Jura 2006

It had been a long wait. The first time I picked up the SHR calendar was 2001 and looking through it the Jura Fell Race sounded like the one to do. It was cancelled that year because of foot and mouth. 2002 and 2003 I picked up colds in the few days before, 2004, other commitments and 2005, an injury stopped play. 2006 was game on and it didn’t disappoint. Cloud down to about 250m at the start made for tricky route finding over the first 3 tops. I was in a small group and we went for a minor detour between Dubh Bheinn and Glas Bheinn, dropping about 20 places in the process and meaning that I had the unusual experience of passing Chris twice. My target of sub 4 hours (and hence a whisky glass) looked to have gone out the window after the detour but getting to the top of Corra Bheinn the watch said it might just be possible. Unfortunately my legs didn’t appear to be answering calls for more speed. The famous tussocks and holes down to the river didn’t disappoint and with plenty of rain recently it was very soggy with the river also high. The helpful marshall at the 3 Arch Bridge told me only the road to go. I was all too aware of this and with dead legs and a head wind slowing progress even further the only part of ‘Jura’s beautiful coastline’ I was focused on was the distillery which looked very small. I’ll spare the details but I crossed the line retching with 19seconds to spare. It is a complete classic. Thanks to the organisers for an extremely smooth event, the marshalls who endured some pretty unpleasant conditions on the tops and everyone else who helped. Ian Holmes (Bingley) cruised home in 3.31, 20 minutes ahead of second place Alec Keith (HBT) and Adam Ward (Carnethy). Dawn Scott was 1st lady. 4 Westies headed over Chris, Murdo, Steffan and I. We just missed the team prize by one position. For full results and report see the SHR website.