Zombies attacked our reporter this weekend (we asked them to)

Racing through a forest full of zombies might sound like a scene from ’The Walking Dead’, but it is actually how I and many others in Cork spent our Saturday morning over the long bank holiday weekend.

Getting in the Halloween spirit, we took part in the Mercy Hospital Zombie Run in the beautiful Ballincollig Regional Park.

It was a fresh, brisk morning and although a few of us may have been out celebrating the Cork Guinness Jazz weekend the night before we were up bright and early, ready to race.

The aim of the game was to make it out of the forest of zombies ’alive’ by holding onto our three tags which the eager creatures of the night would be looking to grab as we ran passed.

Off we set in a small pack, huddling together for safety, every movement and sound a potential threat.

Suddenly, as I made our way over a bridge something scary was spotted lurking in the shadows - our first zombie!

A quick zig zag passed and a burst of adrenaline coursed through my veins, - success - I had survived my first zombie attack!

On I plundered through the woods strategically dodging and diving past the living dead.

After a while all the sprinting bursts and energetic diversions took its toil on my reaction speed and as I entered a heavily wooded area a zombie sprang out from behind a rock and nabbed one of my three tags.

From there is was a slippery slope, the next set of zombies were particularly enthusiastic and chased me through the forest until they managed to grab a tag each.

For me, it was all over, half way through the route and I had lost all my tags!

The rest of the race was a nice scenic jog through the gorgeous autumnal foliage with the odd zombie leaping out from the bushes giving me a scare.

Crossing the finish line without my tags I joined the many others who had failed to make it through the forest unscathed and got branded by the staff as an infected zombie.

To my surprise there were a few who managed to make their way through the forest without losing all their tags and for these special athletes they were branded survivors with custom tattoos especially made for the event.

A great event and an extremely worthwhile cause. Well done to everyone who took part and many thanks to the organisers at Mercy Hospital.

I’ll definitely be back next year.

The Mercy Hospital fundraising page is here.