For once a bright sunny day greeted us for the last event of
the Burley “summer” festival; to wit- the fell race up t’moor and the runners
congregated around the cordoned-off cricket pitch under the strange glow of a
bright ball in the sky. A pig was quickly sacrificed to appease the Gods to
make sure the ball didn’t destroy us and 14 Fellandalers (I’m including the
pesky second-claimers) signed the sheet to promise not to sue anyone if they
died with their leg in the air as they were fully aware that fell running is a
bloody silly pastime.
The race director gave us all a chat and warned us that the
gates on the lower part of the course that were usually opened for the race
were this year padlocked, meaning that we would have to vault the gates or use
the stiles if we didn’t get there first.
For the start, there was, of course, no to-do and off we
went around the pitches for a quick right turn out of the car park, through the
cars and down the track.
Paul Heely raced in to an unexpected lead followed by
Patrick and myself a little way behind. We weaved down the thin farm tracks,
across the fields and skidded down the final path to the road crossing before
beginning the leg-burning climb up the moor.
Whereas I have traditionally been a terrible climber, I have
recently seemed to have found my hill
legs and can now finally run up hills (at least for a while) and about ¾ of the
way up the first climb, I over took Paul. I kept catching the odd glimpse of
Patrick up in front through a curtain of sweat, but never with any hope of
catching him.
This was the third time I have done this race and by far the
driest conditions, but that didn’t mean that it wasn’t still pretty muddy. I
tried to keep moving as smoothly as I could, but despite that, I was caught by
Monica from Wharfdale not long before reaching the top. She immediately became
my target for the race. I went straight back past her and we hit the dry, fast
track along the top that has a gentle downhill. I could hear her on my tail the
whole way and each time she caught me and pulled level I put in a spurt and
moved away. I put in a 3:40 kilometre to try to keep my position.
As we hit the turn at Burley gate I could see Patrick. He
had already turned back and was a way up the track, probably a good minute in
front. I turned the bend and tried to power up the hill but the fast downhill
had taken its toll and I was struggling to keep the speed up. We passed the
Mountain rescue Land Rover which is there every year and always makes me
chuckle; it doesn’t really fill you full of confidence but I’m certainly glad
it was there.
At the very bottom corner of the race with the last turn
around point, I could see Patrick again and he was powering away up the hill, a
long way in front.
Going up the hill I was now moving slowly and knew that at
any time today’s nemesis (Monica) would pass me being much better at climbing
than me and sure enough she did. I was then surprised to be over taken by
another lady running for Ilkley that was powering up the hill and at a guess I
would have said she was a V50.
I was doing my best to hold on knowing that the rest of the
route was very up and down and that I would be able to put in a very good spurt
down the steep final descent and would probably catch up some time on the
technical rocky sections
To my surprise I over took the Ilkley lady not long before
the descent and as soon as we started to go down, I shot past Monica and
another couple of runners.
Now it was all about getting down the muddy slope and unlike
last week at Shepherd’s Skyline, I seemed to have something left and was able
to keep up some speed. I could hear Monica right up behind me all the time and
my mind was screaming at me to slow down or give up, but I just didn’t want to
give up my position.
Each time we hit the hard packed paths I knew I had to go
hard as everyone else would be and I was holding my place, not catching the
runners in front, but those behind didn’t seem to be gaining.
At one fence I decided that going through the kissing gate
would cost me too much time so I awkwardly threw myself over the gate. At the
final stile I tried to bound over it in a quick movement and I slipped badly as
I went up it, then slipped again as I came down, but managed to keep my feet.
Eventually we hit the last bit of track to the cricket
pitch. I was still fully expecting someone to put in a quick sprint and pass me
before the end so I put in a sprint of my own down the field and was extremely
relieved when I crossed the line with no one passing me. I had managed 2 final
kilometres of 3:44.
I turned around after finishing expecting to see Monica
right behind me, but actually it was the Ilkley lady that had been right behind
me and in fact Monica didn’t finish for another couple of minutes. “I can’t run
downhill to save my life” she explained afterwards.
I had finished in 53:35 (Second lady) an improvement on my
previous effort by 1 minute 23 seconds which was obviously pretty pleasing,
especially given the closed gates.
Patrick had finished in 51:56 and Paul came through a couple of minutes
behind me in 57:07 (Times taken from strava, not the official times yet as they
aren’t out!) *My official time: 53:38 for 39th place out of 222 finishers.
Jed came through about a minute after Paul with his patented
“Massive sprint finish to overtake at least one person whilst wildly out of
control and very nearly demolishing the finishing funnel” move
Next was Phil Steel then in no particular order, Carl,
Stephen Carter, Tanya, Laura, Kat, Simon and Sarah Glover.
We stood around for some pictures for social media and a hot
beverage included in the price (Bargain!) before heading home to hot baths,
muscles rubs and crazy pugs (at least in Tanya’s case) no doubt contemplating
Pendle hill next weekend.
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