Race Report: Thames Towpath 100 03/03/2012

How do you write a race report for a hundred mile race?

Team Moose: 0 down, 103 to go.

I mean, I should really try to explain the sheer enormity of the weekend whilst not  boring you to tears with a mile by mile account of the torture.......and that's not easy.

What was I thinking of........(actually, let's not bother with the psychological defects that made me enter such a race in the first place otherwise we really will be here all night).......suffice to say it was the first race I've entered where I had to accept that failing to finish was a distinct possibility. The goal I set myself was to get past my previous longest race distance of 60 miles and then just see what happened.

In the build up to the race I tried very hard not to think of how far 100 miles really is, but unfortunately I found myself noticing the distances of car journeys much more than usual.........Sandbach to Leeds a mere 78 miles, Sandbach to Warwick, still well short at 88 miles, even a trip to Bangor would bring me up short of a hundred miles.

All smiles still

It became obvious that thinking of it as a single run of 100 miles was more than my head could handle so I decided a few months before the race that I'd break it down into much smaller chunks and use the run 25 minutes and walk 5 minutes approach. There were a couple of reasons for this. From a psychological point of view it's great to know that
however uncomfortable things are you know you're going to have a break within 25 minutes and there's also the practical point of view in that to cover such a long distance you will have to take on a lot of fuel and you have to start taking it on early. Your body can only really absorb about 60 grammes of carbohydrate an hour while running so to eat an energy bar with 30 grammes of carbs in it during each 5 min break is a great way to keep the fuel going in.

Also for me personally I know from experience that I suffer with nausea after running for about 10hrs. Once that sets in I really struggle to consume water let alone eat solid food so any fuel I could replace early on would be vital.

This is where some forward planning comes into play because if I'm going to be running for at least 24 hrs and I'm planning to eat two bars per hour, I really don't want to be stood on the start line with 48 energy bars in my back pack.

Thankfully they had four 'bag drops' where you could have bags sent ahead to various checkpoints. I only needed to make use of two during the night as for the rest of the time Jo was leapfrogging ahead of me ready to supply me with anything I needed.

Fuelling up

At this point I'll bypass the journey down to London etc and just get to the start where amongst loads of much fitter and better runners than us, you could find Team Moose. Three slightly overweight, middle aged, nervous men wondering what on earth they were doing there. And before we had too much time to ponder our situation the horn sounded and our journey began.

The first 25 minutes flew by and as the alarm sounded on our garmins we settled into a walk and consumed our first food. To our amusement many other runners also dropped into a walk at the same time obviously following the same plan. We followed the pattern until we reached the first checkpoint at 12 miles. It was great to be greeted by Jo, my  mum, sister in law and friend, as well as Simon and Jon's girlfriends. We refreshed our water supplies and headed off to the next checkpoint at 22 miles. For some strange reason I found miles 16 and 17 really tough which didn't bode well considering I still had 83 to go. My legs eased up after 18 miles and I was very happy to see the same family and friends at 22 miles cheering us in.

Friends and family providing invaluable support

The route along the Thames was much less boring than I was expecting and along with a few interesting sights like a bloke falling off his bike and a fisherman who cast his fishing line straight into the garden of a mansion on the other side of the Thames we trundled  along ticking off our 25 minute slots. Some of them were really tough and others seemed
to fly by but we stuck to them religiously (apart from stops at the feed stations).

Simon was beginning to struggle to keep up with the pace having spent the four days before the race skiing in Chamonix! Jon and I would wait at the checkpoints for him to catch up but when we realised we'd spent 25 mins at the 38 mile marker we decided we had to push on without him.

Taking a well-earned break

At 48 miles something started to go very wrong, it began with a yawn, then another, then my head started to spin and I found myself nodding off while running. I actually caught  myself counting how many steps I could run with my eyes closed. Apart from a sure sign of delirium it certainly wasn't the safest thing to be doing while running along the Thames Tow Path in the dark. It was only about 8pm at this point which was a real worry with
at least another 16 hours of running ahead of me. I steadily felt worse and worse until I concluded my race was almost certainly going to be over. I shuffled into the check point at 51 miles to be greeted by the new faces of Lou and Izzie which was brilliant. I remember trying to take my mind off how bad I was feeling by asking Izzie about that  day's riding lesson.........."are you sure you want to know about that now Daddy??"

Izzy catching 40 winks inbetween Dad cheering duties.

I decided I needed to try something different to the bars I'd been eating so went for the hot food supplied by the race.......it was the worst hot food I've ever been offered mid race. Some non branded beans with a kind of hot dogs which not even the cheapest high street stores would have put their name to.

I pulled myself together as much as I could, changed into a different pair of shoes and  warmer clothes and aimed to try to get to the 58 mile marker. To be honest I had now  resigned myself to the fact that I wasn't going to make it to 100 miles but was absolutely  determined to pass my previous race record of 60. As we shuffled out of the checkpoint  my Garmin was showing I had 15 mins of running before the next scheduled walk break but  I decided to walk that 15 mins and give my legs a chance to build up to it slowly.

When I broke into a run 20 mins later it was like I'd been given a new set of legs (actually more like a slightly shabby second hand set off eBay but you get my drift) and more importantly my head had come back to me. I trundled through the next 25 mins feeling so much better than I had an hour before.

Thames towpath mud.

I'd not planned to see Jo at the 58 mile checkpoint as I was hoping she would head to the hotel for some sleep before coming out in the morning but my delirium at 51 miles had obviously worried her enough to think I might be requiring a taxi at 58. Along with Lou and Izzie it was great to see her as we shuffled into Reading. I convinced her all was ok and that I was going to carry on.

We'd had a message that Simon had arrived at 51 miles not too long after we had left and having consumed all the food in his backpack was feeling much stronger and was hoping to catch us up in the next few miles. The next message we got was that he'd spent the next ten miles throwing up the contents of his backpack and was now heading for a comfortable night in a hotel in Oxford!

Jon and I continued on into the night sticking to the run 25, walk 5 which was serving us so well. Jon's girlfriend Emilie played a blinder when she appeared at the 71 mile  checkpoint at 1.30am with two bags of hot chips which we happily consumed before  continuing on.

One of the toughest mental challenges for many of the runners as the night went on was the inaccuracy of the given mileages for the checkpoints. As the race had progressed the checkpoints were arriving up to three miles further away than promised which can really mess with your head if you're desperate to reach these little pieces of heaven where a friendly face will look at you sympathetically and then shove you out the door on your way to the next oasis. Many runners were stood comparing garmins trying to work out  what was going on but it wouldn't be until the 82 mile checkpoint we were informed that due to a number of diversions away from the tow path during the night the course was
going to in fact be 3 miles longer than planned.

Now, in my head that was simply unacceptable. I'd signed up to run 100 miles not 103. In my exhausted state I decided I would therefore stop at 100 miles and the organisers could send a taxi for me with my t-shirt and medal.

I obviously wasn't going to stop three miles short of the finish line but at least thinking about it meant I spent a few less minutes thinking about how much my body was now aching.

It was now getting light but it was beginning to spit with rain. We arrived at the 91 mile (94 mile) checkpoint in Abingdon where Jo had rejoined the fun along with my dad and step mum. It was brilliant to see them and I took the chance to have an extra few minutes with them while Jo dealt with a rather large blister that Jon had been cultivating during the night. When we left it was raining harder and the paths were becoming very slippery. In fact the path became so slippery we climbed over a barbed wire fence into a field (not easy on legs that had travelled over 90 miles) just so we could run on a more solid surface.
By the time we reached the final checkpoint at 95 (98) miles the rain was torrential. We decided not to hang about and bid fairwell to family and friends for our last push to the finish line. 

Within five minutes of leaving, the rain turned to snow and the temperature dropped dramatically. When we reached our next 5 minute walk break Jon said he was too cold and would need to keep running. So for the first time in 100 miles we ditched a walk break and just kept running. We got colder and colder but we knew with each step the finish was edging ever closer.  We finally came off the towpath in Oxford and then needed to negotiate a couple of road crossings and a couple of bridges before we spotted the grounds of the ice rink where the finish line was positioned.

As the finish line came into sight we immediately felt disappointed that it was nothing more than a gazeebo in the snow with almost no protection from the wind. Then we saw Jo and Emilie and even Simon had made it out to cheer us in which was brilliant. We came across the line and as we stopped running the cold really hit and we both started shivering uncontrollably.

Unfortunately the organiser had decided to abandon the race after three runners were hospitalised with hypothermia but in the process he took the van with all the end of race kit bags containing our warm clothes with him to the 95 mile checkpoint. Thankfully Jo was there with the car so it wasn't too much of a drama and the situation was a lot more
favourable than if we'd made it to 95 miles to be faced with a race director telling us we could go no further.

So with no fanfare or fuss we disappeared off to the hotel for a couple of hours sleep before all heading out for a lovely meal and a few beers.

Looking just like I felt

As with any race I run I ask questions of myself about what went well and what I would do differently if I were doing it again.

There were much better and fitter runners than me who I passed during the night and there were plenty who didn't finish at all so I obviously got something right. I think the run/walk approach worked perfectly, along with the feeding and drinking. Having Jo on course with family and friends was a huge boost and running with a friend (something I
rarely do) was ideal in this situation.

Had we spent a little less time at each of the feed stations and had the course actually been 100 miles and had the weather been kinder in the last 10 miles then we would have finished under 24 hours but then I said right from the start that I would be much happier to finish 10 minutes inside the 30 hour cut-off knowing I could have run it faster than not finish at all and wish I'd run it slower.

The journey home

As it is I am now the very proud owner of a medal that says I ran 100 miles........ wow!

For more information visit www.centurionrunning.com

Jason