Lake District Training Weekend

Oh boy, life has been so busy lately.  I've not had any time to update this blog for weeks.  I'm going to gloss over much of what happened in the last 4 weeks.  Two weeks ago I had a fun run around the Royston hills with a bunch of guys and girls.  I'd never met some of the runners before, and all those who were new to me had never been to Royston before, so they were in for a surprise.  The terrain is nothing like what you find in Cambridgeshire.  It's literally just across the county boundary and had some seriously steep hills, but none are particularly high.  Still, it makes a nice change from the flat countryside right on our doorstep.

Last weekend I should have run the Malvern Midsummer Marathon, but I decided to abandon instead.  I was trying to kill tow birds with one stone and also visit an old friend in Shropshire.  It's not a part of the world that I know that well and I thought I'd have about a 40 minute drive to the start of the marathon from my friend's house.  After more detailed planning it turned out it would take 1 hour 20 minutes, or thereabouts.  I thought about what time I'd need to get up and set off on the Saturday morning and realised just how unsociable this would be, especially as I hadn't seen my friend in two years.  So I decided to abandon and to be more sociable instead.  So Ruth and I spent a couple of days walking and exploring Shropshire with my old friend Janet instead.  All I can say is that the Shropshire countryside has to be one of the best kept secrets in Britain.  It was stunning.

I've also splashed out and bought myself a new Suunto Ambit 2 GPS watch.  It is much more powerful than my old Garmin 405.  It might even be more clever than me.  I think it will take a long time for me to learn all its features.  It's taken the last two weeks just to get to grips with its basic features.  I've managed to change the screens to give me the data that I want.  The great thing about this watch is that you can adjust the GPS update rate to conserve the battery life, and if you have the update rate as once every 60 seconds then the battery should last 50 hours.  Obviously, you lose accuracy, but a 50 hour battery life will be great for really long ultra marathons were your pace is so slow that having the updates every 60 seconds isn't the end of the world.  Other great features include being able to get a grid reference reading for where you are, useful if you're ever lost! You can also programme in a number of grid references and then have the watch help you to get to those points.  How useful is this?  Well if you're fell running and need to find a hill top in very poor visibility then the watch can guide you there.  The watch will also display your altitude, which my Garmin didn't do.  This is really useful when you're climbing a mountain and would like an idea of how far you are from the top.  

I've just spent the last few days in the Lake District trying to do some serious training ready for the 50 mile Swiss ultra marathon I'll be doing in August and my new watch proved to be a very valuable tool.  I drove up to the Lakes on Thursday.  As the weather forecast for Friday was awful I decided to try and squeeze a run in Thursday afternoon.  I was camping at Castlerigg Hall Farm, just outside Keswick and though that i run up to Great Dodd would be feasible in one afternoon.  It probably would have been if it hadn't been so cloudy and pouring with rain just as I reached the hardest part of the climb.

From the campsite it was pretty much all uphill running to the base of Clough Head, which I thought I could run over on my way to Great Dodd.  The route up to Clough Head was a steep slog without the benefit of any track.  From the start of the climb it wasn't possible to see any peaks due to the low cloud, but I thought so longs I keep going up I should be fine.  Many minutes later I found myself on a peak but checking the altitude with my new watch I realised it was too low to be Clough Head, what I had climbed was Threlkeld Knotts.  Checking the map I could see that the direct route to Clough Head would involve a very steep scramble up a scree slope, either that or head back down and around the scree.  At this point it was pouring with rain, my glasses were covered in rain drops making visibility even worse and it was cold.  So I decided to abandon Great Dodd and head back down. Before returning to the camp site I made a detour to go and see Castlerigg Stone Circle.  As it was still pouring with rain I didn't bother taking any photos, but the monument was worth the detour even in the rain.

Friday was such a complete washout that I spent most of the day shopping in Keswick and sampling three tea shops.  I also drove an hour south to Cartmel to spend the late afternoon and evening visiting a friend who used to be one of my clients.  Her husband is now the vicar at the very impressive Cartmel Priory.  Here's a photo from Google.

Thankfully, Saturday was a dry day, although with low cloud for the first part of the day.  I had also planned to make this trip a recce for doing the Bob Graham Round sometime.  If you don't know what the round is then either look it up on Wikipedia, read Feet in the Clouds by Richard Askwith or look at this website: http://www.ukhillwalking.com/logbook/r/?i=145

Any way, the first stage of the Bob Graham takes you from Keswick up Skiddaw.  Pretty much 800m of climbing to the summit at 931m.  This part is all on good, well marked trails.  From the summit of Skiddaw the Round goes down the north face of Skiddaw to Blake Hill then due east to Hare Crag, then north east to Great Calva.  I had planned to do all this and more.  However, the descent from Skiddaw to Hare Crag was over such rough ground that I found it hard enough to walk let alone run.  The way up to Great Calva crossed the Cumbrian Way, which I had walked several years ago.  The route up to Great Calva and ten off it again was also over rough ground with no trail.  This would have been great as a recce of the Bob Graham Round, but it wasn't really helping me to train for the Swiss ultra marathon.  Once I reached the Cumbrian Way I decided to change my plan, run back towards Keswick and then up to the top of Skiddaw again and then back down on the same path.

The route down from Skiddaw, just about under cloud still.
Doesn't look like much, but it was rough and quite steep.

On the Cumbrian Way heading back towards Keswick.

Nearing the top of Skiddaw for the second time in one day.
Little man to the left and Derwent Water below.

Heading down Skiddaw's stony trail.

It would have been nice to have gone further afield and seen more of the Lake District, but my main priority was to train.  By the end of the day I had climbed 1850m and covered about 20 miles. The Swiss ultra will climb a total of 5000m over 50 miles.  My day running in the Lakes added a lot more perspective to what I will be doing in August.  I also realise that the Swiss ultra is going to be a lot harder than I had originally thought.  Between now and then I also have the dread of the 24 hour Thunder Run to contend with.

I also spent much of my two runs in the Lakes practising using my trekking sticks.  What I found was that using sticks helps save your legs when you are reduced to walking fast up steep hills.  When running on the flat I have observed that many ultra runners carry their sticks in one hand.  I tried this but I found it really messes with my running efficiency.  You do use your arm swing to help with your running efficiency, but having something in one hand means you can't swing that arm as well.  I felt very uneven and wondered if this uneven running could lead to injury.  I tired to swap from one hand to the other and found that I great prefer to carry my sticks in my left hand.   I also tried to have one stick in each hand, but this made matters worse.  It just didn't feel natural to run with something in both hands.  I also found I didn't like having my sticks in my hand on descents.  Some people have told me they're great for balance and also good when the trail is slippery.  Using them to prevent falls when the descent is wet I can understand, but I didn't find that they helped my balance.  I opted to keep my sticks in my backpack as much as possible and to only get them out on really steep climbs, such as going up Skiddaw.  I might waste time putting them away and getting them out again, but for me the time wasted doing this will be made up because I can run better without having the sticks in my hands.

The weekend was also a great test for my Salomon Speedcross shoes.  I can conclude that they are great for a long days run on trails and cross country.  They grip really well on gravel trails, mud and grass.  However, if you have to go across wet moss covered rocks, which I did at times, then you might as well be wearing ice skates.  

I think what I really learnt from the weekend is that I need to do a lot more hill reps and could probably do with strengthening my legs more by doing a lot more squats.  So that is what I aim to do over the coming weeks.

Fen Drayton 12 Hour Night Run

Last night's 12 hour run is officially the hardest thing I've ever done.  Just before 8pm 39 individual runners and 3 different relay teams gathered in the car park of the RSPB nature reserve at Fen Drayton for the briefest of briefings regarding the 12 hour night run.

Runners gathered for the briefing.

There were a few familiar faces.  Ex-rowing crew mate Richard Youell was there, as were two familiar park runners.  I was greatly surprised to see Ken, an american that I ran with during the 3-day Thames Tow Path run last September.  He was visiting the UK once again and decided to do this run during his visit, quite an amazing coincidence given the size of the field.

The run would take place on a rectangular loop around one of the man made lakes at the nature reserve, with one edge of the rectangle also running alongside the river ouse.  The loop was 2.2 miles long, so we were going to get to know it really well over the next 12 hours.  Every dip, tree root, rabbit hole and over hanging branch would be noted and remembered for all subsequent laps.  Still there was something nice about running around one small loop and experiencing it as the light levels changed.  Running through the night and into the sunrise was quite a magical experience, which I was able to appreciate despite being in pain.

Running in small groups over the first couple of laps.

 

We managed to run for almost 2 hours in daylight before it was time to don head torches for the night run.  This would be the first time that I have ever run completely through the night, and I was looking forward to making it through to sun rise.  I was trying to run very conservatively and by midnight I had just completed my first marathon with 8 hours left to go.  I then had a short break to grab a burger.  My main criticism would be that the food provided by the organisers didn't really match what I'd want to be eating on such an event.  I want cake, fruit, malt loaf any maybe a cheese sandwich.  The burger didn't quite sit well with me.

Sunset over the River Ouse.

Running through the night.

I managed to run reasonably well over the next 2 hours, but I was taking very short walk breaks by this stage.  I was also aware that I hadn't eaten as much as I normally would during an ultra marathon, so I stopped to make myself a peanut butter sandwich in a hot dog roll.  I only managed to eat about a third of it before I started to gag.  Again, it just wasn't working for me.  I decided at that point I'd try to make it through the night eating just the couple of Mars bars I'd brought with me.  I really wish I'd also brought my own malt loaf and bananas.

The next 6 hours were a serious hard slog.  Given that I'd run 26 miles in the first 4 hours, I then did about 12 miles in the next 2 hours and then 17 miles in the last 6 hours (this was with lots of stops and I think the organisers forgot to record one of my laps - I believe I did 57.2 miles in total).  I had to walk large chunks over the last six hours.  In hindsight I suspect I partly struggled because I wasn't eating enough.  I also don't think I'd recovered enough since the North Downs Way 50.

At one point I stopped on a deserted stretch of path and turned my head torch off so I could admire the night sky.  It was a clear night and we rarely get to admire the stars in such a perfectly unlit environment.  On one of my laps I managed to startle a small dear, who stood froze in my head torch as I approached it.  I got to within 6 feet and it just slowly ambled off the path to get out of my way.

At 3am, after 7 hours, my legs felt as if someone had been hitting them with bamboo sticks all night.  The course was pancake flat, which always fatigues my legs way more than an undulating run.  The muscles in the legs are work in exactly the same way hour after hour with no respite.  At least on a hilly course the workload in the different muscle groups changes all the time.  I had to really dig deep and kept on telling myself that my main goal was to make it until sun rise.

Not long until sunrise.

The sky was noticeably brighter just before 4am.  By 4.15am it was bright enough not to need torches.  The sun finally appeared above the horizon at about 5am, just as I started yet another lap of the nature reserve.  This would prove to be the hardest lap of the night for me.  Running was so painful that I decided to walk the whole lap.  Occasionally I'd try to run a few hundred metres just to check how my legs felt, but the pain was too much for me so I quickly returned to walking.  I got to the end of the lap at 5.30am and told one of the organisers that I was thinking of packing it in.  I went off to the field kitchen to make a cup of tea and have a little rest.

Alex with his record of everyone's lap.  I'm sure he missed one of mine!

Whilst drinking my tea I thought about the drive back home and getting into bed.  I decided that Ruth probably wouldn't be too happy with an unwashed runner sneaking into bed with her just after 6am.  With that in mind I decided I might as well at least try for one more lap.  To my great surprise I started running and discovered my legs didn't hurt quite so much as before.  The power of tea!  I then managed to run another 3 laps straight, at a slow speed and with short walk breaks.  This got me to just after 7am, at which point I decided I would walk just one final lap as a kind of cool down, so I eventually finished at about 7.40am.  No one was allowed to start another lap after 7.30am.  Given that I was so close to packing in at 5.30am, I was really pleased that I'd managed to to do an additional 8.8 miles.  

Proper daylight again.

This run reconfirmed to me just how much extensive running on the flat hurts.  However, it was a reassuring test of my resolve.  I've never come so close to giving up during an event.  It was also a good test of equipment.  I'm amazed my head torch survived all night with no noticeable drop in the light output.  I only hope I find the Thunder Run course in July to be more to my liking. Right now I have no idea how I'll survive for 24 hours.

Glad to have made it to the end.