Old County Tops 2025 – Race report by Josie
On Saturday, I headed to the Lake District to do Old County Tops Fell Race. Organised by Achille Ratti and it’s massive team of helpers, it’s the longest & possibly one of the toughest races in the fellrunner calendar. This is largely down to the distance of 36miles and the amount of climb involved at over 10,000ft.
Also, as a fell race, it’s route isn’t defined so runners must navigate in pairs often over rough terrain.
With my usual partner Tony Marlow recovering from his operation, I joined forces with my good running friend Kat Klunder from Chorley AC. I was definitely the weakest link in this partnership but Kat assured me, she was still recovering from her podium finish at the Fellsman 2 weeks previous.
The weather forecast was set to be pretty warm for the day with temperatures already high for the start of the race at 8am!
We set off from Great Langdale alongside around 126 teams, all smothered on sun cream. The route traverses the fells over to Grasmere before a long, gradual climb up to Helvellyn. The steep descent down to Wythburn that follows can ruin your legs for the entire race. So we took care not to go too fast here.
On the following section up and over to Angle Tarn, the heat escalated with no breeze. It began to feel like I was in an oven sapping my energy and making me feel unwell. This isn’t uncommon in ultra distance running so I kept moving forward knowing it would pass.
For the next hour I struggled to eat, drink, talk and run until my energy eventually returned.
Before long, we were summiting Englands tallest mountain, Scafell Pike. Possibly the busiest too on a sunny day!
Descending Scafell Pike is quite perilous, but for me, it’s a massive mental positive with only 5 miles of good running to the next Checkpoint at Cockley Beck for an egg butty and a cup of tea!
Following the very quick refreshment stop, it’s a 2mile climb onto the top befoe the final push up Coniston Old Man.
For many, this is the most unpleasent part of the race but Kat and I were well fuelled, catching and overtaking people.
The lure of the finish from here feels amazing. 7 miles of mainly runnable fell and we were chasing every pair of runner’s that we saw.
The last half mile on the road felt like forever but, crossing the finish line back in Langdale was all I’d thought about the whole way round!
Kat and I finished in 10:01hrs to be presented with the coveted County Tops t-shirt and a bespoke OCT stoneware mug for winning our category. Who’s up for it next year? 😎😎
