Lomonds of Fife hill race! And a WIN!

A rather chilled out morning this morning, rolled out of bed at lazy 8.30am (!) and had pre-race porridge and tea and stuff, and lounged on the sofa before needing to leave the house for the Lomonds of Fife race as its only an hour away... a ly in and a race on the same day!? Sweet :D

Lovely drive over actually, never been over here before, across the Clackmannanshire Bridge, Strathmiglo was easy to find but was greeted with a full car park, and dodgily parked the van a bit close to the car park entrance - but I was anxious to get registered and get to the start asap and worried that id run out of time! Gorgeous day, packed my stuff up and trotted up to the start, a very modest chalk line on the floor - im beginning to really love the low key chilled out nature of these races. Its a nice change to not have timing chips and deadly serious marshals! Bumped into Tarin which was great to see a familiar face!!

We set off bang on 1pm, initially a bottleneck as well, the track was very narrow and through the woods before the pack had spread it was pretty difficult to get any pace going but it broke up on the first bog/steep bit in the woods so that sorted it out a bit. Turns out that on this race, there are orienteering stamps and no masrhalled checkpoints which I didnt know, that god for the man in front who told me what it was!! Thats was new!
Then the ascent of East Lomond in the blazing sunshine, man that was warm. Bypassed the water station at the road, kept going and got a gel/water/isotonic in on the last bit of ascent which made me feel ming but i thought it would be worth it later on. There were some super fasties on the way back down as I was beginning the main ascent up...sheesh. Cairn at the top and straight back down again, which was steep grass but dry thank god. I really need to upgrade these shoes.

Coming down off East Lomond - that was a slog	I just love this photo! You ladies rule!

From the low point back at the road, it was steadily uphill allllll the way across the ridge to West Lomond. A beautiful little ridge but quite delicate path was taking no prisoners, people in front of me were falling off of the track, and it sounds awful but

... getting chased!

I gained a lot of places that way! By just keeping running the whole time and I managed to pass the two ladies I had seen earlier on which was great booster so I knew I was gaining on the pack. Climb out of the corrie towards West Lomond was steep and wet, like its a small stream almost. Lots of fun here with rocks, mud and the water... I went in up to my shoulders at one point, picked up a gel pack or two that had clearly just been dropped probably when the person eating it fell over! Then a short 'flat' and the last slog up West Lomond, a nice one actually, not too long and good terrain.

The descent was initially grassy and runnable and nice, and I thought to myself 'yeah, this is quite steep like they said' ... then the steepest grass slope ive EVER seen,...so THATS what they all mean.... I wouldn't go down that with a snowboard in winter let alone here. Apparently this race has the steepest ascent and descent of any of the races. I believe that now. If your'e a skiier, its like the Harakiri of hill running. I adopted the bona fide technique of everyone else, get on your ass and slide! That was all you could do. One guy had gone too fast , had no brakes and almost crashed into me on the way down at one hell of a pace!! So funny!! I twanged my good shoulder on the way down but spent a lot of it giggling like a ten year old. Poor Tarin told me later on he bruised and thistle-bit his butt the whole way down!! No wonder people were saying to me 'oh good, your'e in cycling shorts'.

This was the steepest ascent EVER (middle gully in shot)

Made it down finally, I had so much grass in my pants! Down around the rock, checkpoint, and back up the hill to a marshall for a final checkpoint and traverse, before the tussocky open hillside down to the gorse where I almost got lost, and then into the woods. I was convinced id missed a checkpoint, kept looking for it but no luck, a short uphill track, then undulating and and down again for an abrupt finish, which totally snuck up on me! I heard people shouting, 'first lady' and 'you've placed well' as I came in but i assumed that it was for someone else in front. I immediately confessed to a marshall that I think I missed something but he said no, you're all good after a short description of where I went. It turned out that the other leading ladies had stayed too high on the track before the open hillside descent to the gorse, and id descended after a friend said now was the time, and, saw someone else doing the same, and so I over took the other ladies without seeing them as they got stuck in some rocks! I was gobsmacked and didn't believe everyone saying I was first lady but yeah, a lovely surprise! The slowest winning time in years but I don't care, Ill take it! Yas!

After a long chat with other racers comparing notes on general stuff, and how we all tackled the steep slide, and a hug and photo of celebration, jogged the track back with Tarin and into the village hall for loads of tea, cake, crisps and bananas....awesome. All in glorious weather too. Got my name read out at the hall in front of everyone and it felt weird and awkward but I was beaming from ear to ear :) And to think I nearly didn't go. I rang my mum on the car journey home to tell her like a kid that just won a prize at a fete or something....so funny.

Got home, and had tacos, had beer, had ice cream and sat on the couch for trashy transporters films :)