scottish highlands

Wow, what a year. Despite getting nowhere near as many opportunities I would have liked to run, looking back on this year and recognising what I’ve managed to fit in, I have to say it’s been a heck of a year.

Thinking back to the start of the year, our son William was born last December so training dropped off a cliff at that point. I’d naively signed up to some big races assuming life would continue as normal, but as I’ve described in most of my posts this year, it’s been tough to find the time to train. Despite that, my year started with what I think is becoming my favourite hill race which is Carnethy 5. The 2016 vintage was a snow blizzard of a race, literally, yet I felt amazing during it. I suspect this was due to my reduced training leading up to it, but who knows.

After Carnethy, it was a fairly long period of minimal activity. I helped out at the Highland Fling and in the process became incredibly jealous of those taking part. I loved helping out at such an iconic race in the Scottish ultra racing calendar though and I can highly recommend it for improving your “Contribution to society” levels.

The two main events this year though for me, was the West Highland Way (WHW) and UTMB TDS races. The WHW was up first in June and was a daunting prospect given the minimal training. I had imagined putting in a few months of 100 mile training weeks to give it the best shot I could. I was way off that velocity by the time I got to it though. Despite that, I felt well prepared and what training I could do was pretty bloody awesome.

The race itself went amazingly well looking back. I had hoped for a sub 20hr performance, but the sub 24hr I achieved was fantastic all things considered.

Before the climb up the Devils Staircase

My support team did an amazing job to get me through and the weather made it a mid-summer experience to remember. I heard last week that I have a place in next year’s race. Determined to do better, I’m already dreaming about what it will take to get to the 20hr mark. More on that in another post, though.

After the WHW, next up was TDS; the big one. I’d been in awe of the UTMB series since I discovered running and TDS was as close as I could get to the namesake race of UTMB that my points accumulation would allow me. Oh boy, what a race it is too! We combined a family holiday with the race and spent three weeks in Chamonix to give me some time to prepare and get into the zone so to speak. It worked as well as I could have hoped and the whole experience of the race and the surrounding running festival was amazing. But oh what a race. I still wake up making strange noises thinking of ‘that’ climb our of Bourg St Maurice.

Chamonix – What’s not to love?

I can’t wait to sign up again for this year, though, entries open in a couple of days and I now have enough points to do the UTMB. The dilemma is, do I risk the lottery and attempt to get a UTMB place, or do I go for TDS with an almost certified entry probability in comparison and look to banish some demons of my race?

After UTMB it has been social running only. Only, I haven’t been all that social. My opportunities to attend club nights have been reduced due to family and work commitments, but I’m starting to find more and more ways to fit running back into my life. For now, though, looking back on the year, I’m over the moon with what I achieved and I can’t wait to see how 2017 turns out.

Col Chavannes and smiles because it was over

The past few weeks have been fairly laid back after the Jedburgh race and we managed to arrange a weeks holiday up in the Highlands last week to really get a chance to unwind. It was a perfect short break in an exceptional place I found on the internet. It’s one of those place that, when you find it, you don’t really want to share it in case everyone starts to go. However, it’s so bloody good that I won’t be able to not talk about it, so here it is: Eagle Brae. More about that in a moment. Staying there gave me the chance to get in a few longish runs in some epic locations and most of all, broke my training regime from a rigorous focused approach (I’m laughing to myself writing that), to simply getting out and enjoying my running again; and it worked.

Now a bit about Eagle Brae. It is a place which as soon as you start to learn about it, it makes you wish that it was you who’d come up with the idea. It achieves that nirvana of situations, combining a lifestyle with a business. The owners, Mike and Pawana (pronounced Pubna), are a really nice couple who deserve the success their business is achieving through the hard work they have put into it. It has apparently taken them 8 years to convert a plot of land on a bracken covered steep highland glenside into a luxurious, eco-friendly range of log-cabins, the likes of which this country has never seen. This is no Center Parcs folks, think 5 star hotel made out of giant Canadian logs with cashmere tartan blankets.

I love the place for so many reasons, the location, how they’ve designed the site so nobody overlooks anyone else, the furnishings inside the cabins and that they recognise the type of folk who are likely to go there want fast internet access and help at the end of a telephone when they need an extra bottle of wine of an evening. From a business perspective, I imagine they are probably one of the few enterprises in the area that are drawing some spectacular incomes. It must be hard making a living in remote places like that, but I suspect the effort and investments they have made are paying off handsomely. To say I’m envious would be an understatement, but they are also inspiring for me in terms of what can be achieved with dedication, hard work and, most importantly I think, a great vision.

The area itself is a part of Scotland I’ve never visited, only passed through on the way to other parts. I now wish I’d paid more attention and found my way there sooner. Being on the north side of the Great Glen, it is remote and wild terrain in abundance. The particular area where we stayed was Strathglass, which is a long meandering river valley, off of which turn handsome glens. I explored two during a couple of runs: Glen Strathfarrar which has some increasingly spectacular hills the deeper you go and Glen Affric which I now feel is the most beautiful place I’ve ever been to.

Glen Strathfarrar

After studying Walk Highlands for a number of hours on our first day, I eventually worked out that Glen Strathfarrar was about a mile away from where we were. The MWIS forecast for the area was grim so I opted for a 16km horseshoe route which took in a couple of Corbetts rather than the more remote and exposed Munros in the area. These Corbetts still looked to provide a challenge, but without the high exposure which would attract the fierce winds and snow that was predicted above 800m for the day. Or so I thought.

Having only been running for just over a year, I had a winter season last year, but didn’t really get to adventure into areas with too much exposure. during the summer I’ve had a chance to get out and about up high, but winter gives the mountains a different experience altogether and this run was just what I needed to remind me.

The route started off up a secluded track before breaking out across open moorland and grouse butts. We had seen some significant rainfall during the previous week and consequently the open ground was saturated and any stalkers path was like a river. Within minutes my feet were sodden and I gave up trying to keep them dry. As I climbed above 600m the wind blew and it started to snow. The summit of the first hill, Beinn Bha’ach Ard, was exposed and as I reached it the wind was pushing me sideways. I dressed in everything I had and kept going past the trig point to get in the lee side and away from the wind and on to the next hill, Sgurr a’ Phollain. From here it was a game of find a path, any path, in a long loop back to where I parked the car. It was beautiful country to run in.

Loch Affric Circuit

Later in the week the weather up high was again threatening to blow your skin off, so another venture to Walk Highlands turned up an 18km loop around a loch I’d never heard of before. Whilst I might not have heard about it before, I will certainly never forget it again. Loch Affric and the glen from which it is named, is simply the most beautiful place I’ve ever been to.

The route started and finished in a forestry carpark which, on this wintery, wet and blustery day was deserted when I arrived. Great! I have the place to myself. The route seemed simple enough, set off along the northern shore of the loch along a well laid path, cross a burn about half way along, loop around the far end of the loch and enjoy the run back to the car.

There were two problems with that route. The first, and a nice problem to have, was that the place was so scenic, I kept feeling the need to stop every few minutes to take another picture. The second, and not so nice problem, was that burn I mentioned. In the guide it suggested there would be stepping stones to make it easier to cross. Indeed there were, I could see how they were creating turbulence in the torrent that was raging over them! The burn crossing turned into more of a river fording. Despite having to wade waist deep through freezing cold fast flowing water, I was still smiling at the end of the loop.

At the far end of the loch the path meets another, the Affric-Kintail way, which heads off into the remote glen you can see further along. This apparently leads to the most remote youth hostel in the country and it looked a foreboding place. I looked up the Affric-Kintail way when I got back. It looks like it would make a great route for an ultra marathon! Anyone fancy joining me in creating a race there? There is also a bothy at the end of the loch which I found being refurbished by a couple of guys. I took some time to have a chat with them and I still don’t know if they have the best or worst job in the world given the landscape they worked in. Given how cold it was though, I suspect the view wears off after a while. Maybe.

We are back from the short break now and we have snow finally covering the Lomond hills by where we live. Tonight’s run reminded me why I love running here in winter. I’ll leave you with some wonderful pictures from my run tonight.