Wain Stones, near the summit of Bleaklow Head
This was my "long" slow run for the weekend - a gentle jog up Bleaklow from the Torside Car Park in Longdendale, and also potentially a recce for the Marsden to Edale Race in December. The very pleasantly warm weather with a slight breeze was a lot better than I can expect for Tanky's Trog though.
I felt a little stiff running out along the Longdendale Trail (not unusual - I often feel stiff in the first mile or so) but loosened up a bit after that. I took it fairly easy on the one steep section up onto the high ground above Torside Clough.
Looking up Torside Clough from the initial steep ascent
Above the steep bit, I felt quite good and ran (gently at times to try to stay at a conversational pace) up to Wain Stones and then the Cairn. Approx 4.5 miles and 1,400' ascent from Torside car park to the summit, which I reached in 1:04:30.
The summit of Bleaklow Head, 633m (2,077')
After a five minute rest and a KitKat, I returned by the same route, again taking it really steady, to reach the car park in a shade under 50 minutes from the top.
Looking back across Torside Reservoir from the top of the only steep section of descent. The car park is near the wooded promontory on this side of the reservoir; behind that is Crowden and the valley that takes the Pennine Way up to Laddow Rocks and on over Black Hill.
The total distance was about 9 miles and around 1,450' of ascent in 1:59:30 including the stop. Hopefully this will help a little with the aerobic conditioning which I had right early in the season but is pretty much gone after very little activity in July and the first three weeks of August.
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