Friday 24 June 2011

Worth a gleg. A quick look around the Blogosphere.

I have not been up to much since the Edale Race  but out in the Blogosphere, like the summer, things are warming up.

This lovely short film was posted on the excellent http://www.mudsweatandtears.co.uk/ site.

I pinched this idea from Hiking in Finland. Every now and then Hendrik posts a week in review. This is more like,stuff that caught my eye or a few of my favourite things. Apologies to anyone I have not mentioned. There are so many quality blogs out there, I decided to limit this to ten.

So in no particular order:

1. Its LAMMing season over at one of my favourite blogs Tea & Cake. Check out kate's flickr photos.

2.Simon the fellmonkey finally got his arse into gear and hit the keyboard.

3. Andy had a BIG day out but made it in time for last orders.

4. David and Charlie did a Lakeland 55 recce .

5. The post lady delivered some New shoooos to The House of Funderson.

6. Its hard to keep up with Jessie's posting but she managed to keep her Trap-shut , for a while.

7.Another Simon tells us about the Aftermath . His Housman 100 write up is worth a look too.

8. As is Nick's write up of the LDWA's annual  100miler .

9. I am no mountain biker  but Toni looks lke she is having fun FUN .

10. Miguel and friends had some great results at this tough sounding race race .

10a. Last but not least. Happy blogday to Just Us and a Few Friends



All the best and Have a good weekend
Steve (sbrt)

Saturday 18 June 2011

太極 Taiji


Edale Country Day Fell Race

This great little race is part of the Edale Country Day and is also round three of the Accelerate Gritstone Series.

I hadn't planned on doing any racing last weekend, I had picking up a couple of niggles at Cader Idris and had not got  back into a running routine. A week of morning shifts didn't help but then Sunday morning dawned and all seemed well again. Cool!  'Edale here I come' .

The route starts from a field below the Nab then follows the footpath up the zig zags, past Ringing Roger and up on to the Kinder plateaux. The next section is a lovely trot along the edges to Grindslow Knoll, followed by a steep, grassy, brain off descent, back down to Edale. Which is basically the last part of the Edale Skyline but run anti-clockwise.

Still buzzing, from the descent off Grindslow
At slightly under five miles long and with only one short climb. No compulsory kit or navigation required, this is fell running in its simplest form. Just run and have fun. Which I did.

The race went well, with almost perfect running conditions. Good vis, only a slight breeze and just a gentle sprinkling of rain to cool us down. The only minor mishap was a shoelace that came undone. In spite of being unable to tie my own shoelaces, my finishing position was nearer the top 50% than it has been of late.

Unfortunately its not all been good this week. Following the rules Taiji (yin and yang), pleasure and pain or Dark Peak gritstone and White Peak limestone. I have put my back out. Oops! Never mind, a couple of weeks of being careful and  it should sort itself out. Spare a thought for Mrs sbrt, she is the one who has to put up with my moaning and mardyness.



     One for JP and anyone who enjoys a brain off brakes off descent.






'Thumbs up' photo pinched from Accelerate's facebook page






Thursday 9 June 2011

Rabba dabba do, Rab MnM September 2011




Ray and I failed the auditions for this video, of last years Rab Mountain Marathon. What do you mean too slow and fugly?

Never mind, we had such a good time we have decided to try again.  The competition area for the 2011 event has been announced, as somewhere in North Wales. They usually tell us the exact location, one month before the race but frown upon runners recceing the event area after the final notification.

Team Ibuprofen have not done any navigation based racing or training together for a while now.  Ray did a solo Mini MM (a 3hr score event), in April and I did a couple of recces for the Skyline early on in the year but apart from that, we haven't had to look at map and compass. Hopefully we will be able to get out in the hills together, for a practice.

Last  years race went well, we didn't disgrace ourselves and are hoping to build on that, maybe even do slightly better.

The Kit List will stay the same, with just a few tweaks, which means the only way to improve, is to get out there and 'do some'.

The end of day one. Time for a cuppa tea.

Photo and video from the Dark & White Challenge Events website.