EVENT REPORTT184 ENDURANCE RUNpreferred to run than walk, and definitely did notenjoy the change between the two.We were slowing a bit so after 110 miles I was goingto have to make an awful decision, I tried again witha pep talk, “this is our challenge, it’s how we dealwith this now that counts, we chose to do this raceso we need to do something” I left it as long as Icould, but I was running away from Andy withoutmeaning to, I knew I would have to leave him. Ididn’t want to upset him, had it been the other wayround I would have wanted him run his own race,however I still felt awful even when he said heunderstood and to go on.I was now in 3rd and was hoping that as I caughtKieron so would Andy. No offense intended toKieron, I just really wanted Andy to do well, I owedhim such massive thanks.A while later Kieron caught me up, I hadn’t seen himas he had been sheltering from some pretty heavyrain and was now back up to speed. We bothheaded towards the next checkpoint, we wererunning together at times, but also a bit of cat andmouse and trading positions. I was now completelyfocusing on what I needed to do, how far was leftand telling myself that this was now just a 50 milerace, no more negativity, I could feel my energybuilding up, I felt refreshed and eager to reach thenext checkpoint and cross another one off my list.Kieron had said he was thinking of resting at thenext checkpoint, and I hoped Andy would haveploughed on and would gain strength from gettingto the checkpoint and running himself into 3rd.At the checkpoint as I was told I was now an houraway from the leader, I felt great, nothing matterednow except catching him, I sorted my bag and left,it wasn’t long before I had to stop and get a headtorch out, which I wished I’d done at the checkpointand saved myself the additional stop. From now onevery minute mattered, I was full on racing, but stillso cautious I was on the right path.I was then stopped and asked if I had time for aquick chat, it was one of the race organisers, whomI’m very glad I stopped for when he told me I wasnow in the lead! Sadly the leader had to pull out, Iwas winning overall. An addition to the focus, nownavigation was even more key, just keep movingforward as quick as you can, and don’t go wrong!In the dark the path was hard to spot, I was nowtotally out in the open, the river, I was pretty sure,was on the correct side, but trees marking fieldcrossing could also have been a river and for amoment I was a little worried I’d gone wrong. Iclimbed far enough down the grass verge to be sureit was in fact the river I was following as the fog wasnow really thick, making the head torch fairlyuseless.I was cold, wet, and concerned my head torchwould run out of battery, I was down to the lastone, I swapped to my spare hand torch which wasbetter in the fog, but as the route veered away fromthe river and crossed fields on the diagonal, I had tohope there was a gate with a Thames path markeron it, I really did not want to back track, I actually122 ULTRA TALES | OCTOBER 2014Sponsored by thehttp://
EVENT REPORTT184 ENDURANCE RUNwasn’t sure I could.By now the only walking I was doing now was onthe inclines, which on the Thames path isn’t thatmany, though this far into the race what is classedas an incline is all pretty relative.The next section was now marked with tape, which Iwas grateful for, the way markers are good but it’smuch easier to spot red tape then double check it’sstill a Thames Path sign, especially when havingbeen up since very early Friday morning and it wasnow a rather damp and misty Sunday morning.It didn’t quite dawn on me until afterwards that Ihad manage to get through the whole race with norest, I’d had a few caffeine tablets but had cut outall caffeine months before the race in the hope theywould have more effect than normal, which seemedto have worked well, but what really kept me goingwas this overwhelming drive to just keep moving.I had nothing in my head except get to the nextgate, round the next corner, to the end of the roadturn right… total focus, and clear the mind of anydoubt.In my mind’s eye I tried to see what I looked like,mainly to check I still had a running stride (I’ve gotso many photos at the end of a race where in myhead I’m still ‘running’, but in reality it’s a shufflebarely worth calling that) I was already visualisingthe finish, I was determined on the drive back homethat I would look back on every part of this last 20miles and know I could not have done any more.In the lead and the sun coming up, It really did feellike I was flying, I hit the last checkpoint at a sprint,I was so excited, and with 16 miles to go, the feelingwas unbelievable. I left all food I wasn’t going toeat, having carried it this far I found food in my bagI’d forgotten about, I readjusted my shoulder pads,and left for the last stretch.I remember this leg the best, probably because Ihad covered this part on a training run in bothdirections. I had dreamed of being here. I was told Iwas safely going to win it, but now I wanted to beunder 48 hours, I thought I could go under 47, Itried, but I did just a little too much walking tomake that time.One section which I walked (looking back is nowcomical, at the time not so much) was due to cows.I am not great at running through fields of cows,kind of silly , but in this instance it wasn’t justgiving a few a wide berth, the entire herd wereblocking my path.123 ULTRA TALES | OCTOBER 2014Sponsored by thehttp://
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