Tracker: https://live.opentracking.co.uk/sabs0720/#
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Fascinating to assess the route being taken. I'd been contemplating linking up all the northern fells in a day run and picking a good circular route seemed impossible. But it's absolutely nothing compared to this.
Some of the out-and-backs on her route look utterly soul-destroying, must take immense mental strength to keep going...
I think there might be a thread about doing Wainwright books in a day. iirc Splatcher, who I don’t think has posted for a while, might have been involved. Could be worth a search Travs
She's run straight through the night, no stops at the road crossings so far. A mutual friend says she's 30 mins up on her schedule. She was 90mins up on Paul at Ennerdale last night (according to twitter).
Not sleeping this early is a bold move, but the norm for stuff Sabs has done before i.e. the Spine. Will be interesting to see how her more adventure racing and ultra-trail background and approach compares to the previous holders who were more fell based. The Wainwrights round is in no-one's comfort zone, but Sabrina is a legitimate challenger.
A few little differences to previous routes. Scafell-Scafell pike - Lingmell being the main one I've noticed so far (Steve did Scafell - Lingmoor - Scafell pike. I think Paul did that as well)
Block running/riding is a fairly recent development in ultra distance events. The late Mike Hall did it when he set the record on the Tour Divide bike race. Basically ride for three days without break then have one good eight hour sleep. Repeat. Sofiane Sehili won the Atlas Mountain Race earlier this year doing this by riding the whole route without sleeping for four days.
I think it was Mike Cudahy on the Pennine Way who basically said he ran until he felt tired then no matter the time of day or night he lay down. When he woke up he set off again.
I've just looked at the splits: she may have had a quick snooze in Wasdale, and maybe somewhere between Yewbarrow and Middle Fell.
In the film about his Wainwrights record Paul looked absolutely shattered at one stage - no surprise - but managed to somehow come back to life and finish looking more or less normal. It is an amazingly tough undertaking - good luck to Sabrina. She used to occasionally attend a S+C class in Ambleside that I went to religiously - she was one of the few non regulars who could do everything that was asked of her.
Route variations.
Had a look a bit closer. Rest Dodd and The Nab are being taken on after High Street/The Knott. Steve did these after hitting Martindale.
On a pretty brutal section at the moment... crossing of Mosedale to Hardknott, then shortly a trek out from Harter Fell to Green Crag, then the big climb up to Dow Crag... ouch!
I am however very disppointed she didn't straight-line Lank Rigg to Caw across the river and through the tussocks, instead choosing to keep to the ridgeline... she's obviously taking the easy option :D
So Sabs has stopped at the NDG at 3:45 this morning, 48:45h on the go. I sort of expected this as she owns the Langdale Bunkhouse there, so can get a shower and proper bed!
Up and off to Loft Crag before 6. So maybe 2h stationary.
If you look on the splits tab on the live tracking page linked to you'll see the planned stopped times. So Hobbiton[120] being Langdale. She's another 2hrs planned at Troutbeck and at Glenridding. There's a 60min stop at Dodd Wood but all the other stops are short. Very much a balancing act between getting things sorted and starting to stiffen up.
I was just looking at that myself Bob.
I'll no doubt be proved mightily wrong, but I just can't see how it can be sustained until sunday morning without a single break of more than a couple of hours!
Another mentally tough day today with a fine selection of nightmarish out-and-backs!
Anyone know what the schedule is? Think I read on Twitter than she's on a sub-6 day target, but how true that is I don't know.
Yes you can view the splits on the tracker. Looks like the schedule is for half-hour under 6 days.
That ascent she's about to take up Tarn Crag via the ridge from Easedale, it's a bit of a slog under normal circumstances... You'd probably run it in a race, but you wouldn't enjoy it!
Seems to have slowed slightly since Helm Crag. Steady 15ish minutes up on schedule all morning until then, 12 minutes down at Silver How and 14 at Loughrigg. Will be interesting to see how she gets on over the next lot of hills over to Kirkstone... there's not a lot of fat on those splits!
She was over two hours up at one point yesterday evening/night. Although i expect that will fluctuate wildly again over next couple of days.
But even then, the schedule has a 6.5 hour cushion over the record...
I enjoyed watching this film about Paul Tierney's round. As you say he did look pretty unruffled at the end.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=laMBEjxlst8
Staggering that anybody can keep going for such a length of time. Worth watching for anybody who hasn't already done so.
Looks like she ditched the up-and-down from Hartsop Dodd to Gray Crag overnight, in favour of staying up high on a longer route... thought she might! May have cost ten minutes or so, but probably leave her feeling a little fresher...
Another tough day today on the Far Eastern Fells that I know and love.
She's now about an hour down on the schedule, so ~5.5 up on Paul. BUt moving fairly close to her scheduled splits. She took her rest before Wansfell instead of at Troutbeck this morning.
Looking at the schedule, she's having 2h at Glenridding and, other than an hour below Dodd before the Binsey slog, that's it in terms of 'quality' sleep - everything else is 10-20mins. It'll be really interesting to see how this plays out - will she keep cracking on as is; will she fade; will she take some more sleep and eat into her cushion but allow her to keep moving at a record pace. So many permutations and decisions to be made!
Paul got ahead of Steve's schedule by getting a leg ahead into Martindale by missing some sleep. I can't see that happening here so it's more of a foot race than tactical.
Only 37 mins down at Kentmere, so she's made time over the last couple of splits. Looks like the tactical change of stops overnight worked. The weather up here was particularly bad from about 1000-0400, so she'll have got her kip during that time and made the most of the clearing conditions first thing. Pretty good running weather right now.
Amazing stuff 😊 the weather looks really good up until Sunday. Clear and just warm enough
Looks to have drifted a bit again. Extrapolating a bit, but looks like she could be as much 90 minutes down by Rampsgill. Guess she might be able to get a bit back on the easier section north along the ridge, but I reckon the ground up there is going to be pretty heavy. The target splits of 63 minutes for The Knott to Rampsgill are pretty brutal!
I first thought the loss against the schedule looked a little worse because i think she did The Nab/Rest Dodd in a different order to the targeted split times. But yes it is apparent that some time has been lost.
Totally agree with you on the split times on that section being challenging! Although as you say she appears to have pulled a little back on the Rampsgill-Martindale section. I think there's a little scope to pull bits back overnight, with a break scheduled at Glenridding for tomorrow at dawn.
Well impressed, she should be into SLEEPMONSTER territory now which can make thing s interesting for her, good to see somebody actually getting out doing something and taking advantage of the currently quieter than usual fells, nothing but positive vibes heading her way from me:D
Looks like she had a longer than scheduled rest at Patterdale during the night. Wonder if she'll cut down on the rest at Glenridding, where she currently appears to be...
A lot of runnable terrain today. Which could actually make things harder!!
From my understanding she’s been relatively quick downhill but slower uphill. Maybe a chance to move a bit quicker will help today?
It always made me smile on a Saturday morning after realising the runner you’d be following in bed BGing on a Friday night was still out there. This is a week of that with barely any real stops. Incredible really
Yeah, her planned splits from arrival at Patterdale to the summit of Glenridding Dodd were about 7h30m, which included no break at Patterdale and about 2h at Glenridding. Her actual splits from arriving at Patterdale (2hr break) to Glenridding Dodd are nearly 9h. I think about 1hr of that is the additional break at Glenridding and the rest from small losses on individual splits.
It's getting really interesting now! She's roughly 2h30m down on her own target, so about 4hrs up on the record. But for a while now she seems to be pretty consistently a few minutes down on her target pace from summit to summit. She's got about 60 left to do. This next section through to Souther Fell will be fascinating as it's generally much easier ground and relatively(!) little climb.
I think the splits around Dockray/Gowbarrow/Mell Fells look generous... although going into a 5th day, they need to be!!
The splits on the next section on the northern fells don't appear to have much scope to pull time back... perhaps around Bowscale/Mosedale/Carrock there's a bit of time on offer...
Looks like a bit of an error coming off Whinlatter. Urging her on To go the right way through a screen doesn’t appear to be working.
It looks like she has been suffering today. Until midnight last night she had stayed around two and a half hours down on schedule for quite a long way, but today she has been losing a lot more. Six hours down at Binsey, seven hours down now. The record may be slipping away, but it's still a remarkable achievement.
She is clearly suffering now: 84 minutes from Causey Pike to Barrow, then 59 minutes to Outerside. When everything was going so smoothly for the first four or five days, I think I rather forgot what an enormous undertaking this is. I hope that having the end (almost) in sight helps her to get going again, and that she hasn't done any serious damage to her body.
Thankfully now approaching Catbells. I've hardly dared watch today.
Finished in 161:51:11.
Absolutely fantastic.