2010 A running oddity

[Bierzo Baggie]

La Tebaida Berciana, valley of the monks, home of some of the first Christian hermitages in Western Europe and venue for an annual mountain race which last Sunday celebrated its third edition. For this particular morning the Valley of Silence is slightly less silent and the pastel tones of an alpine backdrop in early spring are streaked with the garish colours of the modern day mountain runner.

Bierzo Baggie, crazy Dutch wine-taster and Oscar, the normal one, took the treacherous winding road to Peñalba (white crag) and parked the car at the end of a dirt track high above the village. Here each one began his own private odyssey , scaling high sweet green meadows, running through streams and stumbling down vertical rock-strewn slopes.

This circuit doesn’t climb any peaks but the 20k and 1000m of ascent might just rate as a catagory A fell race in the UK... to be honest, I don’t know, I read “Feet in the Clouds” but I wouldn’t know a fell if it fell on top of me!

Anyway, there are a couple of long, hard climbs, a couple of technical descents and a lot of huffing and puffing on the speedy flat sections in between. I finished 15 minutes slower than last year and 20 minutes slower than in 2008 but descended like a wild-man in my new Mizuno Wave Harrier beast-shoes and my legs didn’t hurt on Monday morning so things are looking up.

The race was won by Gus the lottery man, top dog of the moment, (top gorilla?.. of course not!)

And afterwards we dined on octopus, fried throat sweetbread and cold hams, basking in the satisfaction of another giant slain.

Photos by some bloke with a decent camera. http://picasaweb.google.es/joexco1961

Next stop Truchillas and then I’ve got the Aquilianos long route in mind. Fancy another long one Sweder?