was not too slow…8:09/mile including ten beer stops; but, there were a lot of folks ahead of me [this is a very fast hash overall].

The ‘winner,’ or at least the first across the line found a special way to capture everyone’s attention by going AWOL for a few hours.  This caused enough concern that searches of several flavours were initiated and attracted enough attention to prompt this local posting: