Blisco Dash AS 8km 600m Sat 27 Jul 24
A Club, English, and new for 2024 British Short Course Fell & Hill Championship Race, as a single race. It certainly took me by surprise – and maybe Ian too.
Driving into Great Langdale around midday with the rain lashing down and, having rained at 12-13C all the way, Cheryl and I were grimacing at the thought of another wet cold Lakes race. It stopped by the time we parked up, but Caren said it had rained most of the morning. The tops including Pike O Blisco were largely hidden in patchy white cloud.
Kit checks and registration in the farm barn, loo visits, final decisions on running shoes and layers, and making sure your laces are securely tied and tucked in. The clouds started to lift and break, letting the strong July sunshine through and by the 1pm Ladies start it was decidedly warm and humid as the sun dried the morning’s rain and we lined up for the Blisco Dash – a 4.5 mile ‘dash’ up 2133’ to the top … and back.

My race was for the English Fell Champs – with me currently top of the F65 table but not a clean set of wins and this was the last and deciding race between fellow competitor Anne Daykin and I – today’s winner would win the series. Anne had been faster than me in the last couple of races but in a short technical race with route choices anything can happen so I was hopeful. A hot sweaty climb, with a lot of walking on the lower steep steps – I kept Anne in sight but she was slowly moving away. I ran as much as I could on the easier slope above before the steeper scrambles to the top. On the summit Anne was coming away from trig point as I approached. Still catchable if I got a good line down and Anne didn’t.

Dib at the trig and back off the top as quick as I could over the rocky top – down to the right to get the grassy descent with a few ladies heading in different directions. I headed back towards the main path hitting it about two thirds the way down to the steeper part, avoiding the scrambles. Anne was nowhere in sight. Was she in front or had she gone further to the right? Reaching the cairn at the top of the steeper descent and still no sign of Anne so I just had to push on as fast as I could. The grassy stretches at the side of the stone steps were wet from the morning rain so while favoured for running, were more slippery than when I had recced it. Down the last easier stretch of path and out onto the road still descending down to the valley bottom. Then that deadly flat stretch where your legs just don’t want to run, having been descending for over 20 minutes, the switch back to flat running, especially on hard tarmac, feels awful – and today was no different. Over the bridge and into the paddock by the farm, and across the line. After a few minutes gathering myself together I noticed Anne over by the water. Not fast enough, she gained 1:30 on the 45min ascent and and 45 secs or so on the 25 min descent so was consistently faster finishing in 68:32 against 70:51.
I went over to congratulate her and we chatted about the race and doing some running together.

Donna was already in with a scraped muddy shoulder and side. Caren was soon in and we were able to wait comfortably in the warm sunshine, recovering, for Cheryl. Cheryl had a good climb but was less comfortable on the descent, finding a hole with her foot, pulling her ankle and leg. Nothing too damaging but lost a few places as she took more care.

We watched the Men’s race set off, including Ian Holmes and Paul Crabtree, Paul running despite the cold wet morning (it definitely wasn’t cold now!), and previous bad experiences in Great Langdale. In less than 40 minutes the leading Men were back. Cheryl and I, after finishing a hot drink and one the glorious warm Old Dungeon Ghyll pies, joined Caren to cheer the Men in. Ian arrived at around 44 mins just ahead of the leading ladies times around 45 mins. Time ticked on. An hour, 70 mins, past my time, 80 mins, past Caren’s time… . Lost? Injured? Approaching 90 mins a ‘damaged’ Paul ran in nursing a badly banged up arm, but determined there wasn’t going to be another DNF in Langdale. A Sunday update was a cut up arm and elbow, a sore shoulder and banged knee but on his feet, mobile, recovering and enjoying more Lakeland sunshine.

The Bingley results amongst 317 runners including 84 women, in a race won by Matthew Knowles of Lanc. & Morecambe in 37:06 and Eve Panone of Ambleside in 45:09 :

Pos No. Name Cat Time Summit S Pos
45 169 Ian Holmes M55 00:44:07 00:30:18 55
243 463 Donna Edmondson-Booker W50 01:08:10 00:40:24 209
257 471 Becky Weight W65 01:10:51 00:46:09 266
290 428 Caren Crabtree W45 01:22:54 00:50:47 289
301 113 Paul Crabtree M55 01:28:27 00:45:17 256
308 470 Cheryl Jepson WSEN 01:37:09 00:56:19 303

Ian was first M55 and Becky 2nd W65.

UK Athletics (British ) Fell & Hill Championship 2024 : Short Course – Blisco Dash

The format of the British Fell Championship changed in 2024 to two races – a Short and a Long and with individual Champions at both distances, and the Team Championships decided on the result of both races. Blisco Dash was the ‘Short’.
Sat in the sunshine after the race, as they started the British Fell Championship presentations with the M70 category, it did suddenly dawn on me that myself and Anne (and Ian) may be part of it. And sure enough we were, on the podium getting British Silver and Gold medals. A little surreal and unexpected (for me at least) making up a little for the slight disappointment of not finding a way to win the English Fell Championship. Ian was probably a little more up to speed than I was 😊. Ian took the M55 Gold and I took the W65 Silver.
See pictures in the Header or in attached file.

English Fell Championship 2024
The English Fell Championship (EFC) – 6 races, 2 each of Short (<10km), Medium (10-20km) and Long (>20km), and your best 4 count including one of each distance. The higher age categories (M70 and W65) only have to do 3 and don’t have to do a Long. For teams (MOpen 5, M40 4, M50, WOpen and W40 3) the best 4 races count including one at each distance.

There is always some Bingley runners who will target the English Fell Championships (EFC) so we try to include a few of the EFC races in the Club Fell Championship. In addition as Ladies Fell Team Manager, I have had a target for the last couple of years to make sure Bingley Ladies feature in the EFC team results. Different ladies can run at different events.

I am happy to say Bingley Ladies stepped up to the mark once again, coming 11th English Team overall in the Open category, and 4th in the Vet 40 category. Top 10 finishes for the Open team at Flower Scar (AM), Pendle Cloughs (AL), Buttermere Sailbeck (AM) and Blisco Dash (AS). Some tough races there with big, competitive fields, and I am very proud of our result and our ladies who were part of that – Amicia Lee, Becky Weight, Caren Crabtree, Cheryl Jepson, Donna Edmondson-Booker, Jo Henry, and Ruth Thackray.

In the individual tables Ruth and Donna scored in the WOpen, W40 and W50 ranking. I scored in the W45, W55, W60 and came second in the W65 table earning a Silver English Fell Championship medal. My fight for the top place came down to the last race at Blisco Dash – I wasn’t quite fast enough. Amicia, Caren, Cheryl and Jo all competed too and feature in the EFC results tables.

For Bingley men 15 did one or more of the 6 EFC races – Alex Small, Dave Stephenson, Gareth Harland, Helder Goncalves, Ian Ferguson, Ian Holmes, James Hardy, Paul Crabtree, Robin Lawrence, Scott Smith, Simon Bell, Simon Butterfield, Steve Webb, Stewart MacDonald and Tom Cooper with many being EFC Team counters. In the Open Mens team 5 are needed for an EFC team count and 4 races count. One more runner at one of the races would have brought the Bingley Men into the Series Open results, and the same for the M40 (4) & M50 (3) teams.

Ian Holmes won his own M55 category topping all 4 of his races to win the EFC M55 Gold medal. He also topped the M50 category (another Gold) by one point, was 5th M45, 7th M40, and one of only 2 M55s to score in the MOpen category. Well done Ian.

Simon Bell (M40), Robin L (M50), Stewart M (M55), Steve W (M60), Ian F (M60) and Dave S (M60) all scored in their own and, sometimes, in younger categories.

Bingley Harriers Fell Championship 2024

Good points in the Club Championship. Four ladies at the top of the Table – partly because we have done our 6 races (best 6 to count) so there are still chances to knock us off the top with three more races to go. See the latest results under More on Team App : https://bingleyharriers.teamapp.com/clubs/567035/custom_pages/8602-fell-championships?_detail=v1

Full details on the Bingley Harriers site – under Disciplines https://bingleyharriers.teamapp.com/clubs/567035/teams/971139?_detail=v1 or under Events. We want as many runners in the club championship as possible, and are now looking to make teams for the October Fell relays where good fell experience is needed. So get yourself out on the fells so you can be part of it.

For Fell and Relay dates for your dairy – click on the attached file. There is a 10,000 character limit on the News item ‘space’ and I have given up trying to edit down this report.

If there are any other fell / off-road ventures you would like to see here write a few lines and pull out the Bingley results and send them to me. I’ll do the rest.
For more information about the fells see our Introduction to Fell Running under Disciplines or contact your Fell Team Managers and support :
Becky Weight, Ladies : beckyweight@btinternet.com
Andy Jebb, Men & Juniors : andrewjebb2@gmail.com
Dave Stephenson : Team support dave.stephenson@blueyonder.co.uk