Sunday 16 January 2011

1559 (answers on a postcard)

A good week running, but no races to report on.

Last year was all about one thing for me, getting around the Bob Graham Round, and as a result, every time I stepped out onto the fell the only thing on my mind was the BGR.
Looking back, the reccying and long days out were brilliant. One of my favourite long days out was the Ullswater round, which I did in some awful conditions, but it was so good to run into Pooley Bridge feeling very strong, after some 9 hours after I had left. My account for the day can be read here.

At the moment I am down to help out on 4 BGs this year, maybe 5. Looking forward to them all.

Also has a result of all my prep for the BGR  I missed a few fell races, I think I did 4 before it, one of them was the 3 peaks in Yorkshire. I have entered again to see if I can beat my time from last year, which was 3.39. To get near 3.30 would be fantastic, but I wont be too hard on myself if I don't. I very much doubt that we will get conditions as good as last year.
The last 3 years has all been about fell running for me, I cant think of anything better - I love it - even being on my own and running onto new tops, getting home and retracing my steps on a map. Brilliant. ( I need to get to the pub more, I think)

I have got a new route (for me) planned to run on the Ullswater Fells that I have been wanting to do for a while now. I thought I would maybe do it this weekend but the weather was too crap for a long day out on the hills so instead I parked my car In Pooley Bridge and ran up to Loadpot. The wind and rain was in my face all the way up and it took me 57 mins , about 10 minutes longer then normal, but as soon as I turned at the cairn ,I flew back down in 32 minutes.


Yesterday I met up with Steve Angus at Talkin tarn near Brampton for a very wet, very windy  very hilly 15 mile road run. The plan was to run the 15 miles at a steady pace , but with about 3 miles to go I realised Steve had dropped back a few meters, so wanting my revenge on him by beating me last week at the XC, I upped my pace slightly. He didn't react to my invitation to race and I got back to the cars some 3-4 minutes before him. Steve is a proper road runner who trains proper, eats proper and is too long in the tooth to react to my foolishness, unlike Stevie B, who takes no encouragement at all.

A fine example of this was on Wednesday night where, along with Sam, we opted out of the 400m reps and instead ran all the steep hills in Penrith. We all agreed at the start that we would take it easy, we all lied and some 8o mins later we were on our knees back the club house, even running on the flats we were trying to keep up with each other, good fun nonetheless though.

On Monday I again went to the local tri club, where we did some, yep, you guessed it, hill reps!

So not a bad week, admittedly there is more road miles then fell miles at the moment, but with the weather and dark nights I am trying to push on them as hard as I can. A bit of speed wont do anybody any harm.

3 comments:

Mountain Kat said...

I know, I know!! I'm 1544! Well done again Stu! Kat

Stu Stod said...

Yeah!
Well done Kate - I mean 1544!!
Hope you have another good year!

Dawn said...

Give a shout out on those BG dates you're helping with, maybe I can come out for a few sections and get to know the route!