Welsh 3000s: 24 Hours or 3 Days?
People sometimes talk about the two versions of the Welsh 3000s as though one is the proper challenge and the other is the easy option.
I don’t think either description is particularly useful. The 24-hour version is obviously the bigger endurance challenge because you are trying to link all fifteen mountains in one continuous attempt, with the effects of fatigue, darkness, food, pace and concentration building throughout the day. The 3-Day version removes that continuous 24-hour pressure, but the mountains themselves don’t disappear. You still have three substantial days, all the scrambling and rough ground, and a lot of ascent and descent across the Yr Wyddfa (Snowdon), Glyderau and Carneddau ranges.
They cover the same mountains, but the experience of doing them is very different.
The 24-hour Welsh 3000s
The attraction of the 24-hour version is fairly obvious if you like endurance challenges. You start at one end of the route and try to link the whole thing together in one continuous push.
That means the pace needs to remain steady enough to keep progress moving all day, and small inefficiencies matter because they get repeated over so many hours. Food needs to keep going in, stops need to stay useful, and changing layers or sorting kit can’t turn into a twenty-minute operation every time the weather changes.
As the day gets longer, concentration and mood become increasingly important too. Conversation usually dries up a bit once people are properly tired and the suffering tends to become more internal. From a guiding point of view I’m often watching fairly small things by then: body language, eye contact, whether somebody is still eating and drinking properly, how quickly they organise themselves at a checkpoint, and how their movement compares with a few hours earlier.
The terrain also feels very different once you have thousands of metres of ascent in your legs. The rough descents later in the route are a good example of that, which I’ve written about separately in Welsh 3000s: The Descents People Underestimate.
One of my favourite parts of the 24-hour challenge is getting onto the summit of Pen yr Ole Wen. It’s the last really big ascent of the route, and once you’re up there the character of the day changes. You’re on the Carneddau plateau, the hardest climbing is behind you and, if the group is still moving well, the finish starts to feel properly achievable.
The 3-Day Welsh 3000s
The 3-Day version has a different rhythm from the start. If the weather is suitable, I normally like to get Crib Goch done on Day 1. It works naturally with the order of the route and means the most weather-dependent scrambling section is completed early rather than sitting there waiting for Day 2 or 3, when a change in conditions could make things much more awkward.
Day 1 is also relatively short, covering the first three summits, so it gives people a slightly gentler introduction before the bigger days that follow. That doesn’t mean the rest of the trip is easy, though. The Glyderau and Carneddau days can easily run to eight, nine or ten hours, and the pace still needs to be sensible because allowing either day to drag indefinitely isn’t particularly enjoyable.
The technical terrain is broadly the same as well. Crib Goch is still Crib Goch, Tryfan can still be awkward, Pen yr Ole Wen is still steep, and the descent beside Bristly Ridge is still the same rough descent. The difference is that you meet those sections much fresher than you do during a continuous 24-hour attempt.
The biggest difference is how you experience the mountains
On the 24-hour challenge, the route gradually becomes dominated by the continuous objective. You are still enjoying the mountains, but the clock, fatigue and the need to keep moving are always in the background.
Over three days there is much more room to actually experience each range. You can have lunch on a summit in good weather without feeling like you should already be moving again. There is more conversation, more time to look around, and you see much more of the landscape in daylight.
I genuinely enjoy that side of the 3-Day. The Carneddau in particular can feel very different when you cross them during the day rather than at the end of a 24-hour attempt in darkness.
There’s a reason people sometimes say they hated Scafell Pike after doing the National Three Peaks. If you climb a mountain in the dark, exhausted and against the clock, you’re not necessarily going to come away loving the place.
The same applies here. On a 24-hour Welsh 3000s attempt the Carneddau can become the final section you’re trying to get through. On the 3-Day you have much more chance to actually see them as mountains.
Which version suits you?
I wouldn’t choose purely on the basis of which one sounds harder.
The 24-hour version tends to suit people who genuinely like endurance challenges and want the satisfaction of linking the whole thing in one continuous push. They are usually motivated by the 24-hour objective itself, including the long hours, limited recovery and the fact that at some point it will probably involve a fair amount of suffering.
The 3-Day version suits people who want to complete the Welsh 3000s but aren’t particularly interested in staying awake for most of a day and night simply because that is the traditional challenge format. Some of those people would probably be perfectly capable of the 24-hour version but just don’t care about doing it that way.
I’ve also had clients use the 3-Day as preparation for a later 24-hour attempt, which can work really well. They learn the route, experience the scrambling and rough ground, and understand how the three ranges fit together before returning to try to link everything in one continuous attempt.
At the other end of the spectrum, some people choose the 3-Day because the 24-hour version genuinely feels beyond what they want to take on. That’s completely reasonable too.
Neither version is more “proper”. They simply emphasise different things. The 24-hour version is more about endurance, efficiency and keeping everything together for one very long day. The 3-Day gives you more recovery and more time to experience the individual ranges, but still asks for three substantial mountain days in a row.
Planning a Welsh 3000s attempt?
Mountain Craft runs both the 24-hour and 3-Day Welsh 3000s in Eryri, alongside private attempts and dedicated preparation days.
