In 2023 Canadian Delaney Irving won the women's race at Cooper's Hill and only found out when she woke up in the medical tent, having crossed the finish line unconscious. This episode digs into the physics of Brockworth's spring bank holiday tradition: a 50 percent gradient where running is impossible, uneven pasture full of rabbit holes, and a seven-to-nine-pound wheel of Double Gloucester in a wooden casing that ricochets downhill at up to 70 miles per hour.

We cover the cheese maker Diana Smart, who supplied the event from 1988 until her death and got a police liability warning at age 86, the 16 injuries of 1993, the withdrawal of St John Ambulance in 2012, the 15,000-person crowd crisis of 2009, the cancelled 2010 event, the failed 2011 ticketing plan and the 2013 foam cheese that floated so slowly an Australian caught it midair. We als ...