Billed as 'Britain's most brutal race', the Spine Race is a mountain ultramarathon from Derbyshire to Scotland ? and to add insult to injury, it takes place in January
It is 2am, the temperature is well below zero and the wind on the exposed hills of the Pennines is whipping snow into waist-deep drifts. You're hungry, your blisters are excruciatingly painful, your fingers are frozen and you've only had a few hours' sleep in the past three days ?
Welcome to the Montane Spine Race ? a 268-mile single-stage winter mountain ultramarathon from Edale in Derbyshire to Kirk Yetholm in the Scottish borders. In an event such as this ? which bills itself as "Britain's most brutal race" ? competitors are operating on the edge and small errors could have serious consequences, with hypothermia and frostbite very real dangers.
The event is the brainchild of expedition photographer Scott Gilmour and polar logistics expert Phil Hayday-Brown, and 11 people lined up for the first race in 2012 ? only three made it to the finish. The next year there were 30 competitors, with 11 making it to Kirk Yetholm.
In January next year I'll be among more than 80 people taking on ice, snow, cold and savage winds in the biggest Spine Race yet, with another 50 running the 105-mile Spine Challenger "sprint" from Edale to Hawes, North Yorkshire.
In a race where three-quarters of runners won't finish, resilience is essential. Rob Spalton, an army officer who dropped out last year but will be back for more in January, said: "The race is clearly physically demanding, but the mental fight is harder."
Although the race is run continuously, there are five checkpoints where runners can get a hot meal and grab a few hours' sleep ? but, with the clock always ticking, the temptation to push on is strong.
Last year Dave Lee only got two hours' sleep in the first three days and nights of racing. As severe sleep deprivation took hold he started hallucinating and twice woke up to find he had fallen asleep while walking. "I didn't know where I was or what I was doing," he wrote in his blog. "I didn't even know I was taking part in this event." When he eventually reached checkpoint three at Middleton-in-Teesdale, 160 miles into the race, the Spine's medical team forced him to get at least six hours' sleep before allowing him to continue.
Lee pushed on to within 15 miles of the finish only to find himself in the second of two groups hit by a heavy dump of snow, when a major storm hit the Cheviots. Both groups managed to hole up in emergency mountain huts for the night until rescue teams were able to get to them at first light. The leading group made it to Kirk Yetholm the next morning ? but the second did not. Lee still considers the Spine Race the best thing he has ever taken part in.
Joint 2012 winner and the only person to have completed the event twice, Gary Morrison, was travelling alone when he slipped on flagstones crossing a remote mountain tarn and plunged chest deep into freezing water.
A commercial diver by trade, the Scotsman quickly recognised the danger posed by hypothermia and sprinted 250 yards to the shelter of some trees; realising that if he stripped off his wet clothes he might succumb to the cold before he could put on warm, dry layers, he instead donned his waterproofs straight over the top, started eating to boost his energy levels and pushed on fast to generate some heat. He made it to the finish.
"If I'd lived in the 19th century I would have been an explorer," says Morrison, who will be back to run the race for the third time in January. "I just enjoy the adventure. I can enter the zone and lose myself for a few days."
Meeting the race team and a few previous competitors on a training weekend earlier this month I can't deny that some of the stories I've heard are making me feel more than a tad nervous at what I'm taking on.
But Gilmour, who also runs the Frostskade 500 across Scandinavia's Arctic wilderness with explorer Charlie Paton, was keen to dispel some of the myths around the Spine Race. "It's not impossible and you're not going to die," he said. "Unless you do something stupid ?"
Cracking the Spine
The Cracking the Spine project challenges school pupils to team up and run 268 miles by Sport Relief weekend in March. Ultrarunner and coach Andy Mouncey has enlisted 300 children at five schools on or near the race route ? from Edale primary school, whose 13 pupils are getting help racking up the miles from parents and teachers, to a 150-strong junior school in Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire, where children will attempt the challenge in teams.
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