Elite WinnersThe day started at 5 a.m. not with acapela turbo-folk, but with Martin wandering around the campsite with his loudhailer telling everyone what a fantastic sunrise they could experience if they were to stick their heads out of their tents – and he wasn't wrong.<br><br>Although the day ended yesterday with a bit of refreshing rain, today started in sunshine (that was only rarely interrupted by the odd passing cloud all day) and it did a great job of lighting up the eastern slope of Creag an Duine, a smaller sharply defined summit off the northwest side of Seana Bhraigh, a hill which dominated the view from the overnight camp.<br><br>Sunday at the LAMM is a chasing start for the leaders of all the linear courses and anyone who finished within an hour and a half of their day one times. The tightest margin for any of the leaders was on the elite course, where Duncan Archer and Jim Mann had only a 2 minute lead over their closest rivals, Dan Gay and Al Anthony. One might almost imagine that that could be down to the 100 gms they saved by carrying one of the new ultra-light Terra Nova Photon tents, which are so light they are almost transparent (I think it was the inspiration for Lady Gaga's pod from the Grammy awards).<br><br>Anyhoo (as we're in Scotland) it looked like the elite was going to be the tightest race of day 2 as the first control was at the top of a 300 m climb up the north west spur of Seana Bhraigh and the chasers would be able to see the leaders all the way up. Alas, that was to be Dan and Al's downfall. So intent were they on not losing touch with the leaders that they lost touch with the terrain, and they somehow managed to confuse themselves on the way into CP 2, losing about 20 minutes in the process and effectively blowing their chances. Had they not made that mistake the race could have gone either way.
SleepMonsters
