The Truth about Ultra Running

Following on from my big 100 (blog here) I had a spell of the post-race blues. I’d done what I’d set out to do, it was all over and I was pretty tired as a result. Tired physically, mentally and emotionally. The big swing of feelings, from fear to hope back to fear, to excitement over to pain, fear, exhilaration, fear, exhaustion mean that at the end of 14 hours, at the end of 10 weeks of training I was pretty done. It was straight back to work and a bit of a break from training, but without any proper direction apart from some yoga and a bit of swimming. So feeling at a real loose end I was really pleased when super runner Simon, someone who has guided me through the last 12 months of my running career (two ultras, a few marathons and countless niggles), offered to coach me towards a half marathon PB.

Before I get into what that means in terms of training, and what a change it will be from ultra distance training, I thought I’d explore a little bit what post-ultra feels like.

Running an Ultra does not make you fit.

That’s not to say that fit people don’t run ultras. The top ultra runners are astonishing in their endurance, their technical abilities, their speed. Killian Jornet, Scott Jurek and Jenn Shelton are outstanding runners who constantly defy what we think of as being humanly possible. But, that’s not to say training for three times the distance will make you three times fitter. It definitely didn’t make me any faster, and I can’t say that running 100k was all that much harder than running 46.2. All that changed was my mindset and my race plan.

Running an Ultra isn’t easy.

Despite what instagram might tell you, running an ultra takes its toll on your body. The sheer effort that your heart puts into being at an elevated rate for 12 plus hours means that it takes much longer to recover than after normal races. Some runners seem to be able to continue as normal after a race, going for a recovery jog a few hours later and then returning to full training within a few days. In reality however I found the ultra to be more disruptive than any race I’ve ever done. It took me two full weeks before I even wanted to run again, and by that time I I’d lost so much fitness it felt like I hadn’t run in years rather than days.

Running an Ultra doesn’t make you an ultra runner.

Let’s be honest, I’m still no Killian. I’m still the slightly ploddy person I was before. Granted I’m a ploddy person that has 62 miles under her belt, but I’m no better a runner than I was before. I think this was the biggest disappointment I had post ultra. I was expecting to come out the other side somehow transformed. From tabby cat to jaguar. Nope. Still as they say, a leopard (or in my case a house kitten) can’t change its spots.

I’d still have run an ultra.

It’s pretty cool really isn’t it. Plus you can eat pork pies at 4am guilt free. If that’s not worth 62 miles of graft what is?

Race to the Stones

I haven’t blogged in an absolute age. I’ve been in a weird state of denial. At the end of March I’d signed for a proper ultra marathon. A little bit on the spur of the moment, London Marathon was first so I didn’t have to think about running two and a half times that for at least… oohh three weeks. Last year I’d done my first 50k, and in the process had run my first marathon, my first trail race, and got 10 and 5k PBs. It had been an amazing experience so I didn’t have the brain brakes on when I put my name down for a 62 mile run across the chilterns. 

So I ran London and was really pleased with my time, and took a couple of weeks off to rest my stiff legs and then suddenly, it was almost June and I hadn’t done any training. So rather than knuckling down and getting on with things, I stopped blogging (because I’d have to admit to doing this thing) and ran like a bit of a dick. Trying to cram lots of miles into a few runs and then suffering as a result. One of the worst ideas was agreeing to run a casual marathon with a couple of friends across the SDW. After a hen do. And three hours sleep. And finishing on the seven sisters. Weeping on top of Beachy Head, eating chips like I hadn’t seen food in a week and ending up back in London with such severe dehydration that my chest was caving in on itself wasn’t a great confidence boost just a couple of weeks before Race to the Stones.

If anything, I think the universe was telling me not to do this race. Three days beforehand I found out that the car we were meant to be using wasn’t available anymore. This meant a desperate airbnb search for somewhere local to stay beforehand and the loss of my one man support crew who was now tasked with navigating public transport cross country to try and meet me 60 miles away at the finish.

SO SCARED

Gently Freaking Out.

STILL SO SCARED

I don’t think Stuart was impressed when I woke up at 5am the morning of the race, sat bolt upright and shouted, ‘what the fuck am I doing? I don’t want to do this.’ But, dragging him across England is becoming a bad habit, and doing it without even reaching the start line might be a step too far. So I gritted my teeth, closed my eyes and waited for the alarm clock to go off for two, long, nervous hours. At last dawn started to creep in and, I got up, pulled my stuff together and double checked my kit and bag. I was running with a suunto Ambit3 rather than my Garmin as the battery life is so much superior (and it’s an all round excellent watch). I’d gone with a pair of Adidas 2.0 ATRs as I thought the combination of trail sole, comfort and wider toe box would be the best bet for a long day on my feet. As normal as I was running with a Salomon S-Lab 5litre race vest – without the soft flasks as I find them a bit cumbersome, using the 1.5l reservoir instead. So along with my lululemon shorts, my trusty Maverick race t-shirt and a pair of Compress sport calf guards I was ready to run. I was too nervous to eat, and instead of gagging on my warm banana I decided to fuel better as the race went on. Not a great decision but it seemed like my only option at the time.

Ready to go…

Sunshine!

Traffic getting to the start line meant we were running late, there were queues picking up race numbers and by the time I actually got across the start line I was 15 minutes behind the starters and also all the walkers. In the long run this didn’t matter but awkwardly dodging lots of walking poles and backpacks on the narrow lanes did mean a slower start than I’d hoped! After a couple of K I found a bit of space and started to run. My race tactic was to run each aid station separately. It was a really well organised race, with 9 pitstops in total, one every 10k or so. Each leg totally manageable in itself, but overall would add up! Usually as soon as I start running a race all the nerves disappear and I can focus on business at hand (or foot) but this time, probably because of the huge distance awaiting, the anxiety didn’t really lift. The first aid stop came fairly quickly. I grabbed a handful of nuts and a couple of granola bars and pushed on through. It was in these early miles that my poor fuelling became apparent. I had aches in my kidneys and back from dehydration and was starting to feel hungry.

Sorta nice!

Getting to pitstop 2 and hearing the cheers of The Boy who’d got a bus and walked 3 miles to meet me left me weeping with anxiety rather than feeling spurred on. I was so aware of how much of what I had to do was unknown. I’d only ever got to the 50k mark and beyond that was dark space. But I thought back to my good friend Simon Lamb’s advice (he of the one man 70 mile christmas commute) who’d told me that discomfort would reach a point and then stop. I had to be comfortable with being uncomfortable. But it would be okay. So with a hug, a kit kat and another hug I headed out again with 77km to cover and the weight of the world on my shoulders.

poppy fields!

Gradually the miles ticked by. My legs got a bit looser and I didn’t die. The terrain was mixed, hilly in parts, woodland, field, trail. It was lovely, but hard to appreciate at times. At each rest stop I grabbed a cereal bar, flapjack or brownie, and shoved it in my race pack for later. I’d been told to treat the race as a very long picnic, which is exactly what I did. Running the flats and downs I walked every up, taking the opportunity to refuel and take stock of where I was. I’m not a fast runner, but I am a very slow walker and I’d get overtaken by half the world as I trudged along. 

The 50k pitstop was extremely welcome. I saw my friend superrunner Cat who’d come in first in the 50k race and was already showered, changed and enjoying a cider. I grabbed a plate of pasta and enjoyed a sit down and a brief catch up before heading back out. I didn’t know what to expect but I found that things really didn’t get much worse after the 50k mark. I had tired legs and was getting sick of flat coke and flapjacks but it wasn’t any worse than the last 10k of a long run. The scenery was lovely, but not miles away from my long runs on the SDW or through Bath or even along the Thames Path (albeit quite a lot hillier than my usual weekend runs!) At times I felt great, at 45k I realised that I had proactively underestimated myself. I think I’d tried to expect failure so that if it happened it wouldn’t hurt so much. But a couple of hours later and 80 odd k down I had a bit of a wobble. I was so far into it, but with a half marathon still to get through and everything starting to just ache and ache, I realised how much of an ultra is purely mental. There was no doubt that my legs could handle the distance, any problems were all in my head.

Tired feet!

Along the way I bumped into a few runners I knew, from real life and from twitter. It was great to see some friendly faces but I felt, unlike in other races, that this was something I wanted to do by myself. I didn’t want to speak to anyone else, or run with anyone else, I just wanted to stare long and hard into my subconscious and see what was lurking in the dark. Which was probably why I gave in and for the last few hours popped in the headphones so I could enjoy a bit of woman’s hour and take my mind off the miles to go.

Sun setting

Finally the 9th pitstop loomed. I sat down for the first time in hours and hours and regrouped. My shoulders were killing. Running with a sack of water and a million half eaten granola bars was taking its toll, and my glutes were killing me. Apart from that I was fine though. I ate a slice of bread wrapped round some cheese and onion crisps, threw back another cup of flat coke and headed out on the final 12k. I had been doing good stretches of walking as the latter stages of the race crept up, anything uphill pretty much. But I decided I wanted to give the last 10k a good go and sped up to what could be called a run. As the course started to wind down off the ridgeway and towards Avebury I realised that with only 5k left I was almost there! The last bit of the run involved an out and back towards the stones themselves. It was getting dark but I was determined to finish without a head torch, so finding Taylor Swift for a final boost I turned back the way I came for the final 2k. 13 hours and 50 minutes after I’d started I crossed the finish line and breathed a sigh of relief. It had been slow, and it hadn’t been pretty but it was done and I was relatively unscathed. I changed my shirt, picked up some food and then it was into a cab and back to our airbnb for a shower and a well deserved lie down.

Happy Finisher!

Blurry Finisher

I’d expected to pass out the moment I saw the bed, but actually I was up all night, my legs were aching, I was starving hungry and I was totally wired. I spent a lot of the darkest hours with my legs up a wall, watching Don’t Tell the Bride on my phone and eating a pork pie. The glamorous life of an ultra runner.

My take-aways on the big 100k? It wasn’t as bad as I was expecting, but it wasn’t as good either. I think my anxiety hampered my enjoyment, and slowed me down too. I was nervous of going too hard or too fast. I’m 99.9% sure that I’ve found my limit. Any further seems a bit pointless. I’ve run far enough that you can see the route on a zoomed out google map of Great Britain. I’d like to do it               again but try to really enjoy it, with maybe a more comprehensive training plan.

For now though? More yoga, more swimming, less flat coke. Stay tuned.

The aftermath