Scottish Islands Peaks Race - 20th to 22nd May

Running Results| Sailing Results

Starting to recover now from the weekend's excesses. For the runners, the weekend consists of:

4½ miles cross country prologue at Oban

23 miles of purgatory on Mull slogging out to Ben More and back from Salen (Friday afternoon)

15 mile jaunt round the Paps of Jura from Craighouse (Saturday morning)

18 miler on Arran to Goatfell and back from Lamlash Bay (starting 1.30 Sunday morning!)

100-metre dash up the pontoon to finish at Troon Club House

More or less 60 miles total running. The runs are interspersed with being bounced around in a small boat, feeling too sick to eat, getting cold and wet, and managing virtually no sleep.

Our boat was Blue Chip - a 28ft Trimaran (Corsair28). Our excellent crew were Steven Garrett (skipper), Derek Cardiff and Graham Goudie; the runners were Chris Upson and Damon Rodwell, both of Westerlands.

The race kicks off at 12 noon on Friday outside Oban sailing club, and finishes (hopefully) on Sunday at Troon harbour. Last year we didn't finish until on 5.30am Monday morning, but this year we'd comfortably finished, dismantled the boat, and were eating breakfast at Troon club house 10.30 Sunday morning. Far more civilised.

Only 5 senior teams had finished when we left Troon:
1st Playing FTSE, 47ft Beneteau monohull (runners Gary Thorpe, Simon Stainer)
2nd Two Hoots, 35ft Shuttleworth Catamaran (Adrian Davis, Es Tresidder)
3rd Blue Chip, about 40 minutes behind Two Hoots (Chris Upson, Damon Rodwell)
4th Scarlet Fever, 36ft monohull, (Jane Meeks, Liz Cowell)
5th Kinetic, 27ft trimaran, (Paul Fettes, Graeme Stewart)

Phil Davies and Jon Whittaker were Kings of the Bens as fastest runners.

Reports by Damon and Manny here

Race Routes
Sailing Route| Oban Run| Mull Run| Jura Run| Arran Run