Montane Winter Spine Race, live.

The length of the Pennine Way, in January

Britain’s hardest race is 431 kilometres of bog, snow and darkness, run non-stop from Derbyshire to the Scottish border.

The Spine follows the Pennine Way from Edale to Kirk Yetholm in the middle of January: 431 kilometres with a 168-hour limit, in a week that gives about seven hours of daylight and takes the rest in wind, rain, frozen peat and snow. There is no stage structure and no enforced sleep — the clock runs from the gun in Edale until the runner touches the wall of the Border Hotel. Around it run the Challenger South to Hardraw, the Challenger North from Hardraw to the finish, and the two Sprints.

The Spine is where dot-watching was invented: a race almost nobody can attend, followed obsessively by thousands of people at home. Livebib is built for exactly that. The course is drawn as a ridgeline with the runner on it, the checkpoints in order with the splits as they land, and an arrival estimate for the next one that keeps updating through the night. One link, free to watch, and nothing to install.