View From the Back of the Field

My body aches.

So the novice fell runner that I am, got to run a proper hard core, long, fell race today. I had a simple aim, to finish and was happy to do so and despite the painful parts of it all absolutely loved the running, the fells, the company on the run and the beer in the pub afterwards.

An early start, my Bingley running mates picked me up and we scooped up earthdreamer on the way past and headed off to the Lakes. I was out of the house 12hours and I don't think we stopped talking except when we were running all day. Most excellent company and conversation.

Prerace we had a mini blipmeet, meeting Pauline andIan Charters who are as lovely as you'd expect. It was a brief meetup as Ian, Bob and I had pain to endure.

I set myself a time goal which I came in under and have learned somethings for the next time I'm racing, I need to loose some weight, get stronger going up, and learn to descend - I was often overtaking going up hill but overtaken coming down. This is was a notch or 2 up from road racing in terms of demand but also reward, and I know that Jura is a 2 or 3 rungs further up the ladder. But mission accomplished today.