Did anyone do the school cross country in freezing conditions?


Touch rugby in the snar was a favourite of our Fuhrer. He made us strip to shorts only (black shorts, or white shorts for the two teams) nee tops, and we run around in it for half an hour. Then you'd take yerself and your countersunk willie into the hot showers which stung yer blue body even worse.
Countersunk Willie. Great name for an American folk singer that.
 
I was there from 1965/66 till 1970. There was no bypass running coz, there was no bypass. There was, however, some sort of triangular cross country route that went over fields and alongside rail tracks. I vaguely remember freezing my tits off during PE and I also have a recollection of the good discus throwers attempting to time it just right so they could get one in one of the freight trucks for the trains running the line at the bottom of the playing/sports field. I suppose that was all gone by your day. I thought the buildings were all gone by the 90s to be honest.

Blimey I had no idea there was train tracks near by? Is that where the woodland is / where the pylons are now in between what was the school field and the bypass? Yeah by the time I had moved to upper school in Greencroft itself I was in my last year I think they had moved the kids from lower school up to the main building for that year so 1999/2000. Still find it mad seeing houses there now.
 
A lad in the year above me at school used to take a flask of tea and a newspaper with him on cross country runs. He always stopped for a break after a couple of miles.
 
Farra school was out over the playing fields, up to the Cavalier down to Gilley Law flats then back up the Old railway line. As picturesque as it sounds.

My worst performance was being beaten by somebody who had forgot their trainers and had to do it in 14 hole Doctor Martens.:eek:
 
Farra school was out over the playing fields, up to the Cavalier down to Gilley Law flats then back up the Old railway line. As picturesque as it sounds.

My worst performance was being beaten by somebody who had forgot their trainers and had to do it in 14 hole Doctor Martens.:eek:
and had stooped couple of times for a tab
 
I can't believe that it was part of the school curriculum so every school must have done it, it was like torture, I think one lad ended up with frost bite in one of his hands, thing is that back then it was probably seen as been good for the body.

Just one ? So his other hand was okay ? Some soft twats around.
 
I did this for school in some inter-school race around silksy ski slope area. Around the lake and up the slope, it was the coldest I've ever been.

We were spraying ralgex on our legs to try and warm up before the race.
Everyone had red stripes on their thighs.

Some kid who went to my school and thought he was going to beat me didn't and came up with the reason he slipped on the ski slope and rolled all the way back down.
 
Used to love cross country on the rare occasions we did it at pennywell comp,down hylton bank,along the lines,along to the golf course then back along the river,I sometimes ran the river route after the gym when I left school,nice route to run.
 
Blimey I had no idea there was train tracks near by? Is that where the woodland is / where the pylons are now in between what was the school field and the bypass? Yeah by the time I had moved to upper school in Greencroft itself I was in my last year I think they had moved the kids from lower school up to the main building for that year so 1999/2000. Still find it mad seeing houses there now.

Woodland? Pylons? Houses?

I’m talking New Kyo here. Greencroft?! That’s for the posh kids. It was all fields, Pit Heaps and old mine workings when I was a lad.

I have no idea what’s there now. I moved to the big city …well Heaton, Jesmond, the West End, Whitley Bay in about 1974 then London and loads of others in the 80s, back to Washington and Fulwell then Lancashire and finally East Yorkshire. If it wasn’t for the fact that there’s nowt in Dipton I’d get lost every time I visited me Mam.
 
So am I...the same school you went to in the 60's was Greencroft Lower School in the 90s (New Kyo). Was there for year 7 and 8 then the upper 3 years were in the upper school in Grencroft itself. Greencroft school doesn't exist anymore though after it merged with East Stanley comp and known as North Durham Academy. It's in Stanley on the site of where Stanley Baths was once upon a time.
 
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Did it at school about 12 of us pretty good would complete run ,enough time to play footy afterwards. Mind we had 4 lads who ran cross country for the county in our year.
 
Aye 2 laps, on lap 1 you hide in the bush and on lap 2 you sprint out the bush for the win
We used to do two laps of the same 'course'.
Part of it went past a supermarket, so we used to go in there on our first land wait for the others on their second lap , then join them - til the teachers sussed it and started waiting at various points to hand out 'cards' as you passed.
Obviously they knew you'd been 'cheating' if you didn't have the right number of cards.
 
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Loved cross country at school, always one of the quickest finishers then sat around cracking on waiting for the rest to come in .
I loved it.
Was v good at it too.
At county finals every year from age 13 to 16.
Good effort. Tough competition at County level.
 
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I can't believe that it was part of the school curriculum so every school must have done it, it was like torture, I think one lad ended up with frost bite in one of his hands, thing is that back then it was probably seen as been good for the body.

Yeah, remember it well through middle school. 2 mile+ run through thick snow , through a stream with lovely ice . Never once cancelled due to weather 😁
No one wanted to be last
 
Aye, loved it. I was a strong runner but never got noticed because I was a scruffy little urchin with worn out trainers and hand me down PE kit.
 

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