A Grand Day Out
Devil's Burden Relay Hill Race 23/01/10
We did this race last year and had such a good time decided to rally the troops again to put in a team. Cath duly took on the mantle of organiser (and it takes some organising this race as the logistics of getting a team together and organising the pick up and drop off of
team members at the different start and finish points are a bit hairy at times!)
Peter and Richard had gamely taken Cath on a recce of the 3rd and most challenging leg the weekend before, in waist high snow! Luckily come race day it was mostly gone leaving some lovely gloopy mud to run through. 2 of the 4 legs are run with 2 people possibly with the idea that surely 2 are less likely to get lost en route! Cath and I were a bit worried as we were to run leg 3 which last year tested even Amanda and Mary who are both good hill runners.
So after meeting the team at Barnton and decanting ourselves and our luggage (most of which was food, I don't know where we thought we were going that required so much Christmas cake and jelly babies!) into 2 cars we headed off to Fife. We arrived at Falkland and bumped into Rachel, Alex and Lynn Morrice who had had to join with Musselburgh Running club to get in a team.
This year there was a 9.30am start and a 10am start so the slower teams could get a head start and give the later starters someone to chase. We waved Louise and Eileen off on the first leg which is straight into the ascent of East Lomond. This leg is 4.4 miles long and climbs 425 mtrs. The rest of the team found a cafe and had tea and pancakes!
After a bit of a panic getting to the Hall reservoir just outside Leslie we arrived just in time to see Eileen and Louise come in and send Jenny off with her christmas cracker compass and soggy map! I should let Louise and Eileen tell their own story but lets just say don't just follow other runners, they could be going the wrong way!
Jennys section was a 3.5 mile run to Scotlandwell with 237mtrs ascent, she put in a storming run and gained us some valuable time.
Next off was Cath and I, straight up along the side of Bishopshill and heading towards West Lomond. This route is 6.4 miles with ascent of 563 mtrs. There are some quad bursting climbs but also a lot of good fast (for us) running. We did well until we got a little mislaid (not lost you understand) between Devils Burden and West Lomond. However after a bit of peering down a steep cliff wondering how to get down we bumped into other runners who had also gone the wrong way. We found the next check point and carried on. We did lose a fair bit of time there and lost the advantage Jenny gave us. (Sorry Jenny).Still we both really enjoyed the run and we were already discussing which hill race to do next, unfortunately we are both away on holiday for the Carnethy 5 this year.
Arriving just a bit tired at Strathmiglo we handed the baton (a piece of waterproof paper we had to punch at each checkpoint) to Janis who set off on the 'glory leg'. This stretch is 4.8 miles with 217 mtrs ascent. By this time Janis had been hanging around for hours and just wanted to get going. Her run along a lonely forest track was a stormer and she beat her time from last year by several minutes. We watched her race over the finish line from the comfort of the car as it was pishing down by now, but we did brave the elements to get a team photo. We also realised that we had to get back to the village hall in 1 car and there was now 6 of us so we put Jenny in the boot and headed back into the village for homemade soup. Then home for a warm bath and everyone out to an Indian restaurant to drink much deserved wine and eat large amounts of curry.....fab!
I don't think the girls will mind me saying that we are not the fastest runners but we are up for a challenge and running can always throw up challenges, it's good to do things that scare you a little because when you complete something like that it makes you feel a little bit taller! And you can eat cake!
Report and photos Lynn Hanley
