- Tuesday 25 February 2025
Our Forest of Dean race brought to an end our second Winter Series, which we thought was fantastic! We would like to start by saying a huge thank you to everyone who has come out to race with us and support our events. In total, we had 424 different racers during the Series with an incredible sixteen completing all four events and fifty-five completing three or more events. We also had three extraordinary racers in Tom Hards, Andrew Ryan and Lyndon Sutton who signed up to all nine of our Summer and Winter events, with Nick Gracie and Oscar Sly competing in all but one. With personal commitments and injury or illness, this is no mean feat.
We tried a few new things this winter, with the introduction of ‘special checkpoints’ being the main one. We experimented with a few different versions of this – the checkpoints not being marked on the map, the checkpoints being located next to other checkpoints and the checkpoints not being worth any points. We hoped it added a bit of fun and variety to what can be tough events on the day, with weather, mishaps and anything else that might crop up on the day. We will likely drop these for our Summer Series and reintroduce them next winter, so feel free to let us know what your thoughts are on the ’special checkpoints’.
In terms of the events, we started the series in glorious sunshine with autumnal colours in the Berkshire Downs and ended with proper winter adventure racing conditions with wind, rain and mud (glorious mud) in the Forest of Dean! You can read the individual race reports for Berkshire, Cotswolds, New Forest and Forest of Dean on the individual pages.
There was the usual mix of adventure racing competition and camaraderie at all events with the Cotswolds probably just shading it as our personal favourite, as much as anything, due to the weather we had to endure to put it on as there were red weather warnings in place for much of the country (although not our event area)!
In terms of the locations, we always like the New Forest and it was great to explore new parts of the Cotswolds and Berkshire Downs and to take our racers to the Forest of Dean – an area that we will definitely be back to explore, though the nav was tricky, to say the least.
On the racing side of things, Campbell Walsh was in incredible form throughout the Series taking a clean sweep of three wins from the three races he took part in to retain his Winter Series crown. Emma Gill (our 2023 Summer Series Champion) returned to the top of the podium in the female category after another Series of superb racing.
This was the first Winter Series with our updated Vets scoring system and it led to some competitive racing with four different race winners in each of the Open and Female categories. Nick Gracie continued where he left off with our Summer Series to take the overall victory whilst Pollie Boyle had an impressive series to win the female category.
We had some great performances this Series from first-time racers as well: Doug Bewley was the pick of the bunch in the Open category, finishing in an impressive fifth place overall in the Series whilst Emma Roe stood out in the female category finishing in fourth place overall and second place in the female vets category. Charles Brignall, James Blyth and Kathryn Heppinstall all completed the full Series at their first attempt in, they’ll be donning their Hall of Fame numbers in no time at all!
Speaking of which, we were delighted to welcome Matthew Saunders and Jeremy Waite into our Hall of Fame at our last race in the Forest of Dean. These are racers who have accumulated 10,000 points racing with us over the years. You can read more about our Hall of Fame here.
Female Category
Emma Gill had another terrific Series, improving on her second place at the last Winter Series, to take the win on 1,828 points. Emma performed really consistently with a standout performance in the New Forest. Eleanor Thackeray had a brilliant Series to finish as runner-up on 1,785 points after three really solid races, particularly on the foot stages where she normally scores highest. Julie Banton took the final spot on the podium with 1620 points after a great Series, with the Cotswolds being her standout race. It’s been amazing to see the growth in the female categories with quite a few different results along the way.
Open Category
Campbell Walsh had an outstanding Series, with three wins from three races, to end on the maximum of 2,400 points. Carl Silver, our reigning Summer Series champion, finished in second place overall with 2,199 points after two second-place race finishes. Tom Hards rounded out the Series podium on 2,139 points after a really solid series with the Cotswolds being a particularly good performance where he finished second behind Campbell.
Full Series results can be found here.
Female Vets Category
Pollie Boyle had a fantastic Series to win the Series with 1,810 points. Pollie was consistent throughout with the New Forest being a standout race where she won the vets category. Emma Roe had an amazing Series in her first full Series with us to finish in second place overall with an adjusted score of 1,768 points. Liz Jones rounded out the podium with an adjusted score of 1,647 points. Liz is a terrific racer and had a great Series with Berkshire being her best result in finishing second overall.
Open Vets Category
Nick Gracie, our reigning Summer Series Champion, continued his fine form to take the Series win. Nick had a brilliant race in the New Forest and backed this up with consistent racing in the Forest of Dean and Berkshire to finish on a Vets adjusted series score of 2,118 points. Phil Haycock finished as runner-up in the Series with an adjusted 2,054 points after another great Series of racing (but alas, Phil was unlucky to finish off the podium by less than five points on two occasions, so close!) Jeremy Waite took the final spot on the podium with an adjusted 2,024 points with the New Forest being his best race where he finished second overall behind Nick Gracie.
Taster Category
Kathryn Heppinstall won the overall Taster category with impressive performances throughout, particularly in the Cotswolds. This was Kathryn’s first Series racing with us and it was great to see her consistently excel throughout what was a varied Series.
Run-only Category
Oscar Sly had a really impressive Series to win the run-only category, with the Cotswolds being his best performance where he won the run-only event.
Bike-only Category
Clare and Chris Gibson had a superb Series with podium finishes at all events and a win in the final race of the Series in the Forest of Dean.
Adventure Racers of the Series
Father and daughter duo, Robert and Charlotte Griffiths, won our Adventure Racer of the Series award, they were ever-present at all of our winter races. They provided some great feedback to us throughout to help us improve our races and brought a terrific attitude and lots of smiles to our events.
What’s next?
We have really enjoyed putting on the events and planning is already well underway for another Series of four winter races from November 2025 – February 2026. We are looking at four brand-new areas to share with you to challenge both your bodies and your minds. More on this in the coming months!
Thank you once again and we look forward to seeing you soon,
Kim and Joe
The 2025 Questars Summer Series
Our Summer Series kicks off in Berkshire on Saturday 12 April with further events in May, June, July and September.
Anyone entering into any of our adventure races will be automatically entered into our Series Championship with each individual’s top four one-day results (or equivalent) counting towards the final Championship position. Full details can be found on our Series Championship page.
