Race date: Saturday 7th March 2026
Race report by Jim Rangeley

The Saddleworth race series is quickly becoming known for its tough routes in potentially shite weather, well catered for aid stations, great organisation, lovely marshalls and excellent scran to finish up. We were greeted with all that save the weather.

Initially the race was just the Saddleworth 10 Res. As the name suggests, it visits 10 reservoirs around Saddleworth Moor, over towards Black Hill and Crowden over a distance of just over a marathon. Since last year, the offering has spread to include a 5 and a 15 res option, 26km and 62km respectively.

Laura and myself were the only Striders lined up to start the 5 Res race, and both of us encumbered with more gear than the minimum required kit. We were both using this race as a dress rehearsal for the Fellsman races in April, a race whose kit list is extensive to say the least (goggles and two head torches extensive). We bumped into fellow Strider Laurence Bate as he headed to start Longer 10 Res race which sets off a little earlier an exchange of good luck and he was away.

Laura and Jim Rangeley

Lawrence Bate (photo by Steve Bateson)

About an hour later we pottered over to the start line around people who’d got their kit into merely a bumbag compared to us with chest pods and bulging packs with our 5 long sleeve layers. It’s an unmarked route which also gave us chance to brush up on our map reading skills, although this element of the race wasn’t too challenging with most of the route being on obvious tracks and paths.

The beginning of the race starts up a steep rocky bank, before levelling off slightly for the first runnable section that creeps steadily up past Dovestone, Yeoman Hey and Greenfield Reservoirs. After a couple of river crossings and a fairly short but super technical section of rockiness known dramatically as “The Boulder Field”, we encountered the major climb of the race up Rimmon Pit Clough. A proper slog of clinging on with hands and many little grassy steps. At the top of the hill we were greeted by the picked corpse of either one of last year’s runners or a lost sheep, I’m assuming the latter.

As we summited there was a bit of a plateau following a rolling squishy bog, through a checkpoint, and onto a slab stone path for a mile or so. These slabs, while certainly important in mitigating erosion, are really slippy in the Scotts I was wearing. As we passed the dam head of Black Moss Res the path split – 5 res straight ahead and the 10 turning right to Swellands Res.

From here, the half way point, it is downhill pretty much all the way back. The running became easier and I settled in to a nice chatty pace towards the Castleshaw Centre checkpoint at around 10ish miles where whisky was on offer. Whisky was consumed. (Penderyn if you’re interested in these sorts of details – there was also an abundance of other foodstuffs including butties and biscuits).

The last climb of the day comes straight away out of the final checkpoint and heads up to Diggle. The rocky ascent also played host to a little stream so the shoes were treated to a little soaking. We were now heading to the final valley of the day but had to first make it down a steep descent. A descent that somehow encouraged the inner soles of my shoes to become close friends with my toes on both feet. Any closer and I’d just have managed to the end, but with still around 4 miles to go both shoes were taken off and I fiddled to get them fit for running again.

After a venue change from last year the final run in has also changed. A slightly meandering bimble on the Tame Valley Way, being an old railway the running was flat and monotonous. And my will to run was really low. But being around a few other people spurred me on to run the last few miles at a reasonable pace just to get to the finish for a pie, pint and some pud.

The race was won by Ben Jarvis in 1:53:47, and Harriet Mccormick in 2:32:57.

5 Res Striders Results