BG - Leg Three

My Race Mate - Sharon McDonald completed a Bob Graham round a few weekes ago. These are my thoughts having paced Legs Three and Five.

I have a love/hate relationship with Leg Three.  To be blunt, it's the Leg when people usually start to suffer, and often BG attempts grind to halt.  I'd paced this leg twice already this year and both contenders bailed out around Esk Hause and then faced the long trudge down to Wasdale.  On the positive side, this is also the Leg where a successful round starts to build momentum and so the rewards are there for the right person.

Sharon before the start. Very calm ...and trying to sneak a chip?

Weather (and darkness) plays a big part in BG success.  It's well documented that Sharon was blighted with poor weather for her round and I'd sent her a few emails about the 'What if' scenarios of arriving at Dunmail having had a hard night leg.   I was only being pragmatic, in effort to save a wasted drive around to Wasdale ... but suffice to say Sharon didn't respond to my emails. I'd also spent couple of weeks explaining how it is possible to make up a lot of time on Legs Four and Five.

So ... What Happened?  Well the weather was crap and Sharon arrived at Dunmail a little bit down on (23hr) Schedule but in good form and having had good support along Leg Two, especially navigationally from Alex Pilkington.

Being slightly down on a 23hr schedule means you are actually nearly an hour up on a 'Completer Scheduled' and I truely believe that if anyone was to continue on schedule it would be Sharon, due to her strength and ability to cope with bad weather. Our Leg Three went Ok; we were ten or fifteen minutes behind two Irish runners leaving Dunmail and slowly caught them over the next few hours, mainly because Andy Jackson and myself are good navigators and we have a lot of local knowledge and experience. The Irish lads did really well considering they were self navigating with little local knowledge.

Conditions were poor but not too horrendous. It was windy and blustery, but there were breaks in the rain so it wasn't as bad as it had been on Leg Two, but cold enought to make me stop and point and extra fleece layer on and warm gloves.  (We probably lost a few miuntes here as I struggled with numb fingers)

It's an Alien? - No Sharon approaching dawn.

Basically, my aim was to continue sustaining a good pace, maintaining good form in terms of mind and body and not losing any more time due bad navigation, not eating or drinking etc.  Sharon was going well; both Andy and myself thought so, but I confess that I had forgotten to bring a schedule so was bluffing abit when Sharon asked me once or twice about times.   Sharon did say that she found the ascent of Bowfell hard, which was the only time she made any negative comment.

I really believe that the 'average 23hr' scheduled available form the BG website is too fast for Leg Three, especially over the high Peaks from Esk Pike to Scafell. So, 'Yes' we did lose some time but it wasn't too much and we were moving as well as we could given the wet rocks and blustery conditions. Broad Stand was not possible due to the weather but we blasted up Lord's Rake instead.  The only time I felt we were a bit slow was coming down from Scafell. We didn't seem to find the best path, but Sharon showed no signs of weakness or slowing apart from taking a painkiller on the final descent from Scafell.

I know Sharon was a bit worried about the time, but with two legs still to go and a slowly improving weather window the chance of succes was still high.  However, everyone has a bad patch somewhere on their BG, and I believe this happened on Leg Four?  Indeed, as I was mentioning this possibility to Graham and Jill, (her excellent roadside support) we saw Sharon climbing steadily up Yewbarrow with a few uncharacteristic pauses.

Cut to Honister and I was a bit surprised that she was arriving with just over three hours for the final Leg Five.  Three hours is OK, and any less can be a bit scary.  Meeting Sharon part way up Grey Knotts it was eveident that she was again moving very well, and talking with her pacers she had gone through her bad patch as was now running well, being able to descend as well as climb strongly.

A good strong climb up Dalehead and then run around towards Hindscarth proved that she was gaining on schedule and the 24hr target was safe as long as she kept moving. Sharon had a big support team on Leg Five, so lot's of good banter, but she was now very sore with a painful knee. We managed to get very good runnable lines all the way down to the road and had just over the hour for the five miles of tarmac. Easy ...just keep jogging on the flat and walk the up hills!


Some people really suffer badly on the final run-in, and I've also seen people fight much tighter deadlines. Sharon had about 10-20 minutes spare as we passed Newlands and climbed towards the Swinside Inn. I'm not really sure what was going on in her head at this point, but at some point she asked me if she would make it, to which I jokingly replied. 'Maybe? quickly followed by a more accurate prediction as she grimaced and glared at me.

'Of course you'll do it.' I replied.  Which is something I'd be saying for a few months really.

Marmot Dark Mountains

What an amazing night!  I've never been so proud to have finished an event, and never worked so hard for such long periods of slog.  The conditions were truely tough. Basically there was around 15-20cm of old soft snow lying with some big sheets of ice underneath. As the thaw came in it produced deep, soft, wet slush, giving very cold feet, coupled with frequent showers of rain and sleet and strong winds.
 
I was well psyched for this; I needed a good hard event and navigation and endurance are my strong points.Footwear had been a worrying choice as some form of water resistant socks would be neccessary, but ones I could get in some mountain running shoes.  I decided to use a good quality thin wool sock inside some stretch Goretex socks from Berghaus. My shoe choice was Inov-8 315 with give a bit more room than my usual choice of Mudclaw 300.

While I'm talking kit, I'll run through my list as it seems to have been key in our success. I wore a pair of full weight (nearly new) Powerstretch legs with Montane Mimimus over trousers throughout. Early on I was too warm in these but not later as the night worn on.  My body was clad in four layers; Helly Hanson Wool Mix Lifa zip, Patagonia Capalene3, Montane Krypton Jacket, and a Montane Atomic waterproof.  I mention these by name solely to illustrate just what thickness of winter warmth I needed.  My comparison, my partner Sharon wore a Paramo Velez smock over a good base layer and was OK as well, although she did think of addding a mid-layer at times but conditions weren't conducive to adding more layers.

The rest of the kit is pretty straight forward.  Soft shell gloves were Ok; they got very wet, and I had expected to change them for Power Stretch gloves and waterproof over mitts but never made the switch. A buff inside the Krypton and Atomic hoods was fine, so my Windstopper helmet liner stayed in the sac. I also carried a Montane Extreme Smock in case things got really bad.

There is a short video of us and others on the Start Line - Aren't we excited!
 
A Petzl Myo XP lasted most of the night and gave adequate field of vision for most of the time in misty conditions. Sharon did have an high output 'Aye-Up' head set which was useful at times, when the cloud cleared.  Just a quick tip here - I usually have my headtorch underneath my hoods so as to keep the warm and as dry as possible. Batteries do last a bit better this way and the headband of your torch doesn't suffer as much damage and wear through constant wetness and the whole lot stays a bit lighter.

I was also respectful of the conditions and would consider pulling out if neccessay. Certainly after the first few hours I did voice my concerns about safety to Sharon, but she was very keen to go on were both warm and confident in our gear.

But it's not just about the gear, but the ability to navigate effectively and efficiently.  One of the downsides of the conditions was that our pae was slow, as it was so hard to run anyway, even downhill!  Therefore, excellent navigation from both of us gave us a strong and confident feeling.  There was a manned control on the Corney Fell road, but the marshals had walked into here for several miles and so a lift back, or even a walk back along the road would have been just as bad as continuing, given the frozen sludge on the road!

And we were still going strong.  We were eating well, with Sharon stoking me up with Pepperoni pizza slices in exchange for Stainsbury's Granola slices.  Eating was becoming a chore, probably due to dehydration as it was difficlut to collect fresh running water. When you did cross a stream way you wanted to get clear of the knee deep marshy edges in order to protect the deep cold numb feeling in my toes. It wasn't until the later stages when we were on the lower western slopes and where the snow had retreated that flowing streams were more common. However, by then each stream crossing had to be treated with caution as they were swollen and often inpassible.

We did make one navigational mistake. We missed control No.17 (stream junction - 137922)  in the dark, just before the cold eerie light of dawn.  It was tricky control being a long way from any clear 'attack point', and we should have used a more cautious approach from the road at Backbarrow Bridge (on the Corny Fell road)   This was very annoying but was a combination of tiredness and complacency, and required a very frustrating and time consuming relocation back to the upper reaches of Back Barrow Beck. A combined and very cautious joint effort of compass bearing, altimeter and pacing evenutally located the control.

At this stage I as at my lowest ebb; it had already been a long night and we'd now been out for 12hours. There was several kilometres to go, and despite the fact were were generally heading for home the terrain was still very hard going with big patches of wet snow, swollen streams and rocky ground.  My feet and ankle were sore, by back sore, and my wrists increasingly painful from the use of trekking poles.  Incidentally, the use of poles did effect my navigation at times, but Sharon is a competent navigator and I don't think I would have survived without poles.  I'm not sure we got the best line between 18-19, and the finish at Muncaster Castle could be seen just off to our left but there was no way of not finishing now.  The swollen streams around control 23 gave us one last little annoyance before a very long and sore plod through water logged rough pasture to the final control.

A very welcome surprise awaited us in the finish barn - a cup of tea, well several cups of tea and a handful of biscuits - before a 2km walk back along the road.  A even bigger surprise awaited us at the event centre, when we found out that we were only the third pair to finish the Elite course, with our friends Kim and Alex assumedly winning the class and I guess Gary Thompset and partner also ahead of us.  (At the time of writing the results aren't yet published on the web.) There had been a big drop out rate in all classes due to the extreme conditions, but everyone had returned safe and well having made sensible 'SMJ' decisions - Sound Mountain Judgement.

So, an epic event but the sense of satisfaction on finishing is huge.  My finger tips and toes are a little numb, whci may just have been the cold, or probably due to bruising from plunging through deep snow or extreme trekking pole action.

Many, many thanks to Shane and his team - Charlie, Dr Mike, Jez, Dave, the Tea Angels and several more, including those I've missed out.  And a big thanks to Sharon for an excellent night on the fells.

OK, time for a brew ...and a snooze.