Great Barrow Challenge Day 1 2011

The Great Barrow Challenge is a four day event and there is a choice of disciplines: walking, running or cycling. Each discipline has a choice of distances, although most people seem to be doing the maximum distance. You can change disciplines within the Challenge so there are some people who are running on Day 1, cycling Day 2, running Day 3 and cycling on Day 4. However, most people are sticking to one discipline. I did three marathons in three days in February so I thought I might push it a little and go for four marathons in four days.

Day 1

I arrived at Race HQ before 7.00 and in time to see some friends off on their 125mile bike ride. It was a small field although some riders set off later, the start times for all events are any time within a two hour window.

I faffed around and went to the run briefing at 7.45. We were warned about the sand at the top of the course and the tank tracks for about 6m from mile 16m. The tank tracks were said to be ankle twisting territory, so I thought I might walk most of that section. We set off soon after 8.00 and I took it very easy. We crossed a fairly busy railway line going over the rails and headed north. It was cloudy with no wind, so perfect running weather. It was almost perfectly flat, just a few very slight rolling hills and descents. There were a couple of slightly bigger hills in the last two miles, but my strategy was just to walk anything that looked like it was going upwards. Preservation is the key.

The course was very well marked. I hardly looked at the written instructions and I didn't look at the supplied map at all. I had downloaded the route to my Garmin and I used that the most. We went through a field of pigs. I did get slightly anxious after my recent experience, when I was chased across a field by some pigs (the fastest 200metres I have done for quite a while !) but after a few seconds I realised these pigs were contained by a low electric fence.

The route up to the top of the course was like running on a heath, not too hard. The sand at the top of the course was fine and not bad at all. At 16m I expected to find it much harder, but the tank tracks weren't too bad at all. Just a bit up and down and you could often run on the grass alongside. The last 4.5m were all on road and I enjoyed these much less. I came home in 5hr 4min. The only damage seems to be some chaffage from my rucksack, I was aware that my shirt was riding up early on, but I was unaware it was causing any damage. Bum bag tomorrow I think.