Extreme Running
When it comes to fitness, can there be anything more extreme than running marathons over mountain tops? Well it just so happens that our valley is home to the famous
Duddon Valley Fell Race - 20 odd miles and 6,000 feet of ascent including the Summits of Harter Fell and Hardknott Fell. I just mention this for interest, as even we're not sufficiently unhinged to give this a go.
But, living amongst this majestic scenery, we couldn't resist the challenge of trying at least one fell race. So when we heard that nobody had died (yet) on the
Dunnerdale Fell Race, we decided to give it a go.
For an enlarged map of the run click the image on the right
Saturday November 11th, 2006
The weather was relatively kind to us. It had been chucking it down on Friday, but Saturday was merely grey and overcast. We arrived an hour early and were allocated our numbers. 100 for Lisa, and 101 (gulp) for Phil. We scanned the assembled athletes hoping to spot a good proportion of unfit, have-a-go types (like us) that we could be sure of beating. No such luck. Out of 240+ runners, we saw just one with a spare pound or two round the midrif - and history records that he beat us in the end. The rest of them were wiry-thin manic-looking vertically aligned greyhounds,
like this guy.
Suitably sobered, we set off as a seething mob at 12 noon. We left the tarmac after about 1/2 a mile and started the gruelling ascent to The Knott. Its a real killer, and by the time we got to the top there was no reassurance to be gained by looking back to see how many people were behind us. It was pitifully few. Once on top we were rewarded by being virtually blown off our feet by a fierce and gusty wind. We had to run at 45 degrees to our course to stay in a straight line.
You might think we'd be lucky to finish at this rate, but our secret weapon was in the descents. Extreme downhill running at breakneck speeds saved the day, and we were in fact highly delighted to come in with a time of around 70 minutes, especially as our first few practice runs of the circuit had taken over 2 hours. To be quite honest, despite coming rather close to the bottom of the results table, we were chuffed to bits. Fortunately Ricky Lightfoot(!!!) wasn't running this year or our time would have been an even larger multiple of the winner's.
Now even though I did come in with a quicker time than Lisa, it really was a magnificent achievement for her .. considering she was running in the veteran over 40's category!!
For full results see
the race results. (If you're just looking for us, I'd suggest starting at the end and working backwards)
November 2007
Do it again ? You must be joking!
Hmmmm, maybe......
