Runners caught up in washout

Oct 30 2008 by Michelle Coyle, North Wales Weekly News

A DWYGYFYLCHI fell runner was caught up in the horrendous floods that struck last week’s marathon in the Lake District.

The Original Mountain Marathon was called off early after the region was struck by over a month’s rainfall in 24 hours, preceded by five inches of rain on the Thursday.

The RAF Valley helicopter joined Cumbrian mountain rescue teams in the search for 1,700 stranded runners.

Chris Near, 35, from Fairy Glen Road, and running partner Tim Higginbottom from Mold, were just two of 2,500 who took part in the gruelling race.

Chris Near, an outdoor instructor at Nant Bwlch yr Haearn, Llanrwst, said: “Training with the Eryri Harriers, we have obviously done a lot of running in bad weather so the conditions weren’t such a shock to us.

“We started at 9am but by 12pm it was a complete washout. River crossings became extremely hazardous. Routes were shortened by organisers and we won Saturday’s elite race in just under four hours. Feeling pretty battered, we settled down for the night in our tent. Then we heard ambulance sirens and were told the race had been called off and to return to our cars.”

The hard work didn’t stop there. On the grim walk back to the starting line over Honister Pass, Chris and Tim found themselves under 3ft of water.

Chris admits feeling frustrated: “We’d raced hard to finish the first day in the lead and were on track to achieve our goal of winning all mountain marathons in a single year. We were disappointed that it was cancelled.

“However, what was more important was that everyone was accounted for safely. It was a bad call on the part of the organisers that it went ahead in the first place. There could have been quite a few deaths as so many people were stuck out there with swollen rivers overnight.”

On returning to North Wales, Chris and Tim went straight to support their wives running in the Coed y Brenin Duathalon on Sunday.