Race report by Shutters:
Organised by CraggRunner ie ‘Darren’ it is 1 of about 11 races he organises around Saddleworth, Littleborough, Cragg Vale, Hebden Bridge areas. The races i have run have all used live tracking via an ankle tag which must be the future for longer races especially in winter, pre-entry was £14 but i turned up on the day and paid £18, electronic tagging, 1 water/sweet CP, and at the end soup, lots of flapjack, caramel cake, not bad at all, oh and a bottle of Beer.
The race is described as a classic fellrace in the making. Visiting the worse and best that Calderdale has to offer! Starting with a steep tarmac uphill from the Hinchcliffe Pub towards the delightful bogs of Sunderland Pasture, onwards to Stoodley Pike, runners head over the moor along the Pennine Way and then over to cross the B6138 Cragg Vale Rd, heading towards Great Manshead Hill and then following the route back towards the Hinchliffe Arms. Each checkpoint must be visited in the correct order and all participants must follow the route marked on the map. The start and finish will be flagged.
And he wasn’t wrong, it was a fairly tough opening few miles climbing upwards before we entered Sunderland Pasture which is a bog fest, like going from Noon Hill to the Pike mid winter, but wetter. I was soon covered in West Yorkshire bog. There was a cool breeze but the sun was out and visibility was good. Running up to Stoodley Pike the runners thinned out and we hit a 4 mile flat section of flagged paths around several ressys, i actually put more effort in here and was catching runners up, a bit of a novelty for me. This was perhaps the worst part of the race, flat and hard paths making my hip joints rattle. At Blackstone edge Ressy we crossed the road and headed towards Manshead Head Trig Point where we were subjected to a 10 min deluge before clearing agin to sunshine. I was running with a guy from Barnsley and we figured we had 5k to go, only a Park Run and most of that would be downhill or flat, no more climbing. As we descended from the Trig we hit a 1 mile road section and again the old hip joints were grumbling, however we came to what Darren said was the last section flagged to the finish and he was spot on, flags every 10m all the way to the finish, no-one could take the wrong turn here! I remebered some of this section as part of The Hebden route but alot dryer than mid January.
At the finish there was a bottle of beer, soup and lots of flap-jack/cake etc. Darrens races are well organised, lots of information about the race, maps etc and live tracking. I have my eye on a few more of his races for next year.
