Challenge Stu

Firstly, I have no idea why the race has two names! Last saturday I ran the first race in the 2013 Ultra series: Wuthering Hike. After the HPM I had felt good and decided on about Tuesday that I was ready to race again. I dug out my rather scratty map from last year and spent a good few hours on Friday night applying laminating film to it... Ready for action, I travelled up to Haworth from Sheffield early saturday morning. The race starts at 8am so it was a 5 o'clock start. As I drove over the weather was pretty claggy, the hill tops were shrouded in cloud, it looked like the navigation would be fun! It was great to see lots of my ultra friends again before the start, as ever at this race a number of people missed the start since they were in the queue for the portaloos, but this year I was well organised and I was on the startline with a few minutes before 8 - phase one complete! So off we went! We jogged off up Cemetry Road then joined the path out towards Bronte Bridge. I was...

As I said in my previous post, the traditional start to the season of silliness was last weekend. I ran the HPM with Martin Beale, Tim Laney, and Martin Indge (who was a last minute stand-in for Martin Humphries), as the "Avon Mountain Athletes"... Having finished third last year we started at a few minutes to midnight, closely followed by Flippers Gang as last year's second place team did not start. It was good to be underway as we ran out onto the road, then turned right and into the farmyard, where we immediately got our feet covered in, er, slurry. We trotted on up towards Hollins Cross, soon after which we were passed by Flipper and his gang. This was expected and has happened every year I've done this race, I wondered if we should be hanging on to them but its a long race and anything could happen. I won't describe every step of the race, but it was a thoroughly enjoyable one. Some who have completed this race (Wil) might disagree but the conditions ...