Hello - New from Cambridgeshir

[Irrevocable]

Hi all,

I am in awe of fell running - it seems right up my street. Of course though living in Cambridgeshire makes it difficult to come close to anything remotely Fell. However this year I want to actually do some races and have a go instead of just admiring it from afar.

If anyone has an idea which direction to travel would be best (in terms of distance as well as ease) and where I can find some beginner friendly races I would really appreciate it. I look at the Events section on this site and my mind boggles because there are so many and I am not sure where would be easiest to go to (guess I am a typical woman when it comes to geography/maps ) and what I could manage as a beginner.

Thanks for any help

[that_fjell_guy]

Hello! and welcome! I guess you really are struggling for events down there. Certainly off the top of my head I can't assist. It might help if you give some short details of your experience generally. Are you a cyclist, 10k road...half marathon, do you climb, that kind of stuff. I tend to think theres a lot of good races around Lancashire that are over steady away fells (...with a bit of bog thrown in!), plus if you're ever up North Yorkshire theres a very good summer and winter series of various length races over relatively good ground. See Eskdale Fell Runners (...I think!?) site.

[IanDarkpeak]

hi and welcome to the forum..
2 hours to the peak would my best guess, southern peak. certainly best choice of races as Lakes are too far.

[Tahr]

Irrevocable

Welcome to the site, bit of a new lad myself to fell running, but as Ian says the Peak District would be the nearest for you I guessfor some good hill running.

ATB

Tahr

[Mike T]

You could base yourself in the Lakes for a holiday, and do one of the Lakeland Trail events - not cheap but well run and sort of "fell-lite" - and you could meet up with one of the local clubs and run with them, for example Ambleside AC welcome visitors. Or closer to home are the Orion 15, the North Downs 30 k, and the Midsummer Munro half marathon - all quite tough trail events with quite a bit of up/down, particularly the last of these, with 3,000 ft of up/down.

[Irrevocable]

I have just finished our cross country league races..did Parliament Hill Southern Race recently which is super hilly and didn't do too bad. I do hill training each week and pound up a couple of steep hills, tend to do a long run up to 20 miles each week too. I think all of this has definitely made me stronger. I have just recently taken up climbing too and that's about it I think I have been running since school but only last few years actually bothered to improve speed/endurance.

Thanks for the suggestions - I will have to look into the Peak District then if that seems to be the closest.

I really appreciate the help

[Irrevocable]

You could base yourself in the Lakes for a holiday, and do one of the Lakeland Trail events - not cheap but well run and sort of "fell-lite" - and you could meet up with one of the local clubs and run with them, for example Ambleside AC welcome visitors. Or closer to home are the Orion 15, the North Downs 30 k, and the Midsummer Munro half marathon - all quite tough trail events with quite a bit of up/down, particularly the last of these, with 3,000 ft of up/down.

Those sound very interesting - tough trail sounds good to me.

[that_fjell_guy]

:thumbup: Sorted!!!

[Trimm Trab]

I used to live near to the highest point in Cambridgeshire - Great Chishill at the princely height of 146m above sea level - so I can appreciate that it is kind of difficult to replicate Lake District climbs down there! However, I now live somewhere even flatter and it doesn't seem to have harmed my race results - I think that just running hard on difficult terrain (boggy/muddy/rocky/uneven etc), can get you pretty fell-fit. So you don't need to be driving hundreds of miles out of your way to go running every weekend, but I would suggest now and again taking a long weekend in the Lakes or Peaks to coincide with something like the Fairfield Horseshoe, doing a nice easy walk around the route the day before, and then having a bash at the race on the Saturday. That's the sort of thing I used to do when I was starting out.

[gk4]

Some of the Shropshire races might be worth considering. The Wrekin on 24th March, and Wrekin Wrecker in November are both close to the motorway and easy to get to. A number of us from Essex frequently make day trips (long day trips) to Shropshire and The Peak District. The Midsummer Madness weekend near Hebden Bridge is also worth considering; 3 races in the weekend, (very good races for an introduction to fell running).