The Spine Race
I have this hate/love/hate relationship with the Pennine Way – not sure why – and for the last 2 years I have worked as a volunteer supporting the Montane Spine Race which has made me love it a bit more. Read more at https://thespinerace.com/. I have no doubt that I am not mentally or physically capable of completing the main race (268 miles in 7 days), especially in winter and certainly not without a great deal of specialised training. I am not an Ultra Trail runner, however there is a big part of me which believes I can do the shorter summer Flare event which is 108 miles in 60 hours (basically about 45 hours moving and 15 hours rest at my pace). So my plan is to work towards building endurance and entering this race for Summer 2020. Who knows I might not be accepted so meanwhile….
County Tops
… I stumbled on this idea of visiting the highest point in each county of the UK and started researching. The underlying problem is the actual definition of a county – historical, ceremonial, current and what this means in terms of number of peaks and how to organise the logistics. I finally settled on using a book called The Peak Bagging Log Book – County Tops of the UK which lists 108 counties across England (48), Scotland (32), Northern Ireland (6) and Wales (22). Of these 4 share a peak with a bordering county, so in reality there are only 104 to visit. I have added an extra one for extra completeness as there is some debate for Nottinghamshire – one of the stated high points is a man-made structure, so I’ll be visiting 2 peaks for that county (not too far apart so shouldn’t be too much trouble. The challenge will mean I will see places I would never otherwise probably go to, and take me to the Isle of Wight and the Shetlands, Orkneys, Stornaway and Isle of Arran in Scotland. The lowest “peak” is High Holborn in the City of London (22m above sea level) and the highest is the far more famous Ben Nevis (Highland) at 1345m. I just might save that one until last if I can make it work logistically. On the subject of logistics – I’m committing to this challenge with some ideas in my head but no detailed plan ands schedule other than the objective of completing the challenge in 12 months, effectively by end of November 2020. I’m setting myself one rule to make sure that each peak is part of a walk of at least 5 miles. This will be essential for the more remote ones but will stop me from the temptation of simply parking as close as possible to others.
