running – Page 5 – the katsura tree

Pier to Pier

It was hard to find anyone who was feeling good. Runners are notorious for grumbling about their form, but we were all in top grumbling form today. One day I’ll chat to runners before a race and someone will say they’ve never felt better and fully expect to PB. Not today though – I was treating the race as a fact-finding mission after a viral infection that has messed up my running for most of the year. The first fact I found was that it was going to cost me £25 to run the 7 miles or so from South Shields to Roker.

I calculated that I’d be running at £3.63 mile pace, which is still slightly cheaper than a Brendan, but that didn’t worry me too much either way. The weather was fine and the race is an old favourite of mine.

In common with the Coastal Run the start is a faintly tribal mass of running shirts stretched across the beach. I was disappointed that the organisers hadn’t drawn a line in the sand with a pointy stick to indicate the Start Line. I do miss that touch.

A few minutes after 10 and away we charged along the beach. This was my first running race in about 6 months and I was curious about how it would go. It was clunky at first and I felt I’d got out of bed 10 minutes earlier rather than the actual 6am start it had been. That extra Espresso had been a bad idea too (I knew it would be, but I never learn), and I had to dive into some bushes to redress that balance. This was a bit awkward as I’d only just passed George and Karen and we’d done the whole ‘Well-Done’ routine – now I was going to have to pass them again and explain myself.

We approached the lane that extends down from Redwell Lane and the usual bottleneck was there as runners queued to get down the steps. There’s big seconds to be gained here by running down the grass, jumping down the wall, across the lane, and up the other side. I’m not sure whether people are just not keen on the wall scramble, or they just don’t realise how much shorter and quicker it is to avoid the steps.

I had to pull over for a bit of quality retching as we passed Souter Lighthouse but on the whole I wasn’t feeling too bad and for the remainder of the race I steadily picked up my pace and picked off runners all the way to the Finish. The sand was firm underfoot at the finish (has that changed?) which was a relief as I’m sure in previous years it’s been a painful comedy sprint in soft sand for the last few yards to the line.

My time was a few minutes slower than the last time I ran the race 5 years ago so I was pretty happy. It could’ve been a lot worse. Graham Daglish was grinning at the end of the finish tunnel as I coughed in, not doing too badly for someone who hasn’t raced in 3 years.

There were a few first-timers today, including Andy James who made the classic mistake of pushing for the line too early. It’s easy done – the Finish looks tantalisingly close, but on closer inspection morphs into a flight of steps with the real Finish another beach away. In fact, the more you speak to people, the harder it is to find someone who hasn’t made this error.

After a chilly start we had fine conditions for this race today. And thanks to the bus driver’s daughter we had plenty of room on the coach as she’d insisted on coming along … and when the coach is already full, you just have to get a bigger one out the garage.

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South Shields parkrun

A week after my gusty Ormskirk parkrun I decided to give South Shields a try. In sharp contrast to last week there was no shelter or toilets although you could park about 5 yards from the start line. I could imagine that on a windy day this exposed location could be a bit bleak but the morning had dawned fine, fair and frosty with clear views out over the sea.

I listened to the briefing and thought I’d misheard. It wasn’t what he said, it was what he didn’t say that caught my attention. I whispered to a nearby volunteer, “you mean, there are no laps?”. With so many parkruns having to squeeze their 5km into a small space laps are often inevitable, but the South Shields parkrun course is just one large anti-clockwise loop that starts at the top of a hill and finishes outside the Sanddancer.

Off we went heading south along the pavement before turning left after a mile to head down to the sea. There’s a bit of GNR, Pier to Pier, and Sanddancer 10K all rolled into one here. The descent was fast and fun with a few frozen puddles to watch out for before a long wide tempo section to the finish flag.

It was a calm day on a course with an overall drop so I should’ve expected a better time than last weeek. Even so I was pleasantly surprised to get just under 24 minutes – three minutes faster than last week! It’s a good event, about £49 cheaper than the GNR and no problems with the traffic getting home from South Shields afterwards.

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Ormskirk parkrun

Scatter, as from an unextinguish’d hearth
Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
Be through my lips to unawaken’d earth
The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?

The decision to read Shelley instead of TS Eliot had been a controversial one given that the timing of the parkrun was so close to the 50th anniversary of the passing of TS Eliot. However the wild and squally wind sweeping over the campus at Edge Hill University for the Ormskirk parkrun had necessitated a change of text for the run briefing. It was certainly one of the more unusual parkrun briefings I’ve listened to. Apart from the usual stuff about the route there was the poetry and some up and coming announcements about the next parkrun where the 19 minute pacer wasn’t sure if they could get round in 19 minutes, and was there a pacer for the pacer? The wonderful thing about parkrun is that no two are alike. You can turn up, as I did, at an unfamiliar venue, locate the familiar flag, and that’s all there is to it. The Ormskirk parkrun I like. Heated changing rooms, toilets and coffee just yards from the start/finish and plenty of parking. The course was tough though; one of those multi-dimensioned lap-type parkruns that always seem far further than 5km. The wind, hills and stairs(!) resulted in a very sluggish 26minute+ parkrun, but it got me out of bed on Saturday morning and I learned a bit of Shelley.

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Loch Ness Marathon

Not since London have I trained so seriously and systematically for a marathon. The training had gone well and I was reasonably confident of finally getting a sub-4 and being able to stop doing marathons.

And so into the taper, and just the small matter of a few old favourites that I would slip in as, I told myself, ‘part of the taper’. GNR, well it was a half-marathon and I needed to do that distance a few weeks before the marathon anyway, and then the LDMT, that was all hills and an endurance slog, so that didn’t count, and perhaps just a cheeky little fell race the week before. I’m sure it’d be fine. What could possibly go wrong?

Through the half-way point of my 5th Loch Ness Marathon in around 2:01, pretty much on race target and on schedule for a negative split. Still feeling fine. This was looking good and I was confident that this was going to be sub-4 day.

In the Loch Ness Marathon they quite conveniently provide a physical as well as metaphorical wall for you around the 19th mile. It’s not a particular big hill, but it’s not really what you want to see around this stage of the race. The wheels on the bus stopped going round and round and I knew with certainty that the game was no longer afoot. Rather than hit the wall head-on I sidled up to it gently, put an arm around its shoulders and said, “Look, I’m sure we can sort out a deal here. What if I accept the race is blown and just concentrate on getting to the finish in as little pain as possible?”. I think the reply was along the lines of “Whatever”. I took my foot of the pedal, stopped running and started jogging.

It was still pretty tough but it could’ve been far worse. My tactical defeat saw me shuffle over the finish line in 4:21, almost exactly the same time to the second as two years earlier, where, co-indidentally, I’d done the LDMT and GNR and a fell race or two during the taper too.

This year the lesson has been well and truly learnt though. I lost 20 minutes in the second half of the race due to running out of energy. All that careful marathon training down the drain. Don’t waste the training. Respect the taper.

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Dale Head

We crossed over the M6 and continued west to Keswick. It was around this point I realised that my Walshes were not sitting on the back seat but were in fact sitting next to the back door back in Durham where I’d cleverly placed them so that I couldn’t possibly forget them when we left the house. A quick detour via George Fisher was required, where I said I wanted a pair of Fell Shoes, size 43, and I needed to walk out the door in them in 10 minutes. This was becoming a habit. I tried on a nice pair of yellow La Sportiva Bushidos that felt just fine so I kept them on and made my way to the counter. “That’ll be £110 please”, she said nicely. My jaw clanged on the counter. This was about twice as much as I’ve ever paid for a running shoe. But they were a very nice yellow colour and I didn’t have any time to spare so I handed over the dosh.

The Borrowdale Show has had several years of bad luck with the weather and this entirely volunteer run event was now financially threatened. Roberta had signed us up for a couple of tickets earlier in the year via the Indiegogo website. This scheme along with some sponsorship appears to have saved the show and this year the weather was looking fantastic. As it turned out we had bags of time and I was standing staring absent mindedly at some carved sticks when the announcement came over the PA: “Would anyone wishing to enter the Fell Race please make their way to the cattle truck.”

Ah, fell racing! I’d missed this. It was good to be back! It’s not a proper race unless you’re filling in an FRA entry form in the back of a cattle truck. I found myself at the front of a queue of 1 and was given my number which was, oh excellent, 1! I’ve never been number 1 before. No pressure then. I had a look at the race details and noted it was an AS. Roberta noticing the worried frown that passed across my otherwise tranquil features asked, “What does AS mean?”. “Er, well basically, short and brutal. Usually.”. I paid some closer attention to where the race actually went and noticed that it marched right up to the top of the hill, the hill being Dale Head, then marched right down again. This wasn’t looking such a clever idea the week before the Loch Ness marathon.

The race briefing had an unusual twist that I hadn’t come across before. To check everyone who had registered was actually starting we all had to shout out our numbers in sequence. No. 26 having registered mere minutes earlier, must’ve decided not to bother, possibly having noted the lithe mass of sinew that was assembled for the race. I was having serious doubts myself – there were no tourists here. This was a serious bunch.

What’s to say about the race itself, apart from it was slate-shatteringly hard. It was hot and I struggled, feeling drained, weak and puzzled, much as I felt in last week’s LDMT. I should’ve been feeling fantastic as I approached the end of my marathon taper but I felt terrible. I stopped for a good drink both ways at the Dalehead Tarn beck (the ‘water stop’ in the Anniversary Waltz) and with some great encouragement from the marshalls managed to get round.

The weather was so warm that there was no need to fumble for post-race jerseys or shelter. I got a cup of tea and found a quiet patch of grass and we just sat quietly for a while soaking up the atmosphere of the show. It was a brutal little race and I should’ve treated it with far more respect than I did. I guess if you want to race well in a race that involves running up hills, then you need to train by running up hills rather than along railway lines. Clearly just buying expensive shoes and wearing the number 1 wasn’t going to cut the mustard.

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Lake District Mountain Trial

I’d been nervous for last year’s cancelled event but this year I was in much better spirits. Conditions were good, bordering on the perfect, and I was feeling fit. I reckoned I was fitter than two years ago when I’d successfully got round the LDMT ahead of the cut-offs so I was reasonably confident as I stood at the Start in Patterdale waiting for the three minute countdown. I wonder where we’d be going?

A taped route led 1200m after the start to map collection and all became clear. For starters we’d be heading straight up St Sunday Crag and make our way to the first checkpoint; a sheepfold at the bottom of Fairfield. Up over the top of St Sunday or do some clever contouring around the side? Hmmm, I decided on the more brutal but easier to navigate over the top route. It was hot and hard but an hour later I was skirting the summit of St Sunday and planning my descent. Conditions were clear and I was lucky to spot the checkpoint from a distance so took a direct line to it. 90 minutes in and I was at checkpoint 1, 7 to go. This was harder than I had expected and although still comfortably within the cutoff I’d hoped to be going faster and feeling more comfortable than I was.

Checkpoint 2 was easy navigation. Hole in the Wall, so back over St Sunday and down to Grisedale Beck, where a fellow runner bid me a cheerful good morning and asked me how I was doing. I was pretty sure I recognised this chap.

“It is you, isn’t it?”, I asked.
“Oh, yes, it’s me.”, Joss replied.

Introductions over, we chatted for a minute, during which time Joss said he was retiring because his knees were giving him trouble. He seemed remarkably upbeat and spoke of seeing his specialist next week to get them fixed. Joss was running with two fantastic sticks that looked hand chiseled and customized – I’ll never look at my Lekis in the same way again. He headed off down the valley back to Patterdale and I headed upwards to the Hole in the Wall.

It was a long hard climb up the wall line during which at some point Andy Blackett from DFR passed me and somehow managed to make me agree to make up a ‘B’ team at the FRA relays, before he pushed on ahead into the distance. Checkpoint Two eventually arrived and I was feeling far more tired than I expected to be, and only half an hour inside the cutoff time. This was beginning to look ominous.

Checkpoint 3 was a fair trek away, somewhere NE of Hart Side. I descended down Red Tarn Beck then crossed over towards Greenside Mine. I was very pleased with my direct route up the beck and across the shoulder of Sheffield Pike to Nick Head, where I picked up a path that contoured all the way round to Brown Hills. My speed was slow but my navigation was fine. I left the path to begin contouring round Brown Hills towards the checkpoint at Coegill Beck. I realised that time was now against me and that if I got to the Checkpoint 3 before being timed-out I’d retire there anyway.

Unfortunately I decided to contour by following my instincts rather than following the compass and it wasn’t too long before I found myself in the wrong beck wondering where the checkpoint had hidden itself. I checked my watch. It was academic. I was out of time. I’d drifted too far east and the checkpoint was out of reach. Five hours and 10 miles into my race, and only two checkpoints visited. Time to admit defeat. I retired. It took me another hour and a half to get back to registration to find Andy Blackett sitting comfortably watching the runners finishing.

“Retired?”, he asked, without preamble.
“Yup”.
“Yeah, me too”.
“?!”

For those who don’t know him, Andy Blackett is no slouch, so I did feel slightly better to hear this news. He too had contoured round Brown Hills making a similar mistake to me but managed to relocate and push on to Checkpoint 3 where he retired. A look at the (extensive) list of ‘rtd’s on the results shows that most people who retired did it at this point.

It was a tough event and sadly, it was too tough for me. I suspect it was a harder course than two years ago, but that’s neither here nor there. It’s advertised as a challenging event and LDMT are entitled to set the bar high, but I doubt I’ll be fit or confident enough to tackle the Classic again.

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Gateshead Harriers Quayside 5K

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At over a pound a mile dearer than the Great North Run I imagined for a second that I could sense Danny’s incandescence sizzling quietly in the evening sunlight. Ordinarily I wouldn’t pay £15 for a 5K that I could do £15 cheaper any Saturday of the year in parkruns all around the country. But I work next door, and I’ve not done a road race for a while. A fast, flat 5K would be useful in providing me with some no-nonsense feedback about what sort of shape I was in.

Just after 6pm I wandered out of BALTIC, registered, then wandered back to my desk and had a nice cup of tea. I looked out of the window and saw a splash of purple so wandered out again to meet my fellow Striders who’d also decided to give this new race a whirl. As 7pm approached we made our way across the Millennium Bridge to the Start of the race in Newcastle. The race started right on time, even if the starting hooter didn’t, but we all got the message, and we leapt away up the River Tyne.

Plenty of marshalls, signs and tape kept us right. It was a straight out and back and it was no time at all before the Scarily Fast runners could be seen coming back downriver. Simon, Alister, and Rich were mixing it up with the SFRs but I wasn’t so far back myself and feeling exhausted but upbeat. Short races are just so much harder than long races, and you have to keep concentrating or your pace slips, and in a short race, you pay for that lapse of concentration. I grabbed the lampost at the turn and birled round and I was heading home. A slight tailwind and, because you’re going downriver you can tell yourself you’re going downhill, and I kept my pace up.

I tried to not keep glancing at my watch but I realised I was in danger of getting a half-decent time. There was just the small matter of the hill at the end. A sharp right onto the Millennium Bridge then keeping to the right to take the shortest line possible – over the summit to hear Alister’s commanding voice encouraging me to shift it downhill to the finish. A cheeky little chicane through the gates and bollards and then a few yards sprint to the line with some convenient railings to hang on to while I waited for the world to stop spinning.

I was pretty pleased to finish 1 second the wrong side of 23 minutes given that my last parkrun a few weeks ago had been nearer 26 minutes. A flat fast and furious race. Everyone needs to do one of those every now and then, even if it does cost £4.84 a mile.

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Whitby urban orienteering

After Saturday’s 30 miles around the Durham Dales a manic urban orienteering event around Whitby on the Sunday seemed like an attractive antidote. I’ve never been to Whitby before and what better way to find out about the place than by running excitedly through the streets and parks. We registered and I chose the longest course with some nice long running stretches while Roberta decided to stick with a shorter course.

Urban orienteering favours the quick thinker; the navigation is usually quite straightforward but you need to make a lot of decisions very quickly. It was, for example, a long way from Control 6 to Control 7. What was the best way? You could easily spend 30-60 seconds pondering all the permutations, come up with an absolutely wizard plan, fiendishly efficient and fast, but that 30 seconds could have been used just running optimistically in the general direction of the control. Sometimes the hare does beat the tortoise.

I do ok in urban orienteering but I need time to read the map, check my location and plan my route. And think. And I do it a few seconds slower than most orienteers, which over 30 controls, soon adds up.

The sun was out and Whitby was busy. But there was plenty of space and it was easy to get round people. It wasn’t quite as easy to parry the questions that many ask when a sweaty runner sprints passed waving a map in the air. Roberta kept bumping into the same dog-walker who seemed to want regular updates. Almost every walker also insists on ‘helping’ with some advice; “there’s one of them things just along there!”. One bloke helpfully told me that he thought I was lying about fifth. Fifth in what, I have absolutely no idea! But fifth would be nice.

There was a nice bit of variety in my course, through streets, paths, parks and an interesting stretch along the seafront. I got around briskly enough without any major errors, apart from going straight from 11 to 13 without bothering with the extra hassle of going to 12. In an urban event such as this with lots of controls it’s surprisingly easy to get out of synch and miss a control.

The event finished back at the school where we started in a nice flat grassy area. With the car parked just a few yards away I was able to sit on the grass and have a coffee while waiting for Roberta. Unlike a conventional running race where a lot of people finish around the same time an orienteering race has people starting and finishing at all sorts of times and apart from the occasional appearance of a brightly coloured runner you’d not know that you were at the Finish line of an orienteering competition. A nice way to round off a weekend’s racing.

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Durham Dales Challenge

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There was, not surprisingly, a bigger than usual turnout for the 25th Anniversary running of the Durham Dales Challenge. I’d forgotten the system for kit checks, which turned out to be looking at the kit list, and signing a form to say that you understood that you had the kit. I would be carrying a torch, and not just any old torch, a working one at that.

And lots of water. I did the Swaledale Marathon thing and assumed rather smugly that my two drinks bottles counted as a cup/mug and so I wouldn’t actually have to have a cup dangling irritatingly from my backback. When I got to the half-way point and could’ve murdered a cup of coffee, I rather wish I had. When they say bring a cup, they mean it.

I’ve done this event before so knew that the navigation was pretty easy. The 30 miler and 17 miler routes part company early on, where Santa points you in the appropriate direction depending on your choice. Santa is the only marshall you’ll see. But you needn’t worry about maps and marshalls, just keep reading the clear route descriptions.

Unfortunately I didn’t read the bit about turning sharp right to go onto a narrow forest path, and instead continued galloping along a stony Hamsterley forest track, only to realise something fishy was going on when I bumped into a marshall. Not any old marshall, but a Hamsterley Marathon marshall. Turning 180 I bounded back from whence I came only to bump into Melanie and Jules who had also made the same mistake, as had many others.

But Melanie and Jules were only getting warmed up. They wouldn’t expect me to do the honourable thing and refrain from listing their impressive list of creative navigational deviations, and they’d be right. It was just as well that for the most of the race they were running a bit faster than me as it allowed me to shout ahead when they strayed from the route, which they did with impressive frequency. We soon got into a rhythm and when we got to Middleton in Teesdale and they turned right instead of left, I simply shouted STRIDERS! as loudly as I could. When they looked back in a guilty golden labrador sort of way I simply pointed meaningfully left in a pointing meaningly left sort of way.

Durham Dales Challenge – follow the tapes

Once out of Middleton in Teesdale (where those who had brought cups had a cup of tea) the half-way point has come and gone and, psychologically, you’re on the way home. But I remembered this being a tough bit of the race. A long climb out of town to get to Checkpoint 6 then the barren climb over the top and down to Great Eggleshope Beck.

On to Checkpoint 7 where I tried to untangle my control card for clipping. The clipping lady insisted that it wasn’t a problem and as she clipped my card commented that she’d be sure to be careful what she did with her clippers. Indeed! I’ve never been a fan of body piercings, and if I did ever get any, they certainly wouldn’t be there. Another reason not to wear lycra.

I’d caught up with Jules and Mel who upon departing checkpoint 7 were about to go off-piste once more. I put them right then followed them out. By this point you’ve past the psychological 20 mile mark and there isn’t much more climbing ahead. Jules and Mel started chatting to a walker and continued chatting to him all the way to the top of the hill. I paused about half way up the hill in order to stay on course and take the path away to the right, and hollered up to Jules and Mel that they might like to do so too.

Durham Dales Challenge – tasty checkpoint

As they came back on course I started jogging again on the now slightly descending path. It was quite nice to be running again and I got into a bit of a rhythm and stuck with it. I was still running when I approached Checkpoint 8 to see several green blobs in the distance. As we got closer they turned out to be marshalls in greenish fancy dress. They offered me a toasted teacake but I just took juice and jelly babies. One commented that there were two lasses just behind me and Jules and Mel turned up a few moments later.

The last 7 miles or so of the DDC are either downhill or flat and I was running quite steadily now so I pushed on. Into a farmyard just as the farmer was herding his sheep down the track. I followed patiently, only avoiding following them into the pen when the farmer obligingly opened another gate and pointed me in the right direction. At the penultimate self-clip checkpoint I caught another runner who was having a bad year. A previous sub-6 hour man he was struggling this time and we ran together almost to the finish, unfortunately taking a slightly longer route as I insisted on unnecessarily taking the path I took last year, rather than the shorter unflooded one I could’ve taken this year.

At the final self-clip I glanced back and saw Jules and Mel not so far behind. Should I wait a few minutes so we could all run in together like something out of The Incredible Journey?. I mean, these were my clubmates and we’d been through a hard 7+ hours together. I looked at my new running partner and asked him. He looked at me as if I was insane and said, simply. “Na, just bury them.”. Well that was clear enough. I tapped my heels together and galloped the last few yards through Wolsingham and up to the school, where, like all proper races, you have to open a door and walk up to a table where you actually finish. No chip timing here.

I think this impeccably organised event is likely to become a favourite of mine, partly due to the elegance of the route, the diversity of terrain and scenery, and probably in no small part due to the relatively easy last 7 miles. The 30 miles pass quickly.

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Keldy and Cawthorne Banks

It’s quite a long way to Cawthorne Banks and you need to drive through a lot of gorgeous North York Moors to get there (well you don’t, but we did) but it was worth the trip. We registered for the courses we fancied then a long trek to the Start which was perched classily beside Elleron Lake. Roberta toddled off on the Orange course, and I started at the same time on Green.

Control 7 to 8 – taking the scenic route

The first four controls were easy. It was all running and easy navigation and I was soon out of breath from the hard running. Things toughened up a bit after that and the controls became more challenging. Then came control 8. Getting a bit over-confident I crashed through the undergrowth in the general direction of control 8. Soon realising that I hadn’t really thought this through, and the reluctance of the control to simply present itself in my path, I started looking for a catching feature – an obvious feature somewhere after the control that would allow me to relocate – that is, work out where the hell I was. Relocating is what you do when you’ve gone a bit astray and you’re desperately looking for nice feature, like a fence or a road or a building that will make things clear where you are. Time ticked on and my minor error was becoming a major error. Was I relocating, or was I lost? There were no obvious catching features and I was, quite literally, just stumbling around in a wood. I stumbled down to the stream and picked a direction. Eventually a footbridge, a road, and oh good grief, I’m there?! Really?? Does this warrant multiple exclamation marks?? Yes!!!

I often ponder over the fickleness of this sport – being both fascinated and horrified by how a simple mistake can pretty much blow your race apart. Sure enough, 26 minutes to find a control that should have taken 5, and my position at the bottom of the results pretty much guaranteed. Well you live and learn. Or other people seem to, anyway.

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