DazH Memorial Race Buttermere

Loweswater Village Hall
Distance: 21.2 miles. Ascent: 9100 ft Strava Plot

At the AGM it was decided to dedicate the most improved trophy in Daz’s name. However some of us felt that this was not enough and that a race would be a true tribute to his memory. Thanks to Dan’s involvement in the idea of reintroducing the old Buttermere Horseshoe and many months of hard work by Paul et,al at  Cumberland Fell Runners the Darren Holloway Memorial Race 2013 was officially on the FRA calendar. My two main aims this year was to help out on another BG after the amazing adventure with AndyG last summer and to do one of the Lakeland Classics, which would probably be Wasdale because it’s the hardest and I want to get my money’s worth.

The ridge to Whiteless Pike

With Daz’s race confirmed Wasdale was out the window.
I was very happy with my performance on Paul’s BG attempt a couple of months ago and I knew I was in just as good shape for this one. I was guessing 6 hrs based on my 4:37 at Peris but chatting to Geoff and DaveW who were predicting 6 and 5 hrs respectively, I had to adjust my guestimate to closer to 7 hours. Reccies for this race were totally out of the question so the reccies consisted of picking up snippets of information from the race thread on the FRA forum. This proved very useful as people mentioned that different parts of the race share common ground with the Teenager with Altitude and Ennerdale. A bit of downloading of race routes from Strava and uploading to Bing maps where I can view them on the OS 25,000 maps showed me some of the more important lines namely the Haystacks and Seat bypass. Come race day I was ready with my photocopied map in its plastic sheet. Part of me was actually half hoping that it would be a bit claggy then I would have to do a bit of navigating.

On Friday night we started to arrive in the camp site in Buttermere and Pennine’s finest (Dan, Robin and myself) stood there discussing the race route. “Are we doing all these?” “Were do we start?” “Don’t know” “Do we go up that one?” “Don’t know” “Is that Haystacks?” “It looks a long way”, “I think I might be getting nervous now”. A million midge bites later Dan was getting bored and the midges were driving us mad so I was glad to head off to the Fish for a drink.

Relaxing before the start

Finally race day arrived and Dan gets volunteered into being the designated driver so Robin, Hano and myself pile into his car to be ferried right up to the church hall, nothing is too good for us. The usually milling around and meeting Daz’s family.

Then a few words from Daz’s cousin (Neil) and we were off. Very quickly I was in last place while everybody went haring off down the road. I though to myself what’s the point? There were a few members of Pennine manning some gates in the early stages and I started to feel a bit embarrassed, with all of the shouts of encouragement, and me in last place so I had to do a little sprint to get into second-last place, much better.

A few words from Neil and then we were "off"

The first climb of the day was Whiteside, being 11 am the sun had yet to dry out the rocks and the cloud base was still a bit low. It all combined to make the rock on Whiteside and the crossing over to the  checkpoint at Hopegill Head pretty slippery, I believe KarenN had a bad fall in this area. There were numerous opportunities to pick safer/quicker line along this section that would have really worked to the advantage of people familiar with the route.  Following Hopegill we had the first lovely long descent of the day down to the col before below Eel Crag before starting the climb up to  Grasmoor.

The battle for second-last place

We were setting into the race now and I was starting to identify a few people that were travelling at about my pace. This was the beginning of a long day of Leap Frog. As people overtook me I just let them go as I was confident that I would be able be able to catch them later. If it was going to be  a game of attrition, I would win   Uneventful run over Wandope Moss then a little descent on Whiteless Edge where the wet rock got me and straight down. My right hand took the blow resulting in a lovely blood flow and the thought “have I broken my wrist”. Relieved that my pelvis had escaped, I just ignored it and kept going. Get to Whileless Pike then that massive descent to Newlands. I was a bit horrified by it when driving through it on Friday eventing but it was actually quite good fun.

Nice touch Robin with the cycling cap (credit Mark Sammon)

Through Newlands and a big thank you to all of the words of encouragement before the climb up to Buttermere moss. Some words for inspiring fell runners do not try to take compass bearings off a map while walking across a bog, especially Buttermere Moss, twice in a minute I tripped over a tussock and fell flat on my face. I mucked up on this section just being lazy I blindly followed  three women (who I had being seeing a lot of during the day) in front of me. They stayed too high while contouring around Robinson and it made for very slow going, while clambering over the rocks. I over took them eventually and saw much better ground lower down. I headed down to it and made better time to Littledale Edge with the women following me.

Climbing up to Buttermere Moss from Newlands

I did not remember the descent from Dale Head to Honister being so long but there are some nice grassy bits so made for easy running.

"that_fell_guy" and me reaching the top of yet another climb.

Now the climb to Inominate Tarn where I was looking forward to meeting Joe and Dan. Tricky enough area around there and I was glad to have somebody to follow to. Big hello and a fist full of Jelly Babies then my research paid off as I followed the  Ennerdale route to High Crag.  Made a mistake here as I stayed to the right of the main foot path which lead me into loose rock that slowed my progress allowing a couple to catch up with me.
By High Style the land really opens out and with the clear conditions I had not really being navigating all day so I was not totally sure of where I was without getting the map out and studying it properly. Much better to follow somebody and there were two ideal candidates a bit in front of me. I caught up with them and stuck with them around Red Pike and the descent down to Scale Beck. I don’t know what I was thinking but soon after joining the beck I thought I saw a foot path over on the other side and I assumed the two lads were intending on cutting over to it so I just broke off to have a drink in the stream and then join the footpath. When I got up to where it was, there wasn't one, it was just a little land slide. I felt a bit embarrassed to cross back again to start following the lads again so I decided to just head in a straight line to  Mellbreak. At first it was a nightmare as I was struggling through thick heather, but then I started to pick up bits of trods and the heather gave way to bracken and I was starting to realize that I had accidental made a master stroke as I could see the foot path beside Scale Beck continue downhill. Over the fence and then the long climb to Mellbreak. I noticed I was being followed by somebody in white I was curious as to where that person had come from as there was nobody close to us on the descent from High Style. After the race Hano was telling me that he and Wendy Dodds were following Scale Beck when Wendy saw me and straight away cut over to follow me. I was pretty flattered by that. The two lads I was with complemented me at the end on my line as I gained a lot of time on them. I felt like a fraud.

Dan's and Joe's checkpoint at Inominate Tarn

The end of this race is so like Peris with the steep descent and long run it. Like Peris I felt I had loads left in the tank and I was able to do a nice descent and steady run into the end. Great cheers from Stevie and Co in the pub and the shout to keep left to face that horrible little climb up the road at the end. I was always expecting to be the last Pennine home so was a bit alarmed when somebody asked where is Hano. I had not seen him all day and it was only with my bit of inspired navigation that I got past him without knowing. He arrived back in soon after me looking very tired and very happy in equal measures.

What can be said about the race it was a fantastic experience, (for my first Lake District race), amazing route in almost perfect conditions. The food was amazing, except that I had been eating sugary stuff all day so sweet cakes was the last thing I wanted, I had some anyway but I was chatting to one of Daz’s relatives telling her I was sick of sugar and would kill for a bacon sandwich, she said she would remember that for next year.