3 Peaks Hill Race

My first proper race of the season and a reccy for the Fellsman rolled into one. 24 miles and 5000ft going over the three biggest hills in the Yorkshire Dales sounded like fun. It wasn't. Having spent much of the winter up here either hill running or climbing I haven't had much oportunity for running on the hard and stoney tracks that make up much of the race route.

The race was certainly well organised with route flags every 10 or so meters and water stations. Crowds of spectators on all the ascents and 750 runners did make the event stand out from what I usually associate with fell running. However, sections of the route were really quite tedious and I quickly discovered that I lack pace on the flat. As soon as we hit hills I began to drop people whilst not even going too hard. Every level section was in contrast torture and I could barely hang on.

I dropped 3min from my intended 3h50 schedule on the first hill (Pen-Y-Ghent) due to the sheer number of people. A further 6 minutes driffted away of the long track section to Ribblehead and another 3 minutes on the last flat 'descent' of Ingleborough. So all in I came in after 4h1.27 in about 245 place. Cramp was a serious problem which came on about the 20km mark. Bad eating and drinking?

At I learnt a few things for the Fellsman. An MP3 player will be invaluable for maintaining motivation and pace on the flat bits, I am feeling strong on the hills, I need to eat and drink more regularly and I now have 24 miles of hard track in my legs. Looking at my heart rate with an average of 166 and a max of 188 I think I may need to train at a higher level to be able to cope with the stress of racing.

My recovery is going alright (I couldn't walk that well on Sunday) and a two week taper should just about see me right. Fingers crossed for the 10th May.

Kishorn Bouldering

With only about four weeks until my first, and only, big race of the season I am seriously over-trained. During the speed sessions this past week my heart rate has stayed persistantly low and any attempt at increase in pace is impossible due to tired legs. It got so bad this weekend that all motivation to go running went out of the window. Instead I went over to Applecross for a pub lunch, followed by tea and cake before I finally got motivation to check out the bouldering in Kishorn. Well actually the boulders are just down off the Bealach na Ba. The largest, the Kishorn Stone, is obvious on the drive up from the loch, sitting as it does on a grassy ridge about 5-10 minutes easy walk south of the road. There is space for one car at NG811 408 which is about 500m up from the large car-park by the bend. Other than that parking is fairly limited, unless of course you want to park in a passing space. The rock is a hard, smooth sandstone and the boulders generally seem to have a reasonable clean side on the west and a steeper and dirtier east side with mostly flat (and dry) landings. Someone seems to have drilled a steel spike into the top of the boulder closest to the road. All boulders are accessed by a network of deer tracks and it wasn't even that wet underfoot. Lower down the hill, about 5mins further from the Kishorn Stone, there is a cluster of further boulders with varied problems ranging from very straight forward slab scrambling to overhanging desperates. Enough here to keep someone of my medicore talents happy for a couple of hours.

Sunday was worse as I felt so tired and ill on Saturday evening that I called off the planned climbing trip to the Ben and did some gardening instead. Perhaps a couple of days complete rest will sort me out. I certainly hope it does anyway.

Life isn't all bad though. On an evening run (about 28km in 4.5hs) over in Kishorn on Tuesday I chanced upon a great little crag up high on Beinn a'chait. Torridon's answer to Burbage North so watch this space for a photo-topo soon ; 0)

Loch Sheildaig - kayaking

An Austrian sea kayaking? What ever next!

Too much climbing and running had depleted my Brownie Point cache to such an extent that a sea kayaking trip with Emily was the order of the day. We put in at Sheildaig and paddled round Loch Sheildaig on, mostly, calm waters surrounded by sea cliffs and snow-capped mountains. Apart from nearly capsizing after hitting some fish farming junk it was a great trip. Only two seals were spotted, but a skirmish between some sea gulls and some sort of eagle made up for the poor seal quota.

My shoulders and core muscles really felt it and I will have to get out more if I want to paddle around Raasay in the Summer!

Highlander Mountain Marathon

A mountain marathon in the Highlands in April could either mean two things; completely crystal blue skies or shed loads of precipitation. We got both this weekend as high winds blew through snow squalls (although blizzards may be a better description) between brighter spells.



Friday night at the event centre in Torridon village was pretty grim and an anxious night was spent in the tent listening to the rain lashing against the fly sheet and being battered by sudden gusts of wind rolling down the flanks of Ben Alligin. Saturday was much better and at 7.30am we set off on a magical mystery bus tour to the other side of the hills by Loch Carron. Very unexpected. 'A' class had a slight twist where you could leave out one of the checkpoints of your choice. This had the effect of splitting everyone up and we saw hardly anyone all day. The checkpoints were in superb locations and the running was suprisingly good on stalkers paths and deer tracks. I have run and walked a fair bit round the area before, but the course took me to parts where I would have never had the inclination to go. After 30km of running we reached the overnight camp near Coulin after 7hs and unexpectedly in 5th place.


The overnight camp was much more pleasant compared to all other mountain marathons I have done due to the suply of cooked food, hot drinks, beer and a band. Still, I felt the need to heat up some extra food in the tent. It was less windy than the previous night, but there had been a dusting of snow. All in all a very cosy night, although the thought of another day trogging through snow was not that inspiring.


Day 2 was awful. My feet, having just spent the last 12 hours thawing them out, were agony after just 10min of running. This sensation ebbed and flowed throughout the day in direct proportion the the depth of snow and water on the ground. I was carrying most of the kit, but my partner had bad blisters and was struggling to raise the speed above walking pace. It took 2hs to get the first 2 checkpoints and even the spells of sunshine could do little to improve my mood. Deep snow and tricky terrain kept our pace to a minimum throughout the day. The combination of the pain in my feet and a frustration at the lack of running terrain made it all very demotivating. If Jonathan hadn't been so keen to finish I am sure I would have joined the dnfs. Eventually, we reached the 3 last rather cruelly placed checkpoints, having mastered a lethal near-vertical heather gully and a waist-deep river crossing, and finished having surprisingly only dropping one place.

I suppose I must have had some enjoyable moments out of the 7.5hs (25km in distance) we were 'running' for. Previously I have read somewhere that 'there are no bad days, just learning days', so it was without a doubt a day to learn something. Would I do it again? Most definetly!