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Twenty three before tea

Twenty three Wainwrights and back in time for tea…could this be the new challenge for fellwalkers and runners?

When we published our map of Wainwrights within reach of the hostel, after Paul Tierney’s record-breaking run round ALL of them, our list of 23 caught the imagination of many Lakes lovers on social media.

Not content with eyeing-up the list for eventual completion – and it IS a rather random list, based on an oblong area of the map with our hostel at the centre – they started discussing how the 23 tops could be linked together to form a new challenge.

The consensus was that the tops could best be divided into two loops, returning at lunchtime to the hostel for a break after loop one before setting off on the second.

Loop one would be:

  • Sergeant Man
  • Thunacar Knott
  • Pavey Ark
  • Harrison Stickle
  • Pike o Stickle
  • Loft Crag
  • Pike o Blisco
  • Lingmoor
  • Black Fell
  • Holme Fell
  • Wetherlam
  • Swirl How
  • Great Carrs

And loop two would be:

  • Helm Crag
  • Tarn Crag
  • Blea Rigg
  • Silver How
  • Loughrigg
  • Nab Scar
  • Heron Pike
  • Stone Arthur
  • High Pike
  • Low Pike

It’s illogical, perhaps, to omit the rest of the Fairfield Horseshoe, or the Old Man of Coniston, but if we stepped back to photograph the map and include those, then Elterwater moves from the centre. So for now, until someone tries it, that’s the list as we originally published it.

Online discussion then centred on a name for the challenge. The Elterwater Endeavour and the Elterwander were among the suggestions, but our favourite is “23 before tea”, with its implication that ALL could, perhaps, be done in a day. And when someone DOES have a go, we shall most certainly have the kettle on for tea when you get back.

So now we hand the challenge over to you. Try it out. Test each loop, or test the summits in your own favoured order, and then let us know. What time did it take? What was the total mileage? Did you have fun? And do you take sugar in your tea?

Paul Tierney’s new record for completing all the Wainwrights in the Lake District has captured the attention of the world. (BBC news / ITV news)

It’s a remarkable new record, six days six hours and five minutes to run over 214 Lakeland fells, breaking Steve Birkinshaw’s record by seven hours.

We took a photo of the map that Tierney’s support team was using during his challenge, a map specially created for them by Harvey Maps based on Birkinshaw’s route. The photo placed Elterwater at its centre, and then we traced the route lines to the south, west, north and north east, and listed the summits within that box.