stillwaddler Wrote:I loved the piccies, but please, please be careful,
This turned out to be very, very good advice.
The warning signs were all there. The long range weather forecast had predicted snow over 1600m. By Friday a disturbing, yellow flash had appeared on the forecaster’s map in the vicinity of Truchillas. The rocks of Vizcodillo were going to be very slippery.
Decided to do the sensible thing. I offered my services as a freelance “corredor escoba” (the broom runner). No, I wasn’t going to benevolently sweep up afterwards. My job would be to lurk at the back of the field and make sure nobody got lost. Two people had done just that last year and mountain rescue had been called out so despite the course being well marked, accidents can and will happen.
I’ve described
this route a couple of times before. It’s a straight up and straight down affair with a lot of loose stone and rock and waist high, gorse-like vegetation. Today conditions were particularly treacherous. By Lake Truchillas (two thirds of the way up) half of the field had packed it in and turned back early. That included my own travelling companions from El Bierzo mad dog Jorge, Isaac the train driver and Tombrio the coal miner with the yellow mop top. In fact I’d reached the point where I had nobody left to sweep up. The people I was with weren’t going any further and I’d lost sight of the new “last runner”. I was stuck in no-man’s land.
Delved into my rucksack for rainwear, hat and gloves and set off in hot pursuit of the tail-ender but by this point things were turning increasingly nasty. A vicious wind stung my face and flurries of snow and hail coated the vegetation and rocks like icing sugar. An apocalyptical scene commenced as a merry procession of ashen faced runners emerged one by one from the mist and stumbled across chaotic streams of boulders sometimes on their hands and knees. Some of them only wore singlet and shorts and there were a lot of contorted faces and few smiles. Seen from afar it all looked very disturbing. I had to remind myself that I too sometimes do this for fun.
Took my gloves off to take a couple of photos and then couldn’t get the things back on again. Spent the next hour blowing on my hands as my fingers turned numb.
Met a couple of marshals shivering at some undefined point below the peak of Vizcodillo and they told me that I couldn’t go any further.
“It doesn’t matter,” I answered cheerfully “I’m the man with the broom.”
They seemed unimpressed and I waited with them silently for the last two runners who had passed earlier in search of the summit in the midst of a blizzard.
There were a few nervous moments as we waited for the two guys to emerge. My debut as “corredor escoba” was in danger of ending in disastrous failure and their morning in hypothermia. Then the first fellow appeared in the distance, a 50-something head-banger with froth around his mouth. I let him find his own way home. A little later and much to our relief the last man came into view and in mighty fine shape he was too. Joined the guy run-walking back to the safety and relative warmth of the path beyond the lake and to a decent round of applause from the good folk who had stayed to the very end at the finish line.
Maybe in the UK this sort of scenario is a regular feature of fell running events where a certain degree of self sufficiency is taken for granted but here it generally takes people by surprise. Out of 100 plus starters only about 50 made it to the summit and back. Even the great Salvador Calvo, “the bald saviour” and winner of the Great Wall of China marathon turned back when a couple of bolts of lightning shook the skyline. Wimp. In fact the only person in our little party of six (me included) who actually completed this year’s race was a girl called Susana who was awarded a large cup for her efforts. Well done Susana!
Back on dry land we enjoyed large dollops of paella and free beer on tap in the nearby village of Truchas (trout) before the long haul back to El Bierzo.
The all new training diary.
