Project Munnies
Full stats here Munnies.xlsx. Route on Strava here
An even FULLER report with Sasha’s thoughts will appear in the next journal!
During the start of lockdown, I was reading Jonny Muir’s book, The Mountains are Calling, and I very much liked reading about the history of the Munro 24hour record. I knew Jim Mann had the record in the Cairngorms and this had been slightly surprising since all other attempts had either been in Lochaber or Glen Shiel. I also had a recollection of talking to Sasha about it and him saying that he thought it was weird Jim didn’t get Braeriach since he was up on the ridge. I decided to have a look for myself at Jim’s route and found that there was a lot of potential for additions to the round, especially since Jim had only taken ~22:10.
Since I had a little more time now due to WFH, I thought this could be a fun little lockdown project. So, I had call with Sasha, and he said that weirdly he’d been looking at it too. We decided there was some scope for a 31 Munny round in Glen Shiel but the Cairngorms were the place to be going for it. We got planning some routes and agreed on a round of 33 Munnies – reverse loop of Jim’s but with the additions of Ben Avon and Beinn a’ Bhùird to start with and Braeriach in the middle. I then whipped up a schedule (and a spreadsheet that I’m far too proud of) based off Jim’s splits and some runs that we’d already done in the Cairngorms. We planned on an AM start to bank some sleep and avoid doing the rockier bits in the dark. We sent the spready to Timbo Morgan in hope that he would be keen to join us, and he was.
We sat on it for a while, occasionally making tweaks to the route, until lockdown restrictions were sufficiently eased, then Sasha and I got a couple of recces’ in for the bits that we thought needed it most. We made some changes to the schedule and it still seemed reasonable. I realised we had said we were going to do things like this before and never quite followed it up, so to prevent that happening we should set a date and make a start with asking people for support. Unfortunately, Tim couldn’t make it in August, so it was back down to the 2 of us.
The logistics weren’t easy since the Cairngorm’s are very remote, but we devised a way of splitting the route into 4, which later turned into 5, long (40k minimum) support legs. After many discussions we decided to cull Braeriach – it made the schedule seem a lot more realistic (we could have some breaks now) and 32 Munro’s was still 2 more than anyone had done before. We were both keen for it to be a low-key affair and simply a good (but tough) day out with some friends, just like Jim’s had been previously. I was confident that for support we could just message our friends and they would be keen, which thankfully they were, despite some of them having to run further than they ever had before…and with packs. So, that was it, a week before our potential date, the weather was looking okay, the route was done, and so were the logistics – now we just had to do it. If I’m honest I was a little anxious the week before – partially because I was wondering what was motivating me to do this and partially because of the pandemic but overall I had the view that it was going to be a very fun day and that we had enough support and experience that we would be okay should anything go wrong. I messaged Jim a couple of days before telling him the plan and he graciously replied with “Great news 😊 it’s there for the taking! Do you want any support?”.
On the big day, I was awoken by Sasha who promptly told me he hadn’t slept a wink and the he was most likely just going to be a support runner for me. I can’t remember exactly how I responded but it was probably something truly inspirational like – nah, you’ll be fine. I’m sure not getting any sleep before a 24hour challenge isn’t ideal prep but despite Sasha being very worried about the situation, I wasn’t particularly worried for him – Sasha has told me many times before races that he is going to run badly and then he goes on to do exceedingly well – sure this was a little more extreme than usual but he has a way of pulling things out of bags.
Anyway, we got to the start in good time and were all set, it was exciting. Will and Ewan were on first leg with us and the weather was looking lovely. The way to Ben Avon was gorgeous but also hot so we made sure to be drinking a load. I’d planned it so we would be up on schedule straight away just to give us some breathing space but maybe over did it a little as were 17mins up at the first Munny. On the next one Ewan and Will decided to bomb it down a valley to make sure we had enough water for the next stretch, but it took them a while to catch up and by the time they did we had already crossed over two big streams and now Ewan was knackered, oh well. The next two were expectedly boggy but we got okay lines to both and were still a comfy 20mins up on schedule as we headed down the steep slopes of Beinn a’Chaorainn and into the valley.
Next up we had Eddie, Tom and Max, who were, as usual, in a lively spirit. The climb up M’headhoin was Steep and a little rough but we knew we had a nice stretch up high for a while after that. The next few were ticked off smoothly and I was feeling very happy about the progress – Sasha had been a little less responsive than usual to begin with but he was moving well so I still wasn’t worried about him dropping despite him mentioning that he might. We took a much better line off Big Mac to Carn a M’haim than when Sasha and I did it last year and even the descent off Carn a M’haim into the Lairig Ghru (this one is really steep) seemed nicer than when we did it two weeks ago despite taking the exact same line.
We had a nice little pit stop in the Lairig Ghru before moving onwards to leg 3 where we were joined by Tam, Dan Stan and Anna Mac. Kicking things off we had a pleasant climb up the Demon’s Penis (this is the actual translation), with Dan playing some tunes which kept spirits high but did feel that we had to apologise to the walkers we passed. Cairn Toul got done no dramas, then we entered a little bit of clag up Sgor an Lochain Uaine, so we got the cags on and had to be a little careful finding the ridge towards Monadh Mor. The next two climbs were all good and then we had a winding and muddy descent down to the Dee before picking up the pace along the Dee on arrival at the next changeover point – White Bridge. We arrived about 40mins ahead of schedule, having had a real blast for 10 hours. Everything was looking very optimistic and I think Sasha’s quitting mind-set was finally gone.
None of the food on offer at White Bridge was particularly appealing to me but I snacked on a few things, changed top and buff, before getting eaten alive by midges which was perfect motivation to get moving again. On the night leg we were graced with the presence of Andy Barr, Felix and Gregor. The climb up Carn Bhac was tough going and we got the torches on at about an hour into the leg, we lost some time on the sched here but it wasn’t too worrying as we had a good buffer and I was pretty sure there was time to be shaved on the last leg if we could move okay. The descent off Carn Bhac was the start of my demise. I buckled my knee in some rough stuff which was initially painful, but the pain seemed to go away quickly so I didn’t think much of it. The next stretch continued to be rough with plenty of peat-hags and heather to contend with, but in general the mood was good and it seemed like the guys were having a competition to see who could convince us to eat the most as we had a constant flow of scran on offer. I’d noticed that my lower hamstring had become a tad painful, which I hushedly mentioned to Sasha when he asked how I was getting on, but I still didn’t think it was a problem – just a bit of pain.
The rough terrain never really eased up and the descent off Carn an Righ was probably the first time the pain worried me, it was particularly bad on the descents and flats, and here I had to grimace a bit to keep up. The climb up Glas Tulaichean was exponentially steep as we hauled ourselves to the top by clinging on to heather – I quite enjoyed this one. The next stretch presented more pain for me but I kept quiet about it as I didn’t want to bring the mood down, though thinking about it now maybe everyone knew that my responses of “all good” weren’t quite the whole truth. Anyway, I felt like we were still moving okay, and I had a vague hope that if I could make it to Glenshee then maybe something would change. We ticked off An Socath pretty well and then had a brief discussion for the route to the next one – I was keen for a slightly longer and hillier but potentially more paths route but Andy, who did a really stellar job with nav, thought straight was likely quicker so we went with that, and he was almost certainly correct.
On the way to Carn a’Gheoidh the hamstring deterioration escalated and now it was just constant pain. On the climb up I was getting a little detached from the group but to speed up I was having to go sideways to make it less painful. When the hill started to plateau, I tried a little jog, but it wasn’t happening without a heavy limp. In the end the decision to bail was easy, it wasn’t worth risking the record, Sasha was in fine fettle to continue without me, and I was only going to get slower, so I told them to leave me. Sasha didn’t like it, but we all knew it made sense. Felix very kindly stayed behind with me, so we layered up and started our trudge back. Stopping had caused the hammy to seize up quite a bit so the walk was very slow and took a lot longer than I thought it would. Still, we had some chat as I bored Felix with previous woes from mountain marathons. When we made it to Glenshee, Andy and his mum kindly offered for me to sleep on the floor of their campervan, so I even got a couple of hours of shut eye.
We made our way to Bridge of Dee to catch Sasha finishing in the morning, there was absolutely no doubt in my mind that he would smash it and finish well within 24 hours, but thank goodness he did otherwise the whole thing really would’ve been a sorry affair. It was cool to have the whole support crew together at the bridge and made me realise that there aren’t too many groups of friends who could pull off such a feat with about a week and a half’s notice. Sasha finished in 23:13, after 48 hours awake, delirious and pretty much in tears, a monumental effort, and just enough time to make you wonder if Braeriach was possible too. I felt a little sorry for Gregor, who was collapsed in a heap having just run a monstrous 80k with a lot of support gear, I will make sure to return the favour one day.
Since the run I’ve been quite busy with work – I’ve got accounting exams coming up so the two mock exams I did on Wednesday were most likely flunked. The hamstring is taking its time to recover – I’ve just got a vague limp when walking now and the pain is becoming more tolerable. I had virtual physio on Wednesday, and they seemed to think it was probably a tear but unsure on how bad a tear. The rest of the body feels very normal so that’s nice and hopefully I’ll be able to engage my brain in the upcoming exams.
Massive thanks again to the support crew for the help, Jim Mann for inspiration and offer of support, and of course to Sasha for getting the job done and putting up with me.
General support: Elena Chepelina, Lucy Haines, Emma Wilson, Alice Wilson, Roanne Lilley
Leg 1: Will Rigg, Ewan McMillan
Leg 2: Tom Lines, Eddie Narbett, Max Bloor
Leg 3: Thomas Wilson, Daniel Stansfield, Anna Macfadyen
Leg 4: Andrew Barr, Felix Wilson, Gregor Malcolm
Leg 5: Oleg Chepelin, Gregor Malcolm
Ali Masson