LondonSkaters Speed Team - Speed Skating & Rollerblading Club in London

Rick · Joined: 25 Feb 2004 Posts: 5887

MOD (Nasha): Blenheim Inline Challenge website is now up.

New race, fantastic venue, professional organisation. It's a half marathon, run by the organisors of The London Triathlon, with a little input from us.

The course is 3 and a bit loops round Blenheim Palace on the road that runs through the grounds. It is pretty smooth and undulates a bit round the back but it mostly flat. Lots of lovely scenery to look at while you are going round.

There is a triathlon on there all weekend so the race will be run on the Saturday morning, quite early, actual time to be confirmed. They do things a little differently from us and mail out the race numbers to people so the registration desk will just be for people who need to get chips unless there is going to be on the day registration.

Cost to be confirmed at this time but because of the cost of the venue, and the level of organisation there, it will be above average price for UK races. However, there should be entry to the grounds and parts of the palace to competitors included in your entry (normally £6) which should make it more attractive.

It's quite difficult to get there by public transport especially for early in the morning so you can get changed and warmed up before the race. If there are enough of us, we can look into the cost of a coach to take people from Central London to the venue and back. Alternatively Oxford is a really nice City and if you want to make a weekend of it then you can.

Gav has done a tremendous amount of work to get this off the ground so I hope as many of us will support it as we can. The organisers have hopes of making it a regular part of their event and would like to turn it into a 500+ skater race within the next few years. It is also a chance to showcase speed skating to another bunch of fit, speed junkies....the triathletes, so if we can be available after the event in team colours to answer any questions, promote skating, the LIM and perhaps attract some new members then that would be great.

If you can spread the word to others it would also help us to have another race in the South of England to go to each year.

It's 2 weeks before Preston marathon so I think it will be a good warm up event.

We will be doing the promotional website but registration will be through the triathlon website.

For those of you that want to find out about Blenheim Palace there is info here. In general, it was built for/given to John Churchill (The 1st Duke of Marlborough) for his victory at the Battle of Blenheim, 1704. It has been the seat of the Duchy ever since. If you think the family name sounds familiar then you are right. It is the birth place of Sir Winston Churchill. I think you probably know who he was.

Xia · Joined: 06 Apr 2004 Posts: 874 Location: Geneva (Suisse)

Great! Will try to be there!
Congrats guys for putting skating on the radar of other poeple!

merten · Posted: Thu Feb 09, 2006 9:47 am Subject:

Lovely pictures, Sounds interesting. The entry cost for triathletes is 58 GBP if I read correctly, whew. Are we looking at similar pricing for the inline race?

Rick · Joined: 25 Feb 2004 Posts: 5887

No. We were talking about costs last night with the organisers. It's not confirmed yet but expect something about half that. Probably a little more for overseas people as they post race numbers out to minimise the admin on race day. That's something we could learn for the LIM should we start getting the sort of number of participants that make on the day impossible. The triathlon has 4000 entries on both the saturday and the sunday so that is what they are geared for. To put it in perspective, LIM was 122 last year.

Gav · Posted: Thu Feb 09, 2006 10:11 am Subject:

I am so excited about this! It's got the potential to be an awesome race!

It's a great course, we have the backing of a supremely professional organisation, and it will be a lovely day up in Oxford!

dan_b · Joined: 15 Jun 2004 Posts: 2414

Sounds pretty cool - nice work. Mark me as potentially interested in a coach, if you're trying to assess demand.

ed! · Posted: Thu Feb 09, 2006 10:44 am Subject:

Ditto!

Mikey-two-Names · Joined: 24 Feb 2004 Posts: 4069

I'm up for a coach as well, it's wicked fun, much the best way to travel to/from an event like this. Skaters party!!! Videos to show on the bus, etc.

lemming · Joined: 05 Jan 2005 Posts: 691 Location: Reading, UK

I should be there. If people can make it to Reading, they can come with me in the car... unless I'm already full.

Tim · Joined: 26 Jul 2004 Posts: 381 Location: leytonstone E11

definitely going now if transport can be sorted out

tanya g · Posted: Tue Feb 14, 2006 5:22 pm Subject:

Natasha · Joined: 09 Jul 2004 Posts: 2973 Location: Basingstoke

Of course they can come. This is a fun day out for everyone. Methinks we should try and organise some kind of fun event afterwards - picnic, sports day, bearing cleaning etc.

Rick · Joined: 25 Feb 2004 Posts: 5887

Gav · Posted: Tue Feb 14, 2006 5:28 pm Subject:

The idea is to make this into a mass participation event where we have hundreds of skaters taking part on a great course. The more people who come, and the more publicity we can give it the better!!

Mikey-two-Names · Joined: 24 Feb 2004 Posts: 4069

I'm there, and I'll be using LondonSkaters.com to advertise the race.