This was my fourth time lining up at the start line for the Ben Venue race, having completed it in 2011 and 2012 and then crashing out after about 5 seconds in 2013 (thanks anonymous Westies guy). Today went much better than than last year with the wet weather clearing up, the sun shining and the summit fully clear of cloud. Only 39 runners had turned up, less than half the amount that normally attend. There were a couple of good faces on the start line, Al Anthony, Kenny Richmond and Fergus Johnston being the favourites (in my mind at least) so I knew I’d have to put in a good effort to try keep with them.
Off we set and began the run up to the actual hill itself. I felt decent so decided to take the lead early on and settled into a nice rhythm through the woods. There was a small group of us, the ‘favourites’ and myself, with a non-vested guy just behind who I didn’t recognise.
We all reached the first checkpoint at the same time which marks the start of the main ascent up Ben Venue. It’s rough going from here with ‘hands on knees’ walking for the whole way up more or less. I had expected to fall back a bit here from the lead group as I usually find climbing to be my weakest form of running.Happily enough I was feeling good and strong and managed to take the lead about half way up.
The summit was completely clear but I didn’t take the time to check the views (which were very good apparently). I’d managed to keep in the lead and open a small gap over the others so I was feeling very good. I’m fairly confident in my ability to run flat/downhill so I felt that I was in a good place to potentially try and win!
I had heard talk about a short cut of sorts which, instead of traversing around the ridge from the summit of Ben Venue to the next checkpoint, cuts across the side instead. I kept looking round just to check what the other guys where doing, I decided that if I caught them going the more direct route then I would go that way as well. Unfortunately they veered off the path while I wasn’t looking and I couldn’t see them anywhere. So I decided to just follow the route that I knew and hopefully it wouldn’t make too much of a difference.
It wasn’t until I had the next checkpoint in my sights that I caught sight of Al and Kenny about a minute and a bit ahead, looking like they were running well. I still felt strong so didn’t panic and just put my head down and tried to close the gap. I lost sight of them for a while until we reached the very steep, grassy descent but it was hard to tell how big the gap was at this point. I just decided to go for it and hurtled down the hill, managing somehow to keep on my feet the whole way down!
I could see the two ahead quite consistently from here and realised that I was catching them. We hit the land rover track and I tried to keep my legs moving as quickly as I could manage without blowing up.
For the next few km I slowly closed the gap on them both until we reached the road which marks about a couple of hundred metres to the start line and a good bit more to the finish. (For those that haven’t raced this before, the finish is about 700m or so further on past the start line).
Through the start line I timed myself to be about 15 seconds behind Kenny, who was just a couple of seconds behind Al but by this point my legs were finished and I knew I wouldn’t be able to get any closer. I eased up a bit and hobbled my best to the finish line finisheing around 40 seconds behind the two.
Al won the race, a couple of seconds ahead of Kenny so well done to the both of them! Iain had a great run to beat all of his previous times and finish in 6th position. Two other Carnethies ran the race, Alex Erskine and Peter Walker and a good thing they did as we managed to win the team prize!
A really great race (probably one of my favourites) that I’d strongly recommend anyone to have a go at. I’ll hopefully be back next year to try out the ‘short cut’!
Andrew Gilmore