Beinn Ratha Hill Race

26th April 2008

The most northerly hill race on the mainland saw a new winner this year due to the unfortunate absence of defending champion Manuel Gorman. In returning his trophy, I did at least get my hands on a race prize for once.

21 runners started the race on a beautiful sunny afternoon, with an aggressive headwind battering the field. A couple of miles of easy land rover track gives way to wildly rough tussocky ground, which saps energy as it sinks under your feet. Leaders Graeme Taylor and Steven Worsley were clear by this point, with Eric Duncan putting in an incredible bull-like continuous run up the steep slope to take the fading David Spencer who was 3rd.

Some barely-runnable ground leads to the first summit, before a steep plunge down a heathery slope and over a fence towards the second peak. For some reason I chose to spend time re-attaching my number which had been ripped off by the wind on the descent, rather than going with Colin Olden in 5th as he battled with Spencer. Another tactical mistake then saw me blast up the final climb in pursuit of this duo, hands-on-heather, and fail to run "over the summit" as I had overdone it on the climb.

The long rough descent across the moor is well-flagged, picking up an overgrown vehicle track on the way down. This varies from help to hindrance - sometimes it's a solid tyre track, other times it becomes an ankle-bursting ditch. Eventually you meet the road for the mile back up past the start and on to Reay Golf Club and the finish.

Young local lad Taylor was first home in 55:32, trailed at some distance by a fatigued J Orr in a not-too-hideous 1:03:35. Twenty runners finished, with HHR's Russell McKechnie suffering a pulled calf at a fence on the initial track. I'm now planning a wee break from racing as I think I'm going backwards a bit since my good early-season form.

If you don't think a race with 240m of ascent sounds like much of a hill race, the reserve judgement until you're tried this one. I see why Manny likes it, as it's pretty wild! For lowland Westies, think Kaim and you wouldn't be far off. It sure ain't a trail race.

Thanks to organiser Sophie Dunnet and her team for a well-organised race, with good marshalling and marking throughout and a friendly welcome (with cakes) back at the accomodating Reay Golf Club.

Full results on SHR.

My full set of photos are online, and I've put a few up with this report too.

Posted by Johnston Orr on Sun 27 Apr 2008 | 7 comments

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