DARK PEAK NEWS Spring 2015 Editorial Notes Readers will have noticed immediately a bit of a different Chairman’s Report – April 2015 look to DPN. After eight years of dedication Dave Holmes is standing down as editor-in-chief. On behalf all the DPFR members, appreciation is placed on record here of his Dark Peak works because individually we all enjoy, and are focused on, what we do, and because hard work and dedication, his sterling service to the Club. socially we enjoy the trip. There are many strands in terms of what is on offer and long may this We have got used to DPN being a publication meeting the continue. To a degree and perhaps increasingly we do need administration and people to stand up to highest professional standards, with a quality of content est. 1976 make things work. Dave Holmes has propped up the ‘men in blazers’ during his distant long stint as www.dpfr.org.uk and presentation which has done the club proud (and of which bigger and better-resourced organisations would Chairman, on the committee for many years and producing a pretty sharp Dark Peak News. Dave President: Eric Mitchell have been envious). has stepped back from that a wee bit but hopefully will remain to feed in. Rest in peace Chase. Dave A new team has assumed responsibility for putting deserves recognition and gratitude for consistently putting his head above the parapet and helping us DPN together this time, Ann Watmore and Tim Tett, aided Chairman Secretary and abetted by Alan Yates, have been joint co-ordinators, all to enjoy our running. Regarding the magazine, Tim Tett, Ann Watmore and Alan Yates, with Tim Tom Westgate Rob Moore continuing to rely on the publishing expertise of Tim Mackey continuing his crucial desk-top publishing bit, have stepped into the breach. The magazine 95 Stumperlowe Hall Rd 2 Kerwen Close Sheffield Dore Mackey. The change has inevitably affected the look of will morph, given time to settle, into something different, and different is good in my eyes – so S10 3QT Sheffield our magazine, making it perhaps more like the Newsletter thanks to all. 0114 263 0632 S17 3DF of yore and more informal than the quality product we’ve [email protected] 07766 520741 been used to for the last eight years. Our hope is that it Gavin stepped up to organise the Skyline this year. This is fresh in our minds as conditions [email protected] will be on doormats in time to be read before the AGM were poor, to say the least, and it was good to have his intellect and gravitas as a steady hand on where any discussion of its future direction or offers of the tiller. Again the Skyline works because we have time-served folk doing the same thing year in, Treasurer Membership organisational help will be welcomed. This initial number year out. As I know, this can be tedious depending what your task is, but, for the organizer, being Tim Hawley Ann Watmore in the new series is a kind of prototype, miscellaneous Jasmine Cottage 26 Robertson Drive and for now ‘experimental’. We expect it to settle into a able to delegate specific tasks to competent folk is reassuring and makes sense.There are many club Main Road Sheffield regular pattern as things evolve, and future developments members like Kevin ‘kitchen’ Saville and his team who would love to be out on the hill but who Dungworth S6 5DY Sheffield 0114 233 8383 will depend on members’ willingness to supply copy. come back to do the same job year in, year out. Great thanks to all the volunteers. Thanks also to S6 6HF [email protected] We are grateful to the members who have contributed Dave Taylor for coordinating the marshals, and to the club members and friends who shepherded 0114 285 1633 reports on their adventures and race experiences and [email protected] we have included a smattering of results and some new runners off the hill. The mountain rescue and ambulance teams also had their work cut out to stay on top of things, and we are most grateful for all they did on the day. As it turned out we were short Clothing and Eqpt Men’s Captain items. Some of the features we have come to expect are Richard Hakes Rob Little absent this time but will no doubt resurface as occasional of folk at the finish, because there were quite a number of victims of the extreme conditions. It also 454A Loxley Road 9, Bridgeholme Mill elements in the future. seems evident that when things get tough we do need more people on hand on race day. Loxley Charley Lane If sufficient material comes in, three numbers a year Sheffield Chinley could be produced. What is needed are reports on races, Looking at the Skyline and recent experience in general, hypothermia has been a recurrent big S6 6RS High Peak challenges/adventures and other doings; contributions issue. Whenever we go out on a long run we need to focus clearly on what the weather prospects are 0114 233 9912 SK23 6DX [email protected] 07791 283861 to ongoing debates about fell-running in general; and, specifically, to prepare for the possibility of ‘wind chill’. Wet and windy conditions combined [email protected] reminiscences; book and kit reviews; photos, cartoons with near zero temperatures rapidly create penetrating, critical effects, and we all need to carry and captions; jokes, quizzes, etc; in fact anything at all Women’s Captain Website relevant to our activities and ethos. Short and snappy adequate kit to manage whatever the weather throws at us or our fellow runner. Helen Elmore John Dalton contributions will be as welcome as more substantial ones It is perhaps ironic that I am talking of people ‘standing up’ because I am standing down as 117, Millhouses Lane, 1, Cannon Fields Sheffield, Hathersage (with optimal length of under 1,200 words – which is 2-3 Chairman after May’s AGM. I have done my bit and I have enjoyed involving many of you in the S7 2HD Derbyshire pages). discussions. On occasion there have been contentious matters and important decisions to make, 0114 237 6609 S32 1AG So, please get writing and send stuff initially to Tim [email protected] 01433 659523 Tett via [email protected]. Don’t worry about but they have been shared, and I am happy with the way in which each and every major issue has [email protected] presentation or formal correctness. The experienced team been resolved. The club should be aware that many of the committee work of editors, working with Tim Mackey, will knock items into consistently and outside their brief: you know who you are, and so I pass on Dark Peak News shape, consulting with authors as necessary. my wholehearted thanks. On my ‘coronation’ as club Chairman I was handed a David Holmes It has been a challenge but Tim Mackey has been 615, Loxley Road, leather-bound copy of Ten Years of DPFR (1986) –‘10 Years on the Bog’, as it Loxley, able to keep things in perspective for us and reduce the Sheffield, apparent enormity of what we had taken on. The sense of is affectionately known– kindly donated by Will McLewin. In many ways the S6 6RR satisfaction (or do we mean relief?) as it nears completion book enshrines the spirit of our club, and as such I will be handing it on to my 0114 234 4186 is immeasurable. We hope you enjoy it. [email protected] successor. Thanks again to all. TW The Eds Cheers 2 3 News from England Athletics and from Dark Peak Safety Committee meeting South Yorks County Athletics Association At the club AGM held in the Maynard weather, so we now have an address list of No, not good news I am afraid. England Athletics have once again put their individual Arms in Grindleford last year a request regular runners with their car registration registration fee up from £10 to £12. This means unfortunately that a small number of you was made by our Chairman, Tom Westgate, and mobile phone numbers with the signing who helpfully pay for your registration via your standing order will have to contact your for volunteers to form a safety advisory in sheets. Tom has bound some of these bank to change it for 2016. You can do this now to save me having to remind you later in committee. He was rightly concerned that simplified signing in sheets together with the year – please. If there is a positive side it is that in 2013 EA were set to increase the fee with more new members turning up on our phone and car information in the back. This from £5 at the time to £20 at the same time reducing the number if disciplines covered by that Wednesday night runs we needed a better means that regular runners only have to sign fee. There was a bit of an outcry at the time preventing them from doing so but it seems they way of accounting for who was on what run. in and not spend ages writing down numbers, are gradually hiking it up now, apparently to make up for lost income from grants from the On a typical summer Wednesday night these only needing to be completed by newer government etc. What became of the Olympic legacy I wonder? and sometimes on winter Wart’s nights, members. More EA related news from the South Yorkshire County Athletics Association - no, not all runners set off together.