Ras yr Yddfa / Snowdon Race

Not your typical fell race. For starters there are crowds of people at the start/finish to cheer you on, which never normally happens. Then there's a helicopter that follows you up the mountain, filming your every move (assuming you're in 1st place) and most importantly there's the shoes - it's not a race for Walshes and Innov8s, it's more Nike and Reebock. It's pretty much tarmac and rock all the way, grip isn't really a problem, comfort is (comfort, fell running - in the same sentance?).

Thought i was coming down with Swine flu the night before, felt bobbins, couldn' see anyway I'd be racing on saturday, but didn't feel too bad by the morning, just a bit lethargic. All of which disappeared when the race started. I started with Matt but realised that even for my modest aims we were way too far back in the field so put on a burst to move up the field before we left the tarmac when passing would just get harder.

Predictably enough Matt left me soon after we hit the path, but I tried to stop him getting too much of a lead on me. I passed Swiss Schali (aka Patrick Schalbetter) soon after Halfway Station - although he was still with me above Clogwyn, which was about where Emlyn Roberts passed me. This was not a good sign for my personal battle with Emlyn - I figured I needed about 2 minutes advantage on him at the summit to have any chance of beating him.
As the gradient eased off the visibilty dropped to nothing, the path narrowed, the number of walkers seemed to increase and the lead runners started to pass me on their way down. I guessed (fairly accurately) that Matt had summitted 2 minutes ahead of me and reasoned (not so accurately) that I'd easily regain this on the descent. Emlyn ran away from me on the loose section above Clogwyn and I eventually caught Matt at halfway station, but I couldn't shake him and after the tunnel he passed me again as I ran out of puff on the flatter section. I caught up with Matt by the time we hit the tarmac but I didn't think I'd have any chance of keeping up with him over the final 400m through Llanberis. Unluckily for Matt he cramped up on the steep descent before that and finished 8 seconds ahead of him - shades of Lemond vs Fignon on the Champs Elysees? Perhaps not.

Stat-attack:
Summit time: 1:03:58
Stage Position: 165th
Descent time: 31:46
Stage Position: 80th

Overall time: 1:35:43
Overall Position: 127th

I'm happy with that :)

Not quite a road century

I had intended to do a 100 mile road ride yesterday, but it didn't quite happen. Woke up ridiculously early, so I was on the bike at 6.30am, but it was a glorious morning and I was plenty warm enough with just a jersey, arm warmers and gillet. Rolled down to Llanberis, climbed up Pen y Pass in a rude head-wind, then down to Betws y Coed. Shortly after that the GPS batteries died (no, of course I didn't take spares). through Penmachno and past Llyn Celyn to a cafe stop just north of Bala. Then Trawsfynedd, Prenteg, Beddgelert, Penygroes.
The first 95 miles felt fine, the last 4 miles took 30 mins. Felt quite tired afterwards.

99.6 miles
3290m ascent
7h 40m
Max Speed 45 mph
1 malt loaf
3 chocolate brioche
2 boiled eggs on toast

Ras Moel Elio

Mental.
Moel Elio is my local run, from the front door I can be on the summit in 40 mins, so I know it quite well. The race stars in Llanberis tthough, so there's more climbing to do, but that was OK. What was quite definitely NOT OK was the wind that was blowing over the summits - it wasn't quite blowing you off your feet - it would have had to be ooh, about 3mph stronger to do that, but I was blown off course a few times and when it started hailing, well, that just wasn't funny. I estimated the wind speed was 50 - 60 mph, apparently someone measured gusts of 80 mph on the ridge!
Anyway, it was nice to drop off te front of Moel Cynghorion and eventually get out of the wind. For some reason I wasn't happy on the descents, but had a decent run otherwise, finishing 28th in 84:57.

Dyfi Enduro

What a great event - it's so good that virtually everyone I know stayed away this year! No matter, it probably just meant that Saturday night was slightly less beer-fueled, good to catch up with Chipps and Emily though - and Stef & Gemma (eventually).
The course at the Dyfi is a lot of fun - well, the descents are a lot of fun, it helps if you enjoy climbing because there's 3500m of it, but nearly all doable on the Singlespeed.

The numbers:
Distance: 60km
Ascent 3500m
time: 3h43m
Gear Ratio: 32:19
wheels: 29ers

The food:
2 clif gels (first one 20 mins after the start!)
1 flapjack
2 bits of fruit cake
1 chocolate brioche

The pain:
Yes, after 2 and a half hours quads, calves and lower back were aching in unison.

The fun:
Lots of it on all the downhills :)

Looking forward to next year!

3 Peaks Race

24 miles, 1500m ascent.
I've had better days.
Got to Horton reasonably early and was registered by 9am - over an hour before the race start. Went back to the van to get changed and found I'd picked up the bag with cycling shoes in, rather than running shoes - not good. A quick phone call confirmed that the desired running shoes were back at Diane's house in Bentham and they were promptly delivered to me in Horton 7 minutes before the race start.
Up Pen-y-gent was fine. On the way down I was consciously trying to take it easy and was probably being too casual about it until I tripped and landed flat on my face. No real damage done, the bloke behind asked if I was OK and then remarked "well, it looked quite good!". I was feeling fine at Ribblehead and shortly afterwards I passed Cath and then Derek from Tod Harriers and had a few words with them. Started feeling less good as the climb up Whernside steepened. Cath passed me, then Derek and we had a few words. Just below the summit I felt a twinge in my right calf, but nothing serious, had a quick stretch against the wall at the top, because I'd read that it was a good idea to help stave off the "Whernside cramps" and set off along the windy ridge.
At the first stile my right calf locked up - I could see the muscle was in spasm - assumed it was cramp, tried to stretch it off and it calmed down but it didn't go away. Walked on for a bit, stretched some more, shuffled on, stretched again, but it wasn't really getting better - I was going to have to do the rest of the route with just one good leg. Walking was OK, I could do a slow run with short strides, but my right leg wasn't doing anymore than that. It had stopped being a race for me (not sure what I was racing against, but still...) and was just about finishing now. I briefly considered retiring at the Hill Inn, but decided to push on because I could.
Eventually shuffled into Horton in 4h57m, feeling a bit tired and a bit frustrated, which was a bit weird as I didn't have a target in mind - I suppose I just wanted to go as fast as I could - and that didn't happen. But you can't take anything for granted in something like the 3 Peaks. Even though I felt fit enough, strong enough and pretty confident before the start, it's still a hard route and there's plenty of scope for things to go wrong.
Guess I'll have to do it again next year :)

Ras Moel Tryfan

Damn, that was windy!
First race of the Great Arete Tuesday night series last night, a 3m dash up Moel Tryfan from Y Fron. One of the windiest races I've ever done, which certainly spiced things up a bit - almost came to a dead stop at one point when I sort of ran into a wall of wind. No idea where I finished but it felt like I was going OK and I crossed the line in 22m15s - which probably qualifies as the shortest/fastest race I've ever done.

Damn fine weekend

Went for an early run up Snowdon yesterday with Matt as a sort of early practice for the Snowdon Race. Nice steady run up the Llanberis path (well, a fair bit of walking up to and beyond Clogwyn) got to the summit in about 1h10m, had a short faff with shoes and came down in about 40 mins. At the last but one gate a walker asked if there was a good view from the top, I couldn't help laughing and pointed at the cloud which was sitting at about 800m, "no, it's kind of cloudy and windy up there!". If his eye sight was so bad he couldn't see the clouds, why was he bothered about the view? Anyhoo...

Had a short rehab ride with Sue in the afternoon from Capel Curig - Ogwen and back. Dinner at every Londoner's favourite Snowdonia pub - it's never a good sign when your fish pie is vaguely tepid, so I'll not be going back there in a hurry. On a brighter note, stopped off at the Fricsan on the way home for a majestic pint of Purple Moose Glaslyn - so good I had 2 in fact.

Today was another rehab ride with Sue from Bontnewydd to Felinheli, taking in the Garddfon (Hartleys Cumbria Way) and Yr Harbor (er, J20 - no beer worth drinking). Got home and walked down to the Snowdonia Inn with Pippa (Jennings Cocker Hoop).
As if all that wasn't good enough, it hasn't even rained. Brilliant!

3 Peaks Training

Started doing some properish training for the 3 Peaks. Went to Salisbury for 21st/22nd and went out do to a 3 hour run - underestimated how much ground you can cover in the absence of real hills and nearly fell off the map somewhere east of Figsbury Rings. Anyway, pieced together a mostly off road kind of there and back route that took me over the magical 3 hour mark, Tracklogs says it was the best part of 19 miles. Didn't feel too bad afterwards, although a couple of rubbish nights sleep left me feeling pretty lousy for the rest of the week. Ho hum. Really must try some mountain biking down there.

Last weekend I went up to Bentham to do an actual recce of the actual 3 Peaks. Walked up Pen y gent with Pippa on saturday and did a nordic walk / run of the Race route minus Pen y Gent on Sunday in a steady 5 hours. Quite pleased to be feeling OK after that :)

Ras Moel Wnion

I did Ras Moel Wnion (4m, 1500’) on Saturday, which was also Matt’s first fell race. So I wasn’t too happy that new boy had the temerity to pass me on the steep climb up Moel Wnion when I was feeling fairly rubbish. I decided that it was a useful training run even if I wasn’t going so well and it was a nice day to be out anyway so I kept going and felt better as the race went on. Luckily for me, Matt didn’t yet own a pair of fell shoes and was consequently struggling a bit on the steeper descents – and this race has about 3 descents which get progressively more technical, so I was able to catch him coming down off Gyrn. I think I passed a couple of others on the final descent from Moel Faban and finished in an unconfirmed 44m50 – quicker than last year, but the start/finish had moved so there was less ascent this time.

Went for a lovely ride up Drum the next day – IN THE SUN! It was great :)

Long time no blog...

To borrow a line from the marvellous 'Flight of the Concords', when I'm doing interesting stuff I'm too busy having fun to write on my blog. When I've got time to write on my blog, there's nothing much to say. Anyhoo...

Had a flippin ace weekend - did Ras Moel y Ci on Saturday (Sue's first fell race!) which was great. Hadn't done it before - a long steady climb, which was hard because it was all runable, followed by a short techy descent and a mix of mud, rocks, tarmac, fields, missing out the legal short cut through my own general ignorance. Sue comfortably achieved her goal of not coming last and managed a top 10 placing in her catergory, which was better than I managed. Grrr!

Went to Penmachno this morning and met up with SteveM & 360 and ragged it around loops 1 & 2. Just me & Dave really, as Steve's knee wasn't working so he ducked out early on. I made the rash decision to singlespeed it. Weirdly, my legs feel quite tired tonight. New (well, to me) Fox forks on the Karate Monkey and I have to say it went like stink, confirming what I've long suspected - that fully rigid bikes are for cocks! You heard it here first...

Another wet weekend.

Went out for yet another run in the pissing rain yesterday. I almost couldn't be arsed (still recovering from Thursdays TT?), but I felt OK once I was out and did a new circuit - half way to Llanberis, up the bottom bit of Moel Elio back through the ex-forest - about 45 minutes.
Felt inspired enough to go to the Beacon afterwards. Spent ages gassing to Keith & Ray, did some bouldering, got arm pump very quickly. haven't worked out yet if that's the nature of the sport or if I'm doing it all wrong. Better than watching telly though :)

36 minutes of pain

Last night we decided to ride a time trial from Brynrefail to the surge pools. 600m climb over 9.1km. It hurt. My quads were feeling it after about a minute, but I managed to avoid blowing up and got to the top in 36:06. Felt quite sick at the end and it was only this morning that I started talking normally again. Had a feint cough all today as a result of turning my lungs inside out last night. Great fun!

Catch up part 2

Um, another blog gap. Whoops. My sister came up 2 weeks ago and we went to Penmachno for a fun packed Thursday night ride. Well, I say fun, in truth I was captain uncoordinated all night, but managed to not crash through the policy of riding quite slowly. Ho hum.

Went out on the road bikes on the Sunday - Beddgelert, Nantmor, Pen y Pass. Nice circuit marred slightly by a puncture. Time to replace those bag o'shite Michelin Lithions I think. I offered them to Wendy, but she didn't want them...

Last Thursday night I went up Snowdon with Alun. Fanbleedintastic! Up & down the Llanberis path, 2 hours to the summit where it was thick cloud and a bit parky. Alun donned his full body armour gimpsuit and flew down the descent while I didn't really bother trying to keep with him. If there's a better descent in the UK I want to hear about it!

Got up early saturday and took the road bike out for a scenic ride to Bangor via the surge Pools and Bethesda. Met Sue at the Station, sent her off to Manchester and drove home for DIY fun.

Sunday morning Matt came over and we ran up Moel Elio, back via lower Cefn Du. First half decent run for a while and I'm pleased to say it felt fine.

Tuesday night I went out and ran some hill reps on the road. It hurt.

Catch up

Last Thursday night I met Matt at pentir and we rode up Moel Ici, over to Marchlyn, up towards the surge pools, down the quarries to Bus Stop and back over past cliff richard woods and down Moel Ici for a pint at the Vaynol. It was almost like summer for a change, but it didn't last.

Saturday I was chez Stricklands at 7am for a ride with Matt and Gary to check out the local downhill track. Rain was threatening but didn't really happen, but I did manage to be sick near the top of the downhill. Weird. Felt pretty lousy the rest of the day.

Sunday - took Pippa for a 30 min run over the soggy slopes of Cefn du.
Monday - as Sunday.
Tuesday - as Monday.

The Valley is flooded. IT IS FUCKING AUGUST FOR FUCK'S SAKE!

Endura Sleepless in the Saddle

I was just a little trepidacious (is that a word?) about doing a 24 hour race as a pair, wasn't sure if my legs would explode as I hadn't really had a great build up to it. anyway, got down for about 7.30 on friday, parked up and went straight out to ride the course, partly to give my legs a loosener and partly to figure out the course and see if there were any easy sections where I could eat on the go. Bumped into SteveM, Mel & Shaggy setting up camp on my way round, which was handy and that's where I headed after my lap. Figured I'd be lapping in about 60 mins at pairs pace. Luckily me and Emily were in total agreement about strategy - 3 laps on, 3 laps off so we could get a decent rest between rides.
Had a couple of beers and went to bed about 1am.
It pissed it down for much of saturday morning, which didn't bode well, so I opted to use the back-up bike - Surly Karate Monkey (singlespeed being suposedly mud-proof). I started the race with the run and was near enough to the front to not get too badly held up at the first bit of singletrack and by the time I got to the 2nd bit of woods there wasn't really any hold ups at all. First lap in just under an hour and all seemed OK. 2nd lap was different though, the course was much more churned up now and the going was a bit slower. Washing out in the first bombhole didn't help (twisting the bars in the process) then the back wheel stopped turning while pushing up a hill - time to de-clag the sticky mud. Lap 3 was crash-free and I started to carry instead of push through the worst mud, picking mud off the bike as I walked. Then Emily went out for 3 laps and there was more rain.
It was 9.30 when I went out again and the course had deteriorated massively. good job I'd put a skinny CCX tyre on the back. Maybe. After walking virtually all the singletrack - which was now covered in about 4" of peanut butter mud - I got half way around in an hour. This was the opposite of fun and I was reconsidering the 3 lap strategy. After a load more walking I was thinking "fuck this!". Riding bikes is good, endurance events are good, I'll quite happily take myself into a world of pain and exhaustion either on foot or on a bike. Note the 'or' in that last sentance. Bikes are for riding, I have next to no interest in pushing bikes unless there's a reward for the misery (e.g. Snowdon). And while I'm here, I'd like to add that running or riding myself into the ground in Wales, Scotland, Yorkshire, the Alps or Colorado beats the shit out of truding across potato fields in middle englandshire where the views extend to the gravel pits, the container distribution centre and the power station. This was the kind of conclusion I reached in these 2 hours. Can't say I reached a low point or anything, I just decided I couldn't be arsed with such an unsatisying venture. So I finished that lap and had a beer. It was bad. I think I must have passed about 30 people with bikes in various states of fuckedness - most geared bikes seemed to be dying. I heard later that the Shimano boys were fitting 15 rear mechs an hour - which is bonkers.
Emily took it all with good grace and resolved that she'd go out for some laps in the morning. I took a cold shower and downed some more beers with Mel, Shaggy, Steve, Chris and Schali and gave encouragement to Jac in her solo effort.
Had breakfast with Schali, Chipps & Emily and eventually Emily went out for some laps. At this point I had no interest in going out again, but guilt got the better of me and after emily's 2nd lap I went out at 12.30 for another (final) lap. Got back in about 15 mins before the 2pm cut off and Emily took the glory lap, which was fine with me.

So, after taking 10 hours off, we finished 5th! I think a lot of people just quit altogether - broken bikes would have accounted for a lot of riders. Don't think I'll be back to 'ride' it again. Courses like that don't stand up in the wet. In the UK it tends to rain quite often. I'll took for more intersting events next year.

Moel Elio & Marin Time Trial

Went up the Moel on saturday for first time in ages, took it steady, felt OK on the way up, took it very steady on the way down and nothing bad happened.
Went to the Marin trail on sunday to beast myself, which worked a treat. did the loop in 1h43, so there's the target for next time. think I made the Dragon's back in 57 mins.

Plas Menai

last week's thursday night gathering was at Plas Menai to play on the miniture track there. All singletrack, all fun, all over very quickly. 1 km in total. We did it the right way round, the wrong way round, did it again and then time trialled it. Good fun. Then it rained and we went to the bar where it took 30 minutes to pour 5 pints of Guiness.

Llyn Cowlyd

went out last sunday to ride the Cowlyd / Crafnant circuit - 2 superb bits of trail seperated by what feels like about 15 miles of tarmac. Well, it's probably less than 15 miles - 14 maybe? Anyway it's still good. 3h20.

Snowdon Race and deposits in the karma bank

Just got back from watching the snowdon race - the first time I've ever been a fell running spectator. I nordic walked/ran over to Llanberis, watched the start gave a cheer to everyone I knew and to Swiss Schalli, who I don't know, but I do know some people who know some people who ride bikes with him. Power walked up to half way station and helped the marshalls pick up the plastic cups that had been discarded then didn't have too long to wait for the leader to come past on his way down (probably less than a minute after the lantern rouge had passed on their way up!).
Cheered more people on the descent - Espana, Italia, Scotland, Eryri - got sore hands from clapping so much. Saw Iain, Sarah, Hannah and Schalli come past and then started to make my way down. I could run faster than the competitors by now, which made me feel a tad guilty, but i figured at least I wasn't in their way.
Found a guy who'd taken a fall and bust his finger pretty badly, some German tourists were already on the phone to mountain rescue when I got there, trying to get a helicopter for him! Luckily broken finger man didn't need too much persuading to walk himself off the hill. The nice but dim tourists then wanted to bandage it up for him, which seemed pretty pointless as by the time they'd done that he could have walked himself to an ambulance in Llanberis. I think it shows a certain mental weakness to call out a helicopter for a broken finger, with that attitude it's not hard to see why they lost 2 world wars ;-)
Anyway, John (broken finger man), whilst clearly shaken up, could see the sense in getting himself back to Llanberis ASAP so I walked down with him, partly to make sure he was Ok and partly to rescue him from the Germans :) Fair play to him, he was determined to finish the race because he'd been sponsered and once we got to the tarmac he jogged back to the finish.
I nordic ranwalked back home and got quite sweaty.

Le Tour d'Apres Travail

A much anticipated stage that was sure to see some changes in the GC. Before a pedal had been turned though, the news was all about more riders abandoning – following the sacking of their young rider Tom Carter the entire Team Egniol withdrew, which immediately raised questions about some of their recent impressive performances.

The EA team leader Matt Strickland and super-domestique James Camis also failed to make the start line, saying that "with the GC out of reach we're pulling out now to focus on the BBQ, hopefully we can come away from that with a big haul of medallions".

With points available at intermediate sprint stages (30mph signs) it was pretty frantic from the off, Guy bagging the first points at Deiniolen and again at Mynedd Llandegai (even though he didn't even notice that one). Ali pulled back some points at Bethesda as Guy had by this point completely forgotten about the sprints, but was still leading by 5 points as they approached the mountains. A vicious headwind on the climb up the Col d'Ogwen made it difficult for any attacks to go clear, but Ali and Guy worked together to isolate and then drop Craig the only surviving member of the EA team. Ali took the first KOM points and the bunch regrouped for the descent to Capel Curig.

Guy attacked early on the approach to Capel and bagged another 5 points before the feedzone at Plas y Brenin. At the foot of the hors categorie Courmet de Pen y Pass Ali road away from the groupetto to take the second summit of the stage and secure the KOM jersey. He stayed clear on the descent to take the sprint points at Nant Peris but the group reformed on the valley road, before Guy burst away again to easily win the Llanberis sprint. Showing Cavendish-like dominance Guy took the final points at Clwt-y-bont too, the NHS rider winning the green jersey by a massive 15 point margin.

Great BBQ too, thanks to Matt & Asa.