Hathersage Hurtle
So far, today is a green, blue and bright Derbyshire day. Moisture is turning into vapour in the fields and there are clouds hanging low in the valley. The weather forecast showed today as a grey, featureless expanse of cloud, but instead we’re starting the day under a glowing yellow sun.
People seem to be enjoying the surprise and gathering in groups and chatting amongst the tents and the stalls. The tents are organised in a circle, keeping the registration, food, drink and merchandise stalls in the shade. In a few hours, its where the race will conclude – one runner at a time – until the tents and canopies come down and get put away.
The starting point is elsewhere and by the time we get there, everyone is organising into a kind of good natured snake that comes apart, reforms and stretches out along a grassy flat path next to the river. The sun gets higher, taking up more of the sky and shining its light directly into our eyes and making everyone look down and around with their features shaded. It feels good to be here in the light and when we start, we move as a group into a big bottleneck and have to stop for a few minutes before we can leave the field and start running up the hill into the day.
Matt and me head off together straight away, and leave Tony and Jawad to their steadier – and wiser I think – pace. I recall the grey recce I did in the mist the previous week and try to fix in my mind where the hills are. By the crest of the second hill, I’m working quite hard and I’m glad to finally begin the sweep down the lane toward the bright fields above Offerton and the valley we’re in. Inclines are still things to be run up for now and it feels tough to do. The downhills are negotiated at pace which is something I don’t do often and something that I don’t do well. The scenery is great and and it feels good to look at and be alive in the monstrous roll and ripple of the hills.
From the bottom of a fold in the hillside, under a sheet of blue sky we start the ascent toward Shatton mast. There isn’t much in the way of downhill here and we start walking sections of the hills. This isn’t how I normally run but its interesting to try. The majority of the mud and the moisture has dried up and – aside from a few stubborn sections of clag – the ground is fairly hard and steep in places. Its tough on the ankles and the sky is bright and clear. By the time we get to the top of the trail above Shatton and Thornhill Trail, I’m exhausted. For some reason, I don’t feel warmed up yet and not quite in a rhythm but the sun’s brought out the flowers and birds are chirping and wheeling around us and again, the countryside looks great and feels like it might be the foothills of Eden. The trail starts to tip us downhill and the sun goes from bright to hot and starts to shine from the side.
We arrive at Thornhill Trail, a place I did not know existed until I ran this route. Matt and me strike up a conversation about ferns and how good they are to look at, how pleasant it is to be around them. To me, they seem to be imprinted into human consciousness and there’s something of the fractal pattern about the splay of their shark-tooth leaves and the freshness and water-beaded green of them.
The sun makes the leaves along our trail gleam and sparkle. Its easier to think of those sparkles as stars than it is to think about what our nearest star does. As it heats the world around us, our days get longer and warmer and the pace at which it does things gives us days, weeks and years. Life speeds up and grows and dies much more quickly and fills up the spaces left by the winter and the absence of light. The complexity of its affects and the distances and times associated with it are so huge in scale that they make the brain feel small and stop working. Perhaps its better to not think about super heated stars.
Meanwhile, the day has erupted in the Hope Valley; the shadows have been chased down and stuffed into the corners and the round sky is streaked with thin, white clouds. Stanage Edge towers over us to our right and the thought of running up a monolith like that is intimidating. It looks like we should go around rather than up it and even though I’ve run the route before – in the mist and the rain with the imposing and sublime aspects of the Edge hidden in the mist – I feel like its impossible to run up something that big.
We get overtaken by – and then start swapping places with – a runner from Rotherham whose name we never find out. Together we start the crawl from Yorkshire Bridge up to the top of Stanage. I don’t really remember much of this stage apart from sunspots, tiredness and a sense of endless toil that’s over and done with more quickly than I expected. Matt picks up the pace and leaves, getting to the top of Stanage Edge before me and eventually vanishing into the heat.
Its hard to confidently put a foot down anywhere at the top of Stanage because its so broken and rocky. What I would have liked at the top is a steady, easy-to-navigate trail on which I did not have to think about placing my trainers but its not the case. Running strides get broken down into a kind of formless and tired scramble over the rocks and the sand. Two women go past easily, much better at this than me. There are still other runners around and we’re around the 12 mile stage. The reservoir on my back is fairly new and its been rubbing on my neck for the last few miles. The skin is raw and maybe even a bit sunburned, although its not bleeding or leaking fluid yet. I have to hang onto the straps to pull them away from two big red stripes on my neck. Its painful but bearable.
Dropping down from Stanage is hard. After the brain-work of picking a route through boulders (like deciphering a mad pattern) and the physical work of navigating them (like dancing a mad dance) getting used to middle-distances and flowing-but-rocky trail is disorienting. The possibility of tripping and hitting the ground in a heap becomes ever-present and almost a fantasy. Bearable hunger, tiredness and thirst kick in and the ground occasionally looks inviting. Sat at home, the bright summer atmosphere would have made a great morning to sit outside and think about doing something like this.
By Burbage, strange leg cramps spread out from muscles that are mysterious to me. I haven’t put on my zero-drops for this race because I want to see what happens to my heels when I wear shoes with a drop. At Burbage, my heels are fine, but worrying muscle spasms flash up my calves like lightning. I stuff myself with cake at the bottom of Burbage’s long, rocky valley, feeling sick and overawed by the day.
The heat and the light are intense by the time I get to Padley Gorge although I feel less sick, more tired, completely drained of power but calm and still moving. The descent through the Gorge is pretty technical, especially after 14 miles of racing. Again, falling over and injury loom over this section like Stanage over Thornhill Trail, but it turns out to be quite fun and quick. The tree roots and rocks and people are in the past and behind me seconds after my brain detects them and then the next set and the set after them too. The trees are curling through sunny glades and the ground drops away to the river on the left. Birds are trilling and everything sounds close and feels warm. I’m still afraid that I’ll trip over and crash into the rocks, but it never happens.
I exchange places a few times with an older man who moves with a kind of efficient grace. He doesn’t look like he’s expending a joule of energy that he doesn’t need to and his breathing is measured where mine’s ragged. I pass him somehow and then there’s no-one.
The bottom of the Gorge is blurry and I think my memories have mixed into the recce I did. By the time the woodlands sprout from the ground in front of me, with a chance to hide from the sun, lose myself in roots and enjoy some relative flat, there’s a voice telling me to stop and walk. I do so briefly, which makes me feel sick, so I start up again and ignore the cramps and weird pains. Running by the river for the final few miles is beautiful and I pass a few people and ignore the internal pressure to stop. Runners are sparse at this point and the final stretch of road feels interminable. By the time I get back, I feel sick, but I find that I’m less than 10 minutes behind Matt. I collapse into a chair and start to enjoy a fine summer’s day.