Up Hill Starts

Who wants to start a race in to an immediate up hill? Any takers? Me neither! Looking at my last three events you would think I love them.

Doynton Hard Half

Dursley Dozen

And then there was todays event which really takes the biscuit to be fair! This is the elevation profile for that run

yep the first three miles up hill. We started at 860ft elevation and at three miles were at 1.702ft. Safe to say it was not a fast start. Of course as you can see the rest of the run was not really flat, but we did have some nice downs including one on the road and the last two miles were down hill to the finish. The last mile was my fastest so am claiming this as a negative split.

Now I know you are all desperate to enter this run now with the fantastic start so let me tell you more about it. It was the Hameldown Hammer Half marathon (the Devon race organisers love a bit of alliteration!) The start was from Widddicombe on the Moor, on Dartmoor. This is why it is called The Hammer…..(well that and the need for a word beginning with H of course!)

Today in Devon, like most of the UK it was bright but very cold, seems Siberia has sent their cold front this way. I love winter days with bright blue skies so really wasn’t terribly worried by the cold temperatures.

Whats not to love?

The run started at 11, we stayed in the car till 10:56, it was THAT cold.

After we got the first miles out of the way (that was a never ending up!) we of course had some stunning views. Dartmoor is truly beautiful especially on a day like today and for a pleasant change the ground underfoot was hard and for the most part dry, no knee deep mud today, but frozen ankle jarring terrain but least you can run on that albeit with some caution.

As you can imagine up on the top with no shelter whatsoever, it was very breezy and very cold. At one point I lost all feeling in my chin and lip, I daren’t talk for risk of slurring my words, it really felt like I had been to the dentist, fortunately I had a Buff round my neck that I soon pulled up over my face.

I tried really hard to run as much as I could just to keep warm, also concerned for my running buddy as he is very much a cold-blooded creature who runs most times resembling Scott of the Antarctic, and it would be my fault if he got cold as A) I am slow B) I gave fashion advice on what to wear before we left the car, but I did reprieve things a bit by giving him my gloves to wear on top of his ones, AND I had pre heated them for him by running 8 miles with them stuffed in my bra!

I loved the run (maybe not the first part) and will certainly add it to my to do list for next year.