The Original Mountain Marathon
Getting Ready
Rob Howard / 26.10.2007
Race registration at the OMM is a slick operation, it has to be with 3000 racers to process through what is normally a cow barn accessed by a single track lane. There was a one-way system in place around the village to cope with this and a steady flow of traffic pulling up into the farm yard to register, and into the field below to set up camp for the night.The open end of the barn was blocked up by a wall of hay bales to keep the wind and the rain out, and inside there was a large and busy event shop and rows of tables for registration. Here the kit check forms were handed in, and Stan Johnston wasn’t sure everyone had checked they had what they were ticking for! “They are supposed to check each item and then hand the form in, but some are just ticking all the boxes without looking! If they get caught by a spot kit check during the race, they’ll be sorry as they’ll be disqualified.�
All teams also had to collect one of the Sportident timing tags, attached to one team member’s wrist by an unbreakable ‘hospital’ band. This will be used to punch in at every control to record their progress and produce the results.
There were few queues as registration progressed (its open late into the night and again early tomorrow morning), but in the refreshment tent Wilf’s were dealing with a long queue of hungry racers – which they successfully did in a triumph of mobile catering!
One of those enjoying the food was defending elite title holder Al Powell, who was waiting for his new OMM partner Jonny Morgan. He won the title last year with his brother Ifor, who isn’t racing this time due to a loss of form, so Al is racing with a fellow mountain guide and hopeful of another good result. “He seems to be good at everything, and though he hasn’t run this race for 6 or 7 years, or raced an elite course, he is in good form. He can’t run and read a map at the same time though – so the navigation is down to me!�
“There are some good teams here this year,� he added. “Jon Aylward is in good form and as we live 500m apart I often see him out on the hills ... and we each probably go that bit quicker when we pass by!�
“Steve Birkinshaw and Morgan Donnelly will always be hard to beat and the quickest runners here are probably the Symmonds brothers, Joe and Andy. They are top class fell runners, but I don’t know how good they are at navigating. It’ll be a good race, but how we’ll fare I’m not sure as I’m full of cold at the moment. We’ll just have to see.�See All Event Posts
