Great Whernside

[mr brightside]

Never seen the race that dry. Bit of a repeat of coiners really, only firing on 3 cylinders and feeling the fatigue and exhaustion a lot. First bit of the descent went ok, but I was dead by hag dyke. My brain and legs work very well at going as fast as they know they can go, but my lungs can't keep up, it's an odd sensation. The guy in front went wrong on the final section, but I was too burnt out to take advantage.

Thanks to the wharfedale guys, they had a busy day and I didn't see Geoff shift from the laptop all day.

[mr brightside]

It's on again this saturday, should be looking at a better result than in the summer. EOD and pre entry available.

[noel]

Mrs Noel will be there too. Trying to get fit again ahead of the relays.

[mr brightside]

Mrs Noel will be there too. Trying to get fit again ahead of the relays.

As a titan of the racing scene, Noel, have you ever taken the straight line down off the trig to meet the corner of the tourist path as it turns left into the bogs? The route over the open fell, that is. I'm always getting held up on the tourist path, especially on the lower more washed out reaches. You'll see plenty taking this route, and i think visibility may be better than previous years.

There's also a straight line over the bogs from where the tourist path goes right into the washed out section, but i've only ever seen Ted go that way.

[noel]

If there's a Titan who follows the person in-front, that's me.

I've seen a few different lines but never more that about 10 metres from the path, where it's easier to run down the tussocks than stay on the stony path.

Good luck with finding a fast route. With your descending speed this should be an ideal race to make up lots of places.

[mr brightside]

It's that first kink in the path that drops you into the bogs, i want to straight line the bugger to the north. I saw loads of people following Mike Fanning over there many years ago. The only snag will be if it's a load of rock with a small covering of turf.

[mr brightside]

Cheers to Sam and company for organising, one of the best weather days I've seen for this. My experimental route went slightly wrong, I decided to head off piste straight from the trig and got my line wrong. There was no line of sight to any landmark, and the first one that came into view was caseker gill meaning I was way off to the north. The upper section is littered with large boulders and the grass is very long, I tripped on tussocks twice and nearly went down on my face. By the time I popped out above the bogs I was looking at a minute of contouring south to pick up the bog path, which was hard work. I lost about a minute, but I'd expect to gain one minute down to the bogs, so really it cost me a couple.

The best way would be to follow the path off the trig until you clear the boulders, then spear off right. Once again it's a case of don't do what I did.

[mr brightside]

http://www.wharfedaleharriers.co.uk/...deresults2022/

Results are up, I could have finally broken the 40m barrier if I'd have got my lines right. 40.23 was clocked.

[mr brightside]

Weather has been dry for a while now, so good conditions are expected.

[mr brightside]

The early line off right towards the far cairns above hag dike is not, I repeat, not on. It wouldn't be on for a top runner like Ian Holmes, it wouldn't even be on for the longest legged avatar on pandora.

Things didn't start too auspiciously when I felt the wind direction and strength. I had Anthony Kay's parkrun wind speed deficit calculations churning over in my head and started to worry what my losses might add up to. My line to the right over the top of the rock steps was perfect and I dropped into the bogs right where I needed to. Sadly, after a good overtake it went badly. I went right as planned and after a few steps of good running found some virtually impenetrable tussocks, and shortly afterwards my face stuffed into one of them. It was such a grind needing so much knee lift I was reduced to a walk at one stage; looking to the left I saw the guy I'd passed casually dropping over the edge of the scar. Upon reaching the edge I was in such a state of O2 debt that I made a rather amateurish job of dropping the scar, and wheezed through hag dike like an old asthmatic. The tail wind didn't to a lot on the way down.

It's very unusual to have the wind coming from the ENE, normally it's a SW for this race which gives you a push up.

I'm not giving up on this alternative line, I know it's faster from the scar edge down if only you can get there in one piece and not having lost too much time. I know of a random trod that goes directly to the first cairn over to the right, so there may be a chance to pick up my line off that.

Nice to meet Bob and Joanne, it's great having a woman to hang out with isn't it.