From club member Adrian Edwards:
Mt Snowdon Ultra 50 race report – sorry, it’s a long one – as is befitting of a 50-miler that takes nearly 24hrs to complete!
After completing the Lakeland 50 three times, Andy Burgess decided that it was too flat and set out to find something with a bit more climb. The Mt Snowdon Ultra 50 was probably the only 50-mile ultramarathon he could find with ‘more climb’ (14,000ft of it!), and since I’d never been up Mt Snowdon before I foolishly agreed to go along with him. Ed Bailey also joined us in this endeavour, having completed three other 50-mile ultras by the same company (GB Ultras) already this year.
And so it was that the three of us set off in the dark from Betws-y-Coed at 6:30am on Saturday and headed for the mountains. The first section was nice and gentle as we headed out along a wooded valley next to the river, and it was stop-start as runners filed through gates and over styles. After 8 miles we arrived at the first checkpoint of the day nicely warmed up.
Now the fun started – an ascent up the first mountain of the day, Tryfan (3,010ft). We joined a queue of ‘runners’ starting the ascent up the north face. To begin with it was a moderate climb, but by the time we were half way up it had become a ‘scramble’ requiring the use of hands as much as feet. And with sheer drops on some sections it wasn’t a great place to be if you suffer from vertigo – which I sadly do! Still, we kept on climbing until eventually we were on the Heather Terrace path (Boggy Terrace would be a better name) and a descent down to the A4086 and a cuppa at Checkpoint 2.
From here we set off up the Pyg Track for a 10-mile loop around the summit of Snowdon (3,560ft). It was a much easier (and less scary!) climb than the first one, only made difficult by picking our way through the hordes of tourists. We didn’t hang around long at the top (too crowded, raining/hailing and poor visibility) and soon headed back down the Miners Track, even managing to do a rare bit of running as the path levelled and the tourists thinned out around the Llyn Lydaw reservoir. Back to CP2, which was now CP4 (CP3 should have been at the top of Snowdon, but was binned due to the weather).
After a welcome brew, the three of us headed back through the bogs, which gave way to stony ground and then eventually a boulder field as we reached the summit of the third mountain of the day, Glyder Fach (3,261ft, and the names translates as ‘Small Mound’ in Welsh!). Ed had dropped back a bit on the ascent, although for several miles we could still see him moving up with some other runners. Unfortunately by the time Andy and I had picked our way up and over the boulder-strewn summit we’d lost sight of him, and a combination of time pressure (we knew we were dicing with cut-off times) and wind chill meant that we had little choice but to descend to CP5 and hope he’d catch us there. And what a descent it was, down the infamous ‘Devil’s Kitchen’ (lots of bum-sliding) until we reached some more runnable ground to get us to the checkpoint at the western tip of the Llyn Ogwen lake.
Unfortunately, Ed didn’t materialise and we started to get quite cold waiting in the checkpoint, so we decided to proceed as a duo. I had mentioned to Andy that since it was now getting dark I didn’t fancy doing the final ascent if it was a tricky blighter, but a marshal informed us that this last mountain was a much easier route. He either a) was actually a mountain goat disguised as a marshal b) didn’t know where the route actually went or c) flat-out lied! To begin with, it was quite steep and a bit boggy, then it was VERY steep and loose scree, and then it just looked…like an impenetrable rock face. We checked watches and phones multiple times, and each time it said we were on the GPX race route – but try as we may, we could not see a way to reach the top. Neither did the thought of trying to go back down appeal – all that loose rock would have made for a very treacherous descent in daylight, let alone at night. Around this point whilst searching for a way up I fell off a rock and landed flat on my back, improving my mood no end. After 10 minutes of huddling on a rock contemplating our predicament a group of runners slowly made its way up to our position, and taking safety in numbers we set out as a larger group to find our way. After another hour of dead-ends, rock scrambles, pushing and pulling we emerged onto flatter ground (well it’s all relative!) and made our way past the summit of Pen yr Ole Wen (3,209ft) and a long slog in the dark along a ridge line to the summits of Carnedd Dafydd (3,425ft) and Carnedd Llewelyn (2nd highest peak in Wales at 3,491ft). From here we started a steep descent (yep, more bum sliding) down another totally un-pronounceable trail (‘Bwlch Eryl Farchog’ if you want to give it a go) and traversed a ridge line that gave me another chance to experience vertigo. It was much easier to ignore it in the dark – just don’t shine your headtorch towards the steep drops! Eventually it became a boggy slope akin to Dartmoor and Andy I and started doing some actual running, overtaking a few people…until I mistook the reflection of a sheep’s eyes in my headtorch for a reflective route marker and missed a turn. Luckily Andy’s watch soon warned us we’d gone off track, and no sheep were harmed in the incident.
We arrived at CP6 (which was also CP1) about 20 minutes inside the cut-off time and were told we could only carry on if we didn’t hang around too long. Having survived all the big mountains neither of us were in the mood to get timed out with 13 miles to go, so we set out at what felt like a furious pace (as in we actually did some running), passing more competitors on a loop around Llyn Crafant reservoir. There was still plenty of climb by Somerset standards (probably the equal of anything you’ll find in the Quantocks or Blackdowns), but after the ‘big boy’ mountains it didn’t seem too bad! We arrived at the final CP with a much healthier margin between us and the dreaded cut-off (about 45 minutes I think – what a luxury), but didn’t hang about too long just in case…
The final eight miles back to Betws-y-Coed seemed to take forever, although we were still making a reasonable speed (possibly even approaching Emma Greig’s standard walking pace!) and passing other competitors. Just as I was thinking that some cruel person had moved an entire town just to trick us we began to see the glow of lights. And then there it was – the finish! We ran in together for a ‘sprint finish’ across the village green. We finished in 23 hours 25 mins – a mahoosive 35 minutes inside the cut-off, and about 10 minutes over Andy’s 100-mile PB! I couldn’t quite comprehend it when the marshals handed us ‘silver’ finishers medals (top 100 finishers got gold, 101-200 finishers silver and 201+ finishers a bronze – except not that may people finished!) and told us we were joint 115th! (I’ve just seen the results and we’ve been bumped up two places to 113th – I think a few people missed a checkpoint).
My heart goes out to Ed, who retired at CP6 after completing all the toughest parts of the course. I know he’s already planning to go back next year and give it another crack. Those of you that know him know what a friendly, unassuming and tenacious guy he is – and also more than a little bonkers, as I’m damned if I’d go anywhere near that route again! Andy also proved yet again that he’s just the man you want running (or scrambling, or bum-sliding) next to you when the going gets tough.
Byth eto! — with Andy Burgess.
