Haworth Hobble Sat 9th March 51km/1340m

Another completion of the tour of the Pennine Moors. This time in 6:49:41 (prov), an improvement of 6 mins on last year. Going well on the outward part and 10mins up on last year by the 4th CP, 2mins dropped and regained by CP9 (just before the climb to Top 'O' Stairs) and then a further drop of 4mins on the last section.

I'd decided to experiment and run in my mudclaws. 3 Peaks is less than 2 months away and I'm having to think carefully about shoe choice. My roclites (gortex) are coming to the end of their life, comfy but little grip left and the uppers look decidedly worse for wear. They'd cope on a dry day, but would end up like a pair of skis on a wet. The dilema, do I buy a new pair of trail shoes now and try and break them in, or do I try with something else I already own.

The verdict. Well they got me round. The grip was welcome on parts of the route, but I was certainly conscious of foot placement all the way round, running on the softer sections of tracks, grassy verges etc. No full-on occurence of foot pain, but it was nagging away on the last third of the route. It woul'd have been there earlier had I not exercised the care I did in the first half.

Not the shoe of choice in future for this race for me. If I want to be able to push myself and improve my time further then my feet have to be comfy. I know the route well enough and I really should be capable of posting a time much closer to 6:30hrs. Will I use them for 3 Peaks? Only as a last resort if the roclites have fallen apart by then (don't think breaking in a new pair is an option either). Wasting the £25 race fee dropping out of a race 'cos your feet hurt due to poor choice of footwear would not be good. Better running faster in the comfy shoes on the flat bits to make up for the slower descents on the steeper bits. Oh well, have to keep plugging away at the dreaded track sessions.

TF