High Peak 40

Bit battered & bruised today after my first ever 'ultra race' but can still put my socks on without too much difficulty this morning so must be doing something right! :wink:

Tough event, especially the second half, as I was not prepared for quite so much limestone track and road. Brutal on the feet, especially when you got to about 30miles. Shuffling (sorry, "ultra-running") by the time I got to Deep Dale2 - all the wall hopping before the slippy descent was leg numbing.

Turned out OK in the end though. I was well chuffed to finish in 6hrs 42mins and 12th place. Amazed myself! :w00t:

Great to mingle with other runners who do this sort of thing regularly, a good crowd. Marvin popped up early en route (outside his house!) to give a cheer. Datt, Fly and BritNick took part as well.

A big "Thank you" to all concerned with the race organisation, especially the volunteers on the checkpoints. I was kept going by copious amounts of water, flapjack and fig folls.

Roll on the 'Grin & Bear It'. :D

Well what can I say, completed this yesterday as my first ultra event. Woke up this morning and felt as if I had been beaten with a big stick, feeling a lot better now I’ve had a steady 30 mins on the turbo trainer to get everything moving again.

Having never done anything this length before I didn’t know quite what to expect, but overall I have to say it was a good day out with great organization – Thanks to all the Organizers, marshals’ & helpers.

I have to take my hat off to the 2 guys who ran the course (and managed to finish) in Vibrams. They both seemed to be in a bit of discomfort at Eccles pike, I was sure they would drop out but they had the guts / determination to hang on in there and complete the course – hope your feet didn’t suffer too much

BritNick – good to meet you and put a face to a name
Jodg – Amazing performance:thumbup:

It was tough. I find the road and stoney tracks make it harder than other races of the same length. Had a bad time after Rushup Edge and nearly gave in. After Cave Dale it came together again and I could have run further at the end (perhaps I just need to set off slower)
Great marshalls- very cheerful and welcoming.
Nice to meet people at end (although if you didn't all have such daft forum names it would make it much easier)
Was committed to an orienteering race today- it chucked it down the whole time but an hours run or trying to will probably make my legs feel better tomorrow. Not too bad now so long as I don't sit still too long. Looking forward to a sauna tonight.

From the HP40 website just now: "2010 results will be published later today (Sunday)".

Results are now up. 26th of 164 finishers, and I'm delighted with that. I was 56th last year. And congratulations Karen on being 13th Male Vet. I didn't know you had it in you :w00t:

How long before I am allowed to get well ****** off that thy cannot sort the results
It was bad enough and embarassing yesterday
But now apparently I am male so don't feature in the Ladies at all, never mind the senior Ladies or vet ladies

I know I entered correctly!

Well done Karen. I was sitting next to you at the presentation and could see you were getting a bit peed off when he got all the results wrong. I was also behind you when you had that bad patch. Did you take some monster energy or something because it wasn't long before you picked up and was gone.

I came in just over a minute in front of Nick Ham. A PB for me but just felt tired after half way and got past by loads of people. Trying the Stuart Mills approach. 'Run as fast as you can while you can'. Unfortunately my 'while you can' isn't that long.

Jan, Well done on the superb result and good to speak to you. I may well enter Tankys trog now.
Andy R, Good result too. shame I did't know who you were It's good to put face to names etc.

postmortem for my abysmal attempt is in my blog

What a good race, happy smiling marshals and good route markings. After a long tough year i was happy just to get round. Nice to finish my years efforts with a steady run and time to enjoy the event.:)

What a brilliant day and so many runners to chat to, so much chin-wagging to be done, such a friendly, down-to-earth bunch that cannot be beaten.

I'm suffering the after-effects of forcing myself to run far more than I'm used to (not enough steep uphills to walk). I managed to ultra-shuffle the entire road section from High Low to Chelmorton, but it was probably slower than a fresh walk. I got overtaken loads as the race progressed but I could not have given any more. A PB would have been nice (sub 7:38), then a sub-8 when that was looking impossible, but I could only force an 8:04 out of my complaining legs in the end, and that was on 1.5l of full sugar Coke. Reckon on another half an hour on top of that without it. :o I shouldn't complain. A week's business trip without exercise leading up to it isn't the best preparation of all.

Karen, I sympathise. They mis-recorded my time (gave me the same time as the next finisher) in my PB year a few years ago. It never got corrected (too late, already published and all that). I wish you better luck with your result.

Jan, you racing snake, you. That's an awesome time. Are you sure it's your first ultra? I thought you looked a bit speedy when you passed me on the road out of Buxton. You obviously never slowed down. Well done to you too, Andy R. Another good result to rack up.

Apart from the occasional result issues, I think this event is one of the best, with loads of checkpoints and friendly marshals, and pretty good waymarking. I liked the new checkpoint location on the Monsal Trail, right next to where the waymarker gets interfered with.

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Originally Posted by BritNick

What a brilliant day and so many runners to chat to, so much chin-wagging to be done, such a friendly, down-to-earth bunch that cannot be beaten.

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Ditto. :D

Quote:

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Originally Posted by BritNick

Jan, you racing snake, you.

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I've been called worse! ;)