Turf Zone – BroxCanal
A few days ago, on Turf Blog 28-11-25, I talked about my plans for the El Staminatore medal, taking 200 zones in a 24-hour period, but with a slight difference. I wanted to avoid travelling further afield for enough zones, looking to stay local on my home patch of Bonnyrigg and attempt multiple sessions around the 40 or so zones. In the blog, I described plans for creating additional turf accounts to help take the zones and allow me to re-take them again. Today, with setups and testing completed, it looks like my plans are going to be successful.
Today’s test session revealed a few issues needing resolved. The first is that the screen on my spare phone keeps switching off. I’ve set it to 30 minutes but it continues to switch off every 2 minutes. Okay, not a big problem but I really want to keep the screen live and see what the turf app is up too. Have resolved this by adding a keep-the-screen-on app.
The next issue is those annoying screen alerts for every medal, rank and other turf-related stuff. Each one needs manually closed to keep the main screen in view. I’ve selected auto close takeover dialogue but to no effect. Again, not such a big issue and should lessen over time. Will need to carry out further testing to make sure all is well.
Something else to be aware of concerns setting up the additional turf accounts. I managed to mess up two when I didn’t follow the entire process all the way through. Found that if you don’t verify an email address and try to run the app again you end up in a loop where the turf app tries to send you a code but as you haven’t set up the email it has nowhere to send it. So, always make sure you complete the entire process. I also found that the turf app froze when I tried to take the first zone. However, all was well on reloading the turf app.
Another point I can see that needs thought is paying attention to what you are doing. On one occasion I didn’t get the timing correct when switching the GPS off to allow the other turf account, which has a longer take time than mine, to take the zone first. It’s the assists I want, not the actual take. I also found it easy to get distracted when closing popups on the spare phone and with passersby asking if I was lost. Guess I need to concentrate more.
I also completed a test round of the 40 zones in Bonnyrigg. Took me 1 hour and 16 minutes but I’ll round that up to 1 hour 30 minutes to add a little extra. On the phone, power was reduced by 12%, which I’ll round off to 15%, so one fully charged battery should last the duration. I also noted the distance cycled, a surprising 13 km or 8 miles. If I multiply this up for the 5 sessions I’ll need to do, this gives me 65 km or 40 miles, which is quite manageable.
So, for the El Staminatore, I’m looking at 5 sessions of 40 zones giving me the required 200 zones with a duration of approx. 8 hours, not including rest stops, etc. The phone should use up around 75% of the battery and I’ll be doing around 65 km or 40 miles of cycling. I wanted to know the distance to see how that compares with the range of an electric bike though I’m unsure just how much easier that would make the challenge. The Brompton electric I have on my Santa wish list will do up to 90 km or 55 miles.
For interest, looking at the Staminatrix, that’s 400 zones in 24-hours, we’re looking at least double all the above figures, and then some. 10 sessions of 40 zones, at least 16 hours duration not including rest stops, etc, one full powerpack recharge for the phone and 80 miles cycling. Kind of puts it into perspective the enormous amount of effort required.
In the interests of comparison and to see if the zones would be worthwhile for inclusion in my El Staminatore attempt, I did a circuit of Eskbank and Dalkeith today. The result was 34 zones in 73 minutes, an average of 2.15 zones per minute. Compare this to Bonnyrigg with 40 zones in 76 minutes, an average of 1.90 zones per minute and it’s clear that Eskbank and Dalkeith are not good value for time and effort. So, I’ll be sticking with Bonnyrigg for the attempt, which will, hopefully, be this coming week. Back soon.
Copyright ©2025 Gary Buckham. All rights reserved.
