Budge took on a fell race and followed it up with an off-road duathlon. Sounds like a painful weekend? It was.

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Post-Strathpuffer I had committed to do a fell race in the dark near Darwen organised by a mate of mine – appropriately called the Dark ‘Un. I had planned to do this event last year but the night before, doing a final head torch test, I went over on my ankle and wrecked my racing plans for a couple of months. So I approached the race with some trepidation as I wanted to do well (you always do don’t you?) but the chances of breaking something were high as the course was a tough rocky, muddy, boggy 5 miles.

Turning up without my fell running shoes and making the decision to run in my walking boots was a really dumb start.  Luckily I made it round in one piece.  Not at the pace I had hoped for and with a number of falls, but nothing too serious.  28th place was a pleasing outcome given the circumstances.  Hats off to my team mate Phil who finished just outside the top ten.

The day after though I could hardly walk. Running in walking boots had trashed my legs and the following day I had lined up on the start line of the Fearless off-road duathlon at Llandegla in Wales – an 8K run, 19K mountain bike and a further 4K run.  On the day I turned up really early and tried to warm up as well as I could with a view that if I was struggling I would drop out and just ride the Llandegla red route for fun.

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As it turned out, the legs were stiff but they got me round the course. The bigger issue  was the really strong winds, blowing us to a standstill at times on the run and blowing a couple of people off their bikes during the ride.  The course was a belter, particularly the runs which were very off-road and involved running through ditches full of water, unmarked forest trails and climbing steep, grassy, muddy banks.

I managed to finish the first run in around 40th place, pick up around 10 places on the ride and then a few more on the last run, finishing 26th overall and 5th in class.  Pleasingly, with me turning 50 in May, I managed to pass the guy who won the V50 category on the line so I will be back next year!

12-225x300Our Alex Lawton yet again demonstrated his awesomeness by taking the overall win despite mistakenly riding an extra couple of miles on the bike!

Photos: Paul and Nigel Events Photography