Borrowdale Fell Race

For a change I did a race in the Lakes that I had actually done before – the classic Borrowdale Fell Race (17 miles, 6500 feet). Usually there is quite a good turnout of Westies, but this year it was only Graham Kelly and myself with others injured and racing elsewhere. There were almost 400 runners lined up on the road in Rosthwaite for the start in warm and very humid conditions. The first few miles are flat tracks in a sort of loop which helps sort the field out a bit before the first steep climb up to Bessyboot, which was tough going in the sweaty conditions, a slow power walk of sorts being favoured by most people. After that 1st checkpoint there was a few miles of good cross country style running across the slopes of Glaramara, everyone just following the trod that we hoped was leading us to Esk Hause in the misty conditions. From there it was a bit of a tedious slog up to England’s highest mountain – Scafell Pike. The rocks towards the top were treacherously slippy and I passed at least one runner bandaging a bloody leg. This is the type of terrain that you just accept will be slow and horrible and I just got on with it, knowing there was plenty of race left to make up time if I was up for it. From Scafell Pike everyone seemed to take the “dangerous” scree run off the top, very reminiscent of the descent off the 1st pap on Jura. Full body armour would be very useful here, but in the absence of that you just have to be very careful and have your wits about you. I narrowly avoided being decapitated by a rock the size of my office desk that had been dislodged above me, but fortunately it just stopped short of me. After that fun and games there is the Corridor Route to follow for a mile or two, with its mixture of rocks, slabs, gullies, man-made paths, wet grass requiring total concentration lest you trip and give the Lakeland rock a Glasgow kiss. There were hordes of people at Styhead Tarn waiting to watch us labour up the long climb to Great Gable. I reeled in a few people ahead of me here and thought that this was the makings of a second half charge, but that wasn’t to be as after this I started to weaken a bit and struggled to hold on to the group ahead as we meandered our way over a few misty bumps and down to Honister Pass. This last climb up Dalehead is a real killer after 3 and a half hours and I plodded slowly up, step-counting 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8 all the way up. Fortunately others were feeling even worse than me and I passed Ross McInroy of Helensburgh A.C. having a wee sit down half way up. There is still a beast of a descent down to the finish from here and I gave it all I could on my tired legs as I tried to get within 4 and a half hours, just failing by 3 minutes. I wasn’t too disappointed, however, as it is an achievement to just get round this toughie, and I was also pleased to have recovered from my bug/fever that had laid me low for a week recently. Graham had a good race to finish 10 min ahead of me. Simon Booth of hosts Borrowdale won the race for the 10th time in a row, but in his slowest time, the conditions having taken their toll on his time which was just over 3 hours. I passed
on the steel band in the marquee in favour of a few beers in the pub garden and some banter with some other runners. All in all another great day out in the Lakes.
Results here