Haworth Hobble (aka Wuthering Hike)

My first ‘ultra’ distance race.  Until today, I had never run more than 25 miles before.  The Haworth Hobble is 32 miles and has 4,700ft of ascent!

I set off for Haworth on Friday afternoon on the train and bus so with a view to having a relaxing evening in a B&B so that I wouldn’t have to get up too early in the morning for the 8am start.

At about 3.30pm I decided to see if I could find my way along the first couple of miles of the route using the directions card we had been given.  I couldn’t even make my way out of the village centre!  The directions were as much use as a chocolate fireguard.  They said ‘start at the Fleece pub, then go along the cobbles and out onto Cemetery Road’.  The problem is, when you go up along the cobbles, the road splits in two, neither of which roads are called Cemetery Road!  I had to go onto maps on my phone to find out where to go and it appeared that Cemetery Road was off a road, off another road off the cobbled road.  This was not a good start.  The next bit of the directions said to head to the footpath/road junction and follow the sign to Bronte Bridge and Far Intake.  I walked all the way along Cemetery Road and there were various footpath signs on either side of it but none of them were signed to either of those destinations so I kept on going.  I reached the end of Cemetery Road which was indeed a road/footpath junction so I assumed this to be the correct place, however again none of the signs pointed to Bronte Bridge or Far Intake.  There was one sign which pointed to Bronte Waterfalls so I assumed that to be the right way, although I didn’t carry on any further along and just headed back into Haworth, feeling incredibly despondent with the directions (or lack of them!).  All the other long distance runs I have done have had really clear in depth directions, making it difficult to get lost but this was just useless and I was starting to think I had bitten off more than I could chew. 

When I got back to my B&B, I got my map out and highlighted the entire route, using somebody else’s Strava trace from last year.  I then wandered along the Chaplins Bistro for a tasty lasagne to fuel tomorrow's run.

I didn’t sleep at all well because I was really nervous about the race.  I wasn’t nervous about the distance as I knew that if I got too tired I could always walk as I wasn’t treating it as a race and just wanted to get around the course.  My fear was of getting horribly lost. 

The owners of the B&B I stayed in offered to get me my breakfast early but I declined their kind offer as I have recently found that with these long distance events, I’m much better off filling my face in the couple of days before the event and then just eating something quite light, like a flapjack, on the morning which is what I did today. 

After getting everything together, I made my way to the primary school for the registration and realised that it was actually really warm out so I would have to rethink my clothing.  I took off my Inov8 waterproof and put my much lighter Berghaus waterproof into my bag. 

After nattering to various other Horwich RMI’ers together with running friends from other local clubs, it was soon time for the off. 

The race starts outside the Fleece pub which straightaway is quite a steep cobbled hill so I had decided in advance to walk from the off, just until it levelled out, but I did find myself jogging slightly as I was swept along.  Once it levelled off, we stayed on the road for about a mile before getting out onto the trails.

There’s not much I can say about the first half of the route itself as it has all become a bit of a blur now and seems such a distant memory.  I do remember one bit where I had to queue for ages for a kissing gate but it’s always nice to have a breather. 

As I approached the first food checkpoint around 15 miles in, I could see Gordon up ahead.  I caught up to him at the checkpoint (where I had a hotdog sausage without the bread roll) and wandered along with him for a short while.  Gordon was drinking tea and eating a teacake though and this bit was really runnable so I didn’t want to walk because I was saving any walking for uphill sections and didn’t want to waste any flat or downhill sections so I carried on ahead. 

I then got chatting to a girl named Kim who runs for Todmorden Harriers.  It was her first ultra too and I was glad to be running with her as she was local and so knew where she was going.  We stayed together for a good few miles up until the climb up to Stoodley Pike where I got ahead slightly.  I was then accompanied by a couple from Keighley Harriers, again a relatively local club.  The climb up Stoodley Pike was gruelling this far into the run (over 20 miles in).  It felt so steep and endless.  I was surprised to find though that I was able to run again straight away when I got to the top without needing any respite. 

Not long after Stoodley Pike, after running steeply downhill, there was a road section which started with a flight of steps which were really hard work.  They had a bannister along them and I was using this to pull myself up because my legs were so tired at this point.  Once at the top of the steps the road just seemed to go on and on uphill.  By this point, I had left the Keighley Harriers behind and was now trying to keep up with a group of four runners but I don’t know what, if any, club they were from as they weren’t wearing club vests.  They seemed to know where they were going though so I tried to stay with them. 

Everything after Stoodley Pike seemed to be uphill.  There was of course some downhill but those bits seemed to be over really quickly and it felt like there was far more uphill than down. 

However, by 25 miles I was still feeling pretty fresh.  I felt much better at this point than I had done at the end of the Anglezarke Amble (which is around 25 miles long) and I had got to this point in a quicker time than I had finished the Amble so it was going great.

Towards the end though I was getting to a point where it was hard just running downhill because trying to pick my feet up to avoid falling over rocks was getting increasingly more difficult. I motored on though because I didn’t want to lose the people at the front of me in case I didn’t know where to go.  I know I could have hung on for people behind me to catch up but, by now, I knew I had a good chance of coming in under seven hours so I just wanted to keep going. 

Once Haworth was in sight, I got a huge second wind (or was it a third, fourth or fifth wind?) and suddenly felt full of energy again.  Seeing the primary school was such a relief!

My official time was 6 hours, 53 minutes and 58 seconds which I am really pleased with as the time I had in mind was seven and a half hours.  I was never really bothered about time and just wanted to get around but, the more distance I covered, the more the time seemed important. 

When I got back, I went to get myself some well earned grub and sat with Josie, Albert, Mark, Mike and Tony who had all been back much longer than me. 

I really enjoyed the day and am pleased with the outcome but I don’t think I’ll be doing the race again.  One of the reasons I love the LDWA events is because I enjoy following the route directions but that was impossible on this race.  There was also a bit too much road in it for my liking as well.  If somebody wanted to pair up with me on it one year, however, then I’d probably go for it.

Photo courtesy of Scott Leach - https://www.justgiving.com/scottdoestri

Total distance – 31.7 miles