GREAT LAKELAND 3 DAY EVENTJohn Walmsley and Keith Henderson
Last year Keith and I did this event in idyllic weather, and using an extremely unusual piece of mountain marathon equipment called “sun cream”. This year was to be rather different.
To be fair, the weather wasn’t bad, just a little reminder that mountain marathons are supposed to be a genuine test. Race HQ was at Pooley Bridge at the NE end of Ullswater and over the course of the three days we did a complete circumnavigation of the Lake, plus a foray into the Helvellyn range. The two night’s camping were in Grizedale near Patterdale village.
Keith and I were in the “Café” class, the softest option with 62km and about 3000m of climb over the 3 days. Each day really visited at least one Café or pub, although we eschewed actually going inside due to the consequential loss of time. See, we are still competitively minded even if we are getting slower every year! Our brains are worthy of elite mountain runners, but our legs and lungs are more eligible for Team Slowcoach. Operating at a higher level (in more senses than one) were my old friend Nigel Coe who was in the “Wainwright” Class (96km and 5400m), and WIM’s Chris Turner in the “Expert” class (120km and 7000m). Between us we had all the courses covered.
Day 1 highlights were the superb viewpoint of Hallin Fell near Howtown, with extensive views over Ullswater to compensate for the cramp in our thighs from the short but steep climb, and an ascent of Place Fell before descending to Patterdale. The campsite was pleasant enough, but it was a very cold night in which 3-season sleeping bags were not enough despite multiple additional layers of clothes.
Over my orienteering career I have sometimes joked that my ideal race would be in the mountains, with a course that has one control, 1km of distance and 1000m of climb. Well, day 2 got as close to that as I have ever come to date. The actual stats were 3 controls, 24km and 1250m climb (Overnight Camp – 222 – 226 – 227 - Overnight Camp). Have a look at the map and decide which way you would go from control 222 at Grizedale Tarn, to 226 at the pub near Thirlmere. There is a boring way, and a real mountain way. We chose the latter, even though the boring option was clearly quicker, as did most of those in the Café Class. Such is the spirit of the GL3D. That took us to the summit of Helvellyn in a stiff and freezing wind, necessitating gloves and two layers of head cover. As we started to descend we heard a sound not unlike the hiss of a radio that is off tune and realised it was hail stones, albeit very small, as they hit our jackets. The slog from the pub back up to the main ridge between Raise and Stybarrow Dodd seemed to take forever, but we were much happier once we were coasting down through the old mines and enjoying the tranquillity of Lanty’s Tarn. It had been a long day, almost 8 hours, and virtually non-stop.
Once again, the thermometer hovered around zero for the night and it was hard to leave the relative warmth of our sleeping bags in the morning. On the map our course for the final day looked like an anti-climax, following the Ullswater Way for most of its distance. In actual fact it proved to be really rather pleasant, even when we were close to the road because we were equally proximate to the lake. We also sampled the delights of Glenridding Dodd at the start of the day, and the balcony path that traverses the steep re-entrants of Gowbarrow towards the end. The only real downside was Keith’s shoulder which he had badly injured some 5 weeks ago, and which was reacting severely to a third successive day of carrying a rucksack. The same cause had given him two nights of intermittent sleep at the campsite, hardly the best recipe for a multi-day endurance event. But fortified by pain killers he soldiered on, relentless as ever.
Despite glimpses of blue sky though tiny holes in the cloud, suddenly it grew darker and we had the second hailstorm of the event, this time at much lower altitude. We took shelter under some trees for a couple of minutes to avoid the worst, and then made the final push to the finish, chatting to a friendly nurse from Devon as we went. Eventually she broke into a run, and that inspired us to run too (well, jog). We made sure to keep something in reserve for the last 100m of the run-in, as there were a few spectators to impress. Well, you have to keep up appearances, don’t you?
For the record:
Keith and I ended up 40th/41st out of 92 who completed the Café Class on all three days, in a very respectable time of 18h 8min.
My friend Nigel was 77th out of 137 who completed the Wainwright Class on all three days in a very fine 21h 37min.
And finally Chris was 24th out of 28 (plus loads of others who had to drop down a class or two for days 2 and 3) on Expert Class in a brilliant 24h 10min.
