Welsh 3000 Challenge

The Welsh 3000 Challenge

climb all of the Snowdonia 3000 ft summits in 24 hours

Location: Snowdonia
Price: £150 per person
Length: 24 hours

What is the Welsh 3000 Challenge?
The Welsh 3000 challenge aims to climb all 15 of the summits of Snowdonia that top the magic 3000 feet mark in 24 hours. It is often referred to as the 14 peaks challenge because there is some debate as to whether there are 14 or 15 seperate peaks over 3000 feet. The entire route is close to 30 miles long and involves over 13000 feet of ascent.

Who is the course suitable for?
We walk the majority of the route, you don’t need to be a fell runner. We will try and cover easy ground quickly and you do need to be comfortable on grade 1 ground as we traverse Crib Goch.

You need to be hill fit as you will be on the go for about 18 hours from start to finish. Some prior training is essential as its a tough day out. It is a real challenge and far more people fail to complete it than go all the way to the finish.

We have target and cut off times for each section of the challenge and if you don’t make the cut off time you will not be able to carry on with the next section. These cut off times are based on practical experience of the challenge and prevent problems due to exhuastion on the remote final section.

Course Program
We will meet at 5:00am on the day at Pen Y Pass car park and set off to climb Crib Goch, Garnedd Ugain and Snowdon. We descend to Nant Peris and swap to a fresh leader for the next section. We can refill water bottles at Nant Peris. We aim to complete this first section in 3 hours.

The next section takes in The Glyderau and Tryfan before descending to the Ogwen Valley. Here you will be able to refill water bottles and the leader will be replaced with a fresh one! The middle section should take an additional 6 hours.

The final section takes in the Carneddau and we finish on the North coast at about 10:00pm. This final section should take 8-9 hours giving a total time out of 17-18 hours and the last couple of hours will normally be completed by head torch in the dark.

We organise the logistics of returning to the start of the route with you prior to the challenge.

A fresh leader is given in each valley so that we can maintain your safety and enjoyment throughout the challenge.

As with any mountian day the schedue is subject to weather and conditions. If we are faced with high winds or storms then we will alter the route to suit the weather and do as much of the challenge as the conditions allow.

What about accommodation?
We do not include accommodation with this course. We recommend staying at Pen Y Pass Youth Hostel as this is at the start of the route. For a variety of different accommodation options in Snowdonia, from camping to nice hotels, visit this link.

When does this course run?
You can view the dates of all of our courses throughout the year on the diary page.

If course dates are not shown you can subscribe to our mailing list for updates.

Whats included?
The course fee includes instruction and the use of any specialist equipment. You can read our “whats included” and kit list page here.

Other Questions
You can email me with any questions that you can’t find answers to on the website and I will get back to you as soon as I can.