Simon Barnett’s Round Report

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28 July 2018

Six weeks after making a casual comment to Brian Layton as we were leaving Tring Running Club and the two of us were stood side by side beneath the Donard arch in Newcastle a few minutes before midnight on the last Friday of July.   It felt familiar but all so different.  We were setting off on a joint attempt of the Denis Rankin Round – a loop of 39 of Northern Ireland’s most significant mountains – to be completed within 24 hours.

The attempt had been somewhat thrown together during the tremendous heatwave that was taking place.  A start date and time had been agreed in advance to try and coax some local support and knowledge out onto the hills.  The only disbenefit of the fixed start time was being at the whim of the weather…

Leg 1 – Newcastle to Silent Valley – The Dark leg

A brief lull in the rain a couple of minutes before the start

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The “Denis Rankin” spirit lives on!

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At midnight on Friday 5th October, “Newcastle AC” runners, Mark King, Stephen Wallace & Dominic McInerney, along with a team of assisting runners left Donard Car Park at the start of their attempt of “The Denis Rankin Round”.

The Denis Rankin Round (or “DRR”) is a circuit of all the major peaks in the Mourne Mountains over 400m in height, covering 90km and 6500m in ascent. The challenge is to complete this within a 24 hour period, however, in this instance, the trio were aiming for a completion time of 22 hours 42 minutes.

Mark King, Dominic McInerney & Stephen Wallace at the start of their “DRR”.

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Alex Kendall’s Round Report

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On the way to Northern Ireland for work, I was looking up possible long running routes for a day off I had two and a half weeks later. I only then came across the Denis Rankin round, and the story of Denis Rankin himself. I’m amazed it’s not more known about in England, but hopefully, it will be in time. I had been to the Mournes once before and had run up Slieve Donard in the mist, so didn’t really know the route at all. However, it looked inspired, and since the only real downside was the chance of failure, I planned to give it a go. Continue reading →