Loch Ness Marathon – Part 5 – Race Day

Last October, having failed to make the lottery for London, I suggested to three of my friends, while drunk, that we should all pledge to run the Loch Ness Marathon. This we did and two of us, while sober, actually signed up.

I did my first marathon in Edinburgh in 2009 in a respectable time of 4:12. On the one hand I was quite happy just to have finished a marathon at all but on another I really felt that I had a sub-four hour race in me (somewhere).

Inverness
Bill and I took an Easyjet flight up to Inverness, sadly missing all the lovely scenery that we would have spotted from the train. It did, though, mean that we could get into town with plenty of time to dump our stuff at the guesthouse and then get to the start and register for the event. Picking up our bib numbers and timing chips we had time for a quick photo with ‘nessie’ next to the finish line and the ‘Ness’ river that runs through the town and down to the Loch.

The organisers had offered a ‘pasta party’ but looking in the tent this didn’t seem that fun so we decided to look for our own dinner. We controversially avoided a few italian types places and pasta all together and ‘carbo loaded’ on good old fish and chips at the classy sounding ‘Vegas Chip Ship’. They even had a ‘gourmet menu’ of things like scotch pie and white or red pudding.

With nothing much else to do, especially as drinking beer wasn’t on the cards we just went back to our guesthouse, prepared our things for an early start and were in bed well before 10 o’clock. Such good boys!

The Start
This will certainly count as one of the most interesting and bizarre starts to a running race that I’ve done. The general plan is that we meet at 7am at the ‘finish’ in Inverness and get bussed to the start out beyond the other end of Loch Ness and run all the way back.

It certainly did no harm to my morale that it was a glorious morning as we walked to the coaches at Bught Park. What did make us a bit nervous was that the driver stalled the coach a couple of times on steep rises when we neared the start. Would we even get there?

When we did arrive, we did the usual pre-race routine of a long queue for a portaloo (there is never enough), followed by hanging about in the chilly, pretty moorland for the race to start. It is, in fact tricky to think of a more picturesque start to a race than this.

Start to Halfway
This race felt very much like three distinct parts so i’ll break it down that way.

Going into the race and even up to the start i’d been very unsure what sort of plan I should go for. I didn’t think my training had been nearly good enough, so should I still aim for a sub-four hour pace? If I tried, would I blow out and not finish at all? I’d be more upset at not finishing than the time goal but it seemed wrong to not try. I was confused!

What I did know was that the race started with several miles of downhill and as the gun went off and we went over the line, I thought that at least I should make hay while gravity was on my side and go fast in the early stages.

The course undulated slightly but the general trend was down hill and the first few miles I did blisteringly fast (by my own standards). In fact they were literally blistering as I found to my extreme consternation that I had started developing a blister at about mile 7. This was not good and I don’t know why as I hardly ever had any blisters on my training runs? Same shoes and socks, a mystery?

The road soon joined the Loch and we got occasional stunning views, though most of the time it was behind a treeline.

When things (sort of) flattened out I found myself still keeping up a fastish pace but at the time it felt a bit unnatural to have to force myself to go slower. The miles ticked by, my foot was getting sorer and the views still good. As might be expected, the further along it went, the runners got increasingly spaced out. I never found myself alone but soon there were no problems overtaking slower runners.

I kept to my water and food strategy – accept all ‘normal’ water, pour some over my head and drink the rest. One energy gel each hour (I had three). I didn’t accept any of the energy drinks or other gels or shot blocs on offer.

When I saw the 13 mile marker hove into view, I was both glad and worried. Getting past half-way makes me feel it is metaphorically ‘downhill’ from then on. On the worrying side I was already feeling quite tired. Had my pace just exhausted me? Was I going to finish?

Thirteen to Eighteen miles
These five miles were very tough for me. I was feeling increasingly tired and to cap it all there was a short but stiff hill at the 18 mile mark. I knew I was technically ahead of a four hour pace so decided to just walk it and conserve my energy. I hate having runners stream past me and I had to remind myself that I was competing against myself and not them.

I still had eight miles to go and at this point I really wondered how I was going to do it. My legs felt like they had very little left. Very definitely my lowest point of the race.

I told myself to keep plodding, one foot in front of the other. It also occurred to me that this was just another hour and a half of my life and I could put up with some discomfort for that long. The idea of being able to put up with pain if I give a time limit seemed to work. Somehow I was able to continue.

Nineteen miles to the finish
Both my feet hurt but one was excruciating. I listened to music for the whole of the event and for periods this may have helped distract me from the pain.

I plodded along for a few more miles until another climb around the 20 mile marker. Again I walked the steepest bit but did get running again near the top. The good news from this point was that there were no more hills, just slightly down or level. It also cheered me up to know it was ‘just’ a 10k to go. This distance feels very achievable!

The other morale booster was that despite a couple of very slow 1km split times on the hills I was still on for the sub-four hours. My addled brain kept trying to do the maths on my slowing pace against the distance to go and I convinced myself that it was still possible. All I had to do was keep going. No stopping or walking any more.

My legs could have easily and at any point now have just given up and stopped. My head was the only thing keeping me going. Each time a mile marker went past, I tried to re-calculate my projected time. It was going to be close, but I was still on for my projected time.

When I went through 23 miles I think I just knew I could do it. My legs were on total autopilot, in fact I could barely feel them anymore. The soles of my feet were agony. Despite this, I knew that if I kept going for just 30 more minutes I could stop.

The last few mile markers came and went and we entered the outskirts of Inverness and finally with 1 mile to go, the riverbank. The route cruelly makes you pass the finish on the other side of the river before crossing the bridge and coming back. I realised now that I could walk that last mile and still make it but this was not the time for walking.

I did find that a lot of other runners still had the energy for a sprint finish and dashed past me over the last few hundred meters. I was content just to run over the finish line at all!

I had done it. Not just finished, not just beaten my personal best but also smashed through the four hour time I’d set myself last year. I was delighted, relieved, happy and incredibly proud of myself.

Position: 700 of 2414 finishers
Half-Marathon: 1:49:47
Marathon: 3:54:43

For some fun, this is my pace against elevation:

Post Race
I stumbled through the finish line, got my medal, t-shirt and goody bag and accepted any other items offered such as bananas or energy bars. I was done for and could barely stand. I did manage to take the selfie with my medal and send it to facebook with the message ‘Fucking smashed it. Sub Four hour time’. As you can see, I was a bit emotional!

I phoned Deborah to tell her the good news and reassure her that I was (just about) alive.

I picked up my bag and went to have a bite to eat in the Baxters tent. The food was pretty average but I was extremely grateful for it. A band started up as I was eating, giving a very good rendition of Nina Simone’s ‘Feeling good’. This almost made me burst into tears, I WAS feeling good.

I took the seemingly vast walk (of a few hundred meters) to the showers and got myself cleaned up. I even showered wearing my medal! It was here I discovered that one foot was mostly unscathed, the other, however, had an enormous blood blister. If you are curious and not squeamish, here it is.

I then went back to the finish, just missing my friend Bill cross the line. He also beat his goal of getting a sub-five hour time. We are both heroes!

He went for a shower while I had a coffee and monitored all the likes and comments following my sweary Facebook post. If you were one of these people – thank you, it means a lot!

All that remained was to find something ‘proper’ to eat (burger for me), drink several pints of water and finally a beer. Bill and I just sighed and groaned almost constantly throughout the evening.

Just for fun, we had booked the sleeper train back to London. What you need after a tough physical day is a tiny cabin with no room to swing a mouse (let alone a cat). Actually I was pretty happy to lie down for a few hours and go to sleep at 9pm.

Thanks Loch Ness marathon it has been amazing and emotional! I can now retire from marathon running (for a few years at least) and do some new things!

Kayaking course starts next week….

Wildman 2014 – 15km trail run

I did the 10km Wildman, run by ‘Human Race’, last year so I had a vague idea of the first two thirds of the course with the final 5km set to be a bit of a mystery.

I was also starting with my friend Matt R, who I knew to be pretty quick. Having said that, I’ve been training hard recently and for once wasn’t really fearing the numerous climbs that I knew we would have. Still, my money at the start was on matt.

With all the recent rain the course was muddy but not exeptionally so and most really glutinous bits could be avoided. In addition to this I was wearing my trail running shoes and I felt it made a big difference to my speed, especially on the downhills where I could go fast in safety.

It is good to note that the ‘million’ squats and sprints that I do in my normal training pay off when assaulting the numerous stiff climbs. I wanted to start steady and then maybe ‘go for it’ later on, but I found that even my regular pace meant that I started to get ahead of Matt after the first few kilometres. I didn’t read much into this at the time, knowing that he too was saving energy for the end and he could well catch me up..

The end of the 10km brings you back to the start point and at this stage I was feeling pretty good. It turned out to be extrememly wise to keep something in the tank for the last 5km as suddenly the climbs became extremely steep and the paths a lot less defined. It also included a fine water feature to plunge through for dramatic effect!

Fun in puddles

I really felt that Matt was likely to charge past me at any point which in turn really helped me keep my pace up right to the end. It was with great relief that the finish line finally came and in what now seems a pretty good time of 1:22:36. The winner only managed 1:04, which seems almost close!

Matt came in 6 mins later but it looks like we are still friends! A fun race, hopefully something that will be in my annual calendar.

 

Marathon training #2 – 13.1 miles

I said that the half-marathon was going to give me a good idea of progress, and it has.

The good news at least is that I can at least get round the first 13 miles of the course. The bad news is that I don’t think I could have taken another step. Things aren’t desperate yet, but I do have some hard work to do now to get in shape for the big one.

Hastings half-marathon
It all started fairly badly with the most chaotic and stressful starts I’ve ever had. We got to Hastings with what I thought was a reasonable 45 minutes to spare, however, what with traffic almost at a standstill and then nowhere to park I nearly didn’t make it. I was also busting for the loo and there were no toilets, ahhhh.

Always check out the route of a race. I didn’t and found that this race was amazingly hilly. Significant amounts of the first 5 miles are up-hill with one stretch of 2 miles continuously! This was fairly tough and I was very glad of my hill training at home. After the first 5 miles the route undulated or was flat or downhill which was good as my legs were about done.

I kept going through the unseasonably warm March weather (it really was a beautiful day), but I increasingly found as time went on that I was passing less and less people and many more were passing me.

During the race I gave a strategy that I’d read about a go. In this race I walked through all the water stops, tried to drink the cup and additionally threw a cup over my head. I still found drinking much water a struggle, but the pause was always welcome.

I was very grateful to see the ten mile marker as I ran through Hastings old town as I was fairly beat by now and I knew that it was just a run along the front to the finish. Those last miles, however, I found very tough and it was mostly will power that kept me going. Things got particularly desperate when I didn’t see the 11 mile marker and it seemed like forever before the 12 came into view.

I eventually made the finish line, though I couldn’t manage a final sprint. Very tired. Spent. Happy.

Summary
The Hastings half-marathon is a tough and hilly race and I only just made the finish. I did just about get in under two hours though, which is a plus. Not sure I’d do this race again, too much hassle to get to the start.

Now the real hard work begins…

Race – Knacker Cracker 2009 10km

Squadron Leader 'Snoopy' Webber

It was billed as the ‘toughest 10km race in Britain’ and having done it, I’m not one to argue. The Knacker Cracker, now in its sixth year is an annual race that takes place at Box Hill in Surrey every New Years day and the participants are encouraged to take part in fancy dress.

When I saw this race advertised it immediately appealed to me as it sounded quite a challenge, pretty fun and there is something slightly subversive about doing a run on a morning that everyone else is at home with a hangover.

The drive to the race was slightly bizarre as I’m sure we only saw about four or five cars in the whole journey. We knew we’d arrived at the right place when we got to the Rykers Cafe and saw lots of people dressed kind of for running but in a wide range of fancy dress.

Fancy dress
Milling about at the start we checked out the other costumes and were quite impressed. There was a Mr T, a group of six came as the cast of the Wizard of Oz, there was a couple in towels and showers caps, someone in a loincloth and tribal body paint, pirates, jesters, a coal miner, the pink panther and many more.

I’d considered a few ideas myself, but eventually decided on ‘World War One flying ace’. I’d thought about hiring an outfit, but in the end opted to make one myself. My flying hat was cut from a brown cushion cover and my goggles were just those I use for swimming. I did the old trick of sewing a white pillow case to a coat hanger to make a scarf and I printed out my RAF wings off the interweb and stuck it to some cardboard. To finish things off, Deborah painted on a handlebar moustache with some waterproof mascara. From a distance at least, I looked the part.

The Race
It was a bitterly cold morning and hanging around at the start was a little bleak. The race is handicapped so that the fastest runners start last and my slightly optimistic estimate put me in the second to last group. I was a tiny bit worried that I might be last on this one.

The race starts with a lung-bursting run up to the top of Box hill and essentially makes you go up and down at various points about four times. I managed to run all the way up the first hill, half-way up the second and from then on all up-hills were walked completely. I get what I thought was a decent bit of hill training where I live, but this was not nearly good enough preparation for this race. To be fair to myself almost no-one ran up hill three and absolutely no-one ran up the last which was a very steep slope with steps.

Between painful climbs there were muddy, slippy hair-raising downhills and a couple of bits on the level. I got passed quite a bit, but hearteningly I managed to get round a few others myself. I was pretty knackered by about half-way and I was absolutely shattered by the end of the last hill.

One thing that kept my spirits up in the race was getting encouragement from spectators and marshals (who were great) and by giving out ‘hellos’, ‘Tally hos’, ‘Do it for queen and country’ (in my best RAF posh voice) and generally saluting anyone I passed. The last kilometre was at least a nice downhill and I was very glad to throw a nice salute as I went over the finishing line.

I came in a respectable 127 out of 213 finishers with an official time of 01:10:05.

The gear

The gear

As a rule, I’ve learnt not to get too many expectations about the ‘goodies’ that are given out in races. It’s often a really cruddy medal and a poor quality cotton t-shirt that will never be worn.

With the Knacker Cracker, however, my meagre expectations were well exceeded. The medal is actually really good and deserves hanging up. The race shirt is a decent quality long-sleeve hi-vis running top that has all the participants names on. As a brucey bonus you also get a logo’d mug and even some hot soup and a roll which is very welcome.

Summary
On New Years day morning I’d given serious thought to backing out of this race and staying in bed. I’m really glad that I found some gumption and did it as it was good fun, despite the hills and I have sense of having joined a brotherhood of…errr…nutters. This could even be an annual event for me?!

Thanks to Deborah and Rose for giving me some great support, especially on such a cold day!