FRA Relays/HangoverO

This year's UKA Fell and Hill Relays (more commonly referred to as 'The FRAs') were held in sunkissed Kettlewell last weekend. I headed down on the Friday evening with Andy from Durham FR, and we bumped into many fell runners, and a rather bemused lad who was doing a road-trip and had stumbled into Kettlewell on race weekend, in the pub.
On Saturday morning I woke at 7.30 and couldn't get back to sleep. It was pretty chilly and the first proper frost of the year. I went for a walk in the direction of leg1 to take some photos.

Ducks Crossing

Cam Head above an inversion layer

I was running leg 3 (the Navigation leg) with Dave Ward, who said he was a bit ill. Dave tends to beat me in longer races, and I beat him in shorter races, so hopefully over the 7miles or so we'd be fairly well matched. Noel (Leg 1), Paul and Adam (Leg 2) had great runs and set us out in 18th place with Dark Peak Vets and not far off HBT and a Wharfedale Team. We picked up the map and both of us thought we had a score course. We asked the ladies handing out the maps if we could take the controls in any order and we heard her say yes.
Needless to say it wasn't a score course. We got to #1 with the other 3 teams then headed to #4 where we saw the race leaders (John and Rhys from DP) going through and were told by the marshals that we did have to take the controls in order.
Bugger.
Overall we dropped about 3 mins and 2 places. We were running hard but after the mistake all thoughts of nav had gone out of the window. We followed the other teams which lead to bananas at #3 and #4. Dave and I were well matched on the hills and through the terrain, but I was much quicker on the downs.

My route. Green=fast. Red=slow.

Overall our team finished a respectable 21st, but we were so close to the top 20! Pennine's other teams did well in their classes (V40 6th, V50 3rd, Ladies 9th). It was also nice to see many of my ShUOC friends do well in the Dark Peak senior teams - who finished 1st and 8th.

Compass Sport Cup Final.
After the FRAs I headed down to Sheffield for the Final of the UK Club Orienteering competition, which was being held on the Longshaw estate. My club (SYO) have won for the last 4/5 years. Last year I managed to place as a counter due to people being missing at the FRAs. Unfortunately this year's performance was hindered by the mother of all hangovers, I was pleased to just get round and I felt much better after doing so. I Orienteered quite well considering and it perked me up following the previous weekend's debacle at the UK Cup final. However it did rekindle my enjoyment in Orienteering after a few months off.

Brown Course at Longshaw

I'm now into a few weeks of rest before starting some winter training - going to have to be a bit better constructed this year as I try to maintain my upward curve over recent years.

Look out for an OMM preview (even though I won't be going), hoping to fit one in early next week!