Old County Tops.

Hello 🙂

This is a mini-blog-ette.
Not a full blow ramble-on-a-thon, just a lightning quick write-up of the grand day out that is THE OLD COUNTY TOPS FELL RACE.

Other stuff.

The gorgeous summer-like-spring, (but we do need some rain!)
A successful and semi-enjoyable car boot sale (after saing “NEVER AGAIN” at Rufforth in winter 2004).

The Old County Tops

I was born (a long time ago) in Westmor(e)land, in 1974, Westmorland (Wrestling in long johns with fancy undercrackers) joined forces with Cumberland (sausages, mmm) and Furness (Barrow RLFC) to form the mighty CUMBRIA.

All of which was reversed 2 years ago, when Cumbria reverted back to the old 3 counties, a rant I won’t even begin here.

The Old County Tops are the highest points in each county. In Westmorland it was/is Helvellyn, in Cumberland it was/is Scafell Pike and in Furness it was/is Coniston Old Man. In 1988 Achille Ratti Climbing Club hatched the idea of linking up all 3 tops in a fell race, starting and finishing in Great Langdale with a distance of 37 miles and 10,000ft of up and down, (59.5km with 3049m of climbing). A grand day out!

My mate John and I had chatted about having a crack at the race a while ago. It is the longest A race in the FRA calendar and was planned as my “A” race of the year.
Up to April things were going well, then the usual suspects (niggles and dodgy guts) started rearing their ugly heads and suddenly it was time for kick-off, now or never!

We went up to Great Langdale on the Friday night, the A65 stretched out 105 miles into a 4.5hr journey, but we were there. Me running, the girls marshalling/helping out. The Langdale hut was a hive of activity.

Dawn dawned into a beautiful day.

There is a VIDEO at the foot of the page, so I won’t bore you with a blow-by-blow account here, but it was an awesome day out.

The race is expertly organised by ARCC and it was an extra bonus to see the girls at Cockley Beck, (they were working on the feed station).

Windy on the tops and hot in the valleys, we played the long game.

After chasing the cut-offs, we got in under the 12 hours to get our well earned OCT T-shirts and less than 24hrs later, we had agreed to go back next year. Sub 10 hours maybe 🙂

Pennine Way North…

Providing my knee is moving and my trench foot has cleared up (big ask), a week on Wednesday I will be running/walking/stumbling/rolling/hallucinating my way down the Pennine Way from Kirk Yetholm to Hawes.

How will it go?
I have absolutely no idea at all.
Watch this space!

Raiders round-up

After a last minute draw away against Batley, the mighty Raiders are in 4th position in the league. A tough trip away at Toulouse (hopefully with a win) this weekend.

The Raiders ladies started their Superleague campaign at the weekend, but got off to a bad start with a defeat away at Leigh. No easy games in the top flight.

And finally…

A video that took longer to make than it took to run.
My on-the-run effort, filmed on my phone, trotting round the Old County Tops with my mate John, on a glorious sunny day.
We’ll be back next year!

Thank you for reading/watching.
Until the next time.

Johnny