Leg 2 Recce

As I said, I thought I'd over done it a bit at St Bees and woke up on Sunday morning with a very tired body, especially torso and arms, I had stiff and sore biceps for gods sake!! so I knew the big run today would be a bit of a battle. To top that off I also knew it would be windy, or very windy on the tops. Still, drove around to Thelkeld and headed off up Clough Head in a strong westerly. This was a constant companion all the way along the ridge and was very strong in places. The cloud sat at about 750m but wasn't too thick, and the remenants of the snow and ice caused little problem. I was nearly reduced to crawling at one point up to Low Man, as the gusts were threatening to take me off my feet. Much happier with the route along the tops. I haven't looked at my splits yet but they weren't far off the mark, and I really did feel battered right from the start.

As the wind was so strong and the rain/sleet/snow arrived as I neared the top of Seat Sandal, I decided to head back to Threlkeld via the valley like last year. Managed a better route avoiding some of the main road and was much stronger than last year, when I struggled to run towards the end of the day. Yesterday I felt battered but kept up a very steady pace back along the valley into the wind. Discussed last night whether the days bouldering was me finding an excuse for feeling tired when actually I am just not fit enough, but was told that almost certainly the bouldering had taken a lot more out of me than I give it credit for! I hope so....