From Ash Winter…

While many Harriers were off performing heroics at the Calderdale Way Relay, I decided to take the short hop to Grassington. The trail race of the same name was a steep, multi-terrain effort, raising money for the Grassington Primary School PTA. Running up hills for a good cause is a good way to spend a Sunday morning so off I went.

The 30-minute trip went by in a swirl of the finest tunes of the 1980’s and I was parking up at the National Park centre. Collected my number, had time for a small warm up, with a taste of the hill through the town centre, just to make sure I was ready. An enjoyably relaxed gathering near the start line followed, a short speech about not getting lost and off we went.

As is customary, we were straight into the climb. Through the town onto dry and dusty trails and finally over the fields, with many gates and stiles to leap over. Or at least in my head. The real climb was ahead though. A group of three of us plodded up the hill, swapping places a few times, which became a pattern for the next few kilometres over the undulating tops. Once the descents started in earnest, I start to pull away from the other two in the group. A couple of short, sharp hills closed the gap a little though, so the finish was tighter than I thought it would be. The final kilometre was a battle that I eventually lost, with a tight finish with literally 5 or 6 seconds between us. However, that didn’t spoil the enjoyment of the day, and we all agreed it was fun to run in a small group of similar paces, challenging each other to keep pushing on. All in the spirit of the day, which was most excellent.

In the end, I finished a respectable 7th place. Stayed a while to cheer on some of the finishers, but Grassington was getting busier and busier so decided to head home. I picked up my swag bag and began the trip back to Ilkley. The swag bag is one of the single best hauls in the history of me running races. Bottle of Landlord, Timothy Taylors branded bottle opener and sunglasses (who would have imagined such a thing existed), medal, chocolate brownie and box of Yorkshire Tea (standard, not Gold).

100% recommend the Grassington Trail Race, would run up those hills again.