GL3D- Silva Great Lakeland 3day – An adventure with Trailrun4fun – Race report

4th time lucky! In many ways, that’s just what we were, when we for the forth time the managed to start and run the race – Silva, Great Lakeland 3day “GL3D”. 

Check the movie!! of our running adventure in Lake District

It all started close to 3 years ago, during the autumn of 2019, when Martin, Robert and Jacob from Trailrun4Fun had the idea to travel to Lake District and run together in the beautiful mountains. Like many adventures that Jacob organises, a big group of us from Trailrun4fun got excited and wanted to join. 

We started ro plan the race and running trip early. Started to chat about how to best pack the dry bag, what was the best and lightest tent to use. How do you dress and how to keep warm in a rainy and potentially snowy Lake District. After all, this was tougher in many way than what many of us had done before. Pack for rain, running, snow, food and camping for three days. All in a drug bag on 60L, weighing a maximum of 13kg.

To ensure we learnt all the tricks from each other, a pre-trip event was organised in Enebyberg. Everyone brought their gear and we had a small expo. Sharing knowledge and excitement. We were about to head over to England for an amazing experience in Lake District during the Silva Great Lakeland 3day race. Then a pandemic hit…

Due to travel restrictions, and all other types of restrictions, the sad news came that the 2020 edition of Silva Great Lakeland was postponed. Oh well, only to August. This pandemic can’t continue that long… Well it could. The autumn edition was postponed as well. The spring 2021 edition of Silva Great Lakeland was postponed to August 2021. Would this race ever happen? Now, the autumn edition of Silva Great Lakeland 2021 did happen, but most of us had chosen to postpone the race again to this year. And hear we are, we have just completed the 2022 edition of Silva Great Lakeland 3day and wow, it was worth the wait!

GL3D, Day 1 – Travel from London and Sweden to Manchester

Most of the team from Trailrun4fun had decided to take the same flight from Stockholm, but as I happened to be in England for work already, I flew from Heathrow, London on Friday morning. As it happened, I met the rest of all the Swedish runners in our group on the airport transfer to the car rental. Finally, we were gathered and it felt real. 

Martin, that had (much appreciated) done most of organisation for this trip, had ensured that our group was divided in 5 smaller groups, and each group had rented a car from the airport. I picked up our car from Sixt at  Manchester airport without much hassle, despite their system was down. Lucky for me, it was the correct Manchester Airport. Apparently, as one of us discovered there is a Manchester Airport in the US as we’ll, where his car was waiting for him 😂

As we all had fetched our cars, we headed up towards Keswick, Lake District. On the way up from Manchester to Keswick it was a pleasure to see how the landscaped change. From the rural flag city landscape in Manchester, to majestic hills in Lake District. Having lived in London, and seen many beautiful parts of England, I was still amazed how beautiful Lake District was, and this was just the beginning of the trip.

Keswick, where the start of the 3 day run would be the following morning, was a beautiful little English village with lots of outdoor shops and nice restaurants. Again, I was surprised over how clean this village was compared to many other English villages I’ve visited. Someone even said, it feels likes a British version of an alp village.

Once we had settled in to the B&B where old stayed, we headed over the start arena to get our mandatory gear checked. Wow, its soon finally time!!

The evening was spent at a local pub, with a mixture of excitement and nervs from most. After dinner, we wrapped up the evening back at the B&B, talking about the best routes to take and plotting the the course on the map. After all, the Silva – Great Lakeland 3days, isn’t just a normal run. It’s navigation while running on the fells. It’s up to each and every runner to make sure they make it over and around the fells to make sure you have passed all checkpoints. We were soon ready to start what would for some become the biggest adventures so far.

GL3D, Day 2, Race Day 1 – Joining the experts

31K – 2,150m meter elevation gain – 6:46

My plan for day 1, was to run Wainwright Long, the second longest route of the available four courses. Though, as it happened I would be alone on this course, and as “the experts” running the expert route was a small and happy gang from Trailrun4fun I couldn’t resists not to join them in the morning.  This would become my longest run since TGCC, Trans Gran Canaria Classic as I have since the suffered by some kind of foot pain. The first 10K felt amazing.

With big smiles on our faces we ran through the British country side, in a landscape where everyone was just waking up. As the sun stretched over the hill, and the lake glittering in the sunshine joint with the sound of birds and roosters waking the neighbourhood, we were sure that this would be an amazing day.

Unfortunately, this feeling didn’t stick for long for me. Already at the second steep incline, I could feel that my pulse was not what it should be. I thought it was harder to breath that I normally do and when the pain in the food made me to fall behind of the group even in the downhill, I realised that I’m not in shape to keep up the speed with these experts. I guess, having had Covid just a week prior, and with a foot that hurts every step I walk I shouldn’t be surprised or feel upset, rather happy that I could still be here. So I let the group go…

I continued by my self in slower a tempo, and even if the next hill was one of the toughest for the day – it quickly felt better. It makes such a huge difference to run in the temp that is right just for me when the intention is to continue for hours. Even if one can continue in a “too high” tempo for a long time, the fatigue it brings will make it harder to recover and continue the following days.

After another couple of hours I arrived to a cafe, in the middle of nowhere and to my surprise I met Jens, who had also decided to take the rest of the day in his own tempo. We had a coffee and coke together, and chatted about the experience so far.  The rest of the day, we ran together and selected a more manageable route back to camp.

The feeling when I first saw the camp was amazing. On top of the mountain, I could see the camp next to a small lake. As the sun at times broke through the clouds, it lit up the camp and with the steep and technical decline down to camp – it was an amazing end to the first day. 

After we had put up our tent, (it started to rain just when I was done, puh) we sat down in the big tent with hundreds of fellow runners. We all shared the experience of the day, with a beer in the hand and some amazing vegan food.

Evening like this, is what make running trips like this special!

Day 3, Race Day 2 – Wainwright Short

33.5K – 2,160m elevation gain – 9:16

I woke up the second day and felt strong. Having slowed down the day before helped me to be in a better shape the second day compared to what I would have been in, if I continued in for me a too high tempo. To ensure my breathing was ok, and my foot stayed in manageable pain and control, I had decided to shorten the distance and take the Wainwright short for the second day.

I started the run together with Helena and Stefan, but had planned to depart from them after the first checkpoint. They had planned to run in the valley to the second checkpoint, and I wanted to enjoy the mountains more and had planned a ridge filled route to the second checkpoint. Though, as we struggled to navigate in the fog, and as my phone had died I decided that it was unwise. Rather, it was better to join Helena and Stefan on their route. And… I must say that I’m glad I did… 

As we ran through the valley, we found a small single track trail next to the river. We knew this would increase the distance a bit, but compared to running the easier, and shorter gravel road, the choice was easy. We had no rush, and we all would select a trail over a road any day. The trail next to the river was amazing. Close to one of the highlights of the trip. 

As we continued during the day, we saw… nothing – at least not on the tops. 😉 It was cloudy and rainy most of the day. Despite that, we had a really good time together and navigated our way well throughout the day. As we came down from the hills in the valleys again, one could really enjoy the nature. Lake District truly is a beautiful place.

Other than the nice single track trail next to the river, a few other highlights of the day was:

• Running in a steep downhill through rolling rocks. Just like how you see cool trail runners do in the Salomon movies on Youtube 😉 It was super fun, and much easier than I thought.
• Downhill to the camp – Again, running downhill is just amazing. As I had taken the day in for me a more relaxed tempo, I could truly enjoy the downhill with fresh legs. 
• Watching the camp – I sat down a few minutes to rest and enjoy the view over the camp as we can closer to finish for the day. It was beautiful to see the camp, next to the lake and in the sun that finally started to let us now that it existed. I felt happy that I could enjoy this.

As we had completed the day, we met up all others and enjoyed a really nice evening together in the camp. Drinking, eating and laughing. A really good time.

Day 4, Race Day 3 – Wainwright Short

21K – 1,300m elevation gain – 4:05

Feeling strong, but a bit “tired” of the late night I was a bit unsure of what to do. Though, as I had enjoyed the company yesterday, and I didn’t want to push me too hard I decided that I will take the Wainwright short again, as most of our group did.  

I quickly met up with Jacob, Robert and Fredrik and decided I would join them. After the first CP we picked up Tina, and most of the rest of the day we ran together.  This last day was fantastic. Still cloudy and not the views we had the first day but the route was beautiful and we were all in a good mood.

Jacob, who had also just recently had covid was strong as ever. Super quick uphill and an inspiration to talk to. He always make the day better. Tina, who claims she’s not as fast… was the one flying both uphill and downhill with super light steps. Well done! Robert navigated us well through the day was strong the whole day. I could see a difference to last year, and which he also stated – he was stronger and quicker due to all gym training. Well Done to Robert as well, perhaps I should copy that as gym training apparently pays off 😉

Once we all had completed the race we took an hour or two at the camp before heading back to the B&B. Completing a trip like this always bring such mixed emotions. Super proud that one has completed it. Tired and exhausted. Sad that it’s over. Happy for the friendship and experience won!

We sealed the trip with a fantastic pub dinner together, and a pint of Guinness at the local pub.

Thank you to all running friends that made this trip special.

Thanks to the organisation behind Silva Great Lakeland 3day who put so much effort into making this a great race. You succeeded.

Thanks to Jacob and Martin for all your hard effort to organise this trip. You did an amazing job. Well Done. 

Some more of all of the amazing photos we took