Saturday 23 May 2009

Hutton roof fell race



Today I ran the Hutton Roof fell race, Its always a great day out, the weather was kind to us again but there was quite a bit of mud around to make conditions slippy in places!
There was a bigger turnout of fast runners this year as it was a inter county championship race.
As I still don't feel fully recovered from my Marathon I decided to enjoy the race and run within myself, having said that I'm not sure I could have run much faster anyway!
The race starts in a field and it was a bit hectic as we swung round and headed through a narrow gap in a stone wall! Quickly we made our way up a very steep climb over rocks and boulders, once at the top I tried to get my breath back as we ran over the tops, I managed to pass quite a few runners over the easier sections without going into my red zone!
Next was a very fast downhill, stepping on one of the many jagged rocks or loose stones was the big hazard, a lot of concentration was required to keep upright!
The biggest challenge soon came into sight as we turned a corner and headed up the mountain, zig zagging at first then straight up the scree
this was tough, crawling on my hands and knees at a painfully slow pace, we were all lined out following one another, breathless and with quads full of lactic. I finally make it over the steepest section, I try to start running again but my legs feel like a drunken sailors!
Downhill through craggy outbreaks of rocks, I start to recover, I overtake a couple of runners, next a jump down a rock ledge before a steady downhill to the road, across the road and the start of the final section, a steady climb through trees eventfully coming out on the top of a hill, some technical downhill then very fast down a grassy bank, following a tall lad and a girl we take a sharp corner onto a single track, the girl infront gets a stitch, I shout encouragement " not far to go," a tall Scottish girl comes flying past, back through the narrow hole in the wall, a slight rise then the final 200m on tarmac, I sprint on the inside taking it out, pulling away from the group I've been running with!
Not my fastest ever time but I really enjoyed the race and scenery!
We spend the rest of the afternoon relaxing and gouging on home made cakes and watching the race presentation !
= 1.02.22
Sun 24th
Run with Jon, sandhill 6, plus run down and back inc 8 short sprints = 1.30

2 comments:

Ewen said...

That looks harder than the hill on the ACT mountain champs course! At least you've got grass - ours is just rocks and dirt.

Glad you enjoyed the race and the scenery. Do you get time to look at the scenery?!

RICK said...

Yes! but running up the mountain all I saw was the tread on the runners shoes in front of me!