Tag Archives: Trail

Red Bull Steeplechase: race report (catch-up part two)

by Ben

My catch-up quest continues! Three more races to get through, starting with a big one (literally):

Red Bull Steeplechase – 18 June

This was one of my favourite races of 2016, and when I saw that it was coming back to Exmoor for a second year, I couldn’t resist. Despite the huge hike in price. In 2016, I’d been pretty close to making it through the second checkpoint, and onto Lynton, but I missed out by a couple of minutes. I was itching for the chance to go further. Of course, then we had a baby, didn’t get enough sleep to train properly, and I came to realise that even equalling last year’s effort would be a fair achievement! This race also happened in what was pretty much the hottest weather I have ever run in. So not ideal… (Getting my excuses in early.)

The race started at 9:30, which I had figured would be one small mercy with the weather. Except that the day before the race, I was doing some gardening at 9:30, and it was already baking hot, so there would be no respite. I mostly tried to stay out of the sun before the race started, and made sure I drank plenty. I also toyed with my race tactics – namely my plan for the start. Last year I was surprised by the pace of the start – we did the first half mile at around 5k pace, as it went through the street (singular) of Lynmouth and then hit a bottleneck at the coastal path.

Ultimately, I decided to take it a bit easier in the heat, and then slowly pick my way through the field later on when it was wider. I then completely ignored this plan, and pelted it through Lynmouth at what Strava suggests was pretty much exactly the same pace as last year. After that quick half mile, we then had a slow half mile of hill climbing. Very slow in fact. The first half mile took about three minutes. The other half took about eight minutes. But, important detail, that was the first horrible climb completed.

After that first hill, things level off for a time, and I could just run. Each mile was slower than 2016, but between the training and the heat, it was still feeling pretty tough. Very tough in fact. About six and a half miles in, running alongside the River Heddon, I stopped for a drink station. Credit to Red Bull: there were lots of drinks stations, and they were very well stocked with bottles of water and cups of Red Bull or a water/Red Bull mix. When I say that I stopped, I really mean it. In a knockout race, I, along with two others I’d been running along with, came to a complete stop to drink a complete 500 ml bottle of water. Such was the heat, and such was the knowledge of the hill to come.

But now, some good news! The marshal at the drink station asked if we’d done it last year. Yes, we all had. Well, he said, that horrible hill climb through the scrub? Not there. Instead we’d turn left and head up the coast path instead. Great!

For some context. These two “struggling” runners came first and fourth. This is how hard the course is.

No, it bloody wasn’t.

It turns out that when you’re at 120 ft, and the checkpoint is at 815 ft, there isn’t really an “easy” option. In 2016, we had one horrible climb, and then a gentler ascent up the road to the checkpoint at about 8.7 miles. This year, the climb up rugged terrain just seemed to go on forever, and the first checkpoint wasn’t until 9.4 miles. On the two intermediate checkpoints, I’d been 110th and 108th, but I knew I’d dropped places heading up the never-ending hill and was 113th. Considering my expectations, I was surprised at how highly I was placed – in 2016, I’d been 128th through the first checkpoint.

Through the second section of the race, things became more lonely as the field spread out, and I was really starting to struggle in the heat. There aren’t really any flat sections of the route, and I was taking frequent walking breaks. Where in 2016 I’d been cheerily acknowledging walkers and those around me, this time I was grunting and hoping for it all to be over. The course was beautiful, the scenery stunning. But my body wasn’t really up for it, and I didn’t cope with the heat very well. Amazingly, I finished in exactly the same position, 110th in both 2016 and 2017. But whereas in 2016, I was only 2:44 behind 100th, this time I was 5:41 behind.

Some other comparisons; last year it cost £30, this year £45. Last year, there were 281 men and 96 women. This year 198 men and 93 women. I fear that the race might have to either move again, or consider the price. It’s an expensive race to put on, and Red Bull do a hell of a lot to make it worthwhile. The drinks (as I said) were well stocked, there was a free “runner’s lunch”, this year it was a pasty, followed by a cream tea. The hoodie from last year had been downgraded to a cotton tee though. And yet again, despite photographers and videographers all over the course, there were no participant photos, just a “pool” of about 15 shots available to the press. To me, this was the most disappointing aspect. Red Bull could get lots more publicity and marketing exposure by making the photos available, with big Red Bull logos in the corner. We’d have shared them on social media, especially given the amazing backdrop. But there was nothing.

All that said, if the race is back on Exmoor again next year… you know, I’d probably do it again: I really want to get to Lynton, and get the train down the cliff.

Right. This was meant to be all three race reports, but I got a bit carried away with the Steeplechase! Look out for part three…

Big Cheese: race report

by Ben

NOTE: Apologies for this being ~~a little~~ very late. I ran this at the start of March, and I’m posting this exactly two months later. In my defence, in the mean time, we’ve had a little boy, and he’s filled a lot of our time. I’ve got another race report, for the Butleigh MT race, to catch up on too, and then a couple of ideas for other stuff. I’ve also got quite a few races coming up. So we’ll see how well I do on keeping up with writing!

A while back, I decided to ditch my plans to race the Bideford Half Marathon and switch to the Big Cheese instead. The link above explains the reasons in full, but essentially I didn’t want the pressure of the training while Lolly was getting more and more tired due to her ~~parasite~~ pregnancy.

Along with the Exmoor Stagger in both 2015 and 2016, and the Red Bull Steeplechase last year, this would be my fourth “ultra-half”. In addition to the distance element (the Stagger was around 16 miles, and I got 14.4 miles into the Steeplechase before being eliminated) each of these races is made much more challenging due to the terrain and elevation. The Big Cheese actually isn’t so bad as the others; a mere 2,000 ft compared to climbing in excess of 3,000 ft for each of the others. (For reference, Scafell Pike stands roughly 3,200 ft above sea-level.) So… 2,000 ft… should be a doddle, eh?

My club mate, Iain, had done the race last year, and it basically killed him (though he was doing it the week after the Grizzly, which itself came a week after the Bideford Half). Meanwhile, Matt reported that a couple of his club-mates described it as essentially “not too bad”.

It was.

The trip from the race HQ to the race start was around a mile, so made for a handy warm-up. I had ummed and ahhed for a while about what to wear; the forecast was for a complete mix of weather, and the race directors had recommended, though not enforced, us to wear a waterproof. (As a fell race, they could have instituted mandatory kit.)

The race begins with a climb up, and up, and up, which lasts just over a mile. I was content to drop down to a walk reasonably early on – there was plenty more to come, and there was no sense in destroying my legs on the first climb when there would be over 14 miles left to go! Still, it was a bit demoralising letting people stream past me, and my legs felt pretty tired anyway! But hill climbing is still the weakest aspect of my running (a symptom of doing most of my running in Taunton town) so I just have to accept that I’m going to lose some positions on hills. That first mile was actually my slowest of the whole race, and included 615 ft of elevation!

After a mile, or just over, things levelled off to an extent and the terrain got trickier as we dropped down into Rowberrow Bottom. I started to gain some places back on the steeper sections of the descent and paused briefly at the first drinks station. Of course, when you’re in anywhere described as “Bottom”, there’s only really one way left for you to go: up. We were now heading towards Beacon Batch, over Black Down. But of course, nothing is that simple. After a run/walk tactic up the initial hill, we took a sharp left and dropped back down the hill rather than taking a direct route to the peak of Beacon Batch. The descent was a treacherous mix of flooded moorland that was of variable quality, but it was nigh on impossible to judge it by look. It was interchangeably slippy mud, sticky mud and lake. I was running pretty quickly to start with (it was a downhill – duh!) but in order to keep my balance, I kept finding myself going quicker and quicker. I probably looked like a pretty cocky so-and-so, practically sprinting through some of the worst terrain of the course. Had I fallen (and it was probably about 50-50) I’d have looked like a right tit.

‘Shit, there’s a camera, make it look like you’re having fun!’

After a short spell of this, the terrain solidified somewhat and took on a more technical aspect before we started climbing again. Along here the ground got silly, just excessively slippy. It was impossible to find a “good” route through it, you had to be content with finding a route that didn’t place you on your arse. This was pretty much the story of the first half of the race – you were either climbing a hill, descending a hill, or struggling through horrific underfoot conditions. The race website has this to say about what shoes to wear:

“It’s likely to be pretty muddy so off road trainers are an advantage but you will be able to get around fine in normal trainers.”

I mean… sure, you would be ABLE to get around in normal trainers. But I doubt it was fine. It wasn’t fine in my trail shoes. But still, whatever.

I made a fair fist of trying to keep running through the bottom part of the climb, but after a switchback, when I noted that I was closer to Matt than I had expected, things got more difficult. The hill got steeper, we’d turned to face the wind, and the mud was still pretty bad too. I dropped to a walk for pretty much the entire climb up to Beacon Batch, the highest point on the Mendip Hills. Thankfully what goes up must come back down, and most of the following four miles was downhill, although after about 400 metres the path had turned into a rocky river, as it had presumably provided a handy run-off for the rain of the previous week. Down this section I heard one runner behind me stumble and fall, though there were other runners around him, and I’m pretty sure he got up and continued okay.

The next mile was predominantly a gentle downhill along the road, which was a nice change in some ways, although it was tough on the legs in trail shoes at that point of the race. We then turned back off the road down through some former mine workings along Velvet Bottom. The path remained pretty good, and this was one of the quickest stretches of the race, though there were a few tricky drops from plateau to plateau.

And then… the worst section of the entire race. It was probably only around 500 metres, but it was steep, with horrible footing, and 11 miles into the race. While trying to negotiate slippy lumps of rock underfoot, you also had to make sure you didn’t get clothes-lined by an low-hanging tree. Still, as I say, it was only a short section. And best of all: it was the final climb, just a few miles and 700 ft of descent left!

The course mostly levelled out for the next mile and a half, before dropping in a reasonably steep, long downhill towards the finish. Even on tired legs, this played to my strengths at an ideal time: a downhill finish lets me get past a few people who then don’t get a corresponding uphill to regain their place. (Technically, I guess, the mammoth climb at the start of the race was the corresponding climb. So ha, we’re all even!) The terrain varied a little bit on the descent, being a decent even path in some places, difficult stony track in others, before the final half-mile stretch along the road.

Overall I come home in 2:11:35 for 39th overall, although that was partly due to a group of runners that had been ahead of me going the wrong way. Considering my relative lack of training, I was well chuffed. And best of all, afterwards – the free cake and cup of tea!

The whole race was organised really well. Number pick up was easy and straightforward, there was a bag drop at race HQ, along with changing rooms and showers (always nice after a muddy trail race!) The route was well signed and the marshals were all friendly and encouraging – which given the inclement weather, particularly on the top of the hills, was much appreciated. All in all, this is a race that has joined my ever-growing list of “want to run every year” races. In fact, I’m starting to run out of weekends in the year…

Bovington Half Marathon: race report

by Ben

After a couple of weeks off, and then the Brent Knoll race, I had the Bovington Half Marathon. I signed up for this race while I was still easing back into running after injury last April. The thought process behind it went like this:

In 2014/15 and 2015/16, I got injured after having a break from running.
In 2016/17 I don’t want to get injured.
If I do a race in December, I probably won’t have a break from running.
Therefore, I won’t get injured.
□*

Anyway, it is probably fair to say that I don’t make all of my best decisions while recovering from injury. In fact, mostly I just pick races with shiny medals. In 2015, this was the Two Tunnels Half Marathon. In 2016, it was this. Not that either were bad races, but by the time it got to the races, neither really fit in with what I was doing.

The week before this race, I’d done 35 miles, including a 15 miles run around the Herepath with Iain and Tim, so it’s fair to say that I didn’t *need* this race in order to keep me running. In fact, by the time it came around, I was viewing it as something of an inconvenience. Particularly as we’d been doing so much parkrun tourism, and along with some long trips with work, I was getting pretty fed up of driving! Still, despite some reservations, I was up and out nice and early on the Sunday to get there in plenty of time.

So what did I know about the race beforehand?

It was at the Tank Museum, with parts of the route on the tank training course.
There were tanks.
The medal had a huge tank on it.
White Star Running are generally reckoned to put on “Good races”.
There would be mud and hills.
Parking was liable to be a nightmare, and we should car share.

In fact, the last of these didn’t prove an issue at all. There had been so much said about car-sharing because of the limited parking that I made sure to arrive nice and early to make sure I had somewhere to park. In fact, I arrived at around the same time as some of my club mates who were doing the marathon, which started an hour before the half! There was plenty of parking (probably because so many people did car-share) and it was really well marshalled too.

The marathon runners.

At first, although we were at the tank museum, there were no tanks in sight. This changed between the marathon start and the half start, when I heard a distant rumbling while I was getting changed in my (warm) car. When I returned to the start/finish area, there were two tanks there – I later found out that these were the two Challenger tanks that were on the race medals.

There were a large group from our club (especially for a race that was so far away), and I spent a good deal of time before both the marathon and half marathon starts chatting with club-mates. So, yeah, no warm-up. Which was a shame, because it was really cold.

This is not a pineapple.

There was a long pre-racing briefing, which I couldn’t really hear because (a) it was very quiet and (b) people were talking. It might have said something like “watch out for all the directional arrows, because you might miss some and go the wrong way.” I’m pretty sure they probably repeated what we’d had emailed to us; “don’t pick up anything that looks like it might be explosive, because it’ll probably be explosive.”

Shortly thereafter, we were off. The first few miles were pretty flat, and on good firm, wide tracks. I was concerned. WSR have a reputation for pretty difficult races, and so far, this one was pretty easy. There were a couple of large “plunge pools” but they were avoidable by paths which skirted up and around them. In both cases, I considered splashing through them, which would have undoubtedly been more fun. But it would have also meant running 11 miles with wet feet, at what was a fairly brisk pace at that point. That, and everyone around me was avoiding them, so it made more sense just to follow the pack. Gain nothing, lose nothing.

Then, around three miles in, we hit a climb, with a worrying sign at the bottom: “Small hill ahead. Big hill later.” Hmmm. Still, the first half was honest at least – the climb wasn’t too bad, and dropped back down the other side was fun too. The course then crossed the road and entered the tank training area. This was where it got properly fun.

What’s that, coming over the hill…

There is very little I can compare it to. The course twisted and turned, dipped and rose, with only two constants. Puddles and mud. There really isn’t anything else that compares much to it – almost everywhere else that we normally run is full of gentle curves: even most woodland tracks are mostly flat. This course had constant undulations of a few metres or so. Added to that, you were having to navigate along the best line on the path, which was rutted with tank tracks. Sometimes it was best to follow the lines left by the tracks themselves, but often these were weirdly rutted, giving the potential for turned ankles (even on the very soft terrain). In other places, the middle was higher (and therefore drier and more solid) as it hadn’t constantly had tank tracks driving over it. It was a real challenge. And what fun! Unsurprisingly my pace dropped a bit through this section, though I was still averaging quicker than eight minute miles.

… oh, look, it’s me!

All too soon, we crossed back over the road and left that fun behind. I skipped the Lovestation, and ran on. Too much so, apparently. Somewhere here I evidently missed a sign. I would blame the chap I was following, except by this stage I had worked my way past those people I could see in front of me, and was by my own reckoning, fifth. First, second, third and fourth were (I thought) way off ahead, while sixth, seventh and eighth (at least) weren’t too far behind me. Which of course meant that when I missed a sign and took a half-mile shortcut, so did they. Of course, at the time, I was completely oblivious to this fact.

A short while later, a chap came storming past me. I did some calculating – either he’d paced himself really well, or he’d got lost, and was out of position. I figured I was probably still in fourth, but might have dropped to sixth. It didn’t really matter, to be honest, but it was keeping me occupied during the last few miles. For a while, I kept him in sight, and also spotted another runner ahead (third, or fourth?) the pair switched positions, but although I held out some hope of catching up, I started to struggle a little myself. We were back on the same stretch that we’d covered in the first three miles, and so it was pretty flat, good terrain, but I didn’t have the energy to be pushing out sub-7 minute miles like I had at the start of the race. (Apart from mile 11 apparently, but that did have a nice downhill.)

Once again, I went around the outside of a couple of pools, knowing that there was a runner not too far behind me. He kept me honest through the final few miles, and kept me pushing. We diverted off the out-and-back section onto some new tracks at about 11 miles. This stretch had some pools that simply couldn’t be avoided. The first was ankle deep; the second was about halfway up my calf! They were fun, but also a test of the water-draining abilities of my new shoes. My Brooks Cascadias had been great at getting rid of water and staying light even when wet; I was interested how my new Inov8 Roclites would do. In summary? Not as well. I think it’s because they have a rock guard around the top of the sole, to protect your feet (and the shoe) from kicking rocks. Which is all well and good, but it doesn’t let the water out as well!

My watch had not long bleeped for 12 miles when I spotted a ‘400 metres to go’ sign, and marshals were shouting that we were nearly there. Eh, what? A short run along the road, up the Tank Museum driveway, across and field, and we were finished. My watch said 12.5 miles. So did mostly everyone else’s. At this point, we didn’t really have any clue that we’d skipped part of the course, that came later, looking on Strava. We thought, first year, maybe a miscalculation?

Apparently, I’m awful at selfies.

From looking on Strava, and Facebook, it looks like plenty of people made the same mistake as I did. I reckon that most of the first ten runners in the half marathon certainly did (though the winner did actually do the whole course.) I don’t know how obvious the sign that we missed was, whether it was one I saw and misinterpreted, or whether I simply didn’t see it. When I found out, I was a bit annoyed; I’d felt pretty chuffed at finishing fifth (though, okay, it wasn’t a particularly quick field; that isn’t really the point of a WSR event), and this took away from it. But, at the end of the day, it was the first race, and there are going to be teething troubles. I absolutely loved the course (the bits that I did, at least!)

I probably didn’t do a WSR race right. I didn’t partake of any of the lovestations, I didn’t feel the badger, I haven’t really joined the “cult”. The medal, if I’m being completely honest, was maybe a little bit TOO big? (I know, I didn’t think it was possible either. But I think if I hang it on my medal hanger, it’ll pull the wall down.) But, all that said, despite running a short race, and having to travel an hour and twenty minutes to get there, I really enjoyed it, and would definitely do it again.

*This is a maths reference. It basically just means I’ve proved what I was trying to.

It’s a really, really big medal.

Brent Knoll: race report

by Ben

After my mad month of races (Bristol Half, Red Bull Steeplechase, Exmoor Stagger and Herepath Half), I took a few weeks off in November. That isn’t to say that I didn’t run at all, but I dramatically cut my mileage back. Then, as November drew to a close, I started to push the mileage back up, which coincided with my two winter races.

Brent Knoll is one of my favourite races on the calendar, and though the conditions were pretty different to in previous years, it ranked highly again this year. The race heads out along a flat farm track for about a mile and a half, then starts the ascent of the Knoll itself. Brent Knoll is classified as a HuMP, meaning it is over 100 metres higher than the surrounding land. The climb is essentially split into two: the first part is up a gradually steepening grassy (muddy) slope, while the second is on a far more established path with steps. A half loop of the summit is followed by twin descents: in this case both of the muddy variety. First a relatively long, steep drop off the summit itself, with a rather abrupt ending at a stile, and then the reverse of the first climb. Then, it’s just back along the farm track and over the finish! Easy, eh?

The 2015 mud…

This was the third year that I ran it: in both 2014 and 2015, I’d slipped over. In 2014, I’d ended up doing a commando roll down the final descent, while in 2015, I just slipped onto my arse down the first drop. That said, the conditions in 2015 were pretty awful. In both years, I finished in roughly 52 minutes.

This year, we’d had a long dry spell, and it showed! The first farm track was normally a case of making a decision between splashing through deep, boggy puddles or trying to dance around them. This year, it was just a farm track with literally two or three shallow puddles.

Up the hill…

The first climb was still tough, but nothing like the scramble it had been previously. I reached the top of the Knoll about two minutes quicker than I had in previous years. But my real gains came where I’ve been finding them all through the latter part of 2016: the descents. Putting on my “Ah, fuck it” attitude, I launched myself down the first hill. The dry weather made the footing much better than previous years, but it’s still a pretty hairy descent. The hill is covered in bumps, divots and tussocks, all waiting for an unsuspecting foot. And then, of course, the abrupt end for the stile: a short flight of steps (which I swerved around) ends with a wooden stile (or it might be a gate actually, I don’t remember). Either way, it isn’t something you want to career into.

I’d overtaken a fair few people down the hill, but in the flatter stretch between the descents, I was feeling it in my legs. I slogged on, and after a slightly unorthodox route back (apparently the marshal sent us the wrong way) it was time for another slightly mad sprint downhill. I zipped back past a chap who had overtaken me on the flat, but it wasn’t long before he was back past me again as we headed back along the farm track.

… and back down again!

I ended up finishing in just under 47 minutes, a massive improvement on my previous two attempts; the good weather and my training conspiring together. Afterwards, I hung around for a while (quite a while) for a drink, some food, and the Somerset Series presentation ceremony, in which I received a lovely engraved glass for finishing eighth overall.

parkrun tourism: Bath Skyline

by Ben

A week before, Salisbury had been our 24th different parkrun, and my 99th parkrun overall. Despite some wobbles, we’d stayed on track for my 25th (aka quarter-Cowell) and 100th to coincide. We’d journeyed to Seaton, Falkirk, Poole, Parke and Salisbury on successive weekends. The only remaining question was where to go for the 100th.

In the end, it wasn’t much of a decision: Lolly’s parents were down again, staying near Bristol for a family Christmas get-together, and so we enlisted them for some baby-sitting while we did the nearby Bath Skyline parkrun. Having steps, we knew that it was one we couldn’t do with the buggy, which was probably the only reason we hadn’t done it before.

Lolly had a great top made for the occasion.

Toilets before could have been a bit of a problem – a 90 minute drive with a toddler can often finish with a rush to the toilet, but thankfully the lovely homeless Little Stoke tourists ahead of us in the queue let us skip straight through! The parkrun community really is great.

The run starts a little distance from the car park, but after a short walk down, we had two tasks: new runner briefing and placing the cakes. Duh – 100th run, quarter-Cowell, parkrun. Three good reasons for cake right there. (Right, I should probably explain this ‘quarter-Cowell’ thing. Basically, Chris and Linda Cowell were the first man and woman to run 100 different events. So doing 100 different runs is termed the “Cowell Club”. 50 runs is a half-Cowell, and 25 a quarter-Cowell. The parkrun tourist jargon buster has this to say: “Quarter Cowell – your 25th different parkrun (cake!)” Sorted.

So, the course. Muddy? – Yes, particularly through the fields late on: definitely a trail shoe route; I mean, look at my back in the picture above. Hilly? – Well, actually, not that much. Other than the steps, most of the course is pretty flat. Pretty? – Very, although the stunning views of Bath’s skyline (it’s all in the name…) were obscured by the fog. As was mostly everything actually.

Pretty. Pretty foggy!

The course follows a distorted figure of eight, taking in one small loop of just over a mile, and another much longer loop of around two miles. The first loop drops gently down to the base of the 30 steps, which then bring you back up to about the same level as the start. I was caught a little out of position at the beginning, so spent much of this section passing people, and slipping on the leaves on the edge of the path! The route then turns back along a long straight to the start/finish, more or less level and on good solid footing. A left turn past the cheering spectators loops you into the trees once more. Again, most of the route through here was on good terrain, but there were a couple of pretty muddy field crossings, though nothing too troubling. The signage and marshals were excellent throughout, and soon we were back on the long straight to the finish. This time it really felt like a bit of a slog as we kicked on towards the end!

I enjoyed the course, though as ever with a trail route, I would have liked it to be a bit more technical, a bit more challenging. But that isn’t really that accessible for a parkrun, and there are plenty of races that give me that. It really is a good parkrun route. My time made it my third-quickest location, after Longrun Meadow and Shrewsbury, but that’s more to do with the fact that I didn’t have the buggy, and am running well right now, than anything else.

As well as my 100th run, it was also one of the Little Stoke tourists’ 100th, so there were double helpings of cake! This compensated a little for the lack of cafe (boo!) after. The out of the way nature of this parkrun, particularly with the start being a short distance from the car park, and just a track with no amenities at all (a trellis table was the height of civilisation), could have really hindered this run, but for whatever reason they don’t seem to. Everyone was just as friendly, organised and willing to hang around and chat as anywhere else. All in all, it was a wonderful place to do my 100th run!

parkrun tourism: Parke

by Ben

Ever since we realised that if we kept touring each week, we could make my 100th parkrun coincide with our 25th different event, we’ve been clocking up the miles. Seaton’s inaugural, Falkirk (for a wedding), Poole.

The following weekend, Lolly’s parents were staying with us, so we took the opportunity to run a course that I hadn’t wanted to do with the buggy: Parke. For a long time, it had been our NENYD (nearest event not yet done), but we just hadn’t had the chance to do it.

So what did we know about it beforehand?

It was a trail course.
It had some hills.
It was reckoned to be one of the toughest parkruns in the country.

Ideal for my 5-month pregnant wife, obviously.

Anyway, after what seemed like a lovely lie-in, we made our way down. There is ample parking, as Parke is one of the National Trust locations. For whatever reason, the car park machines were covered over, so the parking seemed to be free too. As always with a pregnant wife, a trip to the toilets was necessary before the run, which were conveniently located on site.

The run started, and I was immediately struck by the relatively leisurely start. Typically, I hare off, accidentally dragged along by the quick runners at the front. Here, I was still amongst the top ten runners, but was actually slower than my 10k pace. Gosh – was the first hill that bad that people were conserving energy for it?!

Well, sod that. I sped up.

Half a kilometre later, we hit the first hill. Oh boy. Pretty much two thirds of the 80 metres of elevation are compressed into the first kilometre. Things slowed down. I slowed down. I let people head past me – I don’t really bother racing up hills, particularly early on. It just kills your legs for the rest of the run*.

Eventually, the hill levelled off, and then started to descend again. Underfoot the conditions weren’t too bad – it was a bit slippy in places, but mostly firm. The course is essentially two different loops, meeting at a river. So all that climbing we’d done was reversed before the end of the first loop as we gently dropped back, before a sharp descent at the end, down to the river crossing to head out on the second, smaller loop.

This section of the course started along a pretty good track, but then turned right for another climb. This was one of those that looked far worse than it was – I’d been worried I’d have to drop to a walk, but as it turned out, it was pretty short and sharp, and I was able to power myself up it, aware of a runner not too far behind me.

We were going to go back and take a photo of the hill. But… it was a long way from the car park.

After some twists, turns and undulations, the route then dropped back down pretty sharply to the river, and from here it was just a relatively short run back up to the finish. I’d shaken off the runner behind me, and entertained brief hopes that I’d catch the chap in front of me, but it was to no avail. Still, I was surprised and chuffed to discover that I’d finished 5th, my highest parkrun position.

With my run** finished, I decided to head back onto the course to run Lolly in. After a bit of quick maths in which I compared my finishing time with her recent pace, and the state of the course left me none the wiser as to where on the course she would be. I reached the marshal at the crossover point, and asked if he’d seen a pregnant woman with a ’50’ top and a cow cowl, but he just looked at me blankly. I decided to head back down the first loop, and was immediately rewarded by spotting her!

During my repeat of the second loop with Lolly, I had somewhat more time to take in what gorgeous surroundings the run was in. Most of the run is in woodland alongside the River Bovey, and along with Penrose and Mount Edgcumbe, it has to rate as one of the prettiest we’ve done. As to how tough the course is? I find it hard to judge. I’d say that Mount Edgcumbe is a tougher course, because the climb goes on and on and on, over pretty rough terrain. On the other hand, I did that one with a buggy, so it’s always going to feel harder. I also ran this just a week after Brent Knoll, which even on a dry year was tougher. But then, it’s meant to be. So, yes, it’s a pretty tough parkrun course, but don’t let that put you off; it’s a cracker of an event!

* Race.
** Race.

Herepath Half: race report

by Ben

Seven days earlier, the Exmoor Stagger had more or less destroyed my legs. It had done it in stages. First, my right hamstring, then my left. Then I forced my quads to do more work on the downhills to make up the time I was losing uphill. That took out my quads. Then, finally, during the last climb of the race, my calves did most of the work because my hamstrings were long gone. I didn’t really have any major muscle groups left to break.

On Monday, they still felt awful. On Tuesday, I went for a short run, in which by the end I was managing to move in something resembling an actual run. On Wednesday, I had a massage. By Saturday, I had forgotten that I was aching and had a race the following day, and decided to head back to Yeovil Montacute parkrun because they were running the course in reverse.

Sunday morning came, and I was actually feeling pretty good. Lolly headed off to her marshalling point at Staple Hill, where she would have our daughter with her too, while I made the short drive to Thurlbear. There are definitely some benefits to local races, and the short drive is one them! I picked up my race number, had chats with plenty of my club mates who were there; running, helping and organising. Our club puts this race on, and I’d marshalled myself for the past couple of years.

The race basically spends the first five and a half miles climbing to the top of Staple Hill, where I would get to wave to my wife, and then get to run mostly downhill for the remaining eight miles. My race strategy/goal was pretty simple: pace myself off one of my club-mates, Kate, and try not to let her beat me. Though I had finished ahead of Kate at the Stagger the week before, her pacing had seemed a bit more reasonable (though she probably wasn’t suffering from such bad hamstrings at the end…)

A quick start along the road.

I shot off a bit quicker than I meant to, but when I decided to relax my pace it turned out that Kate was right behind me. I immediately had to make a decision: did I stick with my plan of pacing myself off her, or did I adopt my own pacing, judging that it would be worth conserving energy early on during the climbing to use in the latter part of the race? I decided to trust in female pacing. (Almost without exception I’ve found that the women around me pace themselves better than I do. Let’s not read too much into that or try to find any parallels, alright?) I pretty much stuck myself to Kate’s shoulder for the first couple of miles as we started to wind our way up the hill. In this early part of the race, the terrain is pretty easy, and we maintained a grade-adjusted pace of around 7 min/mile. About three miles in, I switched ahead of Kate, but we stayed within a few metres for the next mile or so.

Around mile four, the route diverts from the Herepath for a short while, looping through Mount Fancy Farm, a butterfly reserve. This was typically a boggy section of the race, but one that I knew reasonably well, having marshalled in this area the previous couple of years, and run it a few times from the car park at the top of the hill. Whether because I knew it, or just because I fared better in the more difficult terrain, I passed a few people through the reserve, and moved ahead of Kate. Through a particularly boggy section, I passed another of my club-mates, Phil, who had apparently lost his shoe in the mud.

Autumnal ‘running’ – it’s possible that I’d been walking just before I noticed the photographer though…

The route then turns back onto the Herepath proper and climbs steeply towards the top of Staple Hill. I walked for a short stretch here, but was soon guilted into running again by the race photographer! At the top of the hill, I saw Lolly and Lani, who cheered me on, and directed me around a loop which took in the viewpoint. As I was racing, I didn’t take the opportunity to have a look, but have done at other times, and it is definitely worth it! After the loop came one of my favourite short stretches of the race; a reasonably steep technical descent. The race then crosses from Staple Hill to Neroche, without much change in elevation. From here on, my race was pretty lonely. Phil caught back up to me, but stayed just behind me until I had to take a quick comfort break, and after that I spent most of the rest of the race without anyone within anyone within about 100 metres of me.

In all honesty, I wasn’t a massive fan of the last few miles of the race – and not just because they were the last few miles of a half marathon! Because part of the Herepath is closed, the race follows the road for around a mile, which is pretty tough that far into a trail race, and thereafter, much of the course goes across fields. The end was good fun again, as the route dropped through Thurlbear Wood. I was thankful for the descent, which played to my strengths at the end of the race – particularly as Kate had been slowly catching up with me, and I had been a bite worried that she would sneak past me just before the finish. As it was, I gained a position, and ended up finishing more or less 30 seconds behind Phil and more or less the same ahead of Kate.

“Hmm… didn’t you say you were going to put that ‘400m to go’ sign about halfway around?!”

I was more than chuffed with my time, 1:46:27 on a 13.7 mile trail race. Unsurprisingly from a race put on by my own club, the support on course was terrific. We get good feedback for our marshalling anyway, but obviously being a club member helped!

Would I do this race again? I’d love to – but for the next couple of years it will be back to marshalling. No medal here, but a lovely glass to add to my collection (volunteers get them too). This race was different to my last two trail races – both the Stagger and the Steeplechase were highly challenging races in truly stunning locations, and would both rank very highly in my best ever races. The Herepath was less challenging, though still nicely scenic, particularly around Staple Hill and Neroche. I’d massively recommend this race, and despite the short boggy section, would say that it would be very suitable for those running their first trail race too.

Well earned…

Exmoor Stagger: race report

by Ben

This race wasn’t in my plan. I really enjoyed running it last year; that race remained the furthest I had ever run, and combined with the terrain and the elevation, it was by far the most challenging. However, it was just a week before the Herepath Half, which I really wanted to run, and had already signed up for this year. Both races were part of the Somerset Series, and coming into October, I knew that I had a good chance of finishing in the top ten for the series. This meant that I wanted a good place at the Herepath Half (where I felt I had a better chance) and so decided not to run the Exmoor Stagger to give myself the best chance of running well.

Then, I ran the Red Bull Steeplechase, really enjoyed it, and decided to sign up for the Exmoor Stagger anyway. Because, you know, running is about having fun.

Last year, the three-pronged attack of the distance, elevation and terrain cowed me into taking it easy for the race, and although I planned to do similar this year, the Red Bull Steeplechase had given me a fair bit more confidence for all three. I knew from chatting to Matt, who runs with Minehead RC, that the course had changed from the previous year due to some permissions being revoked, and that it had made the race slightly longer. Though I never saw an official distance posted on the race website, I did see a figure of 16.3 miles on the club’s Facebook page, which I used for guidance.

The race starts on the road, but climbs and climbs and climbs for the first mile and a half before undulating slightly before another, gentler climb to the first peak about 3.2 miles in, where the shorter Stumble race splits off. By the time I reached that split point, I was starting to struggle. It didn’t feel too major at that point, but with only three miles gone, and basically a half marathon still to go, I was concerned that my right hamstring felt like it had nothing to give. While cutting back was an option – I’d get the big black cross of doom on my race number, but still officially finish the shorter race – I didn’t view it as a choice. I entered the race to run a long way, with tough hills, tricky terrain, and getting over Dunkery Beacon, the highest point in Somerset. So I pushed on.

The descent to Wootton Courtenay initially heads down a narrow track through the woods before opening out down a field. While I was limited down the woodland path, I was able to push a bit harder down through the field, and made up a few positions: my hamstring was less of an issue downhill. The run along the road through Wootton Courtenay was something of a slog, and then we headed back off-road for the start of the climb up Dunkery. We skirted around to the north, heading through Webber’s Post, and on this climb I started to seriously suffer with my hamstring, having to regularly slow for walking breaks. I continued to make back time on any downhill sections, but I was mostly losing positions as we made our way up the hill.

As we climbed, I realised that for the second time in two weeks, I was catching up with Matt, and this time I actually caught him! We took the steep climb up Dunkery’s north face together, trading injury woes: we were both suffering from bad hamstrings, but he’d also had an awful night’s sleep. We concluded that the Steeplechase a fortnight before had clearly taken more out of us than we’d realised.

By the time we reached the top, the visibility had been severely hampered by fog, similar to last year. Now that we weren’t climbing any more, I was able to stretch my legs out and get back to a decent pace again, and pushed on ahead of Matt. The descent from Dunkery goes on for around two and a half miles, and it’s probably fair to say that I ran close to recklessly fast down it. I stumbled twice, thankfully catching myself from falling both times. There’s a Strava segment for the descent, and I apparently did it three minutes quicker than last year. So, I guess I know that I’m getting better (or braver, or stupider) at running down hills.

Unfortunately, the old adage is right, and of course we were soon heading back up the hill out of the other side of Wootton Courtenay. There was no chance that I was going to run even a small part of this climb. I started walking at the bottom, and just over ten minutes later, I was still walking. I might – might – have starting running just before the top, as it started to level out. I would love to say that after the climb, I thought ‘all downhill from here, let’s get cracking’. But it was something more like ‘there’s still another fucking three miles left, just keep going’.

Those three miles just felt like they went on forever. I slowed, and slowed, and slowed (well, by Strava’s grade-adjusted pace metric anyway). By the end of the race, I was really struggling. But, I made it, and I even managed to just stay ahead of Matt and Kate, who had engaged in a mad dash sprint finish. If there’d been another 100 metres of the race, I’m pretty sure they would have both beaten me, because I had nothing left to race them.

Despite my hamstring struggles, I really enjoyed this race again. I was pleasantly surprised by my improvement from last year: I was about one minute per mile quicker on average, and finished much much higher up the field. Aside from that, I was also happy with my improvement on the downhill sections, which (like everything else) will only get better with more practice. My more frequent runs on the Quantocks has helped with this, and it’s something I want to try and do even more of.

What was the next goal? To get my hamstring sorted in time for the Herepath Half, seven days later…

Ash Excellent Eight: race report

by Ben

Fittingly, the Ash Excellent Eight was my eighth Somerset Series race of the summer, and with my entry already confirmed for both the Herepath Half and Brent Knoll, I’m on course to hit the ten needed to qualify. I’d not run the Excellent Eight before, and didn’t know much about it, other than a) it was in Ash, b) it was about eight miles, and c) it was presumably excellent. I did a little bit of research: I looked at the Strava stats from someone who had done it last year, and discovered it had a downhill start, an uphill finish, and a lump in the middle. I also had a chat to Matt on Twitter, who said that he had heard from another club-mate that it was pretty flat.

The race came at the end of a busy few days. Well, a busy week really. Had it not been a Somerset Series race, I probably would have just changed my plans and done a training run instead: my plan wanted me to do 14 miles, not an 8-mile race. But after a chat to Lolly, who I’d barely seen during the busy few days before the race, we decided that her and our two-year-old daughter, Lani, would come along as well, and they could possibly do the 2k Fun Run. Or at least have a run around the school fields.

As a Somerset Series race, most of the familiar faces were there as usual, and I had a chat to a few of them before the race, though of those, only Nigel had done the route before. With his usual detailed memory, he gave me a description of the route, though to be honest I’m not sure how well I took it in!

After managing to fit in a one mile warm-up around convincing Lani that she did want to wear her race number for the Fun Run, we were at the start and ready to go. On already weary legs, I opted to let the crowd of runners, and the hill carry me along at the start, as we plummeted down the road. The hill carried on for about a mile, and Strava has proudly declared it my second fastest mile (6:04), after the really absurd descent at the Chew Valley 10k (5:58). I really need to get out and run a fast mile on the flat to beat both of those, so I can be prouder of my best mile!

The descent ended with a left turn onto a farm track. Still a road really – the Google Street View car has even been down it, but there was more mud around. Then shortly after, we turned off that road through a farm, and along what definitely wasn’t anything more than a puddle-riddled farm track. The course very gently undulated along this second mile, though it was all but unnoticeable. Opening out onto the fields, the course split shortly after, with the five mile race taking a shortcut back to Ash. The eight-milers continued through some flood defences and over the River Yeo. Sitting on the edge of the Somerset Levels, the course was pretty much pancake flat through the next couple of miles, as we circled around a golf course.

After the initial shuffling around of positions, we’d settled down past the farm, though I’d been aware that I was losing time on runners around me for most of the race to this point. From about the first drinks station, which was by the river, I started to gain positions and time. I didn’t take any water at that station, which brought me right up behind the runners that were ahead of me, and I slowly picked off each of the three as we wound our way around the golf course. The terrain was probably the worst at this point, with a wet and muddy track to contend with, and one of my gained positions almost certainly seemed to be based on me having more grip than the chap ahead of me.

After a short road climb, we had a longer gentle descent along the road away from Long Sutton. I felt like I was running well on this stretch, but on reflection, I guess it was just the very favourable terrain, as I didn’t seem to make any significant gains on those around me. This lovely section was followed by the hardest part of the course: Knole Hill. It is not, to be fair, too much of a hill to be feared. The Hill Bagging website details that it is only 48m / 157ft high, and we probably only actually climbed about a third of that. But, it is a steep ascent up grass, and everyone around me (including me) had to take it at a walk.

Of course, what goes up must come down, and with the diagonal descent of the hill down the next field, I opened a large gap on those runners behind me. Another muddy, rutted farm track followed, along which I slowly closed the gap on the runner ahead of me. We drew level at the last drinks station, had a brief chat, and then started climbing the final hill.

You remember that mile-long hill that I flew down at the start? Yeah… we had to go back up it at the end. I’d been a little bit worried about this hill, imagining the horror of a mile-long struggle up a hill with regular walking breaks. But… actually… it was fine. I easily ran the whole lot, taking about eight minutes for the mile. Just a short dash to the finish followed – by this stage I was well ahead of the runner I’d been with at the bottom of the hill, but out of range of the runner ahead of me. So I probably didn’t push quite as much as I could have done. Which is annoying, because my finishing time was 1:00:05. If I’d just pushed 6 seconds faster…

At the finish, I was amazed to discover that as well as a medal (somewhat generic, but I can’t complain) there was a t-shirt. Not bad for a race that only cost £12 on the day!

All this for just £12!

Overall, I have mixed feelings about this race. On the one hand, I felt like I ran really well. The ‘light trail’ aspect of the race probably gave me a bit of an advantage: pure road runners probably found it too ‘trail-y’, while proper trail runners found it too ‘road-y’. However, for a trail race, it was a bit flat and perhaps a little boring. But I guess there’s always the Exmoor Stagger if I want hilly and interesting!

Next up: Yeovilton 5k (14 September), Great Bristol Half (25 September)

Haselbury Trail 10k: race report

by Ben

The Haselbury Trail: my seventh Somerset Series race of the season. After a late start, during which I missed the first five races of the series, I’ve now done seven of the eight since. This leaves me needing to do three of the remaining seven races to qualify, though two of those I’m unavoidably missing.

This was my second successive year of running Haselbury, and other than the very basics, I hadn’t remembered much from the previous year. Two sources helped to refresh my memory: reading through my blog post from last year, and my club-mate Nigel – who, it appears, has an amazingly detailed memory for race routes!

Off we go!

So, the basics: cheap on-the-day entry, two-lap multi-terrain course, mildly undulating except for a sharp climb up from a bridge at the end of each of the laps, cattle-grids, stiles, ford and a gentle road climb to the finish. After which you don’t get a medal, but do get an engraved glass. Last year it was a tumbler, this year a pint glass.

I found the race exceptionally tough. My analysis was that the course was slightly easier going than last year, when we’d had some rain through the day, and during the race itself, making the underfoot conditions less than ideal (though still not terrible).

Last year, I made the mistake of chasing after Clive in the first (admittedly downhill) mile, which I completed in 6:32. This year, Clive wasn’t there, so I wouldn’t repeat that mistake… Except that I did. In fact, I went even quicker, posting a first mile of 6:23. Either I was going to see some significant improvement, or I was going to crash and burn for the rest of the course.

Option B it was. Pretty much as soon as we hit the fields, my legs were telling me that they weren’t up for it. I took their message and dropped down into ‘consolidation’ mode. I mostly let those ahead of me slowly extend their advantage, while trying to stay ahead of those behind me, as best as I could. In most of these smaller races, after some initial shuffling around, the pack mostly settles into position for the middle stint of the race, with more shuffling again towards the end, and this race very much followed that pattern for me. I gained and lost a few places on the hill at the end of the first lap – not really sure whether I gained or lost overall though!

Much as last year, the second lap was quite lonely – I spent most of it without any runners 10 metres either side of me, and just concentrated on doing my own thing. Which was mostly trying to goad my legs into continuing, despite their insistence that maybe it would be a good idea to stop for a walk… Until I reached the hill again. At that point, I happily let my legs take over, and dropped to a walk once more.

Unnecessarily fast sprint finish.

At the top of the hill, the course levels out for a time, before heading back uphill along the road that we flew down at the start. Along this section, I quickly caught and passed a runner from Chard, and yelled some encouragement to him as I did so. It looked like he had a stitch or similar. Fortunately/unfortunately, he started back up again just after I passed him, and we pushed each other up the hill, with him passing me just as we neared the top. There was only a right turn and a short run along the cricket ground to go, and I started to push a bit harder. He responded by pushing into a sprint. I started sprinting too. He went a bit quicker again. I thought ‘sod this’ and went all out. To those around us, it probably looked like a slightly short, exhausted, and crazed-looking runner (me) trying to replicate a 100 metre race at the end of a 10k trail race, finishing ahead of a pretty nonplussed runner who wasn’t at all interested in a 100 metre dash. Because, you know, that’s pretty much what happened.

The race memento: ideal with pizza and cider!

For the record, I beat him. I then nearly threw up. It took me a few minutes to recover, and he then wandered over, and shook my hand with the quietly damning comment: “You really wanted to beat me there!” Yeah, okay, perhaps I’m a bit over-competitive sometimes.

The ‘race memento’ was a tulip pint glass – which I vastly prefer to last year’s tumblers, which are too small to be of much use (I don’t drink any shorts). Time-wise, my official time was 47:07, just one second quicker than last year, though my watch time was about ten seconds quicker again. I’m a bit disappointed that I wasn’t fairly significantly quicker than last year, but races in the middle of my current training plan are always going to be tough.

Next up: Ash Excellent 8 (4 September), Yeovilton 5k (14 September), Bristol Half Marathon (25 September, ARGHH!)