January 2014

Sorry for the long absence. Life's too busy these days and blogging has taken a back seat as you no doubt noticed. I shall attempt to catch up taking a month at a time.

2014 continued busier than ever with a Woodbank Parkrun on Sat 4th and:

Sun 05/01. Belle Vue Racers Hit The Trail 5mi.
This has become a firm favourite of mine as a post-festivity lurch back to reality. A trail race with mud and a few short sharp climbs thrown in for added entertainment, it winds its way around Reddish Vale Country Park and finishes with an uphill kick to the finish. 'snogardnet' was at the finish to capture the uphill pain. I just about held off my pursuers.

Sat 18/01. The Hebden 22mi.
Another massive turnout of competitive runners for what was originally conceived as a walking event, but they don't mind. In fact they welcome us because we are polite and courteous and we don't eat much checkpoint food. :-) Yours truly put in a PW performance of 4:44, but the course was slightly lengthened by a couple of reroutes and it was, of course, an utter mud-fest. It was good to see Steve Foster out there with his pooches to cheer us on.

Steve gives encouragement on the reroute to the finish.

My pictures are here.

SportSunday were out in force as usual taking some amazing pictures considering the poor light conditions.

Following the event we had our Runfurther relaunch meeting across the road in the Dusty Miller. The phoenix rose from the ashes. Long Live Runfurther!

Runfurther lives with a more certain future. 

Sun 19/01. Lamb's Longer Leg 5k fell race.

Race 1 in the Hayfield Championships and my first race as a Glossopdale Harrier as second claim club for fell racing. The weather gods finally smiled on us for our steep slog in the hills above The Lamb Inn. With yesterday's Hebden in the legs there would be no PB today.

My new family.

My pictures.

Sat 25/01. Kinder Trial fell race.

Race 2 in the Hayfield Championships, this is an orienteering race from Hayfield in the foothills of Kinder Scout. It was long and tough this year with 16 controls and over 13 miles. For a change there was no snow, just water and mud. In contrast to previous year's 'headless chicken' running around, I backed off and gave myself time to navigate before starting to run. Result? Big PB and highest ever placing for this event - a top half finish no less, which is always hard to come by in fell races. Picture below was captured by competitor Stephen Burt. Nice one Steve.

My pictures.