Carneddau race

[Welsh Harrier]

See you all in The Douglas afterwards!

Is the beer any good?

[Toffer]

Checkpoint 3 to 4??

Direct or down the North ridge to pick up the path that sweeps round?

Thanks for any info, Ali

Straight off the end, weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[jimbob]

I'm just looking at the map for this coming weekend and trying to work out which way the route goes, just to get an idea. I'm looking at the map that Pike posted the link to and also the OS 1:25 Snowdonia, and I can see the path from Carnedd Dafydd along Cefn Ysgolion Duon/Bwlch Cyfryw-drum to Carnedd Llewelyn and then accross to Yr Elen but then I have no idea. I gather to get to the sheepfold CP at the foot of Gyrn Wigau you have to cross Afon Caseg somewhere, so is it just a straight line descent from the top of Yr Elen...looks a bit steep/craggy to me Also how to you get up to Carnedd Dafydd in the first place? I've never been up these wee hills before, so as a Carneddau virgin who will hopefully just follow the long line in front of him, I would just like to get everything right in my head beforehand just in case the clag is down.

[IainR]

I ran most of this with with a mate who is racing on Saturday. I've got the WHW race so won't be there.

On saturday in thick thick cloud it was bloody hard going. It starts with a long run in on roads, some down hills, then a k or so through fields, then a long ascent on short grass, up the ridge towards CD - this is all very runnable. At the top (~last 200m of ascent) of CD you hit scree, which can be quite large in places. In good vis you can connect up grassy runnels and run all the way up to the summit, but we just took a direct line. From the cairn you follow a fairly good path all the way to CL. This path often drops off slightly to the right avoiding the rocky ridge, but again in the thick cloud we just stuck to the ridge.

At the final col, you head up CL, a wall towards the summit runs straight up into the summit cairn so is a good handrail. Here is the tricky section. I know this area fairly well so tend to run north for 2-300 m then traverse around the slopes just below the summit avoiding the rocks, along the top of the crags, to the cairned path. A more direct line may be easier, Once you pick up the Yr Elen ridge it's easy to get to the summit.

The Yr Elen summit is right at the back, it's like a baseball field summit, flat and grassy, but where you (well I always do) think the summit is, it isn't. The summit is in the back right corner. From here the descent ridge heads straight off. It's easy to pick up and easily visible ~ 5 m from the summit cairn.

This is where we had issues. I only had a paper map I'd printed out and the contours were barely visible by now due to rubbing thumbs, and thought I'd found the area for the descent which heads off in a straight line towards the sheep folds after Afon Caseg. But in the clag we opted just to carry on down the ridge and out - as we both had family/friends commitments. We didn't get out of the clag until we hit the walls right down at the farm land. I'm not sure the descent point from this ridge will be marked, and it's not easy to find. I'd say the best way would be to have an altimeter watch on and descend until the right height and combined with the features head off. In thick clag on your own, I'd imagine it would take some convincing to leave the path.

In many ways I hope they don't mark it off as it's such a great traditional fell race, but with the recent fatality in a race in the area, then I couldn't blame the organisers for deciding to mark that point - although there's no crags once you are off the top section of the rocky ridge.

I've been through the bottom of these valleys a few times, you can often pick up sheep tracks through the bogs, and the sheep folds area quite obvious when you get there. The caseg isn't a big river and normally easily forded.

Good luck, it's a great route, but in thick clag a few will do a few extra miles. I found the 10 miles to be too short, we did 10.5 (as measured by watch gps) on Saturday and missed out GW so I reckon it's over 11 maybe nearer 12. Should measure it on Anquet.

[IainR]

Checkpoint 3 to 4??

Direct or down the North ridge to pick up the path that sweeps round?

Thanks for any info, Ali

Direct line. Almost as the crow flies from what I've been told by other local runners.

[jimbob]

Thanks for that IainR, thats a great help.

[Boy Wonder]

IainR - I think your posting is an example of the Forum at it's best

[Average Punter]

In many ways I hope they don't mark it off as it's such a great traditional fell race, but with the recent fatality in a race in the area,.

What happened?

[IainR]

In this years welsh 1000m peaks race a competitor, in the Mountaineers section, fell off Craig LLugwy. It was reported on the BBC and on here at the time.

[jimbob]

Three hours to go...hope the cloud lifts