Calder Valley Fell Runners – 25 December 2023
Silent Night running: Max Wilkinson follows the light to secure his second 3rd place victory of the week
Whilst most of the fell running world paused for Christmas, club newcomer Max took one for the CVFR team on Monday 18 December, being the only racer this side of Christmas and coming third in the Silent Night Fell Race in Co. Durham.
Think like a moth
With no flagging and only the distant glow of the occasional head torch, Silent Night is a demanding night-time race. Max sheds light on his epic adventure below:
Billed as the ‘dark festive cousin’ of the Chapelfell Top race in Weardale Co. Durham (featured in the English Champs this year), Silent Night is organised by Durham Fell Runners. The route is identical to the summer edition as an out and back to the summit of Chapelfell at 703 m elevation from the village of St. John’s Chapel (6.6km, 370m), with the crucial difference of being run after dark in mid-winter. The route isn’t flagged at any point and the second half is on open fell with very much a DIY approach to finding the summit, defined by a very small cairn on a broad top with a network of eroded peat haggs – especially tricky to navigate to in the clag and the dark.
I’ve run this race 4 times now and numerous reccies at night and there’s always a bit of doubt about finding the summit cairn. I’ve never failed on race day but I have aborted on two separate reccies only to review my GPS trace and find I’ve been within 20 metres off the summit. The kit list is extensive for a short out and back – full FRA kit, plus: extra headtorch, extra tights and warm baselayer in a drybag, emergency foil bag, mobile phone with race director number. Navigation is by map and compass, no GPS. 13 runners turned up to start. We had a stern briefing by race diretor Andy Blackett of Durham Fell Runners – essentially, this is a nerve-wracking race for the RD – “you’ve all been vetted prior to entry and should have all your kit, but it’s sound mountain judgement that’ll keep you safe, so please make sensible choices”. Well said and fair enough! Conditions were mild, breezy with some clag forecast on the top. On to the race start, which was announced simply as ‘go’!
I headed out in 3rd place on the rocky climb out of the village behind Durham Fell Runners local Chris Alborough and teammate John Woodhouse. Both very strong runners, Chris knows this fell like the back of his hand (or at least he should, living just down the road.) John is coming back from a calf injury and a bit of an unknown here. They both paired up on the climb and I worked hard to keep them just ahead in the headtorch beam. My plan was to make things as easy for myself as possible by following Chris step for step – he knew the most efficient line up the rocky and boggy path on to the fell, swapping from one side to the other to find the best running, so I stuck to his line and that made me good time. Then through the gate about 15 seconds behind Chris and John and out on to the open fell where the fun really starts!
I hadn’t run the English Champs race in summer, or reccied the route after this race, but had heard there was now a direct and well-defined trod. In previous years I’ve stuck to a quad track to make the first half of the fell climb, but Chris and John had headed on what felt like a direct bearing to the summit, through the rushes and sphagnum, so I had faith in their decision and pressed on and this paid off. I cut through to a bit of a trod, clearly having grown back from the English Champs, this took me direct for the first half of the climb across featureless fell to my second marker, a wall corner. From here I followed another trod about 60 seconds behind Chris and John now, still running as a pair. I pressed on hard to keep them in sight, now a small pool of light ahead. I climbed further and hit a few small features in memory from last years’ race – a collection of small boulders and a trod up the side of a peat hagg. That was the climb mostly out of the way, Chris and John had now disappeared over the crest of the hill but weren’t far ahead. But now on to the crucial bit, finding the summit cairn, this is such a short and fast race that doing any proper map and compass work will put you out of the running, so it was very much pigeon-sense navigation. I knew there’d be a marshal on the summit cairn, with a headtorch, so I dipped my own lamp and focussed on the dark horizon ahead to spot any slight glow of light. The first I spotted was over to my left, clearly not at the top of the hill. I couldn’t possibly be another runner that far over at this point in the race, so I chose to ignore it (turns out it was one of the marshals still on their way up to the summit!) and pushed on in the general direction of the ‘top.’
The going got really sloppy as I crossed in and out of peak haggs, then I spotted a dim glow and soon after two headtorches coming the other way – must be the summit and Chris and John coming back. I headed over and was relieved to find Rory Woods at the summit cairn and exchange a quick grunt of encouragement with Chris and John as they passed me to make the descent – turns out that Rory had to ditch his pack on the climb and sprint to make the summit just seconds before Chris and John arrived!
Having made the summit in a thin swirl of clag I made a 180 and headed back down the way I came. This is the second tricky part of the race, descending at speed over rough fell in the dark and trying to stay on course for a direct line back to the wall corner. Chris and John had disappeared, but there was now a stream of headtorches from runners on the climb, so it was easy enough to backtrack for part of the descent. I lost the trod just before the wall corner and made a small error that cost me 15-20 seconds, but I was relieved to be back at a well-known point and still running well in third place, although I could sense others were on the descent some way up the slope behind me. I hit the quad track and found the line on to the direct English Champs trod and was running strong on the slower part of the descent, then through the gate and back on to the track. This is the bit where I’ve always lost time in the past, not having the quick leg turnover to keep pace on the harder surface, but since I’ve been doing loads of road running at CVFR on a Tuesday night I found I had a better pace here and descended well.
There were a few oh s**t moments on slimy grass and rocks, but I careered on down mostly in control. A headlight up ahead and I could see from the running style it was John and I closed in further towards the final run in to the finish, 27 seconds behind John to take my second third place of the weekend and a massive PB by over 7 minutes (only just short of my current PB in the summer edition of the race). A decent result, clearly all that road running is paying off, hate to say that as a fell runner! Chris came first with a storming run another 2-half minutes ahead of John, he must have pulled away strong on the descent.
A huge pile of mince pies and mulled wine were waiting at the finish and was good fun cheering the rest of the field back in. We headed to The Golden Lion, well placed meters from the finish for a Christmas pint. Plenty of chat about safety procedures in fell races and how different it is racing at night and how few night fell races there are, in fact ‘Mr Sparkles Dark-un’* was the only other night race we could name at the time. Racing at night makes for such a different challenge, I wouldn’t want to do every race like this but it’s a great experience.
*If you fancy trying a night fell race Mr Sparkle’s Dark ‘un happens to be the first CVFR club champs short race of 2024!
On behalf of the CVFR press team we hope you have a wonderful festive time, whether you’re having a good rest for a winning 2024 full of adventures, partaking in some of the festive fell races or simply getting out and enjoying the moors.