The Original Mountain Marathon
In Control
Rob Howard / 26.10.2007
Away from the bustle of registration, on the edge of the village of Durisdeer, the planners were using the village hall to brief marshals for the weekend ahead. While the two planners, Andy Creber (linear courses) and Rod Shaw (score courses) were given directions to marshals I spoke to the controller Roger Smith. “There’s some beautiful terrain here,� he said, “and I’ve never found farmers to be so friendly, they’ve been no bother at all. One I spoke to recently even offered to take all his sheep stock off the hill and open all the gates to make life easier!�
“The only difficulty we’ve had is the extent of the out of bounds areas on the map, and that’s restricted what we’ve been able to do with the courses. There’s one Site of Special Scientific Interest and several areas we couldn’t go into which are used for shooting.�
“We still have very challenging courses and some of the climbs are exceptionally steep, if not too long. These are very shapely hills and we’ve had some lovely days during the planning to get to know them. They are easy underfoot too but it’s not all grass which can be slippery, there is quite a bit of heather mixed in there which will make descents easier in this wet weather.�
“We were fortunate too as the main landowner around here, the Duke of Buccleuch, also owned land at the race we ran at Langholm, and he was so impressed he welcomed us here. When we were here 13 years ago we used the Castle at Drumlanrig as the venue, but there was a long walk to the start and a long run back in once runners came off the hills. This location is much more compact and the start and finish are superb positions, some of the best we’ve ever had.�
“The overnight camp is a very dramatic spot, and as it can be seen from a roadside we’ve tried to keep it secret by arranging for the delivery of portaloos only on Saturday. It would have been a giveaway if anyone passing by on the way to the race today saw rows of bright blue loos lined up in the valley!�
He’s good at keeping secrets. His daughter, Jo Buckley, is racing in the Elite and had no idea where he was going at weekends during the planning. When the venue was announced she said, “You had me fooled – I thought it was going to be in Wales!�See All Event Posts
