Tring2Town - Two 40 mile races, two medals and one great course

Day 1

Leaving the house at 6 in the morning to find the predictions of rain where wrong made me think it was to be a good weekend. Reaching the car I then spent 5 minutes scrapping off the ice to be told on the radio that most parts of the UK had severe weather warnings.

However following a distinct lack of parking at the start for the runners who choose to drive to the start of the first 40 mile event of the weekend, everything from then on went brilliantly. Again the registration process for this event was superb leaving a short amount of time to prepare (given the 30 minutes to find a parking space) – although as many fellow runners will know my main occupation is eating of which I was a little upset to find I ‘ran’ out of time to eat before the race!

The Tring2Town event in previous years has been a 45 mile one day event. However for reasons of only insanity and cruelty the organisers have chosen to amend the route slightly and reduce it to a 40 mile event run in each direction of two days. Competitors can run either one or both of the days.

I have to say given the problems of flooding and running in waist deep water for miles at a time during the last event I was a little apprehensive as to what the course would be like. However the weather on day one was great – a little frosty, but this only helped to make the muddy tracks a bit firmer and make running a bit easier.

 

The race itself was great with the normal problems of map reading and orienteering not being a problem as the Grand Canal path was extremely easy to follow. Saying that the only place I might of otherwise have gone in the wrong direction – I was lucky enough to see a couple of runners heading towards me, having already taken the wrong turn – what a lucky day for me.

As always the volunteer marshals at the check points where absolutely brilliant, giving a cheerful smile and supporting words – even though they had probably been sitting on a cold wall or canal lock for a couple of hours to ensure all the competitors where checked off and had their times recorded.

While the fourth of the five check points was potentially a few miles further on than most runners had expected it was a spirit lifter to find you only then had two miles or so to run to the finish – although due to my lack of breakfast I wasn’t really up for a sprint finish today.

As with so many of the ultra events it was good to meet and run with so many great people as you find having run 35 miles in the freezing cold you can find your pace slows down if your on your own. Chatting between gasps for oxygen also helps the miles fly by.

The best view of the M25 as we head into the country

The hotel stop for the night was a very welcome break and although I would normally stay around and chat - the finish line for me was not outside the hotel but in the restaurant where I did fortunately find several other people. Apologies to all those healthy sporty types but I really did need those two main course meals and additional snacks to prepare me for Sunday.

Finished 49th out of the 121 people that finished

Day 2

OK challenge for today – get to the end before dark!

That was my main challenge given some of the paths I remembered from the earlier day, to ensure I didn’t get any injuries (falling over in the dark) before my big race in Antarctica. However the huge amounts of food eaten the previous night and at breakfast along with my change of running supplement – to now drink rehydration solutions rather than sickly sweet energy drinks seem to put me in good stead for the day.

So peaceful - apart from all those runners!

Again the weather predictions for today had mentioned rain but the start of the race was again cold but clear sky’s and with the benefit of the now down hill (reversed from Saturday) course it made slightly easier going however the very strong northerly winds meant several runners not really moving as far forward for the same amount of energy they would have used on the previous day.

Mentally these longer events mean severally people dropping out more because they have decided they can’t continue rather than for any physical reason. As such I did have to keep reminding my self that every fresh legged runner with a spring in their step sprinting past me in the first ten miles had probably not completed the previous day – or at least that was what I kept telling myself.

40 plus canal and road bridges into the race and we see
the edge of town 77miles down and 3 to go

While running with one of the more experienced (posh word for really mad) ultra runners I found I could still manage a sprint for the last 100 meters uphill at the end of the second day of 40 miles.

Finished 59th out of the 113 people that finished this day and only 15 minutes longer than it had taken me on the Saturday – so very happy with my result.

Finished 20th out of the 50 people that completed both days