Battling to hit the peak of their form

Hugh Dan MacLennan traces the history of the challenge.

MAN'S relationship with the environment takes many wonderful forms.

There are few, however, as intriguing as that manifested in the Ben

Nevis Race -- an annual run to the top of Britain's highest mountain

that is ''the supreme test of athletic stamina''.

At 4406ft (1343 metres) Ben Nevis is generally accepted as being among

the most ferocious in Europe. It is safe to assume that people have

climbed ''the Ben'' (or more accurately made the effort to get to the

top), for as long as there has been a settlement at the head of Loch

Linnhe. St Columba may even have given its majestic features a sideways

glance as he headed up the Great Glen in 563AD.

As time wore on, however, it is clear that the top of the highest

point in the land began to hold no fears for many and was a most

definite attraction. Edward Burt in his Letters from a Gentleman in the

North of Scotland, published in 1754, tells how ''some English officers

took it to their Fancy to go to the top, but could not attain it for

Bogs and huge Perpendicular Rocks''.

Arguably the most famous visitor to make it to the summit in this

period (if we can believe him) was the poet John Keats, who made a grand

tour of Scotland with his friend Charles Brown, in 1818. In a letter to

his brother, which includes an imaginary dialogue between a Mrs Cameron

and Ben Nevis, Keats wrote a sonnet running to 74 lines. It was

allegedly composed at the top of the Ben.

Gradually the scientists of the Scottish Meteorological Society took a

more sophisticated and closer look at the mountain. This led to the

building of a bridle path to the top, and the erection of an observatory

on the summit. A small ''hotel'' was also built there. Lunch was

available for three shillings, bed and breakfast for ten shillings and

there were four small bedrooms.

''A foot-race from the post office at Fort-William to the top of Ben

Nevis and back, was an event which helped considerably to vary the

routine of things at the Observatory. Strength of muscle and physical

endurance are qualities which seldom fail to call forth admiration; but

when these are employed in foolhardy and dangerous exploits, their

possessor is surely acting in opposition to the laws of nature.''

Such was William Kilgour's reaction to what he later described as the

''mania'' which suddenly captured the imagination of people far and

wide. Kilgour, a local worthy whose classic Twenty Years on Ben Nevis

(1904) gives a remarkable insight into the attraction of the Ben was not

impressed: ''There doubtless is a qualified degree on honour in being

able to sprint up and down such a mountain as Ben Nevis in two hours and

a half, but is the game really worth the candle? What object is to be

gained thereby? Verily, athletics are extending if such a departure is

destined to come within the category.''

Goodness only knows what the redoubtable Kilgour would make of events

now, with anything up to 400 runners making the annual ascent of the

Ben. But when 27-year-old William Swan, a local hairdresser, dog

breeder, sporting buff and general man about town, made his legendary

first timed ascent of the mountain at the end of September, 1895, he

achieved much more than celebrity status in establishing an historic

record -- the remarkable time of 2 hours and 41 minutes, stopping to

drink a cup of Bovril at the summit.

Two years later a remarkable individual, Lieut. Col. Spencer Acklom of

the Connaught Rangers, arrived in Lochaber. At 53 years of age, having

undertaken no training, wearing cycling shoes and without a guide,

Acklom established a new time of 2 hours 55 minutes, but from a

different starting point. He was apparently a ''staunch abstainer'',

which may well have been crucial in his ascents! Gradually, as more and

more runners went up the mountain (medals were by now at stake), so the

time for the ascent and descent shortened. William MacDonald of Leith

Gymnasium sliced 28 minutes off the time. His preparations had been

concluded while camping on the banks of the Caledonian Canal. Another

run of 2 hours and 20 minutes by Swan earned him a further record, a

Gold Medal and the epithet ''The Ben Nevis Sprinter''.

The enthusiasm for the timed challenge, and the haphazard nature of

runs, soon led to a more formalised attack on the time. On June 3, 1898

a Gold Medal was offered for the race -- yet another route, and this

time ten competitors ran. This race, started by shotgun, was the first

to be run under Scottish Amateur Athletic Association rules. Its

eventual winner was Hugh Kennedy, under keeper at Tor Castle, near Fort

William, who performed the double journey in 2 hours 41 minutes. Hugh

Kennedy's arrival at the summit was relayed to the assembled masses at

the start by means of a telegram from the Observatory.

The medal which had been offered for ''the establishment of an

authentic competitive record for the climbing of Ben Nevis'' was however

unceremoniously dismissed by Kilgour as ''a trinket intrinsically not

worth more than a couple of guineas''.

Women had up until the turn of the century been barred from the race,

but in 1902, the inevitable occurred. The first recorded attempt was

made by Lucy Cameron of Glen Mallie, near Fort William. Her time of 2

hours and 3 minutes, made from the Post Office, was to earn her a

handsome gold medal.

The following year, 1903, saw two timed races, one involving seven

men, run from Achintee farm to the summit only and won by Ewen

Mackenzie, the Observatory roadman. Then MacKenzie and Hugh Kennedy took

part in another race along with Robert Dobson of Glasgow. MacKenzie's

winning time of 2 hours 10 minutes 6.8 seconds from the Post Office for

the ascent and descent was to be the last recorded for 34 years.

The gap in races between 1903 and 1937 is the longest in its history

and due to two factors: the closure of the Observatory in 1904 and the

unfortunate mishap which led to Robert Dobson being found unconscious on

the hill after a nine-hour search.

There has, remarkably perhaps, been only one fatality, during a race

in 1957 when an English runner strayed from the track and became lost.

Several runners have stamped their name on the event -- notably Eddie

Campbell, who has missed only one race since 1951, when it was cancelled

for the first time ever in 1980 due to adverse weather, and David Cannon

of Kendal, the only runner with five wins.

There have been many epic races and truly wonderful moments. None more

poignant than the collapse of Duncan MacIntyre, a local butcher, within

yards of the line in the 1942 race with victory within sight. And the

decision by one runner to allow Dave Spencer of Barrow to win his third

consecutive race in 1960 when he had victory in sight.

The current records from the Claggan Park starting point, stand at

1:25:34 for men and 1:43:25 for women, both established in 1984.

If these marks were to be beaten today, there could be no more fitting

start to the centenary celebrations of William Swan's historic run in

1895.