The Master of Ceremonies.
The Cooper's Hill Cheese Rolling and Wake is an annual event held in May at Cooper's
Hill, SO892146,
near Cheltenham and Gloucester in the Cotswolds region of England. It is traditionally by and for the people of
Brockworth - the local village, but now people from over the world take part. The event takes its name from the hill it occurs
on. From the top of the hill a round of Double Gloucester cheese is rolled, and competitors race down the hill after it. The first person over the finish line at the
bottom of the hill wins the cheese. In theory, competitors are aiming to catch the cheese, but since it has a one second head
start and can reach speeds up to 70 mph (enough to knock over and injure a spectator
as it did in 1997), this rarely occurs.
Accurate information is hard to come by, but the tradition is at least 200 years old. Suggestions have been made that the
event may either date back to Roman times or have been a pagan
healing ritual, but there is no evidence for this.
"The Cheese Rollers" is also the name of the nearby pub in Shurdington, about 3 miles
from Cooper's Hill. Competitors will frequent this venue for some pre-event Dutch courage
or discussion of tactics, and after the event for some convalescence.
Cooper's Hill is also known as a stop on the Cotswold Way.
The next event will start at midday on 26 May 2008.
Injuries
A view down Cooper's Hill, from the start point of the race to the finish (where the dog-walkers are). The face of the hill
itself is concave and hence cannot be seen from this angle. The posts at the bottom are signs from the local council requesting
that, to avoid soil erosion, people do not walk on the face of the hill. The posts are removed for the annual event.
Due to the steepness and uneven surface of the hill there are usually a number of injuries,
ranging from sprained ankles to broken bones and concussions. A first aid service is provided by the local St John Ambulance (Gloucester, Cheltenham and Stroud Divisions) at the bottom of the hill, with a
volunteer rescue group on hand to carry down to them any casualties who do not end up at the
bottom through gravity. A number of ambulance vehicles will attend the event, since there is invariably at least one and often
several more injuries requiring hospital treatment. Cooper's Hill Cheese Rolling has been summarized as "twenty young men chase a
cheese off a cliff and tumble 200 yards to the bottom, where they are scraped up by paramedics and packed off to hospital".
The race of 2005 was delayed while the ambulances returned from the hospital, all of them having
been required to transport casualties from previous races. Nevertheless, it was one of the most popular events in recent years,
with many more participants than were able to run in the four races. [1]
References
- ^ Chasing the cheese in 2005 - BBC Gloucestershire news report
External links
Coordinates:
51.82991° N 2.15812°
W
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