Stanbury Splash 2023

Stanbury Splash – 15th January 2023

212 runners gathered in a quarry on a hilltop near Haworth on Sunday 15th January, including 18 in Holmfirth vests, for the first event of our 2023 Fell Championships. After weeks and weeks of rain,the paths were sodden, but the sun was out. The start was a splashy surge up out of the quarry and out onto an equally splashy Haworth Moor.

The highlights of the event are the three valley crossings, each with a 150-ft grassy or heathery hurtle down to a beck, a knee-deep wade through fast-flowing water and a steep, muddy clamber up the other side. The rest of the route is a 50-50 mix of soaked moorland paths and runnable firm tracks.(The tracks are well-equipped with puddles, in case you start to miss the splashing)

For Holmfirth, Tim Street was 8th man, Sally Coldwell was 7th lady, and there were plenty of impressive runs from the team (results below). It’s a tough event, but some of it is delightfully absurd – it’s not hard to see why it’s so popular – and it was great to be part of an event with such a good team showing on the start line and such positive feeling at the end.

With no real clue about the route beforehand, I thought I’d aim for 70 minutes. I gave it all I had but ran out of steam at the end; Jon Burdon had that extra bit of endurance and flew past in the final half-mile, and I missed my target by one second. I’ll definitely be back.

Thanks to Dave Woodhead, Hannah Victoria & Phil Hobbs for the great photos attached to this post.

Bob Dickinson