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Haglöfs Open5 Series – Bacup
We’re now onto the 3rd event in this winter series of 5 hour races. I had managed to persuade someone else to race with me and was entered into the female pairs with Marie Meldrum. We met during the Big Ben Nevis triathlon in September and I knew we must be fairly evenly matched for pace because we finished only 2 minutes apart in a (nearly) 10 hour race.
Marie picked me up for an early start on Saturday and we drove down south nattering the whole way. A handy stop at Tebay services for dark chocolate waffles from Wales and the world’s tastiest oatcakes from Fife. They came in handy post-race on Sunday! By lunchtime we had made it to Bacup, a funny bit of Lancashire with wild hills and moors sandwiched in amongst industrial towns like Bury, Bolton, Blackburn, Burnley and Bradford. They must have a thing about the letter “B”! Bacup is also the location of the mountain bike trails at Lee and Cragg Quarries.
We managed to faff around quite a lot whilst putting off going out into the wind and heavy showers for a little pre-race ride. Eventually we set off to get a taster for the area and found it to be exceedingly rocky and windy! I was feeling rubbish, Marie was looking great. Andy says I always say I feel ‘off colour’ before a race, which I disputed until I thought about it…
The B&B experience was like something from Fawlty Towers. “John Cleese” answered the door to two wet, muddy and in my case, exceedingly cold, girls. Marie was jabbering about how we were the “ones with the bikes” (he looked blank) and how we were told to “arrive early to avoid getting in the way of a family dinner” (he looked alarmed). The bikes were put in the garage but we felt the need to check he would shut the door on them for us. In the morning Marie asked if he had a rear bike light we could borrow. They were compulsory for this event but the one I lent her had disintegrated on the previous day’s ride. He said “I don’t know what one of them is”. Marie said “you know, the red lights on the back of bikes, they sometimes flash?” and then elaborated “we had one but we totally destroyed it yesterday, the tracks were so rough”. I think any chances of us getting one then were dashed, and we were still laughing about it so much we nearly drove in the opposite direction to registration 😀 (in the end we made do with a little one).
It was like a comedy act getting ready for the race. Marie was so excited / nervous she made about a hundred trips to the toilet. Whilst she was doing goodness-knows-what in the boot, I was trying to route plan and having blank head syndrome. I was shaking badly, half from nerves and half from cold. The friendly squeeze from Dave as I checked some things about allowable routes on the map was really appreciated! We also seemed incapable of deciding what to wear and hid in the car when it rained :-).
By about 10.15 we really couldn’t put it off any longer and headed up to the start/finish area. The weather for this race was quite epic (though still didn’t top the infamous Kirkby Stephen day). Marie did a fantastic job on the run of keeping the pace up, letting me shelter behind her and generally being helpful. I was chuckling at her enthusiasm as I was getting control descriptions read out way before we needed them and questions like “is it that post / stile?” when we were nowhere near the location!
Looking for a control at the top of a quarry, when it was located at the bottom!
Things went slightly haywire when we set off cross-country on a non-existent path. It turned out OK when we miraculously ended up exactly where we needed to be: “3m high walled gap”. We whooped, yelled, laughed, got a funny look from another competitor then shushed and tried to creep off, not to give it away to anyone else! The next control was a mistake as we stumbled through large, scratchy tussocks surrounded by pools of icy cold knee deep water. About this time it started snowing, and when we heard a thunder clap we both screamed! I think it was a mixture of fright and delight :-o. After the next control we went back pretty much the same way, which was silly. We’d have been much quicker skirting round on a real path, as opposed to the fantasy one on the map. Yes, we had been warned … My feet had turned into blocks of ice, which was great first aid for my slightly twisted ankle, and I had forgotten all about my dodgy leg. It was fortunate that Marie forced me to eat as I was putting it off due to cold hands. She was right though, as I needed it to keep warm. It felt late when we finally scrambled down a sheep track (avoiding the lovely firm, graded bike track we couldn’t run on) and got our final run control at the bottom of the quarry.
Still looking sprightly - this was early on in the run!
We’d both been looking forward to the bike leg. I rode like a different person from the day before. Unfortunately, so did Marie! After a slow start, some motivational chit chat and a load of food perked her up again in time for a high speed cobbled descent, before another slump at the end. I could tell it was bad as she started talking to herself, and I did my best to give her a push whenever I could. I think a recent cold was having more of an effect than she’d like to admit. A chain jammed into the front shifter gave us a fright 15 minutes from the end but was soon fixed. On the upside, we only made one small strategic error of an unnecessary short loop in Cragg Quarry. We also both executed a couple of fine manuals off little drop offs which made us happy :D. Marie sung from Winnie the Pooh …
The more it snows (Tiddely pom)
The more it goes (Tiddely pom)
On snowing.
And nobody knows (Tiddely pom)
How cold my toes (Tiddely pom)
Are growing.
… admired the scenery and made helpful suggestions such as “there’s a nice looking path – we could go down that one!” (me: “yes, but later!”)
We must have been almost last back, as transition was nearly deserted when we got there just under 4 minutes late. I’ve never got changed so quickly after a race, desperate to get warm dry socks on my feet! Before the race we knew there were at least 4 other female pairs who could be up at the top and challenging us for a podium finish. Prize giving came quickly and we found we had made it into 2nd place, just pipped by 5 points by Fiona and Fi, who we’d been jostling with on the bike leg (they had a much better run than we did). Overall, we came 9th out of 175 starters, which can’t be bad going, especially considering this was Marie’s first ever adventure race! She was even still smiling at the end and said it was fun, so hopefully we’ll be back another time :-).
Haglöfs Open5 series – Staveley
The first event in this series seems to have come around so quickly – it doesn’t seem a year since I stood at the start of my first solo event in Slaidburn feeling a bundle of nerves. I was nervous this time too, but only in a healthy pre-race kind of way.
I’d arrived in Staveley on Saturday in time for a hearty lunch in the sunshine at Wilf’s (definitely recommended) before going for a spin in the afternoon. I was trying to get a feel for the lie of the land and the state of the trails without wearing myself out. What a shame the 3 hour ride turned into more like 5! However, I had taken advantage of the unseasonable sun, topped up my tan and got an extremely hearty meal at the Eagle and Child in the evening, so it felt like a good day.
Sunday was still warm, but damp. I registered and collected my map in good time. Before each of these races I have a look at the map, try and guess where the likely event area will be and then study it hard to fix it in my mind. Familiarity with what you’re looking at on race day is a great help! It doesn’t always work, but this time it did, as I had the bike area almost exactly right. In the comfort of my B&B I planned some routes with options depending on control values and then rolled back down the hill to start.
I came across this control on Saturday's ride, when it wasn't raining and I wasn't in a hurry!
In the last of these events in April there was loads of great biking with lots of points – which I missed out on because I totally over-stretched myself on the run. I was determined not to do the same this time and set off rather conservatively. The first small loop was over rough ground up and down a hill. My knee was complaining slightly. I went over on my weak ankle. Again. My navigating wasn’t quite precise enough… I put all of this down to being totally out of practice – from both running (practically zero since Ben Nevis) and foot orienteering. Added to which, the new shoes didn’t even seem to be gripping on the tarmac!
I reminded myself I was in it for fun, adjusted my route and after a mere 10.6km in 1h39m I happily set off with loads of time for the biking.
The only way is up and over
I whizzed along the roads and tracks to the first few controls. My bike was munching up the kilometres and I had a big smile on my face! I had a slight nagging worry about the funny noises emanating from my bottom bracket and about another, which just turned out to be me breathing … I concentrated on whooping on the fun bits, riding faster than normal on the technical bits and keeping a nice rhythm on the climbing bits. All was going wonderfully. With about 1h40m left to go I had bags of time for an 11km loop back on the hills, so nipped along a road for a low scoring 10-point control. I even started fretting that I had cut the run too short and would be back early.
I had to push up the next short section – which I had anticipated, so it wasn’t a surprise. However, I suddenly I ran out of water, hit some sort of metaphorical wall and with over an hour still to go, my mood had taken a massive swing in the opposite direction. I couldn’t think straight, I started falling off, and I slooooowwwed down. I stopped more than once to debate an extra out and back (total 2km) that I blatantly did not have time for (luckily my fuddled brain did work this out eventually).
I finally started to see a few more people heading back my way and was inspired to find some new source of energy when Dan Halliday from Team Accelerate caught me up. I couldn’t quite keep him in sight, but it did give me a kick start that I needed. Sadly a little too late – I blasted down the last hill to the finish but came in just under 3 minutes late – 6 penalty points for me.
Good enough to get 2nd in the female solos, though it was very close between the top 4. It wasn’t my perfect tactical race, but neither did I make any glaring errors. What did let me down was the running. The race analysis showing your position between any two controls demonstrates the point nicely; out of all competitors, I was in the top 10 for every bike leg that I did, except one. On the run, I managed to clock in at 92nd on one of the legs – ouch! I did speed up as I went along, so maybe there’s hope yet. A trip to the physio on Friday and some determined actual running training and I’m sure I’ll be back on form in no time :D. Meanwhile, there’s always the promise of more night time trail riding later in the week to keep me happy!
The results and the photos.
Trans Wales 2011
The Trans Wales became one of my ‘3 big events for the summer’ after I was persuaded to enter by fellow adventure racing friend, Elizabeth. We were riding as a female pair, with Rachel Henderson also putting in an appearance in the solo category. And so it was we lined up in Builth Wells last week to start what was to be the last edition of this classic race.
The format was 7 days of mountain biking place to place. Each day consisted of a long ‘linking stage’, which was not a race but had a cut-off time. If you got back on time you were given a ‘race time’ equivalent to the cut off. If you got back late you accrued penalty seconds at the rate of 1 per minute. There were also six short timed race sections which ran at some point out on the course during the day. These ranged from 2 to 8km long, were mostly at trail centres and included a hill climb, a descent, some up and down loops and a night stage. For team pairs, the result was averaged and added to the overall time.
The racing added a bit of spice to the event, but we had gone to enjoy ourselves, ride somewhere different and, in my case, give my shiny new bike (Lynskey titanium 29er hardtail) a proper testing out! I never anticipated how this event would feel – there was a great sense of camaraderie, the food that appeared in the inflatable marquee every night was plentiful and tasted good and everyone had tales to tell at the end of the day. The laidback feel extended to the publicised distances (I learnt that every day was pretty much the same; 60-70km, 5-6 hours in the saddle and the profile would go something like up, up, down, down, up, up ….) and the social events. On one night after we had finished riding it was announced that the band would start at 8pm. This was the first we had heard of a band and was when we were at the most remote camping spot in a field full of midges!
My favourite days riding included one wet drizzly moorland pedal where we got into a fantastic rhythm and it felt just like home, and a ‘big country’ ride, complete with awesome views and a long, speedy, hilly special stage in the middle of it. I had a couple of emotionally fraught moments, but as Rachel so cheerfully put it: “if you don’t have at least one ‘moment’ in the Trans Wales, then you haven’t tried hard enough!”
After a day or two of riding under my belt, I found that the new bike (and disc brakes!) inspired confidence and I was cheerfully cruising down and over stuff I wouldn’t have dreamt of riding before. I also discovered the terrain it was perfectly made for when we rode a rocky byway with many stream crossings. I had been told that big wheels ‘roll better’ – but would I really notice anything different? The answer was a definite ‘Yes’! I could come almost to a standstill on a rocky riverbed, then give a little push on the pedals and suddenly pop over an obstacle and onwards. My body can also vouch for the total comfort of this bike as nothing is now hurting!
As for the racing, we found ourselves in first place in the female pairs category following the initial stage. After dropping to second following the downhill third stage we regained the lead the next day and held it to the end. Longer stages, hilly stages and dark stages all worked to our advantage. We rode well as a team and managed to finish the week still on speaking terms – not bad considering we have only actually ever ridden together (socially or otherwise) once before and had quite different approaches to pitching a tent! Elizabeth did a great job of inspiring confidence and making me relax, enjoy the ride and save my energy on the linking stages or, as she put it, “getting ready to chop my legs off” if I didn’t slow down …
Rachel also made a reputation for herself and climbed onto the podium on the final day to collect a popular special award for being the ‘toughest and most cheerful ever tail-ender’!
All in all, a fantastic event and a great result. Next year they are changing the format, but if the atmosphere and organisation is anything like this one I would highly recommend it.
Me and Elizabeth showing off the leader's jerseys!
Planet Byde 
