I was really looking forward to this essentially non-competitive event - its three days of fell running are always memorable in one way or another (last year partly due to pretty horrible conditions).
It's much more civilised than most mountain marathons since runners don't have to carry their own kit in the hills - just day food, waterproofs, etc. But all overnight kit (camping gear, spare clothes, food, etc.) has to fit into a 50l bag so it's not easy to ensure two comfortable nights' recovery and relaxation without thinking very carefully about what you pack.
It would be particularly interesting to tread some new ground since this year's event wasn't actually in the Lakes but would cover the Howgills (not really new to me but relatively unknown) and the Yorkshire Dales, promising some very runnable terrain. Of course, enjoying the runnability depended somewhat upon not repeating the disastrous runs of the Grizzly and Axe to Exe so I planned to take things steadily.
Distances below are approximate "mountain miles". The climb was relatively low for this sort of event.
It drizzled more or less continuously apart from a few times when the sun emerged and threatened to oust the clouds but never quite made it. I had an easy start with Jeff whom I had met at last year's event and who was also worried about his own fitness (so that made two of us!). It was nice running (a bit) and walking (a lot) up onto the Howgills with stunning views from the steep, grassy ridges and feeling comfortable before dropping down into Sedbergh.
By about three hours we were distinctly jogging rather than running as we followed a river but walked strongly on the subsequent climb, me stuffing my face to ward off the crash! An hour or so later I nearly ground to a halt climbing Whernside, avoided only by a sugar hit. (It brought back memories of some of my early mountain marathons, keeping going only to get the pain over with!) We were both sufficiently tired to take the "no thought required" route right over the summit while the obvious optimum route skirts the top and would have saved us half a mile of distance and a hundred feet of climb! Mind you, running along the top to where the better route came out was marvellous, one of the nicest stretches of the whole event.
It was frustrating not being up to running the gentle climbs, since there was relatively little unrunnable terrain (but some of that was tussocky grass with peat hags which made for seriously hard going!). By about six hours I had finished my own day food and turned to Jeff's Mars bars for more sugar hits (they do work, albeit only for a short time). Finally, three miles of descending road saw us at the finish campsite (which was already beginning to collect standing water in places!) after nearly eight hours out in second place by about half an hour.
A strip wash in the river got me relatively clean before spending the evening eating and drinking copiously.
No rain today! As we were returning to the same campsite (unusual on this event) I didn't have to pack up the tent and other gear. Nice, easy, runnable start, again with Jeff, and then about two miles in short, sharp expletive echoed around the valley as I turned my right ankle. (And it wasn't even particularly rough going!) I hobbled around moaning, groaning and cursing then sat down to pop some drugs. The sensible thing would have been to return to the campsite but I was in the middle of a Real Run and wasn't going to give up that easily!
The going was once again good with a number of quad bike tracks and other paths criss-crossing the tussocky hillsides. We felt really good until just under half way when we reached a long, runnable, relatively flat leg beside a river and were back in jog mode. It was really disappointing not to be able to make the most of the runnability. We caught another pair of runners, including the fastest lady, early on in that stretch but never got away from them.
The route continued largely runnable but we were so tired that many runners whom we had beaten convincingly the previous day and had caught today got away from us over the second half. We were once again only running flats and descents and even opted for the "easy navigation" option of the last couple of miles on road to finish in just over seven hours.
I think we were second again, but nearly an hour down on the winner.
I didn't eat or drink a lot that night (I just didn't fancy it). The rain returned. I slept well.
I spent ages getting sorted in the morning - about an hour, I think, between packing up the kit and preparing for the run. But we were heading home! And I was finally on a small Harvey's 1:40K map rather than the huge 1:25K OS maps of the previous two days which required a black belt in origami to manage on the hill! Jeff had retired after the second day with a knee niggle which he didn't want to exacerbate so I was on my own and decided to give it some welly - sort of a "death or glory" approach!
I started last (you can start when you like with slower people setting off early and faster ones later), just behind Ian who had been fastest the previous two days (well over an hour faster than me cumulatively - I should have been running about the same speed as him, had I been fit). I felt strong running steadily more or less all the way up (yes, running uphill - I said this was going to be death or glory, didn't I?!) to the first checkpoint, walking only the steeper parts, and had about a minute lead over Ian by the time I got there.
I was still going very strongly on the big climb to the second checkpoint and then let myself go for the long, steady descent over tussocky but runnable grass to the third, reaching it before anyone else. I was flying.
There was a monster climb to the fourth checkpoint (1,500' in about two thirds of a mile but I'm good at that stuff) and then just a couple more short, sharp climbs in between runnable bits before the final long, steady descent to the finish. Navigation was surprisingly tricky (now was not the time to follow the wrong stream!) and I had a spot of bother returning through the village with a map surveyed 30 years ago! But I finished strongly, a very satisfying 25 minutes ahead of second-placed Ian. There's life in the old dog yet!