Monday, 7 March 2011

English Fell Championships: Long Mynd


So Sunday was a completely different experience and one I was much more at home with. It was a good hour and half drive to Church Stretton, for the first counter in the English Championships. My legs didn’t feel too heavy warming up, but I knew they’d be tired and it was just a case of going out and keeping the pace up, bearing in mind 5 of the 7 climbs are in the second half of this race. I hadn’t been to the area since I was a child so it was really all new terrain. Luckily it was a fair day with high broken cloud, and a gentle breeze.

We set off at 11 and I kept it relatively steady for the first two climbs, keeping with a few known faces, before the long undulating run along the ridge which really hurt for me. I also suffered on the long descents as they we soo fast! But luckily all the BG training meant I kept a good pace going over the last few climbs when others seemed to be going backwards. Unfortunately, near the very end I lost a couple of positions on the final descent as my quads started to tie up, but finished 22nd lady in 2 hours 17 minutes, earning myself 10 championship points. It was a fair run after the efforts of the day before!

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