Great Santa Run – 10/12/2006

My friend Alan coerced me into joining 2000 other people in dressing up like Santa and running a short distance in the name of charity. The Great Santa Run was held at Princes Street Gardens on Sunday morning. Just over 2000 people turned up to run, walk or slog their way around 2 laps of the gardens to benefit the When You Wish Upon A Star charity, who hoped to use the proceeds to send 100 children to Lapland to meet Santa.

I arrived at 10:30, picked up my Santa suit and met Alan beside registration as I enclaused myself in red and white felt. The suits were one size fits some, meaning I could gain 100lbs and mine would still fit just fine. With all of that extra fabric around me, I was very happily warm. After suiting, we wandered to the main Santa paddock, where hundreds of Santas and a handful of elves grooved to bad 80s music. The 80s became the 70s and soon 2000 Santaed runners were YMCAing their warmups.

The DJ had us count down our own start and soon we were off and running. The first few out of the gate actually got to run. The rest, well, it was more of a stroll than a run. Alan attempted to run and occasionally charged around bimblers on the grass. I followed. The first turn bottlenecked Santas for ages, putting a stop to Alan’s and my attempts to run. As we turned, the bottleneck eased and we got the chance to jog. Occasionally.

Up we went, spectators surrounded us on both sides and closed in to photograph the spectacle of 2000 bearded men and women careening past. We alternately stopped and started, bobbed and weaved, and enjoyed occasional fits of running interspersed with walks. On the way back down the hill, Alan saw two friends as we enjoyed another burst of running.

As we approached the starting area, we came to a dead halt. LIDL had donated goody bags to the event, and this particular bottleneck was a collection of queues of Santas collecting their loot. We queued, found our way through, and escaped out the other side. I saw Neil armed with camera just past the start line as we began lap 2.

Lap 2 was pretty much lather, rinse, repeat of lap 1. Same bottlenecks, same bobbing and weaving, same spectators nearly getting trampled by running Santas. We waved to Alan’s friends on the way down the other side. This time, the bottleneck queue through to the starting area was for our official commemorative medals. By the time we had queued, the path out the start looked reasonably clear. We ran most of a lap 3, finally enjoying the opportunity to run somewhat consistently. There were not outright bottlenecks, but plenty of ducking and sidestepping around the slowest of the lap 2 Santas. We careened past Alan’s friends a third time and sprinted toward the awaiting bottleneck back to the starting area, with 3K under our jolly belts.

I found Neil among the photographers on stage, going mad as usual with his camera. After talking about the charity and sharing a video of the 2005 Lapland flight, the event closed officially with a more amoeba than circle of Santas arm-over-arm, singing (or humming) Auld Lang Syne. A few Santas charged their amoeba bumps inward, dragging the rest of their attached Santas with them. I got stepped on by at least half a dozen people. My nearly pristine ill-fitting trousers became as muddy as everyone else’s.

We returned to Neil et al’s flat on Clerk Street and were joined by Neil, Kate, Dave, Tre and Chris for a long lunch at Peckham’s. After lunch, we wandered to the Bike Co-op so I could try on bikes. I didn’t buy anything, but I pretty much talked myself into a girly model mountain bike. It’s a shame in a way, because mountain biking Santa would have been an appropriately muddy end to the costume that was already disintegrating off my body.

Neil’s blog is here and his photos from the event are here. I think that might be the back of my head in the last photo on his blog.