This article was written for Axe Valley Runners' July '99 newsletter. Since most members don't know the Lake District very well it doesn't go into all the gory details or specifically name many places.
A ten-year-old dream finally became reality at 11:27pm on Saturday 26th June when I completed the Bob Graham Round within the prescribed 24 hours. The 70-mile route starts and finishes in Keswick and takes in 42 of the Lake District's highest peaks, giving it around 25,000' of ascent. (That's about five miles vertically!) The route is very roughly equivalent to four Grizzlies, each with twice the normal climb ... but at least there's no beach! It was devised and first completed in 1932 by a Keswick shepherd whose name I will leave you to guess. It has since become the mark of a true fell runner - if you ain't done a BGR you ain't a real mountain man (or woman)!
And so it was that the Southern Softies decided to give it a crack. By the great weekend we had assembled a crack team of assorted dubious characters who take delight in such forms of madness as mountain marathons, 30-hour canoe races and talking about spreadsheets. We also had an impressive selection of injuries - I had twisted my right ankle three times on the Midsummer Dream the previous weekend which also caused the achilles to get rather sore, Alan had a bruised calf and John had two blisters on his right heel so large that he cut holes in the his trainers to accommodate them! At least Rob wasn't injured ... until he bashed his leg about three hours in! John had also made himself a pertex DJ and trousers for the occasion and must be the only person to have completed the BGR in a black tie!
To avoid arguments on the hills under stressful circumstances we agreed certain rules, the most important being:
We started at midnight with a five-mile road run, of all things! I didn't feel at all tired, despite not having slept since the previous evening, and it was rather nice jogging along a quiet lane in the bright moonlight. After a brief stop to pick up kit we were on the fells. The moon was nearly full and there wasn't a cloud in the sky - Rob didn't even bother taking a torch ... mind you, he was the one who fell over twice! About 2:30 we reached Honister Pass at the end of the first leg. Three peaks down, thirty nine to go, feeling good and just ahead of schedule.
The second leg initially took us over to Great Gable by which time I was feeling pretty knackered. So slowly did I come off Gable that I was holding up our pacer Barny who is well-known for his extreme caution on rough ground and steep descents ... oh, the humiliation! For the rest of the leg Rob and I were generally trailing the other two which didn't bode well. To cap it all the descent into Wasdale at the end of that leg was one of the worst I have ever done. It was 'orrible with a capital apostrophe! Rob was way down on the other two, Barny was way down on him and I was way down on him feeling like death warmed up. I was completely wiped out, my legs didn't do what I asked them to and my knees hurt like fury so, when I got to the bottom, I asked one of the supporters to run on to the others and tell them to continue without me - I was retiring. But he refused. When I joined the others Alan, without knowing my state of mind but who obviously realised that I was somewhat knackered, suggested that I see how I felt when we got to the next water stop as I could then descend from there if necessary. So I didn't say anything but after a quick drink set off after the others for the longest climb of the day (Scafell) just behind schedule.
By the time I got to the top I wasn't far behind Alan and John and it was Rob's turn to really suffer. Half a dozen peaks later we met him on his way down, having retired. We were now fifteen minutes down on schedule which meant that the others should go on ahead rather than keep with me. As it happens, though, this is just where I got my second wind - it had only taken ten hours! I even made it to the top of the next few peaks well ahead of the others and was starting a seven-hour high.
The rest of the peaks on this leg felt easy. I was out in front much of the time and certainly never dropping behind. Even the precipitous descent off Steel Fell to the road at Dunmail Raise (900' in a third of a mile) couldn't dampen my spirits and I was first down. A far cry from Wasdale! But we were still fifteen minutes down on schedule.
I had always felt that if I could get to Dunmail I had cracked it, conveniently overlooking the fact that it was only just over half way! After some refuelling and a bit of banter by the road we were off again, onwards and upwards.
The next three peaks each involved long, steep climbs but finally we were up on the Helvellyn-Dodds ridge - 9 miles with only 2,000' ascent, all of it easy going and most of it actually nice, springy turf - it was heavenly! I felt so good I even ran up a mile-long hill! It was so tranquil by the summit cairn as I admired the view while waiting for the others. Then the last peak of the leg before the descent to Threlkeld ... and back on schedule!
The final leg had only taken us three hours on the recce and we had scheduled four. Just three more relatively innocuous peaks. But one thing after another made it such misery. Firstly my knees nearly packed up - they just didn't want to work properly and the first ascent was so slow. The following descent seemed to take forever as the ground was too tussocky for easy running in our condition. The next climb was long and tedious and was saved only by a pretty good descent. Then it was through deep, tussocky grass, bilberry bushes and heather on the lower slopes of Skiddaw. ("I've found a good route," one pacer had said. "If this is a good route, I'd hate to see a bad one!" another replied.)
This was my lowest mental state of the day and I was so tired that my eyes were closing, even as I walked. I stopped briefly and nearly fell over. Had I done so I may well have been fast asleep by the time anyone got to me, I was that tired. The worst of it was the realisation that Keswick was still over an hour away and I really wondered whether I could stay awake that long. Interestingly, though, once I breasted the summit ridge and got the wind in my face I really perked up and felt relatively good. And I was ahead of everyone else.
As I walked up to the summit cairn I noticed a couple of flashes of light behind me and assumed that someone was getting their headtorch ready since darkness was fast approaching. After the cairn I kept moving along the summit ridge when I was overtaken by one of the pacers who gently suggested that I ought to get my sorry carcass off the hill pronto as the flashes were, in fact, lightning!
By the time we picked up the path down torches were on and we jogged our way down to a car park at the foot, John and I arriving together. Alan turned up while we were having a quick slurp of tea and enquired whether we had been into Keswick and come back to meet him! He had only been a couple of minutes behind us but he had thought he was so far down that we had had time to finish and get back up there! The last couple of miles could have been very tricky to navigate in the dark but our pacers had recced it well and got us back to Keswick 23 1/2 hours after leaving ... just in time for the best chips I have ever tasted!
I slept well that night.
Postscript.
The record for the round is under 14 hours, the youngest person to complete it on time was 16, the oldest over 65 and the extended round 24-hour record stands at an incredible 77 peaks.
Our own success was a triumph of organisation and enthusiastic supporters. We certainly couldn't have done it without all the help we received ... mind you, they seemed to enjoy the day a whole lot more than we did!
We ate and drank much less than expected - I had taken about ten pounds of hill food and another twenty pounds or so for the road crossings but used little of it. I think my total solid intake in the 24 hours was roughly three bananas, a packet of dried banana flakes, a few cereal bars, three bars of chocolate and a dozen jelly babies. Fluid was a mixture of water, various sports drinks which didn't seem to do much for me and a few small cups of sweet, black tea which gave me a buzz for about an hour.
In a way it was harder than we had anticipated but it was just difficult to make good time - keeping going didn't actually pose too much of a problem (apart from the final leg!) and we were lucky that our comfortable pace was enough to get us round on time. It certainly didn't feel anything like a non-stop 24 hours. I was in better physical shape after this event than after a normal fell race or mountain marathon, presumably because it was relatively low intensity.
So what's next? Some people run it unpaced on the hills or even entirely unsupported; double rounds have been done but not both within 24 hours; there's a similar round in North Wales and I've got my eyes on a rather nice 70-mile circuit in East Devon ... but those are for another day!