Kinder Killer

Originally the plan was a trip to the outskirts of London, drive down after work, fulfill a family commitment, drive to Skegness arriving about 3 am, sleep in the car, visit some friends and drive home. However a short visit with friends feels almost ignorant, they are good friends and well worth spending the time for a real visit, so I changed the plan.

The new plan was a drive from home to London, then drive to Edale in the English Peak district, grab a couple of hours sleep in the car and have an early start on the Kinder Killer. The kinder killer is a loop of approx. 33 miles with 9,000 foot of ascent, a comprehensive run following the most attractive routes up, down and around Kinder's complex system of convoluted ridges and valleys, including some interesting but very easy rock scrambles.

After much messing about with traffic diversions I finally landed in Edale at 4.30 am, I parked in the darkest corner of the village hall car park and climbed into my sleeping bag in the back of the car, completely exhaust and ready for some sleep. Unfortunately I didn’t notice the railway tracks only 20 feet away and was woken every hour by passing trains.

When my alarm sounded at 7.20 I awoke feeling surprisingly fresh and was heading up through Edale by 8am. There were no cafes open for an early morning coffee or shops to find food so I got on with the first ascent up Grindsbrook Clough. Obviously I had a GPS route on my phone as I am totally useless at navigation and with 79% battery I was pretty confident there was enough charge to last the whole day. I got View Ranger running and off I went.

Kinder’s valleys are a real treat, in September they are becoming over grown with bracken and thistles and all sort of under growth. Almost always the path becomes over grown part way up and you find yourself walking in the stream as this provides the easiest passage.

As expected the scramble at the top was wet rock but easy none the less and the view from the top was spectacular. One down and feeling good.

The next few hours were about rocky technical descents and lovely flowing tracks running across the edge of Kinder, the kind of running I enjoy and I was making the most of it, running all the gentle ascents and pushing a little on the descents. About 1pm I stopped for some food and ate about half of the carton of custard I had packed. I had very little food and a couple of litres of drink but was happy I had enough for the day. I guessed that I was about half way through the run and although I was beginning to feel tired I also felt pretty good and pressed on to the next descent, a long and gentle run down towards the Snake pass road.

The next ascent was tough and I was getting low on drink so refilled a couple of bottles with water from a stream near the top of the ascent to Blackden Moor, taking the opportunity to stick my head under a small waterfall and cool off a little. The sun was high and the sky cloud free so I was over heating a little, luckily there a numerous streams on the ascents as they are mostly up valleys, hence I took every opportunity I could to poor water over my head and cool down.

Following Blackden Moor around the hill side I strayed from the path and found myself battling through head high bracken, the Hoka Stinson ADR trail shoes I use are great but a little unstable when traversing hill sides and I found myself tripping and falling like a drunk person.

Having managed the struggle through the bracken forest I checked my phone’s GPS and was still right on the track, unfortunately the charge was down to 17%. I pushed on across "The Edge" heading towards Mill Hill, finishing off my custard as I jogged and enjoyed the feeling that I could run for ever. Mill Hill was busy, there was a lot of walkers about, i took a rest and consulted the GPS again. Only 3 ascents left but my phone was beeping to tell me the battery was low. Only 13% charge.

I spent the next 3 hours worried that my phone would fail as the display got dimmer, the battery charge was expiring fast, the ascents were killing me and I felt like quitting, I took a couple of energy gels I had left and pushed on. My navigation is very poor but I got the map out and plotted the route in case the phone died, which on the final ascent it did. However I had almost completed the route with only the final ascent to go.

By 5.40 pm I was back in the car park exhausted by very happy, at my current level of fitness i found the Kinder Killer very tough, however it is a great route and I would recommend it to anyone.