Well where do I start? I entered this race mainly to try to beat a hilly 100 mile off road race as I have failed twice at the Lakeland 100. I have run 145 miles at the GUCR but on the flat.
I knew this would be a tough race as only about a third ever finish and anyone I have spoken about it has said how tough it is.
I travelled down in the morning as the race registration opens at 10:30 and the start is 12pm. It was great to meet so many people I had not seen for a while as I don’t race that often. Keith Godden, Joan Clark, Iveagh Jameson, Dick Kearn, Dave Baker, Pete and John and others who I have met at this race.
Not to mention the infamous Henk the race director who is a huge character. He swears at everyone and verbally abuses anyone he can but is amazingly likeable. I first met him when he was manning the 133 mile checkpoint at this years GUCR when as I came through his first words were “fuck me those are the biggest man tits I have ever seen”! On registration opening he shouted “registrations open dickheads”! I registered and picked up number 165 and a nice race t shirt. I chatted to some more ppl and then got ready for the race.
There was a small low key charity presentation 15 mins before the race where henk handed the race profits over to a local charity and handed out 2 impromptu awards. One for the “hurry the fuck up you are taking your fucking time award” to a guy who has finished last each time over 29 hours and the “donkey award” to Dave Baker who has attempted the 100 5 years running but still never finished.
On to the race. It was started with ” right you lot fuck off from Henk” and we were off, the course has 1500+ ft of elevation per lap and is mostly on stony forest trails and hardpack chalky ground and some loose stony sections on hills and is very unforgiving. It is very hard to get into any sort of rythmn at all and there are very few sections where u can get a sustained run in. But it is a pretty route through heathland and forest and with good views. The course is tough though with very steep rough hills and one in particular that its hard to stay upright on and I was sat on my arse a few times on that one.
I ran the first 2 laps with Iveagh who had come over from Ireland to run this and who I had spent a good few hours running with at GUCR earlier this year and is a really nice guy. We did each of the first 2 laps in 2:10.
On the third lap Iveagh was proving to be just too strong on the hills for me and I slightly dropped of his pace on the hills and the third lap was done in about 2:20ish. I was starting to feel it a bit and the next lap was about 2:40ish.
From the third lap I was in the dark and mostly running on my own with the occasional hello as runners passed me or I caught slower 50 mile runners. I like running in the dark and was glad I had brough my brightest headtorch which is my mountain bike light fitted to a head harness and lit up the forest and trail very well which was good considering the terrain.
I came in on 60 miles within the 18 hour cut off with about 2 hours in the bank but was slowing down quite a bit with my quads really trashed from the hills.
Sue ran the next lap with me as this is when you are alowed buddy runners and it was nice to run from night into daylight with her. Not that we did much running as my legs pretty much fell apart on this lap and it took 3:40ish to complete and even with my bit of spare time in the bank I knew my legs would struggle to match that on the next lap let alone maintain a faster time.
So I called it a day on 70 miles.
With no regrets as I knew I had no chance of completing and was soundly beaten by the course this time round and I had no excuse or injury I was just not up to it.
This is a very tough course with tight time limits that look ok from the outside till you try to match them on the course.
Well done to all those that kept going and those who completed it. You guys are amazing.
Bad luck to Joan Clark and Dave Baker who both picked up injuries and could not complete.
Positives.
Knee was fine and did not have an issue from any part of my body and I am recovery fine.
I ran 70 tough miles and met some great ppl and learnt a few lessons.
Negatives/lessons to learn
Need more hill training
Need more race experience on the longer stuff
Need to up my mileage and increase my basic speed.
Need to drop weight as it is having some effect on the hills.
I still enjoyed the weekend and enjoyed the race and will be back.
I have things to work on for next year which I will sort out over the winter.
Thanks for reading.
Please feel free to comment.