‘This is a proper fell race,’ a fellow runner declared in the minutes before the Box Hill fell race. ‘Proper’ fell race? In Surrey? On a 224-metre hill? How I scoffed. A scoff of a man who believed he was qualified to scoff, a veteran of Ben Nevis, Jura and Slioch – actual ‘proper’ hill races….
Tag: hill running
Ben Nevis Race 2010
Eroded and overcrowded it may be, but I’ve grown fond of Ben Nevis. It was the first Munro I climbed, as a brief walking interlude while cycling between John O’ Groats and Lands End on a snowy May day in 2003. I climbed it with my girlfriend, now fiancée, two years later, with swirling mist obscuring any…
An electrifying day on the Malverns, literally
It is the last thing a runner needs, particularly at the end of a hard, long training session: to be electrocuted. I was coming off End Hill at the northern extent of the Malvern Hills when I stepped over a low fence. My T-shirt, which was hanging from my shorts, must have brushed the wire, for a split second later…
Training for the Ben Nevis race…
… in central London. Not easy, not easy at all. Still, I’m trying to do the best I can with what is at my disposal. The absence of hills of any great height or length – you would have thought there could be at least one Munro, even a rubbish one, in London – means I…
Cioch Mhor hill race
Contrary to popular belief, the winner of the Cioch Mhor race is not the fastest runner, but the man who has the least regard for his testicles. Today’s race crossed a succession of barbed wire fences. It’s nothing to worry about for the veterans. They have had children. I wouldn’t mind being a father one day. No…
Beinn Bhuidhe Mhor
Highland Cross bumf has arrived, asking some honest questions. Have you prepared to walk, jog or run across 20 miles of rough terrain? No. Are you prepared to then climb on your bike and ride for a further 30 miles, many of them up and down steep hills? Definitely not. I’m being a little dramatic….
Knockfarrel hill race
Perhaps I’m being unnecessarily hard on myself, but the more I run the worse I seem to get. Take today’s effort: the Knockfarrel hill race, a 5.5-mile run up to the Pictish hillfort and Cnoc Mor overlooking Strathpeffer. I ran last year’s race with precious little hill training in my legs and naive to the demands of such…
Cioch Mhor
Cioch Mhor today, a 482m hill below Ben Wyvis. Starting from Tulloch Castle in Dingwall, we followed a track west, then up a dead-straight road to Drynie. Soon we were on Tulloch Hill, climbing steeply along farm tracks. Eventually the gradient eased, with the path snaking to the trig pillar atop 339m Cnoc a’ Bhreacaich. From…
Craig Dunain hill race
And so the Highland hill running season is underway: Craig Dunain, a 5.5-mile dash to a 900ft summit, a glorified cross-country for purists, a useful test of early spring form for the rest. Things started going wrong for me 24 hours before the race. ‘Jonny Muir should lead the charge’, wrote the Inverness Courier’s esteemed athletics…
Craig Dunain
Up Craig Dunain again, yet again. There is no other hill or mountain I have climbed so frequently, at the moment three times a week. And why not? The hill is a perfect training ground within easy running distance of Inverness. Craig Dunain – all 288m of it – doesn’t look terribly impressive in this photograph, but it’s a…
Ben Nevis Race – in!
I’m in! I’ve got a place in the Ben Nevis Race, the pinnacle of the Scottish hill racing season. I’m excited, yet nauseous.
Ben Nevis race 2010
I’ve entered the Ben Nevis race. That doesn’t mean I’ll get a place. That wasn’t meant to rhyme. I’ve just put an application in the post. Hopefully, the local yobs don’t torch the pillar box containing my neatly folded entry form and cheque tonight, which, in the part of Inverness I live in, is a possibility….
Heights of Madness 