This week I’ve been lucky to have my boyfriend (last name McDuffie so he fits right in here) visiting from Boston, and he wanted to run a hill race while he was here. There wasn’t a lot on the calendar, but even if there was I think Stuc a’ Chroin would have been our top pick for the weekend. Asking around beforehand I’d gotten three opinions from people with experience – two said it could be good for a first hill race due to the all the marking and support on the course (provided you didn’t mind a hard run), and one seemed to say it might be a good way for an American who hadn’t been in the hills to bust up their legs and maybe freeze to death. Going with the majority opinion and a touch of foolhardy can-do yankee spirit we decided to go for it. On the ride out Mike Lynch and Neil Burnett did their best to scare us (and Krysia who was also doing this one for the first time) with tales of legs cracking in half, runners getting lost, and wild animals hiding in the mist.
Despite this we made it to the fairly warm and sort of sunny start and set off up the hill. The first section up through the woods was ok, I was in my usual position near the back of the field and was happy to catch some people by taking bigger steps uphill (probably due to my very long legs). I was a little worried coming to the the descent into Glen Ample where I could the the colorful string of people inching up Beinn Each. I decided not to look at them again and soon enough was inching up behind them myself, right along with Helen Wise (who I’d stick with until the top of Stuc).
Somehow I made it up there and could still move my legs so I kept going, occasionally looking up from my feet and seeing some dramatic views that made the climb feel worthwhile. I got to the cross over point just in time to see some of the frontrunners (though maybe not the very front ones) flying down (including all the very fast Carnethies who’d go on to win the team prize). I tried to stay out of their way as they descended but had a lot of trouble guessing where they might want to go. At this point the wind had picked up and it was quite cold, and due to my watering eyes and wild hair and the fact that many people had put on jackets and hats since they started I had some trouble recognizing familiar faces as they flew past on their way down, but I did see a few.
At long last I saw my boyfriend coming down among them (I’ll confess I’d been a little worried about finding him cast aside along the edge of the ridge somewhere), and was luckily able to recognize him. I kept on trudging upwards as fast as I could, through more and more snow, dodging lots of people who’d given up running down and were just bum sliding, and finally reached the top. The last I saw of Helen was as I handed off a water bottle to her and took off going down (don’t worry though, she wasn’t eaten by a cloud animal).
I’ve always thought that my favorite thing about running up hills was getting to go down them, and this was definitely the case on Saturday. The snowy part felt fast and fun, and the rocks on the ridge were the kind of terrain I’m most used to. My legs were really happy to just go down and down and down. The climb back up out of Glen Ample was a slog that I tried to ignore, and then got a nice long stretch of easy downhill running to the finish.
I squeaked in under four hours, which was fine with me since my only goal was to get around have both my legs still attached at the end.
Link to results here: http://www.scottishhillracing.co.uk/RaceResults.aspx?RaceID=RA-0033&RaceYear=2015
And photos of Carnethies (courtesy of Allardyce Photography) plus new route: http://www.stucachroin5000.org.uk/route.htm
More photos here: http://www.stucachroin5000.org.uk/
Annie Gagliardi