Totley's exterminator

I've just had a check and a fair bit of this fell race isn't actually in Derbyshire but I'll carry on regardless.

Decided a while back to try something a bit further than I am used to, and having missed the half tour of Bradwell settled on the 'Exterminator', a fabulous looking route through some of the western most areas of the peak district.  I felt I knew some parts of the route already, Stanage Edge, Padley Gorge and the Longshaw Estate, whilst some areas would be new to me such as Totley Moor and Mitchell's Field.

I felt that with my partial knowledge and some studying of the route from afar, I would be ok in amongst the other runners, figuring the bit I knew the least about would be covered whilst the runners were all still in reasonable close proximity.  Armed with my checked, mandatory kit, map of the route and instructions I was ready to go.

The weather forecast was for fine, dry weather but the skies over Matlock and Bakewell on the way over promised anything but, with a blanket of thick black cloud covering the Derwent valley towns. Totley itself was in under blue skies though the low lying rainbow on the horizon promised something different.

The climb up to the trig point on Totley moor (CP1) was taken at a steady enough pace, with the leaders already disappearing into the distance and sure enough I was able to follow the line of runners off the hill and down to the stepping stones (CP2), taking some routes I certainly would not have picked out had I been on my own. 

After the climb up to the road had been completed, I had managed to find myself a fair way behind those in front of me so decided to push on up through Houndkirk Moor and onto Burbage Moor.  The narrow paths though the heather were again, not on the original route plan I had in my head, but I managed to tag onto a few other runners by the time we dropped over the rocks and headed to Higger Tor.

Keeping it nice and steady over Higger Tor to CP3, some water and a Jelly Baby, the route then took us up onto Stanage Edge.  Although the clouds still looked a bit threatening the rain was holding off and the temperature was good.  CP4 was duly reached and we were shown our route off the rocks and into the bracken.  Could have picked a better route down here I'm sure.  Looking at google earth there do seem to be some tracks through but I struggled to find them and was off my feet twice on my way to the bottom.

Some nice steady running was then ahead taking in some of the Stanage Struggle route to the Church at Hathersage.   Another water and Jelly baby at CP5 and a fellow runner asking me if I was ok? which was nice of him, thought I must have been looking a bit tired or something.  A bit more climbing up to and beyond CP6 at the far end of Mitchell's field saw me drop a couple of places before starting a long slow decent to the familiarity of the pump station at bottom of Padley Gorge.

I'd managed to fall behind those ahead of me at this point and rather than wait for a few seconds for those behind I set off from CP7 on the route that I had worked out before hand, down to Grindleford station and then taking the path up into Longshaw.  Now I still say this doesn't look to bad on the map but the height loss and subsequent gain I had to make, meant I found myself on a route with no other runners, and the climb up the steep ascent into the National Trust estate was taking it toll on my legs. Combine that with missing the planned entry point, then running what ended up being three sides of a square instead of one, my decision to not hang around for someone who knew what they were doing was proving to bit of a minor disaster.

Looking back I was pretty cross with myself for the amount of time and places I lost because of this, and the extra distance was telling as my pace slowed to a walk once up on White Edge Moor.  It was however, quite interesting to be in a race but out there on my own cutting through the acres of purple heather.

No runners in sight, either back towards Longshaw...

...or ahead towards white edge.

The Skies were becoming much brighter as I made my way back onto Totley moor and up to the trig point again, finally joining up again with some other runners approaching from the other side, all moving better than me at this stage. Thankfully the return back down to Totley was all downhill and I managed to get back to the Cricket Inn without losing any more places, but felt the lap of the sports field was a little uncalled for.  I was shattered.

Post CP8 performance aside, a cracking event through some magnificent scenery and with the heather still out in force it was fabulous views all round.  Lovely roast pork bap and cake at the finish made me feel a bit better as well.  Found the guy who had shown concern for my health back in Hathersage and thanked him.  I had only noticed later in the run that my knee and shin were covered in blood, almost certainly a result of my descending technique off Stanage Edge.

Would I do again?  Certainly, but may get in a recce of where I went wrong  before my next attempt.

My route