22nd March: Sussex

Since I have embarked on this running odyssey (oddity?) my better half, LSS, has softened in her stance about running and has come to the conclusion that she might as well join in the lunacy, albeit over a shorter distance than me. The main motivator for her is as Father Time marches on, she can no longer eat as much cheese or chocolate as she wants without a consequential increase in arse-size, so for the first time in her life she feels she is now at a point where she needs to do something to avoid the dreaded spread of approaching middle age.

Just before Christmas LSS surprised me by announcing out of the blue (knowing I would be there running the marathon), that she had entered the Endurancelife CTS Sussex 10k as a focus or her running and was going to train for it with Spud, our springer spaniel/ border collie cross breed, as her running buddy - with the cunning plan that his 4 pawed drive would help to drag her up hills and get her around the course a bit quicker than if she was by herself... And now the day of reckoning was upon us.

Rather than following my normal pattern of driving to the run the night before, with LSS not wanting to leave a nihilistic teenager to look after our other 2 dogs overnight, we were up at sparrow's fart on the morning to drive the couple of hours to Birling Gap on the Sussex coast.

Dawn broke on the drive down and by 7am we were parked at the event base, located this time in a slightly different place to previous; perched on the top of a hill overlooking the marquee.

Looking to the event base from the parked van.

Walking down the hill to the marquee to register, Spud with his rather long and luxurious tail in his carefree way was just wandering along savouring all these new smells, watching the Skylarks rise and sing, when he must have touched the electric fence that bordered the verge with it, and with a yelp he jumped forwards having experienced the sudden unexpected voltage up his bum. He stood rooted to the spot and looked around accusingly as to who could have done this to him before correctly figuring out it was the fence and began walking as far away from it as he could!

The runners beginning to gather.

The two of us registered for our events before returning to the van for some breakfast and for me to get changed. In no time at all I found myself all briefed and waving goodbye to LSS and Spud as I hit the trail whilst they waited around for their later start in the 10k.

Blue skies were above us as we made our way along the undulations of the seven sisters, the weather far better than it was a couple of years ago when it was sub zero, blowing a hooly and alternating between sleet and freezing rain - the singularly most miserable experience I have ever had whilst running. Back then the temperature including the wind-chill was below freezing, but today I could tell that at some point I would end-up overheating as my dressing for winter weather would prove to be too much for balmy springtime.

The view once through the gate.

Going through the gate on to the Seven Sisters I found myself running with a Texan who was very impressed with the scenery, especially the sight of the beautifully white statuesque chalk cliffs. I explained to him about Beachy Head and its claim to fame as a suicide hot-spot, with plenty of people using the height and sheer drop to their advantage - something he found difficult to comprehend and certainly was not in the tour-guide he consulted!

Down.

Up.

And down again, repeat ad-infinitum.

I love traversing these undulations along the cliff-tops to the nature reserve and the turn inland, the continual switching from ascent to descent gives you one hell of a workout before the 'recovery' jog through to the nature reserve and the final climb to the first checkpoint… This course is very easy to nominally break in to manageable chunks with there only being 3 Checkpoints - this first section over the cliffs is followed by the inland stretch along a causeway in a water-meadow then a long slog up hill on the chalky path of the South Downs Way, past the chalk cutting sculpture of the ‘long man’ then down in to the forest paths undulating their way to CP2. From CP2 you have the longer 8 mile section back over the other half of the Seven Sisters, enjoying more of the undulations and the view out to sea. The final shortest leg of 5 miles taking us back inland following the contours of the ridgeway to the finish.

En route to CP2 I was yo-yoing position with a couple from America who are shortly to be returning across the pond to live in Florida and are spending as much time as they can taking-in all the marathon and ultra trail-runs they can before they depart. They told me a few home-truths about what we have here in Britain and not to take it for granted, it went something like this:

What we have in Britain is phenomenal. Whilst living in London, within 3 hours of travel should you want to, you can go every weekend and find a trail marathon or ultra to run. We are blessed with a fantastic variety of every sort of terrain from forest to mountain, from moor to coastal path, all easily accessible thanks to the country's comprehensive travel links be it the road or rail networks. Its not the same in the states, where you have plenty of runs should you want to, but most will be shorter distances and on roads, not forgetting with the States being so much bigger and spread-out, if you want a change in scenery then you have to fly to a different part of the country to find what you are looking for (or alternatively move there to live), so all of a sudden, what you can do in a day in Britain (travel there, run, travel back), then you need 2-3 days to do the same over there. As such the cost of doing this becomes astronomical, plus with only 10 days ‘annual leave’ in America it eats in to any holiday plans you may have, so you only tend to do one or two 'big' races a year if they are not local to you.

The two of them have fallen in love with the land of Britain, where all this beautiful scenery is compressed into such a tight package to get out and enjoy and they have chosen to explore as much of it as they can whilst here, which ironically is far more than most people born and raised here do… In short they believe, we should not take what we have for granted and appreciate what we have got and get out and enjoy it! with running large chunks of the countryside certainly makes it easier to see the beautiful landscapes… Although I realise that by you reading this I am already ‘preaching to the converted’ on this subject so as to speak.

One thing they find amusing over in the States is the trend for a ‘new’ distance in running events - what is loosely termed as an ‘half ultra’. These are neither a half marathon, a marathon or an ultra marathon - the latter has no definitive length as it only means its distance is longer than a marathon so how can you have a ‘half ultra’?.. And why would you want to run a distance that is more than a half but not much shorter than a full marathon that carries the kudos of neither?

By the time I reached CP2 I was beginning to overheat in the sun and the shelter from any cooling wind by the forest around me, so I took the time once through it to stop and remove my jacket to allow my body to cool down. I figured that once out on to the coast for this third leg the wind on the cliff-tops would certainly be cooler, but it would not be too much to cause an issue with me getting too cold and besides you can always put the jacket back on!

The way Endurancelife organise this event through its route planning and the start times of the various distances means that at my pace over the marathon course, I meet-up with the bottom 25% of the field of 10k runners at around their 5k mark. With this prior knowledge, I did not say anything to LSS, but I had a sneaky suspicion that I might be able to catch her and Spud up at some point along the course, so with this in mind I made a decent effort to get from CP2 to the part of the course where marathon and 10k meet.

Shortly after I joined the course with the 10k runners as they head back on to the coast from their furthest part inland, I found myself picking-off some of the slower runners. Running a long downhill sloping field with a rabbit legging it from one side to the other in front of me, I caught sight of LSS and Spud in the distance as they began the climb up through the woodland to the cliff-tops. I now had them in my sight so began to slowly reel them in, finally catching them as the edge of the cliffs and the sea beyond hove into view.

LSS & Spud: A smudge on the horizon.

I slowed down to say hello to the ruddy-faced LSS who was really suffering from thirst, so immediately offered her some refreshment from my hydration pack… We may have recce’d the route, but running it rather than walking it was proving to be tougher than anticipated for LSS, so rather than running-off and leaving her I accompanied both her and Spud on their run-walk down to Birling Gap and then up on to the grassy cliffs and the climb to Beachy Head.

Spud smiles for the camera.

It was a real pleasure to be running with LSS and Spud at their first 'race' and by being with them they certainly sped-up a bit compared to the pace they would have travelled at had they been all alone on the attritional climb up to the summit of Beachy Head... And after the long hard slog to the top of that, LSS was surprised anybody would still have the energy to throw themselves off the top by the time they had managed to drag themselves all the way up there!

The windswept duo about to turn for the finish.

The wind was beginning to pick-up now and with clouds coming-in to cover the sun the temperature was dropping, so when LSS and Spud veered left for the final mile back to the finish, I put my head down and upped the pace to attempt to get some warmth back as I battled with the hills and wind of the exposed cliff-top path. I knew my time now was going to be slower than previous efforts through taking the time to run with LSS & Spud rather than steaming-on past them, however it did mean I had some energy in the tank so-as-to-speak through not going as hard as I could for the last few miles.

Down the other side of Beachy Head.

Eastbourne beckons.

After the turn at the third and final CP on the edge of Eastbourne and the climb up on to the ridge I knew I was on the last stretch back to the finish, so ran as hard as I could over the fields and past the bemused spectators in the form of herds of cows, the iPod was on shuffle and the amusing rhymes of ‘Goldie Lookin Chain’ in my ears made me smile as I ploughed on and overtook a few of the marathoners who had overtaken me whilst I was with LSS and Spud.

Attacking the final hill after the teasing turn away from the finish line that you look for a couple of miles to be heading towards, I managed to catch and pass a couple of the ultra runners and on the home-straight I even managed to drift past a couple of the half marathoners… Eventually crossing the line 10 minutes slower than last year.

I had a look around for LSS and Spud at the finish but I was not surprised that they did not hang around for about an hour to wait for me as the wind and lack of sun was making it a bit uncomfortable for the exhausted to be there without being wrapped-up in several layers of extra clothing.

I made the walk back to the van and found the pair of them cuddled-up together in the back having a recovery snooze before I rudely awakened them… LSS had thoroughly enjoyed the run, and was rightly proud of her achievement in finishing her first event, and with the difficulty of the terrain it is certainly a case of jumping in at the deep-end! She also admitted that she thinks anyone doing the ultra or the marathon on these courses are certifiable from the pain she was feeling from dragging herself around the 10k! The first one will always be the hardest but no-one can ever take away the achievement in finishing. I look back to how I was feeling in the final stages of the CTS Pembroke some 2 and a half years ago and all the pain and suffering I was experiencing, and how it is now a distant memory… Running the distance has not become easier physically, just less hard mentally, and less painful now my body is used to it, and in the words of Jens Voigt, the recently retired pro-cyclist and former holder of the 1 hour record, I’ve learned to say ‘Shut up legs’, and keep on trucking :)

Snuggled!

Next up on the race agenda is the Pendine Ultra - my second ever official ultra.



The tunes on the iPod that helped me back over the last section were:

Greece 2000 - Three Drives
21 Ounces - Goldie Lookin’ Chain
America - Razorlight
Blues X-Man - Jon Spencer Blues Explosion
Hit So Hard - Hole
Head Gone Astray - Soup Dragons
DOA - Foo Fighters
The Woman I Love - The Hollies
Monkey Love - Goldie Lookin’ Chain
Duffryn Vigilante Squad - Goldie Lookin’ Chain
Bird Dream of the Olympus Mons - Pixies
Wait & Bleed - Slipknot


Eat pies.
Drink beer.
Run far.