Attempts 27/28/29 July

well that was a trip! a brief report from me. Nicky set off at 4.00am with Simon Cox and Neil Talbott in what was supposed to be light winds and a few showers. The rain came down 3-4 times quite hard with low clag, Yiannis taking his role on the parachute. they made up about 17 minutes on the 3.27 scedule which was a shock. I was on leg 2 with Digby and joined mid leg by Neil bringing hot drinks. Nickys pace was astonishing and we were pushed hard in a strong wind. we had a really bad storm come through at Dollywagon. DW to fair field in 32 minutes and the full leg in 3.30! still 17-18 minutes up, 2 minutes rest and she was off with Tim Whittaker(Nicky's devils spine partner) and Joe Mann( using his recent fittnes on his munro round). I lost touch then but Yiannis rejoined at Rossett and IanF had a rope at Broad Stand I think Nicky had lost only a few minutes despite thick clag and rain wind

the conditions had got much worse as has been said earlier. Neil and myself drove round to Honister(after a brief trip to the pub for a carb top up) and walked in with hot drinks for the team Neil went to Black Sail and I went to Windy gap where Yiannis turned up out of the thick clag just after Borrowdales finest had passed by on a reccie.

I was worried the wet rock and clag would slow Nicky down, Ha! virtually to the predicted minute Iheard loose rocks above and Nicky turned up with support Tim, Dave Sykes, Olly Stephenson and Neil.

Nicky left Honister pretty much on time and continued through picking up Keith Holmes, Helen Elmore, Joe and Tim again(3 legs!) more heavy rain/clag etc.

Nick Cable joined in to lead off from Robinson.

Quite a big crowd awaited Nicky at Moothall including the support of Wil Spain and Sarah



Amanda Heading from Racekit once again masterminded Nickys round.

A flawless effort from a strong support for a remarkable woman.....

Nicky you know what your support thought......words just aren't enough. Well done.....

It was a fantastic day with Nicky breaking the record in the most testing of conditions, an immense performance... but I think you are forgetting to report a particularly unpleasant sight at the end of the round when a certain Wicked Winterburn, a man of notoriously viscous and intemperate disposition, was seen stealing women's and children's chips...

There were various other callous acts of Wicked Winterburn eating other peoples food... you have been warned! ;-)

Cheers,

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Originally Posted by simon cox

It was a fantastic day with Nicky breaking the record in the most testing of conditions, an immense performance... but I think you are forgetting to report a particularly unpleasant sight at the end of the round when a certain Wicked Winterburn, a man of notoriously viscous and intemperate disposition, was seen stealing women's and children's chips...

There were various other callous acts of Wicked Winterburn eating other peoples food... you have been warned! ;-)

Cheers,

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I'm innocent!!! they were just left waiting to be hoovered up. Thank Andrea for the Champers

Fantastic! Well done Nicky. We met some of her support crew in the car park at Wasdale. Really glad she not only made it but broke the record as well. In the conditions, that's amazing.

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Originally Posted by ydt

Nicky Spinks: 18:12, a new record. Yiannis

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Cheers for posting this Martyn. It took me twenty minutes to post the first update on my phone from the campsite and after I texted everyone with updates, I got sidetracked by food and sleep :) Great to meet you and Mark. Hope Jack got safely back to Honister. Despite Stolly not being able to complete his round, it was a brilliant weekend. Running in the lakes with like-minded people, what's not to like? Looking forward to the next attempt, whenever that will be!

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Originally Posted by Martyn P

I'm sorry to say that Stolly was forced to pull out on leg 3 at Esk Pike. We were caught in a sudden spell of very bad weather and it all got a bit nasty. We retreated down to Styhead and into Wasdale via the pass and Hes brought Mark and myself back to Dunmail. Stolly is probably fast asleep in his tent outside Keswick right now, I'm sure he'll pass on the full story later on. Brave attempt and disappointing for him, there were patches of blue sky above when we were going up Steel Fell and we all thought it was going to be a good day weather-wise.

It was the Lingmell Dash in Wasdale today, they all seemed to come in OK - you could see the Lingmell summit clearly, so maybe that was one top that escaped it.

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Nicky looked remarkably fresh when finishing, with nice weather sub-18 was on the cards!

Wil and Sarah finished within 2mins of each other, Sarah powering past Wil just before Portinscale, refusing to believe myself and RachFR telling her that we were OK on time. Wil was very relaxed.

pretty green support team, with only 2 having experience supporting before, but a great weekend - only one big mistake where we found 'Dollywaggon 2' during a slight detour - clag down from clough head to grizledale tarn made for a long night!

Well done everyone who got around this weekend only down side we all have to wait till next year for dinner to here everyones stories,be worth it though I am going to get slighty drunk

Bad luck Stolly, it's all training for a successful third time lucky though:)
Well done Nicky:thumbup:

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Originally Posted by Hes

Cheers for posting this Martyn. It took me twenty minutes to post the first update on my phone from the campsite and after I texted everyone with updates, I got sidetracked by food and sleep :) Great to meet you and Mark. Hope Jack got safely back to Honister. Despite Stolly not being able to complete his round, it was a brilliant weekend. Running in the lakes with like-minded people, what's not to like? Looking forward to the next attempt, whenever that will be!

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Hello Hes,

Got back to honister and warmed up on the way. Thanks for the warm car, and thanks to Kelly for the cups of tea. Stolly, I'm happy to help out on your next attempt if you need it.

Jack.

Just a quick note to say that it was a fantastic run and I'm just sorry that my legs just forgot to turn up for it :). Maybe I just didn't taper enough or maybe the thrashing I gave them at Ingleborough (especially the nutter sprint all the way down) last week was still in them - either way I was already struggling a little on the long but gradual climb from Clough Head to Great Dodd so just what, 16 miles in, I knew I was in for a tough day. (My legs had perversely been brilliantly strong after full on 50 miles on my previous weather halted attempt, just 4 weeks ago!!)

I was down (on my 23 hour schedule) by 15 minutes at the top of Blencathra, due mainly to pissing rain and poor visibility on Skiddaw, 10 at Threlkeld after throwing myself off the side of Doddick in misty drizzle and thick fog and, even though I struggled along much of the Helvellyn ridgeline and we took a dodgy line off of Nethermost Pike, just 4 minutes by Dunmail. To to be honest though, I'd expected to be half an hour up by then. I wasn't firing on all cylinders and things got gradually worse from Calf Crag, losing a couple of minutes here and there. It was raining on and off most of the time and foggy on the tops but, after getting through the Langdales, a complete and utter monsoon set in which reached horrendous proportions by Bowfell, with a heck of a wind chill thrown in. I'd lost some more time by then, down 23 minutes, (but more positively still 37 up on a 24 hour schedule) but had, at least for the moment, managed to stop the rot. But now the weather had chosen to go mental too in what quite frankly couldn't have been a worse place!

My legs (my quads specifically) were feeling really ropey and after marching on the best we could striving against the elements it was plain that the weather was becoming borderline dangerous. We were all drenched through and shivering pretty badly and we still had all the boulder scrambling and fannying about to do over Scafell Pike and Scafell before we could drop out of the weather. My quads weren't getting better any time soon anyway and we were all freezing cold so I called it a day. Regardless of my legs I think it was the right decision as it still took us a good while struggling through a continual deluge to get down to Wasdale via Esk Haus and Sty Head and we had to run most of the time regardless of my legs just to keep warm.

Eventually I turned up like a drowned rat at the Wasdale Head Inn and scrounged an immediate pint on a tab whilst Martyn, Mark and Lucas went to tell the support crew what had happened.

Thanks to all my helpers and pacers - Hes, Gav and Lee leg 1, Mark (mk1) and Adrian leg 2, Martyn, Mark (mk2) and Lucas leg 3 and unused Jack leg 4 and Kelly (ground support and leg 5). Martyn and Mark were both hoping to do leg 4 too and Hes leg 5 but it would have taken some sort of bottle in those conditions to want to carry on! And not forgetting Harry and Wallace on leg 3 who mostly loved it too, although both of them were shivering with the cold and driving rain on Bowfell. Top team.

Oh and a fantastic memory of a shooting star just as we started climbing the reverse slope of Blencathra (a gap in the clouds!) and the sun did try and burst through briefly too...

http://img99.imageshack.us/img99/5729/p7280018.jpg



And awesome Nicky Spinks!