Caesars 50 Mile Challenge

What an event, with the MOD land making for a superb course involving a variety of trail elements including steep climbs (with flint and stones and sand) and similarly tricky descents, plenty of twists and turns and a range of challenging paths and routes through forests it all made for a great one lap 10 mile event – then I only had another 7 to go!

Before continuing I must just say thanks to the generosity of those who voted last week, of which the majority pledged for me completing 80 miles and thank-you Sam for suggesting a week off.

From the below profile of the 10 mile course you can get a sense of the challenge each competitor faced again and again.

Well on arrival at the site I made my first mistake and as with every other new event I’ve tried this year learnt a little more. Having arrived an hour early for the event I found I was one of the last to arrive and as such found myself parking about 200 meters away from the start/finish line which I didn’t think anything of until after about the second or third lap when I realised the reason everyone one arrived early was to enable them to park close to the finish line so that if you had to get back to you car for a change of socks or trainers or an extra layer of clothing you avoided the 400meter extra round trip which I had given my self by parking so far away.

A very cheerful Race Director greeted everyone and was keen to re-enforce his description of the event as being difficult and that if anyone injured them selves or fell over – it was hard luck (On a serious note we where then given the regular safety notes and made aware of the disclaimers on picking up the race numbers!). At this point I was not worried.

As you can see from the Course Profile above it was at about the third peak of the first lap I became worried as each runner still closely grouped together reached the top of this climb to be faced by the Race Director cheerfully laughing at us all – as he promised he would at which point he added “you haven’t see half of it yet” which I just knew didn’t bode well for the rest of the course.

Tired and exhausted I finished the first lap by which point all the runners where starting to spread out (within a few laps everyone would have spread out so much it felt like you where running on your own).

Various sites including the army out training obviously the site of 50 or so runners was as strange a site for those guys as us catching glimpse of 10 to 20 soldiers going through their paces during the day. More surprising for the runners was the shock to the system just after sunset when each runner was only visible by their head torch of which many runners would retail stories later of running for 20 plus minutes not seeing a sole around and then in the middle of nowhere looking up to shine your light to enable you to check your bearings and check your on the right route to be confronted by a camouflaged faced soldier or two looking back at you then returning to the original task of map reading.

After the first lap was over I settled down with only a few other guys in front of me I thought I could use them to help pace me for the long night ahead. Unfortunately, my lack of experience in trail running and probably a moment’s slip in concentration meant I suddenly had a difference of opinion between my right foot, right knee and the rest of my body which on a down hill section decided they all preferred a different way down. After a short pause to regain my footing, do the basic check of foot attached to leg and knee still in middle of leg I continued on. Unfortunately I ended up doing something technical to the knee area which meant it became difficult and painful in the knee joint if I stopped moving it for more than a couple of minutes – not a problem I thought originally. After making it to the end of the lap a little worse for wear I took a jog back to the car to see how best to try and make it a little more comfortable to attempt one more lap. With a change of shoes from trail and back to more conventional shoes with more cushioning and a few other items to help me, I soon settled into the third lap and found it a lot more comfortable to run.

Additional challenges came from the onset of dark other than the obvious lack of light – such as the fortunate weather during the day of no rain and no clouds meant a cold night which in itself was fine as each runner increased their number of layers on each completion of a lap. However the climate also then meant various pockets of fog on open and low level ground. Not much of a problem for those who had had the opportunity to do several laps in the daylight hours. Unfortunately I came a cross a runner in the middle of the night who through a combination of the fog and tiredness had got disorientated and missed some of the course route signs. He was only 4 miles from completing his 50 mile challenge and was soon back on course although a little slower as he was also injured.

Various people retired throughout the day and night for various reasons, obviously mainly from injury or fatigue but I did find one runner who had made the mistake of taking a seat too close to the camp fire that had been set up at the half way mark – A very tempting option but one I had to decline as I knew I would not get up from next to the fire if I settled down for more than a few minutes.

The two checkpoints on the course where extremely well stocked with foods and drinks in an attempt to keep the runners fuelled and able to keep going through the night – as such I don’t think I’ve ever drunk so much orange juice, coke and tea in 24 hours and as for the food well I’m surprised I lost so much weight in this event given I can’t remember not eating for more than an hour or two at a time.

Mentally the challenge is just as strong with the majority of the runners having not competed the distance they entered for before. As such as people realised they would potentially only just make the time limit set for their event or might not make it at all and with the cold night people started to retire further and further into the night. I could only remember the voice of other competitors at eh start line who had said they had been on the course trial several months prior and had been training since then, others who said they only did a couple of events a year – meanwhile I had been out the night before helping with the CF Music Gig (click on link to read about this) which meant missing out on dinner, finishing at 3am and only getting 4 hours sleep – but it was worth it – what a great evening. With the positive thoughts of the evening and my concentration on not getting lost in the fog I felt confident I would make it through the night – if a little slower than I had hoped.

As with so many other events I meet so many nice people – from Lucy who during the later part of the evening when I found the head torch I had that said it was able to run for 100 hours on one set of batteries actually meant 10 hours on full power and then a feint candle glow after that – I then spent a mile or so running from memory until I was assisted by Lucy who I managed to make it through to the next checkpoint by following the her light. Rescued with spare batteries at the next checkpoint we then found that we had both been in the same situation (i.e. both had spare batteries in our cars not expecting to have to use them). Having been running for several hours without much conversation it was also good to talk – finding out that she had also completed the IOW trail event last week – a real gluten for punishment.

Sun rise and 10 plus hours since sunset seemed to come round so quickly and with it a whole new respect for sunlight – the effect of running on very uneven surfaces which require good concentration at the best of times to ensure not miss-footing is far worse when you have to concentrate in the light of a head torch which moves with your body and as such requires adjusting at every incline or decline in the trail.

Morning therefore meant a faster and more positive couple of laps with the warmth of the sun (well actually it wasn’t that warm but it was nice) and the amazing sites at sunrise from two baby dears to the mist hanging over the lakes and rabbits which you had heard during the night but could not see.

After saying my thank-you’s to the guys at the mid lap checkpoint as I completed 75 mile, for me I felt the small injuries gained early on in the race pale into insignificance as I made the most of enjoying the last 5 miles of the course finishing with a sprint up and down the sand bank hill (now being partly used by motor cross bikes) and then across the last 100 meter flat sand area to the finish line.

With my first 80 mile event out of the way and a visit to the physio I have lots of ideas for future events!!!! – What great fun if a little painful and the requirement of me to pass out later in the day for about 14 hours.