Equinox weekend September 2024, I didn’t complete the 24 hour Rigby Round of Cairngorm Munros. Summary: it’s OK to fail, provided you learn something from it. In this case, not to approach something too casually.

The Rigby visits the 18 Munro summits in the Northern Cairngorms, and is meant to be done solo, unsupported, and without reccies. It is a little longer than most 24 hour rounds at about 72 miles, but with less height gain. It is extremely remote, most of the hills feel like the absolute middle of nowhere. A decent amount is on paths, but sometimes those paths disappear into boulderfields, and some lines are used very infrequently. Apparently the Rigby is completed about once every 18 months. But not by me!

I think I can say I have learned at least one thing from each conspicuous failure or near miss. Here are a few of my favourite ****ups:

2019 ROC mountain marathon where I missed out on winning long score category by a less than the value of a low value checkpoint. Like an absolute muppet, I missed a 10 point checkpoint despite running extremely close to it. I had been focusing on what came next, rather than getting the nav right approaching the checkpoint. I then didn’t have time to unpick my mistake, and had to leg it to the finish to avoid penalty points. Learning point: always stay focused on the immediate step.

2022 attempt on the winter solo unsupported Bob Graham, in which I ran out of energy on leg 4. Moral of the story, train specifically for the event/challenge, as well as generally. In this case practice with a heavy bag would have been extremely useful. Also: take the goddamn poles! Did exactly that and got round in 2023.

2023 Bullock Smithy – went too fast on a hot day, believing I’d cope with the heat based on a great run in hot conditions in the 2021 Dragons Back Race. Duh – it’s the recent experience and acclimatisation that counts. I struggled and finished this race in my slowest ever time, despite being in generally good form. Paced myself much better on Lakes in a Day 2023, 1 month later.

Incidentally, those lessons were all really things I should have known. But it’s possible to drift away from things you should know, through overconfidence, attention being elsewhere, and just the passage of time meaning these things get pushed somewhat to one side.

So, you will probably judge for yourself fairly quickly where I went wrong with the Rigby Round. It had been on my to do list for a while, and I had wanted to run something exciting in Scotland this year, but availability and weather never aligned. And then, a free weekend in September at the end of a beautiful week of weather. I had started thinking about the Lakes, or maybe a full traverse of the Brecon Beacons, and then it transpired the weather was actually better in Scotland!

As with the news teams’ battle in Anchorman, that escalated quickly. I had gone from a day trip in the lakes to a 24 hour round in the Cairngorms. With 10 hours of darkness. Travelling up straight after work on the Friday. But it’d be fine, because I had done the Bob Graham in winter, right?

No. I wasn’t rested, only 2 weeks after the Bullock Smithy (57 miles) and having already done a fairly long run that week – because the weather was beautiful and usually I have regretted not using it. And working and driving almost certainly meant the fuelling wasn’t right. The western portion went fine, with a few dodgy lines in the darkness but generally good progress. I reached Corrour Bothy slightly earlier than expected, but then was knocked for six by the steep heather ascent of Carn A Mhaim, and despite eating well, struggled on all the subsequent ascents. So I didn’t make it, deciding after 13 (of 18) summits that I was getting too tired to head out to the eastern end of the round.

Failure, then. But the other important thing to learn here, or be reminded of, is that failure is part of this kind of thing. Is it realistic to expect to succeed every time? No, and in fact if success was guaranteed, the achievements would seem that much less. Is it still disappointing? Of course, and in some ways it feels more annoying because it’s easy to see what went wrong. But again, that’s actually a good thing – if the cause was a mystery, then it’d be hard to learn from it. There’s a general lesson here too, that success in these challenges is not to be taken for granted, and that they all need a bit of specific thought, training, and preparation. So, while I’d much rather have succeeded, it is far from the end of the world to have failed on this one.

Also, a grand day out is never to be sniffed at. So here is a list of causes for joy in not completing the Rigby Round:

1. I have seen many parts of the Cairngorms I had not visited before – as a former climber I had spent a lot of time in the Northern Corries, not much elsewhere.
2. The moon was bright enough to make a torch unnecessary on the initial forest track section – always cool.
3. Crossing the high plateau between Braeriach and Sgor Gaoth, I could take a bearing and then follow brighter stars to stay on line. Also pretty funky.
4. After conceding defeat, it was a more relaxing experience than usual, taking in the scenery and chatting to walkers and cyclists.