Virtual Halloween Challenge - Escape from Pluckley

Pluckley is the most haunted village in England with by some accounts 16 different ghosts.  With Halloween approaching they are all on the prowl and your challenge is to escape to a place of refuge.

Three locations are offering sanctuary - Dorking Church, 100km away, Winchester cathedral 200km distant and Wells cathedral, a challenging 330km from Pluckley.

Unfortunately, this time the undead hordes are chasing you and these ghouls don't follow the rules - they're on your tail from Halloween so you have a 7-day head start!  They will chase you down and if they catch you, you will have to finish the challenge as one of them!

They will travel at a speed that will have them knocking on the door of your chosen place of refuge by midnight on the 25th November, so you will need to record miles consistently to stay out of their clutches!

How does it work

All walks, runs and hikes count towards your total during the entire month.  You can join in any time before the close of the 24th November and backdate any activities from the 25th of October.

Register your miles either manually or automatically with Strava/Garmin or Fitbit and we'll plot your progress on our live map.

Changing Goal Distances

We allow you to switch routes up until the closing date of the event on the 15th October, so if you're finding you're crushing your challenge and want to push harder, or time constraints mean you can't put in the miles you'd hoped - no problem!
But, if you've been caught, you'll stay caught!

To change your challenge, go to My Account -> Tickets and Entries.  Click the 'entry form' tab under the ticket for the event and make your changes to your form.

Teams

Want to compete as a team?  All your miles are combined into your team total and the distance goal you set is the team's goal.

To create a team, first enter this event then go to My Account -> Tickets and Entries and click the 'team' tab beneath the ticket for this challenge.  You can create a team or join an existing one from there.

Pacing Assistance

Things are different this month.  You have 7 days to get away and then they will come after you, laying waste to everything in their path.  So you have chasers, not pacers!

The map will tell you how far ahead or behind pace you are and how many km/mi per day you need to complete from that point onwards.

If you're caught, you'll be infected and become one of the zombie horde but note that this is does not mean you have not achieved your goal - you can still complete the challenge and we'll gingerly hand you your medal at the end of a long pole.

Find Objects

Something else we're trying out for the first time - you can find a couple of objects while out on your activities, take a photo and upload it to this event page.  Find a suitably-halloweeny gravestone and a pumpkin and each will set the chasing horde back by a day, giving you some breathing space.

We're using some whizzy AI technology to check your photos match the brief!

It's not essential to find these objects to complete your challenge.

Awards

It's important to us that we support local businesses and reduce the environmental impact of our events as far as possible.

Complete your challenge and we'll send you a bespoke, wooden medal to commemorate your achievement.  We choose wood because we can source sustainable materials whereas a metal medal is made from base metals with no scrap resale value so these ultimately end up in landfill.

We'll also send you a Pluckley postcard through the mail to mark your achievement, featuring some suitable creepy photos from the village.

We're proud to partner with Trees Not Tees who plant native trees in their managed forests in Scotland to offset CO2.  If you don't want a medal posted out to you, you can exchange it for your very own tree!

Trees Not Tees will email you a certificate of ownership, a photo of your sapling tree and even the exact location in what3words format.  You can even go and visit! This is a fantastic way of doing something positive for the environment and we'll add your tree to the event map and also to your own copse within our virtual forest.

You will need to complete your challenge to receive a medal.  If you have opted for a tree, one will be planted for you whether or not you complete the challenge.

Awards will be posted out around the 8th December to allow time for everyone to log their final miles.

Logging Your Miles

It's very simple to record miles either manually, or automatically if you use Strava.

With Strava, Garmin or Fitbit

•         Below the map on this page find the 'connect service' button
•         Click that, chose your service and you'll be taken to it to approve the connection
•         That's it!

Note that - we request read-only access to your account which means that we cannot write to your page and we can only read public activities from public accounts.  Ensure your activities are recorded as one of 'hike', 'walk', 'run' or 'virtualrun'.  It may take up to an hour to collect your data and update the leaderboard.

Logging Manually

•         Log in to your Ultrabritain account and return to this page
•         Above the map you will find a blue 'Your Activities' button
•         Click that and a popup will show all activities we've recorded for you to date and let you log more
•         Recording is simply a matter of clicking the date on a calendar and entering the distance in either km or miles

You will have up until the 1st December to log miles accrued between the 25th October and 25th November.