Mountain Hardwear Open 5 - Peak District
Peak Performance
Emma Van der Gucht / 15.03.2011
Sunday 6th March saw 262 adventure racers attend the fourth of the Mountain Hardwear Open Adventure winter series. Keen to arrive with enough time to get a good look at the maps and indulge in the necessary amount of pre-race faff, my team mate Jack and I arrived in the picturesque village of Bakewell, keen to see what race planner Ian Hughes had in store for us. Question one was how many layers to wear – temperatures had dropped below zero the night before and despite the forecast sunshine, the wind was biting. Time for a cup of tea and a look at the route. Ian had pre-warned everyone on the website that conditions on the bridleways were a little sticky, and with vivid memories of a three kilometer hike-a-bike at Kirby Stephen, we were keen to avoid them at all costs. Unfortunately, after starting the race and picking up the points distribution it became immediately apparent that this would be impossible, with all of the big pointers only accessible by bridleway. Ah well, this is an adventure race after all!
Our race strategy (if such a thing exists) tends to be to play to our strengths. Historically this has always been mountain biking, but with several months away from the saddle after the Adventure Racing World Championships, it was fairly apparent that this was no longer the case for me, and so we opted to try something different and run first. This turned out to be a good move and we set off down the Monsal Trail towards Haddon Hall for our first points of the day.
Conditions were great – the sun was shining, the ground underfoot was fairly firm and Jack was carrying the rucksack with all (my) stuff in. Happy days! Ian’s run stage took in a range of undulating fields and tracks on mostly good paths, making for straight-forward navigation and fabulous views, particularly in the picturesque Lathkin valley. Having wrestled with the difficult decision whether or not to clear the run, we decided to drop two checkpoints and headed back towards Burton moor and arrived back in transition 15 minutes sooner than we had anticipated. See All Event Posts
