Paint job

Before:

After:

A dance to the music of time

Way back in 2000 the Anniversary Waltz was my 3rd ever fell race. It’s a tough race from the Newlands Valley west of Keswick, with 3600 feet of ascent over 11.5 miles. In 2000 I finished just under the two hour mark in 21st place, ashen-faced but smiling, and properly bitten by this crazy sport. Here’s me on that day, with a tiny two-year-old Lois about to pinch my drink.

This year I persuaded Damon and kids to enter, so we gathered at my Mum’s house on friday evening to consume inordinate quantities of chilli and cheese. Damon’s father died a few days ago and I was really impressed he had still made it, looking strong and keeping the chin up, and the twins were just bouncing off the walls as usual.

On the day, Oscar and Toby were disappointed that their race for age 6-8 didn’t go to the top of any mountains, and their tiny Walshes were relatively untested running twice round the field. Oscar came in 2nd, behind a girl, and won a mug (or was it the other way round?); Toby was a few places behind, and will no doubt serve his revenge well chilled.

Here we are just before the start, with Catbells behind. A few minutes later the Waltz set off at a decent pace, and Damon was striding quite a few places ahead of me as we approached Robinson. The first big climb changed things around, and I went to the lead of a group to the summit, but I over-cooked things a bit and didn’t know the correct line off the summit so I had to let them past again. Note for the future:- on the steep climb of Robinson, we stayed right, up what looked the grassier line; however this turns into rocky scrambling on the ridge, and those who went the more direct route fared better overall. Anyway I was feeling pretty wrecked as we climbed Hindscarth, and when we turned at the trig Damon was only a few yards behind; I felt sure he would soon come storming past. But somehow I kept it together on Dalehead over more scrambly technical stuff, and I knew the further we went the better chance I had to stay ahead.

By this stage we were passing runners who had set off 1.5 hours before us on the longer “Teenager with Altitude” race (stupid name). Possibly distracted by the chap carrying a racing bike, I found an abysmal line off Dalehead, and dropped off the back of the group I’d been with. As we climbed High Spy I was feeling a little gloomy, but three jelly babies helped a bit and I started catching people again. But just when I thought I was getting Neil Ashcroft I took a stupid line (instead of following him) and immediately dropped 100m back.

The last climb of Catbells, through hoards of baffled ramblers, wasn’t nearly as bad as I was expecting and I had plenty in reserve to attack the final tricky descent. I came in 13th in 1:53:05 (3rd V40), with Damon 23rd in 1:57:52. Ben Bardsley won in 1:37, well outside Ian Holmes’s incredible 1:28 record.

It was great to be 6 minutes quicker than 10 years ago, and I’m now completely confident I can return in 2021 and dip under 1:50. Aye, right.

270 runners finished. Full results here.

Ash in the engines

I did the Mynydd Troed race yesterday – a tough 7 miler with 2700 feet of ascent split into three climbs. Glorious weather, but even after a short warm-up my throat was rasping and I could hardly speak. I’m wondering if this was the Eyjafjallajökull eruption at work, as I imagine ash and glass dust cannot be fantastic for the lungs. Martin and a few others felt the same.

Anyway I had a reasonable run, despite coming off the wrong way from Mynydd Troed and having to contour through heather for ages, which probably cost me a minute or so as the following bunch overtook me. I clawed back into third place on the climb of Mynydd Llangorse, and established a big lead over various Chepstow chaps and new work colleague Stewart Bellamy from Mercia. I was way down on the leading pair – Martin Shaw and Paul Murrin – and although I closed the gap a bit, there was no chance of catching them. Here’s me enjoying the final climb.

More pics from Al Tye.

Meanwhile, we’ve booked accommodation for the night before the 3PYR in Barmouth – the Bryn Melyn http://www.brynmelyn.co.uk/

Scafell Pike recce (wreckage?)

 

We’ve been up at my Mum’s house near Cockermouth, so I took the chance to recce the Scafell Pike route.

The running route

My first outing was the run, and instead of starting from Gillerthwaite YHA I parked at gatesgarth in Buttermere and started over Scarth Gap, joining the race route at Black Sail hut. This added some ascent to the route, but perhaps left off some distance. The hills were saturated with melt-water and recent rain.

From Ennerdale the route goes over Black Sail pass, which I had not done in this direction before. The path is obvious in daylight, but I reckon it could be a bit tricky in the dark, both up and down.

Here I am emerging over the top of Black Sail pass, looking over towards Red Pike and Mosedale.

The path on the Mosedale side is lovely – impossible to miss in the dark all the way down to the Wasdale Inn.

The next picture is taken from about half way down, looking into Wasdale. The peak on the right is Stirrup Crag, a subsidiary top of Yewbarrow.

 

 

Being in Wasdale Head reminded me of a fantastic day some years BC (before children) when stockbroker Jon mashed his knee on the Corridor Route, I tried to run up Great Gable from Styhead (long before I started running!), I took pics of Baa and Gavin climbing Nape’s Needle, while Naomi nursed Jon in the pub.

 

Here’s Wasdale, from the start of the climb, where the real task soon becomes apparent… Wasdale Head is just  above sea level, while the top of Scafell Pike is only about 2 miles away at 977m.

 

 

The 3PYR route is, as I understand it, Lingmell Gill to Hollowstones, then left to approach the summit from the Lingmell side. This photo shows the Hollowstones area, where things could certainly be a little confusing in the dark, and the path is marked by occasional small cairns among the boulders. I then followed the tourist path to the left of all the craggy bits, though I wonder if there’s a quicker route up one of the snow-filled gullies.

The summit area was quite snowy, though I doubt we’ll need to worry about that in June.

I was a little weary at the summit, because I’ve not done much going up massive hills since coming back from injury last July, but the fantastic weather and views were keeping me breezy.

It was on the way down I started to realize how hard this leg will be – it’s really steep and rocky, and where the going is not just fractured rock then it is man-made boulder paths; I could feel my thighs turning to mush with every step.

Here we are nearly down, looking back towards Wasdale Head and Mosedale, with Black Sail pass heading away up to the right behind Kirk Fell.

 

Needless to say, I hauled, crawled and clawed my way up Black Sail pass and then Scarth Gap, a shambling wreck by the time I reached the car nearly 5 hours after departure, though perked up marvellously by a large ice cream with flake and raspberry sauce. Here’s a map showing the bits from Black Sail hut down to Scafell Pike. Next… the bike route!

The cycle route

The next day I drove down to Whitehaven to recce the bike route. I found a car park where one machine said “Out of order – please use other machine” and the other machine said “Out of order – please use other machine”, and the verdict among us honest but bewildered punters was that it was free parking day. I went to the harbour office, and a nice lady showed me exactly where the boats come through the harbour wall in the race (the harbour is completely sealed, with a sort of revolving door thing that opens for boats) and where they drop the runners before berthing. All very straightforward compared to the bonkers dinghy frenzy in the SIPR! She said supporters will be able to park on the marina pier.

The cycle route is not exactly hard to find, but I’m really glad to have recce’d it anyway, because there is a one-way system and it wasn’t quite in the direction I was expecting. In fact the route is well signed as the C2C cycle route with clear blue signs and bollards. The first couple of miles go through, umm, how do I put this politely, umm, well it’s a bit like Soweto or a run-down suburb of Belgrade. Wear chewy tyres, coz the route is covered with broken glass and rubbish, and skanky blokes exercising their pit-bulls. Despite a few turns and junctions, this route should be easy to follow, and soon it’s out in the open country, following the old railway line gently uphill all the way to Rowrah and Kirkland. Then onto the road and down into Ennerdale and onto the forestry track to the Youth Hostel.This is where I was wondering whether the road bike would be such a goood choice, but in fact it was fine, because I had put larger tyres on and the track is fairly benign. There were only a couple of short sections where I really wished for knobbly tyres and suspension, though I might change my mind when doing the ride after several hours of running!

It has to be said that the return route does feature some fairly savage hills, and one complete monster, but I’m going to blank that out for now.

Wuthering Hike – evidence of Damon’s enduring chirpieness

Some photo’s to add to Damon’s write-up…

 

Near the start; not a picture of us, but a selection of grizzled northerners – the earth-salt of this kind of event. Actually I had to dash into our B&B to a) fetch my drink bladder, and b) relieve my other bladder, so we were right at the back of the field.

 

 

The family failed to materialize at the first agreed pit stop, so I was very relieved to find them here at about the 14 mile point. In front of us is Westie Dave Rodgers, a bit jaded after running the Fellsman the previous weekend.

 

 

A picture of Damon looking cheerful, just to prove it can happen.

 

 

 

 

 

Enthusiastic troughing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Still looking vaguely athletic as we arrive in Mankinholes village (for more rice pudding), at around 19 miles. I was slightly better prepared than Damon, though far from adequately trained for a 32-miler, and from this point on we were working hard.

 

 

 

 

Here we are at about 28 miles, oh dear, not going very fast at this stage.

 

 

 

 

 

 

And setting off up another lovely hill, with only 4 or 5 miles to go…

 

 

 

 

At the finish – we were immediately threatened with delicious bowls of stew, but Damon had to run away from the smell. Here he is outside telling everyone how much he enjoyed the run.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Me finding the brick that Damon had snuck into my bumbag.