OBSESSED WITH A LOOPY LOOP
Unusual cancellations at short notice of the Bull Hill and Widdop fell races forced a change of agenda from weekly racing. Alternative midweek fixtures posed over ambitious chances of getting to them on time, so reluctantly I had to concede to a mid-summer mini-break from racing. Well it was that, or race on the road. I'd rather win a competition to spend a day in the company of Lewis Hamilton than racecon the roads - that's how much I can't stand the thought of a tarmac surface at the moment. So instead, this was an opportunity to rub my hands at the prospect of indulging in fell training. Time to get my head down with the intention of bouncing back from that Tockholes show. Still rankling as a minor step backwards, it's also a small Chantenay carrot of motivation. You're only as good as you're last race, but some say you're only as good as your next one. I wonder which is true?
Onwards to the subject of obsession though. Obsession can be the backbone to the success of a runner. The very catalyst of their unwavering commitment. But obsession can also be a detrimental distraction. Over the years I've discovered obsessing over running stuff is a fine balance that requires a regular reality check. It's endless what runners can obsess over. Most common traits would be over mileage targets, perhaps the need to run every single day, particular training routes, nutrition fads, average pace, cadence... yes cadence for crying out loud (technology has a lot to answer for) to name but a few.
Obsession, and particularly ones driven by gadgetry, can be further fuelled by the scrutiny of statistics on Strava and similar applications. The daily consciousness of who is watching could become more important than what you're actually doing and the long term goals. Some obsess in regular posts on social media as well, with almost every single time their running shoes get an outing being posted on Facechat, Instatwit or whatever. If it motivates individuals in a positive way then who am I to knock it? But equally, if it induces foolish pride, overtraining or impairing focus, then being continuously needy for public endorsements of fellow runners may not be all that advantageous in the long run.
Allowing any running obsession to override sensibility is a first class ticket to a place called delusion. I've been there a few times, I still frequent it from time to time.
My own running obsessions have changed over the years and I can't deny my own fleeting moments of over-inflated vanity in the past. It is a sport which can naturally release an overdose of happy chemicals to the brain and as such I'd say most runners can't keep a lid on their emotions all of the time. Even those that don't shout from the rooftops will enjoy it when others do it on their behalf sometimes. It's natural. We work hard to try and get good results. When we get them, we have a right to savour that moment. We are only here once. Oddly though, some of my best racing moments of yesteryear were not savoured half as much as I should have, for I was always overly self critical thinking what I could have done - what I could do - to get even better.
To this day, harsh self criticism still surfs upon the ebbs and flows of my fluctuating self esteem. Luckily I can never take myself seriously for too long and will humour myself out of those black holes by revelling in my own self deprecation. Although I will give myself a quick pat on the back these days when I do actually have a good race - rarity that it is. Whilst I'm not partial to all that Strava palaver and self hype on social media which I do find tedious and annoying at times, I guess these pages are my own little outlet of self gratifying tedium which has, to some extent, become an obsession too.
If I do seek or have sought a real source of public validation as a runner, then for me it's always been about the race results. Results are the part of running that history cannot fudge and does not forget. Ultimately that's what one's efforts are judged on. Not that anybody else may be looking or judging, but I am, so it's important to me and I dare say the reason I get upset when I race below par.
Crikey, reading back on those last few paragraphs is quite heavy duty even for me, so pardon the self counselling session there and after yet another subject digression, back to my own current obsessions and alas to the loopy loop...
Racing at least once a week in Spring and Summer has been - whilst also a preconceived plan - something of an obsession. Hopefully this enforced racing break will be a blessing in disguise. But in the last month or so my training has taken a twist by a new obsession over a training route which is a particular loop I enjoy on Pendle Hill. I am now religiously running this loop over and over again. I'm not getting bored of it, far from it. The stopwatch tells me it's making me stronger and that's all I need to know. It's also got me inspired enough to run regularly in the morning. Now that in itself is a revelation! Setting off a little earlier to work for a blast on the fell... I didn't know I had it in me.
This last fortnight or so has seen me up there looping, well I'm not sure how many times, but well in to double figures... obsessed! It feels like some progress is being made and certainly as far as running routines are concerned, there's no fix required to the unbroken. I put all this loopy training to the test last Wednesday with a time trial that was once an obsession in itself and one of the reasons I finally got in to fell racing. Nearer my neck of the woods at White Coppice, a run to the summit of Great Hill and back was once a regular feature in my schedule. My history with this route goes back to first running on the hills with my pal Stix in 2005. It soon became a time trial, an obsession and one which eventually led to joining Chorley Harriers in 2006 and an end to my footballing days. I've run up there more times than I could ever remember, but I don't recall actually running this route as an out and out time trial for maybe six years or more which is a crazy statistic in itself. Where have I been? What have I been doing? Anyway, subconsciously inspired by the excellent theme tune to Scandinavian cop drama 'The Bridge', which Sara and I have been binge watching recently, ''everything goes back to the beginning''. I thought this old classic up and downer would be an acid test for where I'm up to and replace the absence of a race recently. It was certainly the latter. I got really nervous for this and more so than I would do for an actual race! There was the fear of delusion, a fear that I wouldn't get anywhere near the sort of time that I used to bash out. But there was also a quiet confidence, based on recent training runs that I could still knock out a time to be satisfied with. These conflicting emotions combined to create those quite intense pre-time trial nerves. This long overdue return proved to be a positive experience though, with a very respectable time to the summit and deceptively very good split on the return. So this told me what I needed to know. The uphill work is getting better whilst it seemed like normal service had resumed on the flat and downhill. All boding well for the next race then. After another week of loopy loops since, tonight it's back to the racing game in Rossendale.
Wednesday, 25 July 2018
Sunday, 8 July 2018
LEGS DEFY ORDERS
DON ASHTON MEMORIAL TOCKHOLES FELL RACE
It's been a crazy English Summer so far. Hot and sunny every day for two months, a day has not gone by where it's not been fit to peg washing out. England's football team have been the most aesthetically pleasing that certainly I can ever rememberand reaching the World Cup Semi-Finals - but in the world of this running nobody in particular, the wait goes on to run a good race. Excuses are futile and should not detract from the fact that even if the old pins are a bit jaded, I ought to be conditioned enough to grind out something a little better than this.
It was great to see numbers up by almost half for Calvin Ferguson's race, in honour of his veteran champion fell running Granddad. I raced this one last year and whilst I wouldn't put my keen reappearance down to a particular fondness of the course, plenty of decent local competition turn out, there's a good atmosphere about it, a decent pint and natter at The Rock Inn and it's got the sort of no nonsense, rock up and race atmoshere that fell running is all about. So I rocked up again this year and when pondering the evening's line-up, I had good reason to expect to be having a close battle with the likes of Barlick's Andy Berry and a rival from last Summer, Thomas Harkin. I got off to a decent start despite being narked by a couple of incidents early on. Firstly, a Preston runner decided the road sized bridleway we were running down was simply not wide enough. Suddenly and needlessly he cuts across and right under my feet, nearly taking us both out. Raised arm of acknowledgement? There was not. Half a minute later there's a narrow downhill section where a cluster of lads got a bit excited, thrusting themselves down there as if the finishing line is approaching already. One of whom sounds to me from behind in a panic stricken tone, ''COMING THROUGH INSIDE!!''. What the fff...?!?! Now THAT is just bad manners in this game and oh, just five and a half miles remaining at that point. I've seen this lad from the Red Rose club out before, I think he ought to know a bit better than that. I've no qualms about somebody passing - it's a race! But for me, it's the responsibility of the over-taker to do so with a bit of etiquette at least. Nip past if there's a gap, wait a few seconds if there isn't, especially when it's so early in a race. Either way, shouting that sort of nonsense out loud was absolutely ridiculous behaviour in my opinion. I think to myself how great it must be for Josh Boyle and Rob Hope at the front, avoiding all these instances of nuisance value amongst us also-rans.
One of my targets for the evening, Andy Berry is off to flyer. That short stride kicking onwards and away from me, but with still plenty of the race left to go I'm feeling relaxed. That man Fishwick's only just gone past as we get to Bold Venture Park and so has Preston's Jon Green who is on a comeback and just behind me at Tebay last week. Climbing up through the park and on to the moor I'm pretty steady, holding my place. Harkin is now in the mix and I'm sat on him until we plateau upon the moor. That's where engine failure kicked in. I'm not even busting my lungs yet, but I just can't get my legs to turn over quick enough. This seems to have been the case since upping the weekly elevation considerably. The knees just seem a touch stiffer than usual. Oxygen supply was sufficient, but there was a breakdown of electrical communication from brain to legs and they basically defied my orders. Harkin and the Darwen Dasher lad James France get away from me, Berry, Fishwick and Green have now long gone. So I start to properly bust a gut a bit earlier than I would have liked and yet it makes no difference to my pace. There's about a mile of flat and slightly downhill running in to the final third of the race, some of it on a tarmac surface, but even this speedy section was feeling like a wade through treacle. Two runners come by before we pop over a stile back towards Sunnyhurst Reservoir - Rossendale's Marc Barrett and Stephen Smithies of Calder Valley. If I'd been diary writing during the first few years of running, then Steve would have got plenty of mentions. We had some good battles over all sorts of distances and terrains. Now a Vet 50, he's looking in fantastic shape again after quite a few years in and out of the game with a knee injury. He seemed very comfortable here as he cruised by. This was a wake up call for me though. Barrett unfortunately lost his footing and crashed forwards in to the next stile, which I dare say knocked the stuffing out of him a little as Steve and I nudged ahead of him. Then as we approach the road over the damn of the reservoir, it's Steve who sounds like he's puffing a bit now, whilst I seem to catch a second wind and get ahead again. There's a bit of a sting in the tail which I saved myself for and once at the crest of it, I put the work in for the final half mile and managed to keep Mr Smithies behind me on this occasion. Far from delighted with my overall run at the finish, retrospectively I was only about a minute down on what I would have considered quite satisfactory.
If I didn't quite do myself justice in the Ribble Valley Harriers vest this evening, then two that did would be Josh Boyle and Katie Walshaw who won with new course records to their name. I'd like to be getting a bit nearer to Katie in races, but maybe I should be looking behind me. Katie was sixty nine seconds ahead, but only forty five in my wake was the legend Shaun Livesey Snr who continues to make progress on his comeback. In equine terms, Shaun is a thoroughbred, regardless of his age or years spent out of the racing loop. As a comparative carthorse, there is only so much I can do to stop him catching me up eventually. Hitting a run of consistently decent form would certainly help stave Shaun off a bit longer.
Thursday 5th July 2018
DON ASHTON MEMORIAL TOCKHOLES FELL RACE 5.8m/1100ft Tockholes, East Lancs.
1st Man - Josh Boyle (Ribble Valley Harriers) 35:42
1st Lady - Katie Walshaw (Ribble Valley Harriers) 40:20
My Stats - 41:29 15/143
DON ASHTON MEMORIAL TOCKHOLES FELL RACE
It's been a crazy English Summer so far. Hot and sunny every day for two months, a day has not gone by where it's not been fit to peg washing out. England's football team have been the most aesthetically pleasing that certainly I can ever rememberand reaching the World Cup Semi-Finals - but in the world of this running nobody in particular, the wait goes on to run a good race. Excuses are futile and should not detract from the fact that even if the old pins are a bit jaded, I ought to be conditioned enough to grind out something a little better than this.
It was great to see numbers up by almost half for Calvin Ferguson's race, in honour of his veteran champion fell running Granddad. I raced this one last year and whilst I wouldn't put my keen reappearance down to a particular fondness of the course, plenty of decent local competition turn out, there's a good atmosphere about it, a decent pint and natter at The Rock Inn and it's got the sort of no nonsense, rock up and race atmoshere that fell running is all about. So I rocked up again this year and when pondering the evening's line-up, I had good reason to expect to be having a close battle with the likes of Barlick's Andy Berry and a rival from last Summer, Thomas Harkin. I got off to a decent start despite being narked by a couple of incidents early on. Firstly, a Preston runner decided the road sized bridleway we were running down was simply not wide enough. Suddenly and needlessly he cuts across and right under my feet, nearly taking us both out. Raised arm of acknowledgement? There was not. Half a minute later there's a narrow downhill section where a cluster of lads got a bit excited, thrusting themselves down there as if the finishing line is approaching already. One of whom sounds to me from behind in a panic stricken tone, ''COMING THROUGH INSIDE!!''. What the fff...?!?! Now THAT is just bad manners in this game and oh, just five and a half miles remaining at that point. I've seen this lad from the Red Rose club out before, I think he ought to know a bit better than that. I've no qualms about somebody passing - it's a race! But for me, it's the responsibility of the over-taker to do so with a bit of etiquette at least. Nip past if there's a gap, wait a few seconds if there isn't, especially when it's so early in a race. Either way, shouting that sort of nonsense out loud was absolutely ridiculous behaviour in my opinion. I think to myself how great it must be for Josh Boyle and Rob Hope at the front, avoiding all these instances of nuisance value amongst us also-rans.
One of my targets for the evening, Andy Berry is off to flyer. That short stride kicking onwards and away from me, but with still plenty of the race left to go I'm feeling relaxed. That man Fishwick's only just gone past as we get to Bold Venture Park and so has Preston's Jon Green who is on a comeback and just behind me at Tebay last week. Climbing up through the park and on to the moor I'm pretty steady, holding my place. Harkin is now in the mix and I'm sat on him until we plateau upon the moor. That's where engine failure kicked in. I'm not even busting my lungs yet, but I just can't get my legs to turn over quick enough. This seems to have been the case since upping the weekly elevation considerably. The knees just seem a touch stiffer than usual. Oxygen supply was sufficient, but there was a breakdown of electrical communication from brain to legs and they basically defied my orders. Harkin and the Darwen Dasher lad James France get away from me, Berry, Fishwick and Green have now long gone. So I start to properly bust a gut a bit earlier than I would have liked and yet it makes no difference to my pace. There's about a mile of flat and slightly downhill running in to the final third of the race, some of it on a tarmac surface, but even this speedy section was feeling like a wade through treacle. Two runners come by before we pop over a stile back towards Sunnyhurst Reservoir - Rossendale's Marc Barrett and Stephen Smithies of Calder Valley. If I'd been diary writing during the first few years of running, then Steve would have got plenty of mentions. We had some good battles over all sorts of distances and terrains. Now a Vet 50, he's looking in fantastic shape again after quite a few years in and out of the game with a knee injury. He seemed very comfortable here as he cruised by. This was a wake up call for me though. Barrett unfortunately lost his footing and crashed forwards in to the next stile, which I dare say knocked the stuffing out of him a little as Steve and I nudged ahead of him. Then as we approach the road over the damn of the reservoir, it's Steve who sounds like he's puffing a bit now, whilst I seem to catch a second wind and get ahead again. There's a bit of a sting in the tail which I saved myself for and once at the crest of it, I put the work in for the final half mile and managed to keep Mr Smithies behind me on this occasion. Far from delighted with my overall run at the finish, retrospectively I was only about a minute down on what I would have considered quite satisfactory.
If I didn't quite do myself justice in the Ribble Valley Harriers vest this evening, then two that did would be Josh Boyle and Katie Walshaw who won with new course records to their name. I'd like to be getting a bit nearer to Katie in races, but maybe I should be looking behind me. Katie was sixty nine seconds ahead, but only forty five in my wake was the legend Shaun Livesey Snr who continues to make progress on his comeback. In equine terms, Shaun is a thoroughbred, regardless of his age or years spent out of the racing loop. As a comparative carthorse, there is only so much I can do to stop him catching me up eventually. Hitting a run of consistently decent form would certainly help stave Shaun off a bit longer.
Thursday 5th July 2018
DON ASHTON MEMORIAL TOCKHOLES FELL RACE 5.8m/1100ft Tockholes, East Lancs.
1st Man - Josh Boyle (Ribble Valley Harriers) 35:42
1st Lady - Katie Walshaw (Ribble Valley Harriers) 40:20
My Stats - 41:29 15/143
Thursday, 5 July 2018
TIGHT TUSSLE WITH CAPTAIN JACKO
WHALEY WALTZ
There's an in-house club championships on the agenda at Ribble Valley Harriers this year and this race in Derbyshire's Peak District was the first of four on that fixture list. Not far as the crow flies to these parts, but nevertheless an hour and twenty minutes away from my resides in central Lancashire. It's a fair old way just for a 9K trail race and fair to say I probably would not have picked this one out to race but for the fact it was on the club champs list and I had pre-entered months ago. Heading South down the M61, the huge plumages of smoke bellowing from the moorland fires on my favourite training ground Winter Hill completely dominates the skyline. It's been on fire for days, with up to two square miles of precious peat, heather and grasses scorched beyond recognition. It's really upsetting on many levels, not least that it was seemingly started deliberately by some 22 year old scratbag who, we are led to believe, has now been arrested. If it's him, they should throw away the key. Akin to similiar fires on Saddleworth Moor last week, whilst firefighters and armed forces from around the region do an incredible job trying to attain the impossible of suppressing the blaze in continuously hot, dry weather with a strong flame-fanning breeze, just what the hell are the Government doing about this situation to bring extra assistance? Do they even know about it, sat in their ivory towers of some suave London suburb with a Champagne in one hand, polishing their trumpets with the other? Whilst the cost of human life fortunately remains zero, it's a catastrophe on a massive scale. If this was happening in the southern Home Counties we would have had a state of emergency declared and the kitchen sink thrown at it by now. I guess a positive aspect of the government's ignorance is that they haven't made a political stunt out of the situation, for example sending the Home Secretary and Environment Minister in yellow helmet and fireproof jacket for some kind of propaganda photo-shoot. Well, not yet at least.
Back to the running then and I'm joined by just five other clubmates who also made the journey - Ste Hall is expected to kick all our arses, Ben Walmsley versus Andy Payne will be interesting and
ladies captain Nichola Jackson is fresh from - well maybe not fresh - the World Long Distance Mountain Champs in Poland the previous weekend, where she finished a fantastic 24th overall and helped win a Silver medal for the GB team. Chris Barnes put his excuses out there having ran the Twighlight Snowdon race up and down Wales' highest peak the previous evening.
It was the Rose Queen Carnival day in Whaley Bridge and first the parade passed, headed by the local brass band, followed by a rich assortment of floats flowing down the crowded main street. Once the prosession had cleared, it was race time - or seemingly. Unfortunately there was a problem somewhere down the line and a delay to the start. High vis health and safety folk were scuttling about active on thier walkie-talkies about something further down the road. This wasn't a problem, but for the fact that two hundred and odd runners were all lined up ready and absolutely baking in the high sun. I looked down and my inov8's were making in-prints in to the melting tar. There was no direction or communication in the meantime as to when we were going to set off and so it must have been twenty minutes stood there, thinking we must surely be going off at any moment. Not ideal. I'd stiffened up in fact as we finally got let out of the traps, but I loosened off a bit and started to edge my way up in to the top dozen or so. There was some welcome stretches of running under the shade of trees early on which was a brief relief after getting sun struck at the start. But when the climbing began it was in stifling heat, beaming down hard and bouncing back off the parched grasses. It felt like a struggle was imminent, but I could see Andy Payne not too far ahead and so based on that I considered I was doing OK. I was near enough to see that Andy was doing something weird with his vest and turning it in to a cropped top. In some ways I'm glad I didn't get close enough to see the hairy bellied details! But the heat was desperate and when it's like this, male cropped tops isn't such an odd concept if not a great look. Before the main sections of ascent up to the summit on the Wind Gather Rocks, I realise Nichola Jackson is right behind me as she apologised for nutting the back of my leg on a ladder stile. This is going to be tough now. The climbing continues and she stays right my on heels. I'm thinking all sorts of things, like in recent years on the odd occasion we've been in the same race at Woodentops, I've never got near her. Nichola's just done a mountain marathon in a GB vest last weekend, but then I'd raced Tebay only three days previous... did Barnes give her instructions to 'sit on Sutty on the climb until he buckles'?...all these sort of factors were being weighed up in my head as we slogged upwards. But then I thought to myself, 'Hang on, Jacko's got eighteen years on me, this lass is fair game!', so I challenged myself to stay ahead of her for as long as I can on this climb. I might just fancy my chances against her on the way down. I sensed Nic coming along side a time or two but there really wasn't much between us at all on the day. It sounded as if I'd managed to make a little gap on the first downhill stretch across a field, but then she closed in again and it wasn't until a couple of unpleasant downhill road sections where the few seconds of gap that eventually counted were mustered. I'd now set my sights on the young lad ahead who was looking like he was hanging on. Just before the finish there's a river crossing but it took me by surprise how deep it was, popping out of some woods and straight in to four or five feet of water. Panic set in, not through fear of water, but because Nichola is also an ace swimmer! I flapped and stumbled my way across. It cost me a chance to catch the lad ahead but was fortunately enough to hold my place.
So Nichola had big distance in her legs and she has bigger long term fish to fry than busting a gut in the short term to nudge ahead of the likes of myself. But she is a fierce competitor and a class fell runner, so I would be hard on myself not to take some satisfaction from staying ahead of her for once. Besides, it may never happen again.
For the rest of the team, Ste was on cue to finish third overall until he and another lad excruciatingly missed a left turn inside the final mile and lost nine places. So Ben ran well to take over for third place and first Ribble Valley home, keeping himself half a minute ahead of Andy all the way around. Ribble Valley Harriers were on the map in Derbyshire with six inside the top sixteen.
On the way home and immediately on the top road out of Whaley Bridge, the Winter Hill fires are prominent in the distance even here, some fifty miles away. Like some smoking volcano, the plume stretches West beyond Southport and in to the Irish Sea. They still can't see it from London though.
Saturday 30th June 2018
WHALEY WALTZ 5.8m/900ft Whaley Bridge, High Peak, Derbyshire
1st Man - Jack Ross (Staffordshire Moorlands) 39:48
1st Lady - Nichola Jackson (Ribble Valley Harriers) 43:55
My Stats - 43:47 10/208
WHALEY WALTZ
There's an in-house club championships on the agenda at Ribble Valley Harriers this year and this race in Derbyshire's Peak District was the first of four on that fixture list. Not far as the crow flies to these parts, but nevertheless an hour and twenty minutes away from my resides in central Lancashire. It's a fair old way just for a 9K trail race and fair to say I probably would not have picked this one out to race but for the fact it was on the club champs list and I had pre-entered months ago. Heading South down the M61, the huge plumages of smoke bellowing from the moorland fires on my favourite training ground Winter Hill completely dominates the skyline. It's been on fire for days, with up to two square miles of precious peat, heather and grasses scorched beyond recognition. It's really upsetting on many levels, not least that it was seemingly started deliberately by some 22 year old scratbag who, we are led to believe, has now been arrested. If it's him, they should throw away the key. Akin to similiar fires on Saddleworth Moor last week, whilst firefighters and armed forces from around the region do an incredible job trying to attain the impossible of suppressing the blaze in continuously hot, dry weather with a strong flame-fanning breeze, just what the hell are the Government doing about this situation to bring extra assistance? Do they even know about it, sat in their ivory towers of some suave London suburb with a Champagne in one hand, polishing their trumpets with the other? Whilst the cost of human life fortunately remains zero, it's a catastrophe on a massive scale. If this was happening in the southern Home Counties we would have had a state of emergency declared and the kitchen sink thrown at it by now. I guess a positive aspect of the government's ignorance is that they haven't made a political stunt out of the situation, for example sending the Home Secretary and Environment Minister in yellow helmet and fireproof jacket for some kind of propaganda photo-shoot. Well, not yet at least.
Back to the running then and I'm joined by just five other clubmates who also made the journey - Ste Hall is expected to kick all our arses, Ben Walmsley versus Andy Payne will be interesting and
ladies captain Nichola Jackson is fresh from - well maybe not fresh - the World Long Distance Mountain Champs in Poland the previous weekend, where she finished a fantastic 24th overall and helped win a Silver medal for the GB team. Chris Barnes put his excuses out there having ran the Twighlight Snowdon race up and down Wales' highest peak the previous evening.
It was the Rose Queen Carnival day in Whaley Bridge and first the parade passed, headed by the local brass band, followed by a rich assortment of floats flowing down the crowded main street. Once the prosession had cleared, it was race time - or seemingly. Unfortunately there was a problem somewhere down the line and a delay to the start. High vis health and safety folk were scuttling about active on thier walkie-talkies about something further down the road. This wasn't a problem, but for the fact that two hundred and odd runners were all lined up ready and absolutely baking in the high sun. I looked down and my inov8's were making in-prints in to the melting tar. There was no direction or communication in the meantime as to when we were going to set off and so it must have been twenty minutes stood there, thinking we must surely be going off at any moment. Not ideal. I'd stiffened up in fact as we finally got let out of the traps, but I loosened off a bit and started to edge my way up in to the top dozen or so. There was some welcome stretches of running under the shade of trees early on which was a brief relief after getting sun struck at the start. But when the climbing began it was in stifling heat, beaming down hard and bouncing back off the parched grasses. It felt like a struggle was imminent, but I could see Andy Payne not too far ahead and so based on that I considered I was doing OK. I was near enough to see that Andy was doing something weird with his vest and turning it in to a cropped top. In some ways I'm glad I didn't get close enough to see the hairy bellied details! But the heat was desperate and when it's like this, male cropped tops isn't such an odd concept if not a great look. Before the main sections of ascent up to the summit on the Wind Gather Rocks, I realise Nichola Jackson is right behind me as she apologised for nutting the back of my leg on a ladder stile. This is going to be tough now. The climbing continues and she stays right my on heels. I'm thinking all sorts of things, like in recent years on the odd occasion we've been in the same race at Woodentops, I've never got near her. Nichola's just done a mountain marathon in a GB vest last weekend, but then I'd raced Tebay only three days previous... did Barnes give her instructions to 'sit on Sutty on the climb until he buckles'?...all these sort of factors were being weighed up in my head as we slogged upwards. But then I thought to myself, 'Hang on, Jacko's got eighteen years on me, this lass is fair game!', so I challenged myself to stay ahead of her for as long as I can on this climb. I might just fancy my chances against her on the way down. I sensed Nic coming along side a time or two but there really wasn't much between us at all on the day. It sounded as if I'd managed to make a little gap on the first downhill stretch across a field, but then she closed in again and it wasn't until a couple of unpleasant downhill road sections where the few seconds of gap that eventually counted were mustered. I'd now set my sights on the young lad ahead who was looking like he was hanging on. Just before the finish there's a river crossing but it took me by surprise how deep it was, popping out of some woods and straight in to four or five feet of water. Panic set in, not through fear of water, but because Nichola is also an ace swimmer! I flapped and stumbled my way across. It cost me a chance to catch the lad ahead but was fortunately enough to hold my place.
So Nichola had big distance in her legs and she has bigger long term fish to fry than busting a gut in the short term to nudge ahead of the likes of myself. But she is a fierce competitor and a class fell runner, so I would be hard on myself not to take some satisfaction from staying ahead of her for once. Besides, it may never happen again.
For the rest of the team, Ste was on cue to finish third overall until he and another lad excruciatingly missed a left turn inside the final mile and lost nine places. So Ben ran well to take over for third place and first Ribble Valley home, keeping himself half a minute ahead of Andy all the way around. Ribble Valley Harriers were on the map in Derbyshire with six inside the top sixteen.
On the way home and immediately on the top road out of Whaley Bridge, the Winter Hill fires are prominent in the distance even here, some fifty miles away. Like some smoking volcano, the plume stretches West beyond Southport and in to the Irish Sea. They still can't see it from London though.
Saturday 30th June 2018
WHALEY WALTZ 5.8m/900ft Whaley Bridge, High Peak, Derbyshire
1st Man - Jack Ross (Staffordshire Moorlands) 39:48
1st Lady - Nichola Jackson (Ribble Valley Harriers) 43:55
My Stats - 43:47 10/208
Sunday, 1 July 2018
TEBAY JUST TOPS THE BILL
TEBAY FELL RACE
For a classic midweek evening fell race it is fair to say that I have had my head turned by the glories of Blencathra in recent times. It's a few years since I've managed to get up to my old favourite at Tebay, but on this long overdue return I think it may just about have stolen back my affection for top billing. For a start off, I love the Howgills. Distinctive by their contrast to the rest of the Cumbrian fell set, these huge green lumps of mountainous beauty stand out by their sheer mass and endlessly fascinating curvature which rolls out Eastwards in to North Yorkshire. To admire them from below and afar is satisfaction in itself. To be up there, running up and down them... amazing. It's been way too long.
The route of the Tebay race touches the Western fringes of the range, visible on approach as the M6 gets as spectacular as any section of motorway can in this country. The road and mainline railway meet side by side, literally carving through the base of the valley that splits the Howgills from the craggier Birbeck Fells. This is what my well fell weathered Mum considers to be the gateway to proper Northern wild country! I'm inclined to agree.
When I say I'm doing the Tebay race, those not in the know think it's a long way to go on a weekday night, what's so special about Tebay? It's a motorway services isn't it? Tebay is a rustic village of mainly terraced cottages, built on the back of it's former prominence as a major railway yard and junction. The place has probably lost a little bit of it's soul like many of it's kind over the years. But rather than just another cluster of lettings owned by people from Surrey, there are some genuine signs of industry, self sufficiency, proper local life and community still here. Race headquarters at the working man's club is charmingly old school and the recreation ground from where the race starts from most certainly isn't under threat by a tyrant borough council bowing to the pressures of toy town housing developers, unlike in my neck of the woods and the rapidly diminishing green spaces of South Ribble.
The first couple of miles of the race route are pretty unspectacular to be fair. First timers racing on the back of my endearing review would have a right to ask what all the fuss is about. A gradual incline crossing from choppy moorland to farm track and back again on a crow flies line to Ellergill Beck. Even the first climb of distinction up Rispa Pike is just a tough upward plough through long grass and tussock with nowt much to get excited about other than the relief of nearing the top of it. Runaway race leader and man of the moment Carl Bell was almost at the top of it by the time I'd started from the Beck. An incredible talent is that guy. Once upon that broad plateau and over the next mile or so, this could still just seem like your Average Joe race over rugged moorland. Then things change all of a sudden. Just shy of the second checkpoint there's a little steeper slant for twenty yards upon the seemingly featureless mound which has been on the horizon for the last ten minutes. Then that's it - a moment that took my breath away the first time I did this race and has done every time since - the whole of the Howgills opens up in to view and suddenly you realise how high you have climbed already. This is Uldale Head and it's a fabulous reward for a laborious slog until that point. Then you know you are in the Howgills and the racing from here is spectacular. No matter how serious a runner one might be, if you can't afford yourself the odd glance of the awesome landscape around you and suck it all in, then the question would have to be, what the hell are you doing racing up there in the first place?
Up to this point I was holding my own. Briefly I had dreams of sitting on Chorley's Darren Fishwick. Not in a literal sense of course, although that might be one way of stopping him going past me. I haven't beaten Daz in a good few years and I'd say he is much stronger and certainly more consistent in recent times than ever, so it will take some doing. But both he and a small pack had got away from me by about a minute up to Uldale, but I sensed I was somewhere in the top twenty and was ticking over fine on a sweltering evening. It was a ridiculous 27 degrees fahrenheit when we kicked off on the Tebay Recreation Ground at 7:00pm. The drop off Uldale Head is quite sudden and I had nobody in view to follow. Faint trods forked off in various directions and whilst a straight ahead bearing down the middle made sense off memory, I found myself sucked in to the most trodden trod to the left. Descending quite steeply, I still couldn't see anyone ahead which was strange. I realised the error of my ways and started cutting off back over to the right and the middle line that I should have taken in the first place. But still, weirdly, I couldn't see Fishwick and Co scrambling up the opposite hillside. As I started that scramble myself after crossing the beck, low to my right and behold, a Fishwick appears with that posse still following him. They had gone way over to the right it seems, or somewhere. Only Darren knows for sure. One thing I wasn't expecting in this race was to get back ahead of Daz by this point, but after following me along the traverse towards Black Force he took his chance and got ahead again, by maybe two minutes by the time we'd ticked the next summit of Linghaw off and descended to the base of Blease Fell for the final big climb. His group of hangers on followed, some over enthusiastically with the main event still to come. I may have inadvertently shot up in to the top ten somewhere, but lost those places again eventually. Oddly, I couldn't descend quick if I'd tried that evening. Whilst getting my uphill game in to better order, my much stronger downhill skills deserted me. My knees were a bit achey and I just couldn't let my legs go. That wasn't a bad thing here though, as the very business end of the race was still to be ironed out and an empty tank at the bottom of Blease Fell isn't a pleasant experience. Been there and done that one before. Instead I was climbing pretty well, picking a few places back and catching some of Daz's cluster. But by now, he'd burned them off a bit up this big steep slog of a climb and caught up with another solid fell machine I would like to get nearer to, Mark Chippendale of Bowland. It's deceptive on these steep climbs just how far you are behind other runners. It seemed as if I had caught up with Fishwick and Chippendale after they had been out of view on the long descent from Linghaw. What looked like a minute behind these two on the climb was obviously more as when the running begins again off the summit, the black and white stripes of Chorley and the orange and green of Bowland looked half a mile away. My legs just wouldn't kick in to a decent rhythm for the gradual downhill two miles or so off Blease Fell back to Tebay. After losing a couple of places straight away after the summit checkpoint, I did enough to get one back and was somehow holding my place, although in some disbelief really. I was waiting for the cavalry to arrive at any moment as I didn't feel I was moving at all quick enough to sustain my position. The breathing tackle felt fine, but the legs just wouldn't stretch out. I took a few dodgy route choices which needlessly put me through some energy sapping rougher stuff and cost some seconds. Near the finish when company did finally merge on my tail, we all had different ideas where the farm gate off the fell might be situated. The finish line isn't far through that gate. I remembered the track we were running on and that the gate was hidden by the grassy mounds to the left - whereabouts exactly I just daren't gamble. Then Bowland's Sam Harrison and former Nemesis from my time at Chorley Harriers, Dominic Raby, came shifting by and I briefly got distracted by this, setting out to stay with Dom. History tells me trusting Dominic's navigation isn't wise though, so keeping an eye out to my left, a Borrowdale runner had taken the plunge and cut off the track and on to the grass. So I veered off back towards him and once realising he'd got the correct line to the gate, I gave Dominic a shout. But Dom either didn't hear me or was just too focused on the Bowland lad just ahead as these two stuck rigidly to the slightly longer route on the farm track. Well I wasn't going to shout him over twice! I managed to cut them up before the gate and keep the Raby behind me just about, but the young Bowlander Harrison and the Borrowdale guy had that bit of kick to see me off just before we turned back in to the recreation ground. A retrospective disappointment was that this cost me sneakage in to the top fifteen. As for Darren Fishwick, so good at the moment he beat me twice! He must have flown off that final summit, burning Chippendale off by two minutes and moving up to eighth place - more than four minutes on me in the end. I tried not to beat myself up with a time of 1.35, which is tough when I have done 1.21... but I was in tip top form then, the weather was far cooler that night... and, well I was a bit younger. Studying time comparisons from fell races can be a pretty irrelevant pass-time in any case, for realistically never in a million years would I be good enough to get within ten, let alone five minutes of the night's race winner on this or any course.
What a great race though. A truly great race and a tough one. Staying fit enough to make this one an annual habit again would be well worth the toil.
Wedneday 28th June 2018
TEBAY FELL RACE 8m/3000ft Tebay, Cumbria
1st Man - Carl Bell (Keswick) 1.16:39
1st Lady - Clare Nance (Lonsdale FR) 1.43:55
My Stats - 1.35:44 17/82
TEBAY FELL RACE
For a classic midweek evening fell race it is fair to say that I have had my head turned by the glories of Blencathra in recent times. It's a few years since I've managed to get up to my old favourite at Tebay, but on this long overdue return I think it may just about have stolen back my affection for top billing. For a start off, I love the Howgills. Distinctive by their contrast to the rest of the Cumbrian fell set, these huge green lumps of mountainous beauty stand out by their sheer mass and endlessly fascinating curvature which rolls out Eastwards in to North Yorkshire. To admire them from below and afar is satisfaction in itself. To be up there, running up and down them... amazing. It's been way too long.
The route of the Tebay race touches the Western fringes of the range, visible on approach as the M6 gets as spectacular as any section of motorway can in this country. The road and mainline railway meet side by side, literally carving through the base of the valley that splits the Howgills from the craggier Birbeck Fells. This is what my well fell weathered Mum considers to be the gateway to proper Northern wild country! I'm inclined to agree.
When I say I'm doing the Tebay race, those not in the know think it's a long way to go on a weekday night, what's so special about Tebay? It's a motorway services isn't it? Tebay is a rustic village of mainly terraced cottages, built on the back of it's former prominence as a major railway yard and junction. The place has probably lost a little bit of it's soul like many of it's kind over the years. But rather than just another cluster of lettings owned by people from Surrey, there are some genuine signs of industry, self sufficiency, proper local life and community still here. Race headquarters at the working man's club is charmingly old school and the recreation ground from where the race starts from most certainly isn't under threat by a tyrant borough council bowing to the pressures of toy town housing developers, unlike in my neck of the woods and the rapidly diminishing green spaces of South Ribble.
The first couple of miles of the race route are pretty unspectacular to be fair. First timers racing on the back of my endearing review would have a right to ask what all the fuss is about. A gradual incline crossing from choppy moorland to farm track and back again on a crow flies line to Ellergill Beck. Even the first climb of distinction up Rispa Pike is just a tough upward plough through long grass and tussock with nowt much to get excited about other than the relief of nearing the top of it. Runaway race leader and man of the moment Carl Bell was almost at the top of it by the time I'd started from the Beck. An incredible talent is that guy. Once upon that broad plateau and over the next mile or so, this could still just seem like your Average Joe race over rugged moorland. Then things change all of a sudden. Just shy of the second checkpoint there's a little steeper slant for twenty yards upon the seemingly featureless mound which has been on the horizon for the last ten minutes. Then that's it - a moment that took my breath away the first time I did this race and has done every time since - the whole of the Howgills opens up in to view and suddenly you realise how high you have climbed already. This is Uldale Head and it's a fabulous reward for a laborious slog until that point. Then you know you are in the Howgills and the racing from here is spectacular. No matter how serious a runner one might be, if you can't afford yourself the odd glance of the awesome landscape around you and suck it all in, then the question would have to be, what the hell are you doing racing up there in the first place?
Up to this point I was holding my own. Briefly I had dreams of sitting on Chorley's Darren Fishwick. Not in a literal sense of course, although that might be one way of stopping him going past me. I haven't beaten Daz in a good few years and I'd say he is much stronger and certainly more consistent in recent times than ever, so it will take some doing. But both he and a small pack had got away from me by about a minute up to Uldale, but I sensed I was somewhere in the top twenty and was ticking over fine on a sweltering evening. It was a ridiculous 27 degrees fahrenheit when we kicked off on the Tebay Recreation Ground at 7:00pm. The drop off Uldale Head is quite sudden and I had nobody in view to follow. Faint trods forked off in various directions and whilst a straight ahead bearing down the middle made sense off memory, I found myself sucked in to the most trodden trod to the left. Descending quite steeply, I still couldn't see anyone ahead which was strange. I realised the error of my ways and started cutting off back over to the right and the middle line that I should have taken in the first place. But still, weirdly, I couldn't see Fishwick and Co scrambling up the opposite hillside. As I started that scramble myself after crossing the beck, low to my right and behold, a Fishwick appears with that posse still following him. They had gone way over to the right it seems, or somewhere. Only Darren knows for sure. One thing I wasn't expecting in this race was to get back ahead of Daz by this point, but after following me along the traverse towards Black Force he took his chance and got ahead again, by maybe two minutes by the time we'd ticked the next summit of Linghaw off and descended to the base of Blease Fell for the final big climb. His group of hangers on followed, some over enthusiastically with the main event still to come. I may have inadvertently shot up in to the top ten somewhere, but lost those places again eventually. Oddly, I couldn't descend quick if I'd tried that evening. Whilst getting my uphill game in to better order, my much stronger downhill skills deserted me. My knees were a bit achey and I just couldn't let my legs go. That wasn't a bad thing here though, as the very business end of the race was still to be ironed out and an empty tank at the bottom of Blease Fell isn't a pleasant experience. Been there and done that one before. Instead I was climbing pretty well, picking a few places back and catching some of Daz's cluster. But by now, he'd burned them off a bit up this big steep slog of a climb and caught up with another solid fell machine I would like to get nearer to, Mark Chippendale of Bowland. It's deceptive on these steep climbs just how far you are behind other runners. It seemed as if I had caught up with Fishwick and Chippendale after they had been out of view on the long descent from Linghaw. What looked like a minute behind these two on the climb was obviously more as when the running begins again off the summit, the black and white stripes of Chorley and the orange and green of Bowland looked half a mile away. My legs just wouldn't kick in to a decent rhythm for the gradual downhill two miles or so off Blease Fell back to Tebay. After losing a couple of places straight away after the summit checkpoint, I did enough to get one back and was somehow holding my place, although in some disbelief really. I was waiting for the cavalry to arrive at any moment as I didn't feel I was moving at all quick enough to sustain my position. The breathing tackle felt fine, but the legs just wouldn't stretch out. I took a few dodgy route choices which needlessly put me through some energy sapping rougher stuff and cost some seconds. Near the finish when company did finally merge on my tail, we all had different ideas where the farm gate off the fell might be situated. The finish line isn't far through that gate. I remembered the track we were running on and that the gate was hidden by the grassy mounds to the left - whereabouts exactly I just daren't gamble. Then Bowland's Sam Harrison and former Nemesis from my time at Chorley Harriers, Dominic Raby, came shifting by and I briefly got distracted by this, setting out to stay with Dom. History tells me trusting Dominic's navigation isn't wise though, so keeping an eye out to my left, a Borrowdale runner had taken the plunge and cut off the track and on to the grass. So I veered off back towards him and once realising he'd got the correct line to the gate, I gave Dominic a shout. But Dom either didn't hear me or was just too focused on the Bowland lad just ahead as these two stuck rigidly to the slightly longer route on the farm track. Well I wasn't going to shout him over twice! I managed to cut them up before the gate and keep the Raby behind me just about, but the young Bowlander Harrison and the Borrowdale guy had that bit of kick to see me off just before we turned back in to the recreation ground. A retrospective disappointment was that this cost me sneakage in to the top fifteen. As for Darren Fishwick, so good at the moment he beat me twice! He must have flown off that final summit, burning Chippendale off by two minutes and moving up to eighth place - more than four minutes on me in the end. I tried not to beat myself up with a time of 1.35, which is tough when I have done 1.21... but I was in tip top form then, the weather was far cooler that night... and, well I was a bit younger. Studying time comparisons from fell races can be a pretty irrelevant pass-time in any case, for realistically never in a million years would I be good enough to get within ten, let alone five minutes of the night's race winner on this or any course.
What a great race though. A truly great race and a tough one. Staying fit enough to make this one an annual habit again would be well worth the toil.
Wedneday 28th June 2018
TEBAY FELL RACE 8m/3000ft Tebay, Cumbria
1st Man - Carl Bell (Keswick) 1.16:39
1st Lady - Clare Nance (Lonsdale FR) 1.43:55
My Stats - 1.35:44 17/82
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