Most of the western World was probably sitting on the sofa, sleeping off the excesses of Christmas today. Except, of course, the Dragon's Back Race™ competitors who would have been out running, clocking up the miles in preparation for most epic mountain race of 2012.

During November Race Director, Shane Ohly, spent a week recce'ing the majority of the Dragon's Back Race route. This selection of photos and video should give competitors an insight into the terrain and scenery they can expect. Amazingly, apart from some low cloud, he didn't experience a drop of rain during his trip.

With nearly 30 entry applications in 24 hours it has quickly become apparent that we needed to tightened up the vetting procedure.

In due course we plan to publish a comprehensive article about the event history but in the meantime there was some excellent reporting from the event in 1992 that will give you a great perspective on the event.

The joy of planning a five day, 200 mile race. This collection of 1:50,000 Ordnancy Survey maps has been laminated so that the route can be clearly marked, discussed easily and annotated... just not a very practical size for taking out on the hill being nearly 4m long!