Are LDWA Events Long enough?
Rather than squelching across from Winter Hill to Noon Hill on Saturday I decided to go for something a bit longer so got up reasonably early on Saturday and headed over to Kirkby Malham in good time for the runners' start time of 9.30. Got there just after 9 and then found the car park so returned to register by which time the final batch of runners had gone - 9.30 was obviously a latest time for runners as I later found out that as long as they were delayed sufficiently for the checkpoints to be in place, they could go (walkers went at 8.30).
No problem and setting off about 9.25 I could see a runner in front of me who caught just before the first checkpoint at Malham, and it wasn't long before we caught the sweepers and we started to pass walkers.
Let's do a bit more #1 - It's at least 30 years since I went up Gordale Scar and when I got there I suddenly found that my knees didn't fancy one bit of it and rather than risk injury I decided to double back (as did a couple more - but they decided to call it a day and switch to the mini-meander route) and find an alternative route to the next checkpoint at the field centre on the northern shore of the tarn.
Let's do a bit more #2 - Moved past a few more walkers (some for a second time!) and then ended up with no-one in front of me and managed to take myself onto the road back into Malham for some reason, adding on a further 3 miles but also 700 ft of descent followed by 600ft of climb instead of a what would have been fairly easy running.
Back onto the recommended route and the forecast of only light winds with a 10% chance of rain became a full blown gale!
The bonus was that after nearly 7 hours and approaching 30 miles, I was still able to run at a reasonable speed and my knees were okay - all good work for the future (I hope).
As an event I would highly recommend it - lots of cakes and nice food at the end and plenty of people to chat to on the way round and even if you only do the stated distance of 23 miles (which I think is what I'll go for next year) great value for £8 (that's only £3 more than the Astley Park 5k!!!!!!). I would even suggest it as a training run as I would expect to complete the route in under 5 hours on a reasonable day.