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Well, what a fantastic map, plenty of choice and plenty of scope for confusion. This is what Trailquesting is all about, trying to collect as much as possible in the most efficient route. There were lots of possible routes tonight and the key was to keeping the 'in and outs' to a minimum. The controls in the middle of the map were bad to tie in but there was a fairly clear route around the perimeter of the map. The Mint Cake MTB crew had a little home advantage, as we often ride this area on a Thursday night, but different to normal, all the offroad routes were out of bounds.
I was lucky and was able to match Paul Trott this week in gathering all 30 controls. My route was thus: 29 28 27 24 22 17 10 7 11 14 21 16 20 25 26 30 23 19 18 15 13 9 6 3 1 2 4 5 8 12. This route seemed to work really well, some dead ends were unavoidable. Looking at the map at the start, it did seem a compact area, but the fact that the controls were scattered all over the place meant that I still covered 30.2 miles at an average of 16.4 mph. This is the fastest speed up to date and is an indication of the lack of hills this week. 27 was up a steep hill and I did consider leaving it out, but I'm glad I didn't as things turned out. Finding control 28 wasn't immediately obvious as it was set back off the road a bit on a small triangle.
There were 5 controls at the start that were quick to get, a lot of back and forth up the roads, but they were too handy to leave out. This set the scene for the return leg and I had worked out I needed 9 mins to get from 12 back to the finish. The biggest problem with my route was that I had to go over Mount Eiger twice just north of Yealand Storrs, the corner at the north end seemed very sharp after that downhill! I went in and out for 7 which I didn't realise was up a hill, then on to Waterslack. Lots of road junctions and lots of room for error. Control 20 was in the right place, it was just hidden behind a parked car. 1 hour had passed as I left control 30. It looked as though the bigger half of the map was still to cover, but what remained was a nice flowing route around the top. 23 was easy to miss as the fingerpost didn't stand out at all, but it was there amongst the loose chippings.
The climb up the edge of Arnside Knott led to a fantastic descent through Arnside village. I know some people cut down through the estate which is perfectly acceptable. I have been lost in estates on TQ's before, and am a big believer in keeping things as simple as possible, I kept on the yellow road and tackled the hairpin right in front of the church. There were no trains coming at the level crossing, so I bounced over the railway lines ok and soon got to no. 9. The road up to 3 was a bit of a climb, it was nice to have a brief respite while I punched the card. I had ear-marked 1 and 8 as possible controls to leave out if time was getting tight, but with 30 mins left, it was all to play for. Control 1 was in the lovely Deer park amongst the avenue of trees, I often see squirrels darting about in here, but none tonight. No. 2 was up a road with 3 speed bumps, I didn't fancy hitting them with road wheels, so performed 6 gentle bunny hops, just enough to clear them and cause minimum landing impact.
I knew a hill was coming to get up to no. 4 and 5 and if I had 15 mins left by the time I got to the road end before 12, I would go for 8. The road south of 5 was a lovely long descent and I reached the junction with 17 mins left. Things were looking pretty good at this stage, incidents aside. 8 was up a bit of a hill and there were half a dozen horses and riders on the junction all stood about talking. After collecting 12, it was over Mount Eiger again and a sprint to the finish and exactly 4 mins to spare. PT had nearer 10 mins left and he did a similar route but in the other direction.
It was another sunny night and the gentle breeze kept most of the flies away. It was nice to see some seaside on the way to no. 15 and the prominent ruin of Arnside Tower to the SE of control 13. We are half way through the championship now and the league tables are taking shape. P Trott defiantly in 1st place of the men. I seem to be scraping 2nd at the moment, but TSC is creeping up fast, along with the venerable Ray Morriss - organiser of Hawkshead event, this will be a close one. The ladies will be interesting when worst scores start being dropped. Philippa and Rachel are battling it out at the moment, but Jo Ratcliffe is back fresh from holiday and was racing round on her rock lobster in fine style at Yealand. Charlie Herbbert is leading Jason Webb in the Juniors and in the fun team class, some good scores have been posted by Diane and Nigel Walker.
Ken Sepherd had a relatively trouble free run this week, The 2nd hand chain he managed to cadge since Forton was performing well and most of his gears were working most of the time. It was nice of Rod to Organise the Hot Pot at the end, it was nice and tasty and full of sausage. The chosen charity for the proceeds to go to this week is The Palastinian Red Crescent, which is a bit of a foreign red cross type thing. Rod was so organised that there were some photos he had taken on display on a laptop at the end. A huge thanks to Rod, his family and Martin Oglesby for all their good time and effort organising a challenging event, All I can say is please organise another one next year...
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