2017 - the final numbers

The great thing about using something like a Garmin watch is that you get so many facts back about your running (and weight training, swimming, cycling and dog walking).  Here's how 2017 looks for my running:

Total Distance:  982.02 miles. Thanks to a few snow days that meant missing runs that's 12 miles short of my target of 1000 miles in a year.  It didn't help that I also missed quite a few runs early in the year when DH was ill.  

Time spent running: 191 hours 36 minutes 31 seconds. That's almost 8 days.

Calories burned:  81,591.  I like this stat - when you consider that ultra-running is often said to be a cake and crisps eating contest that's 21.9 kg of chocolate cake 😋 or 435 packets of crisps I could have eaten. (Dread to think what 435 packets of crisps would do to my blood pressure though!)

Elevation gained: 16,480 metres. Or 1.8 times the height of Everest.

Average pace: 11 mins 41 secs /mile  (5.1 mph) but this includes the times I was completing ultra runs where the pace drops because of the distance, walking breaks, aid station stops and running on trails.  If you exclude the ultra runs then my average paces was 9 mins 30 secs /mile (6.3 mph) which is still pretty slow.

Most miles in a month: 206 in August which was peak training for the Westminster to Cheltenham run.  Although 145 miles in 4 days is the most concentrated running I ran very little in the following 2 weeks while recovering which knocks the months total down quite a bit.

Average length of run: 5.99 miles

Based on a BBC Sport article on the UK's exercise habits, excluding ultra runs, I'm slightly faster than the average woman runner in the UK (09:34 per mile) and on average I run 1.4 times as far on each occasion (UK average 4.3 miles).  Not that it really matters of course, most of us are only competing with ourselves.

Time to reset the miles counter for 2018.

Christmas Day Running

During November the local gym had a promotion to encourage everyone to get through 7000 calories of effort before Christmas.  Apparently 7000 calories is the average Christmas dinner.  

Today's run only came to 224 calories (with another 165 for walking Marley).  But there's only so much you can fit in with so little daylight at this time of year.  On the other hand dinner didn't come to anywhere near 7000 calories.  I mean how can you eat that much?  Even on the W2C run when we were eating constantly through the day we were only managing to put away about 3500 calories.

Christmas Day is a great time for a run.  Especially when you have a power cut in the middle of the day which takes away the excuse of needing to do something else.  A few people heading for the pub commented that running isn't the right thing to do today but what do they know.  I expect they'll be in the gym for a few days next month then all their good intentions will slide away again.

Snow!

So it snowed heavily on Sunday and it's been below freezing most of the last two days.  Thank goodness for the gym.  Running on the treadmill is pretty dull but it's better than breaking something and not running at all for six weeks or more.

Not that the gym is much warmer.  I wondered why most people inside were wearing long sleeved tops and few were wearing shorts.  Today the staff were sat in fleeces and fingerless mittens even though the reception area is noticeable warmer than the gym itself.  It's better cold than hot though.  I used to go to a gym that was so hot you broke into a sweat just walking across the room.

Rain forecast tonight - wonder if it will wash all the snow away?

Winter Running

A couple of weeks away on holiday and it's suddenly dark before I leave work of an evening and much colder too.  Instead of shorts and t-shirts I've had to switch to long sleeved tops, running tights and more high vis than is fashionable.  Then add a hat, head torch and gloves.  

It makes running seem so much harder.  Starting out in the dark is much more daunting than it going dark while you're out.  You run slower even in well lit areas which makes you wonder where your fitness has gone.  And it's far easier to twist an ankle on a pothole which I have done (painfully) twice this week.

With the lack of focus on an event and all the pre-Christmas distractions it was a struggle to get motivated and go for a run and I was thinking maybe stop running long distances and just concentrate on the 10k and Half Marathon.  Then I read an article "Five lessons from a year of ultra running".  And it reminded me of all the reasons I like ultra's.  So it's time to stop messing around, dig out the winter base training plan again and get on with preparing for something next year, even if I've not yet decided what that something is.

Before the clocks change

Last evening run in daylight tonight before the clocks change.  Next week it will be running in the dark in the evenings.  Time to dig out the reflective jacket and torch again.

Running in the dark is strange, it always feels like I'm running quite fast but when I look at my watch it's actually very slow. Weird.

Looking at the weather forecast for the next few days it won't be long until the long trousers and gloves come out of storage either.  Brrr...

Stroud Half Marathon - good and bad

The good is that today's result is my best half marathon time this year at 02:03:36.  The bad is that's over 9 minutes slower than my PB set on this course last year.

Of course last year I hadn't run an ultra marathon just five weeks before - which has a lot to do with today's result.  

The first 6 miles were fine with my pace actually a little faster than last year.  It even felt easier than last year, not feeling like I was even breathing that much harder than I would on an easy run (which fits with my experience of running this pace in training the last few weeks).  Then my left knee started to hurt.  

I managed to maintain a respectable pace until about mile 9 - which would have brought me in just under the two hour mark.  But from then it was a real struggle - I even resorted to walking for a minute at about 11 miles to see if that would ease off the pain.  It didn't so I carried on running but now very slowly - more a jog than a run.  All of which pushed my time over the two hour mark.

Meanwhile Scott, my running buddy from the Westminster to Cheltenham ultra marathon finished in a very respectable 1 hour 52 minutes.

Oh well, there's always next year.

Brian

Brian the storm, not the snail from the Magic Roundabout.  Wonderful timing for Brian to hit the day before the Stroud Half Marathon though hitting on the day itself would have been worse as we'd have had rain as well as strong winds.  The worst of Brian should have passed by Sunday morning so it should be dry but it's still going to be quite windy - and cold.

The Met Office are currently forecasting westerly winds of 20 mph, with gusts up to 40mph.  The first two miles of the race route head pretty westerly from Stroud before turning north at Stonehouse.  The route then heads west again from miles 4 to 6.  Once we get to Whitminster just before mile 7 the course then heads east back to Stroud so we'll have the wind on our backs for the second half of the race.

The other thing about the weather is it's forecast to be quite cold - 10C feeling like 7C.  At least that's made the decision on what to wear quite easy - long sleeve top, shorts and gloves.  Last year it was warmer and I spent hours agonising over long sleeves or short.  I even changed twice before the start before going with long sleeves then regretting it about 2 miles into the race.

I've got my three plans ready for the race:
- plan 1 is to finish regardless of the time - highly likely to achieve that unless something really bad happens (really bad things can happen in your head as you can convince yourself you can't finish even when you physically could)
- plan 2 is to finish in under two hours - it's possible to achieve that if nothing goes too badly wrong
- plan 3 is to finish in under 2 hours 55 mins - feels a bit unlikely this year as I've not done enough speed work and I've still got a few residual twinges from the Westminster to Cheltenham run.  Plus the wind is going to make the first part of the race hard work and slow things down a bit.

No more runs now before Sunday.  

Life can get in the way

Just occasionally the rest of life gets in the way of running.  This week I've had:

Monday - Scouts
Tuesday - Leaders meeting
Wednesday - Church Night
Thursday - full day work party on the Scout Hut
Friday - hubby had a hospital appointment
Saturday - Standing Strong event in Birmingham

Today I managed to squeeze in a 6 mile run between the end of church this morning and the start of a special Thanksgiving Service this evening.

A fantastic week with lots achieved but not a lot of space for running.

Happy Birthday Parkrun - 13 today

I'm a huge fan of the concept of Parkrun - mass participation, it's a run not a race, you can jog or walk.  But when it comes to taking part I'm less enthusiastic and only turn up occasionally.  In the time it takes to drive there, run the 5k (3 miles) and drive home I could have run 10 miles.  And the Parkrun I normally go to doesn't have much of an atmosphere and the course isn't great either with two tight 'U' turns on each lap.  And running a 5k as fast as I can hurts more than running 30 miles - it just doesn't last as long!

But it was Parkrun's 13th birthday today.  So I thought I'd turn up and show some support.  In total there were 111 runners at the event I joined today and I finished 50th overall (14th female) with what for me was a fairly middling time, though most runners today seemed to be 30 secs to a minute slower than their PB as overnight rain had left the course 'greasy'.  I suppose if you want a personal best it's also better not to have run a hard hill work session the night before.  

Nice and steady?

Day 2 of an attempt to find some speed in preparation for the Stroud Half Marathon with a steady paced run.  

McMillan Running describes steady paced runs as having an easy to medium effort level.  Let's say his description of easy and mine don't have a lot of overlap.  I did manage to keep mostly within the target pace range I'd calculated but it was never going to happen running up Pennylands Bank  which although it's quite a short hill doesn't take prisoners.  I always hope there is lots of traffic at the top of the bank so I can stop on the verge for a breather.  I was out of luck tonight and had to keep running, though fortunately there is a slight downhill back into Broadway.

In theory the steady pace is close to the pace I can run a half marathon at.  It was fine for today's planned 3 miles but that's less than a quarter of the distance I'll be covering.  It's going to be a tough one.

Tempo Intervals

I've put my entry in for the Stroud Half Marathon later this month.  Trouble is with doing so much ultra distance work over the summer I've neglected to do any speed sessions as they really aren't relevant when you are planning to cover 30+ miles in a day.  Two weeks is probably a bit short to make any real difference but I've re-started speed sessions.

Today was a tempo intervals session. That means running at a pace just a bit faster than you could sustain for an hour.  It's all a bit guesswork on how fast you need to be running athough there are calculators that give ranges based on race results.  4 x 800m intervals with 400 metres jogging between each interval.  Overall quite pleased with how it went.  

Back Running

The original plan said one day off for every 10 miles run, so I shouldn't have started running again until next Tuesday (3 Oct).  But I've been getting more and more frustrated and desperate to run again over the last couple of days.  My resting heart rate has settled back into it's normal range.  My knees don't hurt any more, not even walking two miles on concrete pavements in hard shoes upset them, though there is still a tiny bit of swelling on my right knee.  So today I decided that's it, lets go for a short run and see what happens.

I wasn't looking at my watch as I was just intending to take it easy and see how it went.  Then I did look at my watch and it said 8 mins 25 secs a mile.   My breathing was nice and easy so I was expecting to see it say 9 min 30 or even 10 min a mile. I thought it must just be a glitch, sometimes if the GPS signal is lost for a few seconds you can get a false reading on the next update.    I looked again and it still said 8 mins 25 sec a mile.   Maybe I really was running at that pace.  Nothing was hurting so I carried on.

The route turns sharply uphill at the just after two miles which slowed things down a bit.  I didn't want to push things too hard and get injured so I worked on simply keeping my breathing the same. Compared to the last time I ran this route about 8 weeks ago my average pace this time was 1 min 12 secs a mile faster.  All of which is good as it's just three weeks to the Stroud Half Marathon - best get my entry in while there are still places left. 

Today's distance - an amazing 2.57 miles (it's important not to overdo things!)

Heartbeat

It's now eight days since I finished my ultra marathon challenge.  Amongst all the things I noticed on finishing was how high my resting heart rate was at 69 beats a minute (it's usually in the low 50's).  Clearly a sign of the stress I'd put my body under in running 140 miles over four days. 

The good news is that gradually over the week my resting heart rate has been dropping, 64 beats a minute on Friday, 59 yesterday and today 56.  Another day or two and it should be back to normal showing that I've pretty much recovered from the event.  Once that happens, and assuming the residual soreness has gone as well, I can get back to running again.

The even better news is that as of today my run has raised £1142 towards next year's Scouts trip to KISC.  So a massive thank you to everyone who's sponsored me and there's still time to drop by our Just Giving page and make a donation.

Sleep

Fascinating article in today's Guardian about the impacts of getting insufficient sleep.  

It quotes some figures for the impact of sleep on athletic performance which are particularly relevant to anyone doing endurance sports.  If the figure that the time to reach exhaustion drops by 10 - 30% if you get less than 8 hours sleep is accurate that would explain why I found the final day of the W2C so hard.  We didn't get to eat until 9.00pm on day 3 so it was gone 10.00pm by the time we were even heading to our rooms.  Allowing time for undressing, cleaning teeth, getting clothes ready for the next day, it would have been after 1030 when I got into bed.  With the alarm set for 5.45 am that would have given me a maximum of 7 hours 15 min sleep.  It was probably a good bit less than that.

Would I have felt better or worse if I'd skipped the meal and gone straight to bed?  

A short walk

Walking a mile wouldn't normally be worth commenting on for me, but today it is.  It's the first walk of any distance I've done since Monday.  Also feeling much more awake today.  

Hoping the improvement continues and I can get back to running soon.

Planning ahead

This time last week were were at the end of day 1 of the Westminster to Cheltenham run.  Today we've been discussing "Rachel's Revenge".  If you've followed the story of the run you'll remember Rachel had to drop out after day 2 as she'd gone down with a stomach bug.  Day 3 was the day she was really looking forward to, long and hilly - her favourite running conditions.  

So we need to get back to Reading and run the route to Swindon with her.  Of course the logistics are not so easy.  We will need to get overnight bags and runners to Reading, then transport the bags to Swindon along with providing support to the runners along the route.  And the days are getting shorter along with the weather deteriorating.  The Ridgeway is pretty exposed in the winter and we will be running in the dark for longer.  We will either have to go in the next couple of weeks or delay to the spring.

It will all depend on how quickly we can recover.

Thank you to everyone who has sponsored me - £937 raised so far.  It's not too late to drop by our Just Giving page and help send 36 Scouts and Explorer Scouts on an international adventure next year

Recovery

As part of my training for running 138 miles I did a lot of research into the effects of running an ultra marathon on the body as I wanted to be prepared for the likely after effects of the run.

I expected various bits of my body to hurt and indeed they did.  Left ankle was sore and a bit swollen on Tuesday, probably a result of altering my gait to avoid putting pressure on the blister on my heel.  My knees also have a tendency to seize up if I stay in one position too long.  Getting out of the car after a 45 minute drive to or from work is challenging!  

I'm expecting to take about two weeks off from running - a day for every 10 miles is the recommendation from the experts.  But to try and help things along I went for a sports massage this evening.  Well, I knew there were one or two sore spots but Chris at CPM Sports found a few more - ouch!  After an hour of treatment my legs definitely feel looser.

As soon as I finished the run I had a craving for hot roast chicken.  That's in line with the advice to get plenty of protein to aid muscle repair.  I wonder if there's also something the craving for chicken to do with preventing getting a cold?  You know how chicken soup tastes good when you're all snuffly?  Well research shows that nearly 70% of ultra runners get a upper respiratory tract infection within two weeks of finishing an event so I'm hoping that a few helpings of roast chicken will put me in the 30% who don't.

I've also moved the biscuit tin at work out of my line of sight.  I'm not clocking the miles up at the moment so I don't need the calories.  I'm making a conscious effort to get plenty of fruit and veg.  That's hard work as there's nothing quite as satisfying as a Bourbon Cream when you've got a boring task to plough through.

Research indicates that for every mile you run each week in training you need to get a minutes extra sleep a night as it's while sleeping that the body is most effective at repairing itself.  There's a lot less on-line about sleep after an ultra.  During the run itself I found sleeping quite difficult.  At the time I put it down to raised stress hormones and a strange bed.  The closest I can come to a similar feeling is how I felt after a serious car accident 12 years ago, it's a kind of jangly, jumpy feeling.  Now I'm back home I'm ready for bed by 9.00pm and sleeping like a log.

That's all for today, I'm off to get a hot chocolate and head to bed.

Lessons learned

A random selection of things learned and items to remember for next time*:

Hotels

Hotel breakfasts are served too late especially on a weekend.  You need to take food you can eat for breakfast.  That is take don't expect to have time or the energy to go out and buy it the night before.  

Hotel room air conditioning is never adjustable enough.  If you are too hot don't worry about pulling the duvet out of it's cover and sleeping under the empty duvet cover.

The free internet connection is very slow but unless you want to start streaming video it's usable.

Food

Rice pudding makes an acceptable substitute for porridge even though you'll be eating it cold.  You can pour it into a freezer bag to eat on the run.

The hotel menu won't tell you which dish has 1000 calories.  Just avoid the ones marked less than 500 calories - you need the energy.

Your support crew need a means of producing boiling water fast.  Either a thermos flask or something like a jet boil.  There are times when runners need something hot even if it's just a cup of soup, a pot noodle or a mug shot.

Instant meals - especially for the longest day, being able to supply someone with 700 calories worth of hot food would be a huge moral booster around tea time on the longest day.  And budget hotels can stop serving food surprisingly early.

You will get sick of eating sweet stuff, so have plenty of savoury snacks as well - crisps, cheesy biscuits, pepperoni were all popular.  Tinned potatoes rule.  As does coke (even though it's sweet).

Tape a list of what food you have to the outside of your grab bag.  After hours of running you won't be able to remember what you packed and the stuff on the top won't look appealing.

Jaffa cakes turn to crumbs in your pocket leaving a slice of jelly and chocolate 😋

An emergency gel put in a pocket will leak after 3 days.  Sticky is not an adequate description of the mess.

Shoes and clothes

You can't take too many pairs of socks and trainers.  There isn't time to wash and dry stuff overnight unless you are a very fast runner and you probably won't have the energy.  Be prepared to just bundle all your wet kit into a bag and worry about it when you get home.

Change wet shoes and socks at the earliest opportunity - the moral boost is huge.  As is the moral boost from picking up a clean, dry hanky whenever you can.

Microfibre clothes are useful for drying out wet trainers.  Simply stuff into the shoe for an hour while you eat then hang them to dry overnight ready to re-use.  Much more convenient than using newspaper.

Merino wool t-shirts rule - one t-shirt lasted four days without becoming unpleasant.

Pack everything you are carrying in freezer bags.  Even if it doesn't rain your spare warm top will get wet from sweat.

Hat, gloves and a buff are essential - early mornings are pretty cold.  Check you can operate your phone wearing gloves, some touch screens (mine!) don't work without special gloves.

Body Glide - bliss.  Apply a thin layer anywhere that clothing can rub.  That includes your feet!  

Have warm clothes ready to grab as soon as you finish.  It's almost as if the body goes into shock so expect to feel very cold and shivery even in a warm room.

Dog poop bags - you never know how far you're going to have to carry that sticky wrapper before you find a bin.  If it's raining you can pop them over your gloves to keep your hands dry and warm.  And when you need to use the bushes ....

You will need more layers of clothes than you expect to, especially on days 3 and 4 as you are running a serious calorie deficit at that stage.

A good head torch is essential as at this time of the year you will be running in the dark some of the time.  I used a Silva Trail Runner 3X

Maps

It is possible to download maps to some runners watches but I prefer to carry a paper map.  A subscription to the Ordnance Survey maps on-line lets you print off exactly which bit of the map you need on A4 paper.  Printed double sided at 1:25000 a typical days maps weighed less than 25 grams.  Compared to the maps on a watch there is so much more detail to help you keep on track, or if the worst happens, to find your way to the nearest road or direct the emergency services to your location.  

*the team are meeting tomorrow to start planning next year's run  

Cleaning up

Finishing a big run is just like coming back off holiday.  There's a tonne of dirty washing to deal with.

We'd been advised that road shoes would be best for the final day as there were just a couple of muddy fields.  I don't think my new road shoes will ever be the same colour again.  I did ask in the shop if they came in a darker colour.

It's OK, mud is my favourite colour

 I think all the mud has come out of my socks.  

4 days, 7 pair of socks

 Only two pairs of trainers didn't need washing.  The ones I wore to run out of London on the tarmac and the pair I didn't wear.

Trainers draining after washing

As it's been a sunny day so everything has dried quickly - there's nothing worse than the smell of trainers that have hung around wet for days.

Today's reason to be cheerful: washing machines 

Day 4 - Swindon to Cheltenham

Another early start that I almost missed.  I'd silenced the notifications on my phone so I didn't get beeps in the middle of the night when junk e-mails arrived.  What I hadn't realised is that also silences the alarm!  The flashing of the screen did wake me but about 10 minutes late.  

The blister that developed yesterday was extremely painful as it's quite deep - in fact it woke me in the night when I rolled over and it pressed against the mattress.  So padding that was something that had to be done before I set off.  Which ate (pun intended) into my time for breakfast.  In fact Scott and I both left with breakfast in our hands sourced from Neil's wonderful supplies as the hotel didn't start serving until an hour after we wanted to be off.


Scott was really suffering from the beginning.  Overnight his left shin had swollen to double its normal size and was bright red - a worrying development as it can be an indicator of a serious problem.  We hobbled out the door at 0640 as Jez took a picture for the twitter feed.

Leaving Swindon - only just daylight

Jez had warned us that there were a couple of wet fields to cross - he wasn't kidding.  Within 15 minutes of leaving our feet were soaked.  We quickly fell behind schedule as it wasn't possible to run in the mud and Scott was struggling to run even on solid ground.  He also had a problem with the insoles of his trainers moving around and sliding out of position.

Within a few miles we were back on the Thames Path, though here the Thames looks very different from when we'd last seen it.

River Thames near Cricklade

It quickly became apparent that we were in serious calorie deficit from yesterday and suffering from lack of recovery time.  Even though the day was warming up we were both still cold and wearing hats, gloves and windproof jackets.  That was to get worse during the day with both of us suffering the dreaded "bonk" at around the 20 mile mark, even though we'd refuelled whenever we'd met Neil.  

Wild cyclamen growing along the path

With all the different problems we were barely covering 3 miles an hour at times.  That wasn't good when we had a team of people waiting to greet us at the finish who still wanted to get home in time for tea.

Jez caught us up around lunchtime, shortly before we met up with Neil.  That didn't stop us diving into Rendcombe post office for sustenance.  

Meeting Neil came just in time for me as I now had wet feet for over 6 hours.  When I came to change my socks and trainers the sole of my right foot was just beginning to turn white.  Another hour and I'd have been in serious trouble.

Jez kept us moving during the afternoon counting down the miles until we would meet the team rather than miles to the finish - good psychology there.  It seemed like a long time but suddenly we popped out onto the road and there they were a hundred yards away.  There were high fives and hugs as they took us under their wing to help us over the final three miles.  

At the supporters meeting point

We'd done it! We had run, walked, shuffled and (in Scott's case) limped all the way from London to Cheltenham.

Made it - Jez, Neil, Scott and I at the finish

Today's reasons to be cheerful:

- first female finisher of the Westminster to Cheltenham run
- oldest finisher of the Westminster to Cheltenham run 


Today's stats:

Distance: 31 miles (141 miles from Westminster)
Elevation gained:701 metres



Sponsor me and help send Scouts on an adventure of a lifetime 

19/09/17 - edited to add additional photos

Day 3 - Reading to Swindon

Sadly Rachel hadn't recovered overnight and was unable to continue  today.  A huge shame as I know she was looking forward to clocking up a record distance in one day.  

The hotel didn't start serving breakfast until 0700 so we left without our morning coffee.  Fortunately I'd come prepared and brought several tins of rice pudding with me which made an acceptable alternative to porridge.  I don't think you see the best of any city in the early hours and I was glad that I had Scott running with me as we made our way from the hotel back to the Thames Path.  

We walked for about 40 minutes trying to wake up our legs and get breakfast to settle in our stomachs.  On days 1 & 2 we had been running for 25 minutes and walking for 5 minutes but that felt too much for today so we cut the runs down to 15 minutes.  It was all going well on the Thames Path as far as Pangbourne when the route suddenly left the Thames and headed over a significant hill.  From that point on we were running the level sections and downhills while walking the uphills.

We knew there was a coffee shop in Streatley but sadly we arrived before it opened.  We pressed on up the hill towards the Ridgeway and found this elephant sculpture in a garden

It wasn't long after that to our first rendezvous with Neil at the 14 mile point.  It was cold and misty by this point so we both picked up more clothes before heading up onto the Ridgeway itself.

At least the Ridgeway was well signposted.  Once we left it it was detailed navigation using the map all the way to Swindon where we arrived 12 hours 56 minutes after leaving Reading.

The day then seemed to be one long slog up hill and down - too slippy to run in many places.  Neil met us twice more on the Ridgeway then a final time about 8 miles before our destination.  He really is the unsung hero of this weekend, without him we wouldn't have got this far.  

Reasons to be cheerful:

Longest distance covered in one day
Longest distance covered in one week
Fresh dry socks after 30 miles - bliss

Reasons to worry:

My knees are very sore
I have a large blister on my left foot - where my foot was pinched between my trainer insole and the side of the shoe.  Hopefully a change of shoes tomorrow will help

Today's stats:

Distance: 47 miles. (110.4 miles from Westminster)
Elevation gained: 809 metres

Day 2 - Slough to Reading

Not such an early start today although we hit the trail at 0800

Neil (our support crew), Rachel, Scott and I at Slough

The route took us down through Eton and past the famous school

Eton

From there we joined our old friend the Thames Path again.  Pleasant running by the river, it wasn't long until we reached Maidenhead.

We met Neil just past Maidenhead at about the 11 mile mark.  He'd brought us a veritable smorgasbord of goodies which went down very well at this point

Refuelled we pressed on along the Thames Path.  It was at this point we came up with the idea of a where's the nearest loo app.  Obviously the idea for this was spurred by the need of one of the team to answer a call of nature and not a loo in sight.

Diversion around a building site

It was just after the diversion that Rachel started to feel poorly so we stopped by the river for 20 minutes while she ate some food, then carried on walking steadily - any progress being better than no progress - and hoping that she would soon recover.

2 hours later, and with us still walking, we were caught up by Jez who is a much faster runner and had taken the luxury of catching up on a couple of You Tube videos before leaving Slough

River Thames

Another hour later and we found these characters - I think we all felt a bit like they looked

Shortly after this we met Neil for the second time just north of Henley on Thames and re-stocked on water and boiled potatoes for the last 10 miles into Reading.  Rachel decided to keep on walking while Jez, Scott and I ran on ahead.

It's been a challenging day as we've been on our feet for 9 hours.  Time now for more food and another early night.  Tomorrow is the longest day at 47 miles and I don't think any of us are feeling that confident about it.

Today's stats: Total Distance:  35 miles. (63.4 miles from Westminster)
Total ascent:  165 metres 

19/09/17 - edited to correct image orientations

Day 1 - Westminster to Slough

On a normal day there's only one 4.45 in the day and it doesn't have a.m. after it!.  But today isn't a normal day.  Out of the house at 0530 - boy was it nippy around the knees at that time - and on the bus at 0630.  

We arrived in London just after 0930 the bus having crawled the last 10 miles, honestly we could have run faster.  Actually that's where this challenge started.  A couple of people on the bus from London to Cheltenham saying the could run faster than the bus out of London.  

A team photo in front of the Houses of Parliament and we were on our way.  

The W2C2 Team - Jez, Rachel, Scott and I along with Euan who joined us for today.  The rest of the team are raising funds for the mental health charity, MIND

By this time the weather had warmed up and it was pleasant running alongside the Thames in the sunshine, though the miles of tarmac and concrete paving were hard on the feet.

Pagoda at the Peace Park (sorry about the picture quality, taken on my phone)

Boat trip?  Maybe not today

Tweeting a progress report just before we left the Thames

Shortly before the half way point we met a couple of walkers heading into London.  We exchanged greetings and they asked us how far we were running.  Their reaction on being told 138 miles was "oh my giddy aunt, that's a long way"*

At the half way point we left the Thames and joined the Grand Union Canal.  At this point my phone decided it had had enough of Racedrone and unknown to me had shut it down, leaving it looking like I had been abandoned at Richmond.

Locks on the Grand Union Canal, the only point on the route where there is a noticeable ascent

It was at this point that the weather started to cloud over a little but it was still warm and dry.  It was only as we approached the turn onto the Slough branch that it started to rain.  

About 3 miles out of Slough we were met by Neil our support crew who had run out to meet us.  Not only that he'd checked us all into our hotel rooms first and carried our bags up to our rooms.  Now that's above and beyond what you expect from your support crew.

So I've now been revived by a hot shower and some food - just the start of replacing the estimated 3800 calories I've used today.  We're meeting shortly for dinner then it will be an early night in preparation for tomorrow's run.  


Total Distance:  28.44 miles
Elevation gained:  256 metres

*actually their reaction was to come out with an expletive that definitely isn't appropriate for a family friendly blog

10, 9, 8, 7, 6 ...

When we started planning this run there were 10 people interested in taking part.  Gradually that number has dwindled.  Clashes with other events, injuries in training, a nasty kidney stone needing surgery and a case of Lyme Disease (picked up on an ultra event in Canada) have all conspired to reduce the number down to just four*. 

Assuming none of us over-sleeps tomorrow Jez, Rachel, Scott and I will be on the 0630 bus to London.  Getting there will take about 3 hours.  Getting back, well I’m estimating at least 35 hours of running will be needed, possibly more as it’s likely we will all slow down as the event goes on and tiredness takes it toll.  It’s a month’s worth of running crammed into just four days. 

Thinking about too much it isn’t a good idea.  It would be to easy to freak out and panic.  So I keep telling myself it’s not a 138 mile run.  I’m just going to run a mile 138 times.  All I have to do to get to the end is keep running the next mile. 

Over the next four days we’ll be posting updates on twitter (@w2cultra) throughout the day so follow us there as well as catching up with the detail here in the evening.

* Given that I’ve spent the day at work sat next to someone who’s been shivering, coughing, sneezing and generally looking like they are going down with flu that number could go lower still.  The joys of a sick absence policy that encourages people to come into work when they are unwell and spread it round everyone.