The Early Spring Lull…?

This week appears to have been another week of lots of running but not much racing and probably quite a lot of deservedly basking the various awesome achievements of last weekend.  That said, there was still a glimpse of blue and orange at a number of races over the last few days.

Hawkeshead 16k Trail Race (courtesy of Becky Smith)

I headed up to Hawkshead for the second race of the Lakeland Trails series – after wanting to run one of these races for a few years, one finally fitted into the diary! The event consisted of 3 main races (one 10k, a 16k challenge and a 16k race) and youth races also. I completed the last race of the day, the 16k race. The weather was good for running – dry, cool, with a light breeze. The course was extremely hilly and craggy, around beautiful trails, forest and the shores of Windermere. The race route ascended the ‘coffin trail’ – a very steep, mile long (and of course) very rocky trail. All was going well until I tripped down a very steep (and yes) craggy descent.  I managed to limp to the finish in 1:43, 4th in my age category and 14th lady (out of quite a small field of just 150). The winner, Chris Holdsworth Team Inov8, dashed around in a few seconds over an hour!

Radcliffe AC 10k (courtesy of John Pollard)

A cold Sunday morning minus the sun and the promise of a fastish trail race along the Leeds-Liverpool canal and some country park for my continued rehab towards a fell run soon. Only GDHer there I believe.  Well it was a bit eyeballs out for a lot but the sting came in the tail with half a km uphill to finish…when 10k was already completed as Strava will testify. Can’t complain though, a distinctly average 54.18 finish, but then it’s not a PB course.

Eskdale Elevation (courtesy of Lins Palmer)

Lins Palmer took her current obsession with all things steep and uphill to Eskdale yesterday for the Eskdale Elevation, an AL fell race of 20.2km and 1,455m of climbing. All just so I would have something to write about in this week’s report – what a star! Update from Lins…. “Jo Bowen persuaded me to do this race. Good training for Jura, I thought 20 km and 1450m of ascent. Jo told me that the navigation is a bit tricky and she’d mucked up the descent off Scafell twice, even though she’d recced it. We decided to run together for moral support. What a great race. Lots of route choice. I think I sandbagged Jo for the third time, as I chose the route down and we got very off track and came in last. Still smiling though, and I’ve spent 2 hours on google earth trying to work out where we went wrong! Note to self:- I must go back and recce this one”.

Dirty Reiver (courtesy of Tim ‘anyone seen my fell shoes’ Budd)

Whilst definitely not a run and strictly not even a race, Tim “check out my golden hubs” Budd [Ed – Phil, stop adding stuff!] completed the 200km 2019 Dirty Reiver off-road gravel bike cycling challenge today.  “A Long and Gravelly Sportive around Kielder. Think trail ultra, but on a bike. Never particularly steep, but with some fairly uncomfortable sections. No mechanicals, no real problems. Good coffee and some excellent feed stations with boiled cheesy potatoes. Got around the course in 8:12 which was rather faster than I expected.”.

Goldrush Trail Race (courtesy of Lucy Wasinski)

Yesterday Greg and I headed off to our second home…the trails of coed y brenin, for the 8.5 mile Goldrush race and cani cross race. we were at a wedding on the Friday and amazingly stayed off the bevvies after dinner…otherwise things wouldn’t have been pretty.Weather was pretty sunny by the 1pm race start but there was a proper chilly wind! I lined up on the start line with my Welsh nemesis, and couple of other familiar faces who I’ve done battle with previously…so was feeling a tad stressy! But what awaits is literally 8.5miles of trail heaven through the forest with some fab single track, nice technical descents and some rocky uphill. By the end of the first hill id lost sight of the Welsh nemesis and realised the 4inns last week might have taken more out of me than realised, as my quads felt like lead. Pushed as hard as i could but the hills felt a slog, happily balanced out by the descents which are awesome fun, and defo felt the benefit of coach J’s long pyramid reps on the flats! Couldn’t catch the 2nd girl despite gaining on her at the end when she started to walk the last hill back to the finish, but hung on for 3rd place and what ended up being a decent PB at that race, so pretty happy all things considered!
As for Greg and illy in the cani cross race that started half and hour later. Well….they say never work with kids or animals. Never a truer phrase. Whilst most of the dogs were so pumped up they were kept in the cars or vans before the start, illy was chilling, ok snoozing. Once they were off Greg tried to get illy to the front where she’d be happiest with fewer dogs around but she wasn’t having any of it, and try as he might to encourage her, illy was not loving having all these psyched dogs running around so after 20 mins…and well off their usual pace, Greg thought best to call it a day. He told a marshal, turned back to the start and then she got her racing legs and off they flew, typical! Think that will be the last cani X attempt with illy, just not her bag! Least greg could get back to the end and see me finish…couldn’t he?? Lets just say, he’s earning that bombed out trophy…anyone seen the van keys?

Other Stuff (gleaned from Strava and Facebook)

• Mike Raynor conquered the Whitley 10k in 46:05 and generated a number of those lovely PRs medals on Strava.
• Jessica Camp raced around the Tatton 10k and took nearly 3.5 mins off her PB, charging home in 42:04 which she was understandably very pleased about, racking up second female and 5k PB of 20:30 as well.
• Nick Ham appears to have had a great race at the Calderdale Hike on Saturday, completing the 37 miles with over 6,000 feet of ascent in 8hrs 4mins and feeling in fine fettle.

My favourite club member run title on Strava this week is Rosa Christie Lowe’s “Run to Belgium via the highest point in the Netherlands” closely followed, perhaps unsurprisingly, by Lins P’s “Eskdale Elevation with JoBo. Only done it so Els has something to write for club report”.

Parkrun Corner

As always, there was a fair amount of parkrunning on Saturday with Harriers spread far and wide: 16 @ Glossop, 3 @ Marple (PB for Jayne Morton and Jo Brack), 2 @ Hyde, 2 @ Lyme Park (PB for Charles Wrigley), 2 @ Stamford Park (PB for Laurie Barlow), 2 @ Le Lac de Divonne and a Harrier apiece at Gunnersby,  Flatts Lane and  Jamaica Pond.

And finally…..

Don’t forget, it is Herod Farm Fell Race this Wednesday.  The latest info on the volunteering arrangements is available on the GDH FB page.  

If you are racing and would like a mention in the run report over and above what we can scrape from social media, please drop us a line at gdhweeklyreports@gmail.com.

Have a great running week, everyone – happy recce-ing  (how do you even spell that?), hill repping, speed training, marshalling, tapering, etc etc etc.