SportsShoes Blog

As many of you already know Steve Fry and myself are to attempt three laps of the 3 Peaks on the 24^th April in aid of the Jane Tomlinson appeal so yesterday in order to get a good long training run in the bag we did a lap of the Calderdale Way (CW).

The CW is a 50 mile long distance path with around 8500ft of climbing that loops around the West side of Halifax, down to Brighouse across to Todmorden via Cragg Vale then back to Wainstalls following a peek at Heptonstall. With the exception of a few very minor back-roads and the odd busy main road crossing, it’s all off road over a mixture of surfaces ranging from track to woods and canal bank to open moorland.

Steve and I have raced in the CW relay for Bingley Harriers on many occasions and between us have run the entire route albeit as fast as we could in just 6-10 mile bursts so this was going to be something completely different.

We left the car in Steve’s work’s yard just behind Holdsworth House hotel (around 1/3 of the way into leg 5) and set off at 7.45am – thankfully despite the horrendous forecasts, the weather was fine and dry and stayed so until the last few miles.

I’ve only ever done legs 1,2 and 3 of the CW relay so this section was all new to me. The advantage of being led is that you run on new tracks and see new scenery, the disadvantage is that you never know where you are, what’s round the next corner or how long the climb your on goes on for.

We weaved our way up hill and down dale until we reached Shelf – a point I recognised as I grew up on this side of town. Down through Judy Woods and into Norwood Green (which I always think has a ring of Rupert Bear about it) and then we headed for Brighouse. At this point, Steve floated the idea of breakfast and although we were only a couple of hours into what would be a long day I knew I needed to keep energy levels up so agreed. What I didn’t realise was that his idea of breakfast was a stop at McDonalds but when he told me he needed the loo I realised there was more than just weight ‘gain’ on his mind. Anyway McDonalds it was (only the 4^th time in my life) and we attracted a few strange looks from the early morning diners as we jogged up to the counter in full running gear and ordered two Mcbreakfasts (or whatever they’re called) with Latte coffees ‘to go’…. We ditched the packaging and wandered off down the canal stuffing our faces with cholesterol and caffeine – true athletes!

I can’t say I particularly enjoyed my visit to McD’s but the calorie input certainly did the trick and we stormed along to Copley rugby club where we picked up the ‘old’ start of the CW relay. We were in good spirits as we jogged along the leg 1 route and I was now on familiar turf as I’ve raced around here a number of times over the years with James Senior, Jamie Robinson and Steve.

We were soon in Cragg Vale (start of leg 2) and after a quick stretch and a mouthful of flapjack we started the long yomp up to the reservoir then on to the moor top by Stoodly Pike. I’ve only done leg 2 once in 2008 when I was switched from leg 3 and drafted to run with Martin Peace the night before the race. I told him I’d never done it before and asked if he knew the way – he said he’d done it once with Robin and assured me we’d be fine. 10 minutes into the race we were lost and ended up having to trog through knee-deep tussocks and bog to get back to the checkpoint whilst dozens of other runners streamed past us on the right path. As Steve and I followed the track up to Stoodly we got to the point where Martin and I had gone wrong – the correct line is a broad recently laid track of crushed stone rising gently toward the summit and marked with a large wooden signpost saying Calderdale Way, a metal disk adorned with the CW logo and a bright yellow arrow on the wall. The path Martin and I took was through a number of latched gates in completely the wrong direction along a boggy track in which there were no footprints…..(& we’ve both been on a navigation course!)

An old friend of mine owns the Top Brink Inn at Mankinholes so we planned a drinks stop and after a quick photo shoot on the wild and windy moors we trotted down the hill and sought refuge in the pub. Again we were greeted by some odd looks by the folk out for a quiet pint or a nice Good Friday meal but we didn’t care and got stuck into the coca-cola and salted peanuts (choice of champions). Unfortunately my pal Martin wasn’t around so we had to pay and once we’d had our bottles refilled we were on our way to Tod.

From the main road at Todmorden it’s straight up one side of the valley then immediately back down the other to the sports-centre at the leg 2-3 changeover where Steve went in to grab a Snickers and I used the time to answer a few e-mails – technology ehh?

The climb from the start of leg 3 up to the Hobble route at Whirlaw stones is a real stinker and Steve recounted a tale of running the leg a few years ago with John Cordingly – it wasn’t long before John had trotted out of site and as Steve turned a corner nearing the top of the climb he met John sat on a wall looking like he’d just packed away a pic-nic saying ‘well done Steve – great run mate’ in his familiar Manchester accent. This climb took its toll on me and I needed a quick break at the top to fire down a sugary brunch bar and grab a cheese, ham and pickle sarnie which I scoffed as we trotted along. It’s amazing how quickly you can recover if you time your eating right and by the time we were nearing the final climb of leg 3 I was back on full power.

Both Steve and I managed to run up the road to the leg 3 finish but as we started out on leg 4 Steve began to go quiet – a strange phenomenon I’m sure you’d agree and a sure sign he was staring to suffer.

As we climbed up through the woods toward Heptonstall Steve stopped with a pained expression on his face, pulled out his iPod and said he needed to disappear in to ‘the zone’ for a while. I can’t believe he preferred the greatest hits of Bros, Kylie and Kenny Rodgers to my dulcet tones but hey I guess it takes all sorts.

We entered the normally quiet village of Heptonstall to see hundreds of folk boozing and some wearing strange clothing (even stranger than you might normally see in this time frozen town). Apparently we’d stumbled across the Pace Egg Plays – ‘what?’ I hear you cry. Well you may ask as if you do a bit of research you’ll find that nobody is too sure exactly what goes on but it involves beer, sword fighting, beer and amateur dramatics – oh and more beer. Despite the weather, that had now taken a turn for the worse, it actually looked like a bit of fun in a true eccentric English sort of way but we didn’t have time to ‘tread the boards’ and scuttled off down the bridleway to Horse Bridge.

Up to this point I was thinking that leg 4 was easy but the climb out of the valley is tough and long as it crosses the road at Peckett Well and continues right up onto the top of the moor above Old Town. By now the rain was coming in hard and the temperature had dropped considerably so we donned our cags and headed out across the moor. The moor run is a welcome respite from the climbing but the underfoot conditions were challenging due to the amount of water that was soaking the ground. From the far edge of the moor the end was almost insight as we could look across towards Illingworth but it wasn’t over yet as the distant houses were at the other side of a steep and deep valley. We plunged through farm fields and wood, across the stream and then started our last big climb back out towards Wainstalls. After what seemed like a long time we eventually popped out on to the desolate road where leg 4 becomes leg 5. We were now officially on the home run.

This lifted our spirits but we still had a few ups and downs to overcome before we reached Illingworth – the thing about the CW is that whilst there are no massive climbs or mountain summits it is very rarely flat, you’re either going down into a valley or back up the other side.

Eventually we reached Illingworth and crossed the road just south of the Sportsman pub on the main Halifax to Denholme road. Here the route weaves in and out of farms and houses and is quite complicated and with a few hundred yards to go we found ourselves in a field with no ‘official’ exit so we had to scale fences and barbed wire to ‘break out’ on to the road above Holdsworth House.

We trotted down the little snickett behind the hotel and this time I wasn’t making any effort to avoid the mud and puddles as my trainers, which were new-on that morning, now blended in seamlessly with my leggings under a shroud of caked on dirt. We reached the car 10 hours and 45 minutes after setting off and congratulated ourselves on a job well done.

A large Mama’s pepperoni pizza on the way home brought life back to weary bones and as I walked the dog that evening I was already thinking about how I might be feeling if I’d set off to do another lap of the peaks…….roll on the 24^th.

Anyone reading my blog will know that this year I’ve signed up for the West Highland Way Race which is a 95 mile run between Glasgow and Fort William.

The WHW is on the 19th June so between then and now I need to get my mind into ‘going long’ mode and get some miles in.

On the 6th Feb I’m doing the Trog, a 20 mile route around the moors above Calderdale and on the 13th March it’s the Hobble a 33 mile jaunt around the moors above  Haworth. In terms of distance, both of those are just tiddly little warm up jogs although I will be going out hard in both to try and lay down descent times.

What I need before the big event in June is a long distance challenge to really test the mettle - and here it is…..

In 2007 in training for the Ultratrail Tour Du Mont Blanc I ran the 3 Peaks in the Yorkshire Dales twice back to back in 10.5 hours solo.

This time, we’re going for a triple round - yes three laps of the famous Yorkshire 3 Peaks in one go and in less than 24 hours.

To make it even more silly we’re going to attempt the stunt on the 3 Peaks Race day - 24th April. Me and my pal Steve Fry have both entered the race and the plan is to start our first lap at around 2 or 3am, do a steady jog round to finish around 9am then sign on for the race which starts at 10am. We’ll then run the race and, if we can still stay upright, have a quick swig and a bite to eat on the finish field then turn round and do it again. If we have a good third round we’ll hopefully make it back to the pub before they stop serving - now that would make a grand entrance!

The plan is to try and raise a few quid for Cancer charities as I lost a friend last year and a clubmate of Steve and mine also lost her battle with the disease in 2009.

This is the first time I’ve gone public with the plan so I guess it’s now official….