Skins 6 in the peaks Round 1
Posted in Adventure Racing
The weather held and the snow melted in most of the course in time for the first of the Dark and White ‘Skins’ 6 in the peaks adventure races. The location being Macclesfield Forest and surrounding hills. There was two special stages crammed into this 6 hour event. A abseil and an orienteering course using a different scale map to the standard 1:25k OS maps both at Teggs Nose Country Park. Each racer was given an allocated time for the abseil therefore reducing congestion and queuing and this worked very well. It also meant that racers route choices were vastly different and there was a lot less following in evidence as everyone had to be at abseil transition at different times and a route had to be chosen based on their abseil time.A weird start to the race as you had to set off on bikes and you was handed a black and white map to get you to the place to get your control descriptions then go back to the start to get your map. You could then set off racing either running or on foot. Not really sure if this part was necessary although on speaking with the organisers they noted that as people were already on the bikes that a lot of them stayed on the bike and did that section first. This despite being more points on foot.
My abseil was a morning one and I only had about 1 hour of racing to do before my allotted time so bike section was my chosen starter (also as I had been having a discussion with another person about why we always run first so thought I would try the other way) The usual dark & white approach was in full force here. Always laid back but very well organised. Less glitz than other races but some tough courses and some great racing. There was something for everyone at this race. The beginners could have a good go at a challenging but accessible course and for the more experienced there was a tough challenging course with strong opposition. In the end the winner of the Mens category was Bob Johnston from Dark peak fell runners, Nick Gracie and John Laughlin in the male team, Heather Dawes after a strong performance at Open 5 coming home with the womens solo. Full results at the Dark and White site
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