The weekend

I did a climb at the weekend.......just the one. Check out Tim's post here for a picture of me on the rock at Hobson's Quarry, just down the road from Glossop. Great to have that place so close to home.

Tim and his mate did some more climbing at Wormstones on Sunday though not me....I was out for a run. I walked up to Wormstones with them, hung about a bit - but the midges were out in force so I soon left them to it and headed up to Harry Hut trig point, along to the paved path and some searching for a trod down to the shooting cabin on Chunal Moor - managed to completely miss it spectacularly. My options - 1) keep going on the paved path and trundle down Doctors Gate or 2) heather bash til I come upon the path somewhere below the cabin. I quickly dismissed option 1 - too far for me to run today so heather bashing it was. I managed to run a bit of it - narrowly missed a huge hole at one point - saw a hare at close range a little later....and eventually found the path. I'd dropped down by a line of grouse butts - but not the ones I'd expected (directly above the cabin) - and a set of butts I'd not noticed before. On previous trips up that way I've always turned uphill right behind the shooting cabin. So my minor navigation error of not finding the right trod actually turned out OK as I found a feature I didn't know was there.

Once on the path I headed down hill. In hindsight I should have taken the short trip up to the cabin as I soon realised I was fast running out of track and would be back on tarmac pretty quick. Oh well. I made the best of it by focusing on keeping my breathing calm and steady and my pace the same. I pretty much ran all the way from Moorfield back home, with just a couple of very short walk breaks. I'd planned to keep on Derbyshire Level passing the Jumble turning, and turn back towards home after the big house...but I felt strong in my legs so carried on right to the end and the A57....quick left, then left and back home.

I felt mildly disappointed with my 1hr run - only 7km, so averaging 8:26 min/km. I'm told that's fairly ok for the terrain I was on, so I feel better. And thinking about it, it was rough going for a good kilometer. I won't analyse it any further. It's done. what I do know is that I felt strong on the road, and wished there was more path to run on this occasion. Better planning needed!