10 Things I Think About The Campaccio XC 2026

1. €1 Espresso

I think Italy is great, what a great country, a country where coffee isn’t out of control. €1 for an espresso at a café just outside probably the best running park in a city anywhere, Parco Sempione. There was no Trevor to run with this time like I had done before Cinque Mulini, although he was still in Milan, managing a team of Great Islanders and introducing them to the joys of Hotel Poli and The Birra. I should be getting commission at this stage.

2. Straight Down Rain

I think that the rain in Italy is much better than the rain in Ireland. Italian rain comes straight down because there no wind, also because there is no wind it’s not even cold. The weather for the Campaccio weekend was nothing like the almost summery weather we got for Cinque Mulini in November. I was hoping for enough rain to turn the course into a mucky swamp like last year but unfortunately all we got was enough rain to make the course a little mucky and a little soft in places.

3. How Dare You

I think that I was horrified to see M40 on the envelope when I went to collect my number for the race. The Italians do things differently, along with banning juvenile athletes from wearing spikes, age categories are based on the year of birth not the actual date so being born in 1986 makes me M40 already which is terrible as I’m still only 39 and a half. The only good thing is if they let me run this year I still have 5 more years left which is great.

4. Burundian Warm Up

I think that it is worth going to these Gold Label XC races just to see how the real athletes prepare for the race. An hour before the race just as Rhona was getting ready for her race, the Burundian ON athletes were warming up with a most impressive, synchronized skipping routine. I can do the skips but not this type of skipping, this was next level skipping, no wonder they are so much better than us.

5. Zero Craic

I think that the best level of running is my level, the level where things like results and times don’t really matter and it is just from fun. There was very little craic in the warm up pen before we were brought to the start line. I tried talking to the Burundians in the ON kit but I got no response. So I moved on to David Nillson a Swedish runner with Puma who was probably the second oldest man in the race after me albeit with a slightly faster 2:10 marathon time. He was a little bit more responsive than the Burundians, then we were called up to the line for the real craic.

6. Lesson Learned

I think that the most important thing with running these cross country races in Italy is that you have to get out fast at the start otherwise the race is over. I think I learned the lesson a little too well though as after a few 100m in Campaccio I was not far off the top 20 and ahead of my Swedish 2:10 marathon runner friend. This didn’t last long and as soon as we hit the twists, hills and turns of the middle bit of the 2k lap I began to be passed and passed and passed some more until it felt like I was last.

7. Turn Right then Turn Right

I think that I need to remember that the Campaccio course has some unique challenges that other cross country courses don’t have, the middle of the 2k lap is a mixture of almost all right hand turns which is a terrible thing when you have a very bad right ankle like I do. It didn’t seem so bad last year when the course was 95% muck but in this less mucky edition it was proving very difficult, a difficulty that was amplified by my poor choice of footwear in the Dragonfly 2 instead of the Dragonfly XC although it’s almost a course where a trail running shoe would be the best choice.

8. Backwards

I think that it is an awful feeling to be passed by loads of runners. Everyone in Campaccio is really good at running, most of whom are probably doing double threshold and stuff like that, so any mistakes like going out too fast will be punished badly. A lot of people passed me over the first three of the five laps. The only advantage of going out fast was that it seemed very unlikely that I would end up lapped which is my main concern at these races anyway.

9. Francesco Meade

I think that I have done enough of these races now to have some enemies. It took until the second last lap for my enemy from Cinque Mulini, Francesco, to pass me. I had just beaten him back in November so I decided that he was going to be last person that was going to pass me. As I got to the end of my fourth lap I saw the Burundians on the other side of the course heading out on the last lap so I was sure of not being lapped which made me happy.

10. Hot Lemon Tea

I think that the best part of the Campaccio is the hot lemon tea in a special Campaccio mug with the masot on it that you get after finishing the race. I didn’t manage to catch Francesco but I did hold off everyone else by sprinting as hard as I could on the track which makes up the last 300m of the lap. I collected my hot tea said well done to Francesco and walked back over to my shoes where I explained to an women in Italian that her son would be fine with 9mm spikes. Then I went back for a second cup of tea.