Mendip Muddle
Last weekend, I travelled into deepest Somerset to race in the Mendip Muddle with a Bristol based friend.
Listed as a CL Fell Race, this is really a good hilly trail race making sure you go up as many hills as possible and covering the rather odd distance of 12.8 miles. It might have been 21 degrees in sunny Hampshire that day but the Mendips remained stubbornly cold, misty, windy and wet.
A few styles in the first couple of miles caused a bit of a log jam having to wait about 10 minutes in total to get over them all. After that though it was brilliant fun and just as you might expect with hill running on a wet day in other words great running and fantastic views mixed with stone skating and bog snorkelling (ok a bit of an exaggeration but my trail shoes won’t ever be the same again).
Great organisation from Weston AC with supportive marshals all the way round especially at the highest trig point where they bore the brunt of the rain and the wind. Bacon butties, soup, tea and cakes at the finish were very welcome. Oh and I finished in a staggeringly slow 2 hours 25 minutes. Julia Park