Gentle art of running about a quarter of the distance you're supposed to by ducking into a graveyard and waiting for the runners to come round again. Under no circumstances should one recommence as the leaders come through, therefore breaking ones personal best by about ten minutes and getting thrust into the school team, only to embarass yourself when trailing in last by a huge margin at an inter-school event.

Sage advice, and sadly not heeded by one J.C. Royston in his efforts to skive the once-yearly school run. His effort consisted of ducking under a bridge approx 200m from the start/finish line, and treating himself to a crafty kip.
On waking, he peeked out, troll-like, from under the bridge, and saw the finish line was absolutely deserted of everyone bar the timekeepers. Coming to the natural conclusion that everybody else must have finished, he came out from his hiding place and put in an impressive sprint finish.
On crossing the line, however, he was informed by a (curiously unimpressed) teacher that he had just knocked 28 minutes off the previous school record of 44 minutes.
J.C. Royston was not promoted to the school team on the basis of this superhuman feat; he was put into detention, where he presumably had to write out "I must not run at twenty five miles per hour" a thousand times.

Cross Country Bunking was OK, but could often become boring if skipping a few 10+ minute laps. This was often remedied by secreting cigarettes, miniatures of alcohol ('borrowed' from parents' drink-cabinet) - and, err, visually stimulating magazines - in various strategic hiding places during lunch-break. In our case a hollow under a tree-stump in the woods known as 'the spinney' was ideal.

Our Cross Country run consisted of a mile and a half run part of which went through the woods surrounding the school. The least fit of us would walk when hidden by trees and run only in the open. You could also cut across 'Top Field' , so imaginatively named as it was the topmost field, instead of going up and around but you had to make sure the PE teacher wasn't watching you or she'd make you run it again. Also once a year the whole school would have to run to gets points for the House Cup. This was done so that all the unfit people in the school could be seen huffing and puffing and red in the face by the rest of the school. Instead of inspiring us to do better it generally encouraged us to sneak off for a quick fag while the rest of them were working out which house got the most points.