Raichon and Troup win the Winter Spine Race through storms on the Pennine Way
Sebastien Raichon finished the 268-mile Montane Winter Spine Race in 95 hours 43 minutes on Thursday morning; Anna Troup won the women's race in 106:19.
Photograph: Pen-y-ghent in winter, on the Pennine Way, by shikari, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia CommonsSebastien Raichon of France won the Montane Winter Spine Race on Thursday morning, reaching Kirk Yetholm in 95 hours, 43 minutes and 52 seconds. The race had started at 8 am on Sunday in Edale: 268 miles of the Pennine Way, non-stop, in January. Anna Troup won the women's race in 106 hours, 19 minutes and 12 seconds.
Those are slow times for the Spine. Last year's winners took 82 and 87 hours. The difference was the weather. The organisers described a cold snap and violent storms, sub-zero temperatures and biting wind, with frozen paths that later thawed into deep bog. Raichon had never run the route before and said it was more beautiful and more brutal than he had imagined. He ran patiently, took his time at checkpoints and looked after his kit while others dropped out, then pushed from the final checkpoint at Byrness.
The shorter races had their own stories. In the 108-mile Challenger South from Edale to Hawes, Jack Scott won in 25 hours 12 minutes and Sarah Page took the women's race in 29 hours 3 minutes. In the Challenger North, Harry Firth won in 46 hours and Elaine Bisson and Nicky Spinks crossed the line together in 55 hours 57 minutes. Jon Shield and Damian Hall shared the Sprint North win, and Joe Leadley and Sophie Littlefair won the Sprint South.
Four days on your feet in a British winter with a 95-hour winning time. Nobody who finishes this race has anything to prove to anyone.
