Note From Matt Beardshall

Matt started at the same time as me on his round from Keswick, initially he was in a pair, but his buddy had to pull out on leg 1 leaving him to essentially solo the BG carrying his own gear, though he did have 2 others on ground support who popped up at various stages. His Pace was the same as ours and we ran together for long sections and finished together, his essentially solo round was very inspiring and he always seemed relaxed and in good spirits, he sent us a very nice note which I thought it was worth sharing , here is what he had to say:

I hope you are well and the legs are good after the weekend.

Firstly, please pass on my congratulations to Martin for his magnificent effort on Friday and Saturday. He ran magnificently, and never looked troubled. It was inspirational to watch.

It is hard to know where to start thanking you guys for all the support you gave me. Despite having the priority of supporting Martin, you all constantly went out of your way to check that I was ok. I was concerned that I should do my best not to interfere with Martin's attempt and tried to keep out of the way, but you guys happily pulled me in and made a massive difference to me, both physically and mentally. I can honestly say I have never met such a friendly, helpful and inspiring bunch of people. What a fantastic running club. You obviously have the ethos and the spirit just right. I would like to be a member of Dallam running club (I recognise many of you on your website pictures).

I'm very grateful that you guys are willing to ratify my summits - that is very kind. I'm sure one or more of you did see me on every top. But if not I can say with complete integrity that I did summit every peak, and marked my own time for each one. I had a bit of trouble with Steeple. Martin's leg 4 team passed me close to the ridge leading to Steeple. I had gone the wrong way and wandered too far towards Haycock before realising my mistake and correcting it. That was one of only a handful I hadn't managed to reccie. The rest I thankfully did on memory.

Please let me know the names of the people I can put on my ratification form. Thanks.

Another thing. Did any of your team lose a head torch? If so, I have it and would be happy to post it back. I suspect it might belong to one of you guys as early on leg 3 I was about 20 minutes behind, and I found the torch around 20 minutes after I took mine off. It was on the col between High Raise and Thurnacar Knott.

Thanks, and congratulations to Martin once again.

I look forward to running with you guys again sometime,

Best regards,

Matt Beardshall.