A couple of years ago for reasons that were neither good nor
sensible I entered a 100 mile race. Much to my surprise I enjoyed it and did
quite well. The race in question was the T100, one hundred miles (and a bit)
along the Thames from the Thames Barrier to Streatley. However there was a
problem, it has a big brother, the T184…
When I reached the finish of the T100 my main feeling was
one of great satisfaction at my accomplishment, however as time went on another,
nagging, feeling started to develop - there was another 84 miles to the real
finish, the Source of The Thames. In reality this is quite unfair, the T100 and
the T184 are two separate races that just happen to follow the same route and
start at the same time, however reality has never had a large part to play in
my life and this time was no exception.
I should also mention there is some doubt that the point I was running to is really the Source of the Thames but it has a big stone block there saying it is and I never argue with big stone blocks.
Anyway, whatever the logic, the fact was I had entered the
2019 T184. Another fact was that I was mostly terrified by the idea, sometimes
excited but mostly terrified.
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| I appeared to be going to run quite a long way across England |
Before I even got to the running bit however there was quite a lot of preparation to be done. The T-Series Races are what is generally referred to as unsupported. Actually there is a huge amount of support but you have to carry all the food and equipment you want for the duration of the event with you. There are checkpoints, on average one every 25 miles where you will be given water. There are also a large number of taps en-route from which you can also take water. Due to the expected heatwave we would also be allowed to purchase water if necessary but generally the idea is that you don’t consume anything you haven’t carried from the start apart from water.
I spent a very long time messing around with a new pack and
hydration system and never being quite happy with it. Eventually it dawned on
me that actually I had a fully race proven pack of ideal size in the form of my
20 litre UD Fastpack I used on the MDS. Anyone want to buy a nearly new
rucksack?
I bought some nice new Raidlight bottles as the ones I had
were round and the new ones were curved to fit against the body. The round ones
had been OK on the MDS but I thought (OK Sharon thought) that given how long I
would be continuously wearing my pack anything that even slightly increased comfort
was worth doing - needless to say she was absolutely right.
This gave me 1.6 litres of water capacity. I needed at least
another 400ml to comply with the rules and from my T100 experience at least
another litre would be nice. I also like plenty of accessible pockets and so my
UD waist belt with two 600ml bottles was added to the ensemble. I even managed
to squeeze another pocket onto the belt so I now had 2.8 litres of water
capacity and endless accessible storage. It did make me look like I was wearing
Batman’s utility belt around my waist but you can never have enough
pockets. It would have been nice to have tried all this
out before the race but my fallback position was that the pack had been OK
three years ago and the waist belt could be chucked in the pack if necessary .
I work on the theory that a large number of half-baked plans and vague ideas
can be made to look like a coherent strategy from a suitable distance in a very
bad light.
The nutrition strategy was very simple. I had run the T100 on
nothing but Tailwind and so Tailwind would form the core of my nutrition. The
question was how much would I take? Race rules state 2000 calories per day
should be carried so for the T184 this is 8000 calories or 40 stick packs of
Tailwind. I decided to go for 35 packs of Tailwind plus one and a half stick
packs in each bottle to start. I made up the calorie count with a few bags of
peanuts, some Peperami and a porridge bar. I did check with the race organisers
that having so much of my food as powder was OK but their view on everything
seems to be that we are adults and if we comply with the rules it’s up to us
how we do it - which is a nice way for a race to be.
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| Quite a lot of Tailwind - and a hat |
Compulsory kit was compulsory kit so I won’t bore you with
the details of that. Apart from that my only other significant kit item was a
USB power pack to charge my phone and watch. I had made a particularly neat
cable which allowed me to charge my watch whilst still wearing it. This feat
can only be achieved with the standard charging cable if you are prepared to
drill a hole through your wrist.
Clothing was simple, shorts, compression t-shirt, Little
Baddow Ridge Runners club vest, calf guards and ‘Darn Tough’ socks. Footwear
was On Cloud Stratus road shoes as it had been very dry and I knew a huge
amount of the first 100 miles was on roads anyway. The entire ensemble was
topped off with a Tailwind branded tri-cap they had sent me for free when I
bought a large quantity of white powder stimulant from them - by which I mean
caffeinated Tailwind of course. If viewed from the previously mentioned
distance and bad light I could almost pass as a runner.
Obviously I had a fairly good idea what was to come for the
first 100 miles after completing the T100 in 2017. Whilst I couldn’t actually
get out and recce any of the remaining 84 miles I did spend a lot of time with
Google Earth and an OS map trying to get as familiar as I could with the later
stages and to try and identify those areas where I was likely to get lost. This
was probably ‘all of them’ so I tried not to worry too much and just make sure
I had enough batteries to keep my hand held GPS alive through the event. The
GPS was a last minute addition to my kit on the T100 but without it I would
probably still be trying to get to Streatley two years later. I had downloaded
the T184 route and all the checkpoint locations and was planning on following
the pink line on it for 184 miles to the Stone.
On the subject of checkpoints, on average there is about 25
miles between them on this event. This either means you have to carry enough
water for 25 miles or find some between checkpoints. The alternative to this
blindingly obvious fact is to risk dehydration. Given it was forecast to be
extremely hot, and also the fact that most of my calorific intake was going to
be from drinks, not having enough water would be likely to cause me to DNF in
very short order. One of the other things I had done in terms of preparation
was to read the blogs of some of the T184 alumni. There are many and they are
all better than this one but the one that helped more than any other was the
blog of 2015 winner and course record holder Mark Denby. Mark had reconnoitred
the entire route and found water points (or taps as most people call them)
every 12-15 miles between checkpoints. He had also listed them and described
their locations and distances in his blog. In theory there are plenty of places
to obtain water along the Thames as most of the locks have fresh water taps but
they are not always easy to find and sometimes locked up. I understood that
things may have changed in the intervening four years but I created a small
chart with all the checkpoints, Mark’s water points, distances and pacing for
48 hours and 56 hours which I printed out, sealed with some waterproofing spray
and put under my transparent phone case so it was effectively laminated to the
back of my phone. This was one of the best pieces of preparation I did and I
can’t thank Mark enough for sharing the results of his hard work, although it
did make me feel a bit like I was doing the ‘Standing on the shoulders of
giants’ bit (it’s a quote from Sir Isaac Newton and on the edge of at least
some two pound coins if anyone hadn’t come across it before).
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| Everything I really needed to know during the race - Thanks Mark |
Anyway back to the race - except we haven’t even got to the
start yet. With a 10:30 am start time I had ample time to travel to the Thames
Barrier from Chelmsford on Friday morning. I decided to travel early to avoid
the worst of the commuter traffic. This would give me plenty of time for
breakfast and I had already picked out the ‘Valley Café’ outside Charlton
station as a possible source of my last meal. Bacon, egg, sausage, baked beans,
a truly awesome fried slice and a mug of surprisingly passable coffee cost a
mere £4.90 and went down a treat. Just a short walk to the start during which
my phone rang…
Sharon has recently had some scans and was awaiting the
results. When I saw it was her calling I didn’t think she was just going to
wish me luck. However as usual I failed to answer the phone and had to somewhat
nervously call her back. Yes she had spoken to her doctor and all tests were
negative! So far I couldn’t really fault Friday, the journey to Charlton had
been so smooth I haven’t even bother to try and make a joke about it, breakfast
was great and my wife has been given a clean bill of health. It was a very
happy and positive feeling Colin that turned up at the race start to check in.
Unfortunately none of this had suddenly improved my sense of humour; the best I
could manage was ‘is this where I register for the 1.84 mile fun run?’ Liz
(Fretwell, Race Organiser) tried to smile but we both knew it was a pity smile,
not one borne out of any actual amusement. I was given a number and some
paperwork and waited for my turn at the kit check.
Kit check went very smoothly, mainly because for the first
time ever I actually knew where I had put each item of kit. Usually I have a
few items I’m planning on using and a load of stuff that the organisers make me
take and so I only know where the kit I’m going to use is. On this race I was
fully aware I could need any and all of my kit so I had gone to some lengths to
try and pack it logically and remember where each item was. By Saturday night I
would be tired and functioning even less well than normal, a frightening
thought given I can’t usually find anything more than 30 seconds after I put it
down at the best of times. The only thing I had pushed to the bottom of the
pack was my map. If I was down to using that for navigation it would be game
over and ‘can someone please come and get me from Birmingham - yes I know it’s
the Grand Union Canal and not the Thames now…’
kind of scenario and since a bivvy bag was a compulsory kit item I was unlikely
to try and sleep under it.
To anyone that is still reading - why? But thank you for
persevering we are almost at the start of the race. The only other things to
mention was that I had a very useful chat with Al Cormack, who was on his fifth
T184 and that my favourite photographer Ben Lumley was at the start as he would
be the official race photographer. Ben is my favourite photographer for two
reasons, firstly his pictures are amazing (many of them are illustrating this
blog) and secondly he has photographed two races I’d previously run and I’d won
both of them - would it be three out of three? It seemed far too soon to be
worrying about position, my main aim was to try and finish before Sunday night
as I wasn’t sure that mentally I would be able to face a third night out there.
Ben also had purple and orange tape on his camera gear which was apparently
some kind of clever photographer thing to colour code his lenses (I think,
photography is an art form I know even less about than some other art forms).
However it’s also the colours of Little Baddow Ridge Runners and so I was
taking it as a good omen.
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| The race briefing (© Ben Lumley Photography) |
OK, it’s time to ‘reward’ those of you that haven’t got
bored with the massive preamble and start talking about the race. Gareth gave a
short race briefing in which he reiterated that the race was along the Thames and that there was no
necessity at any point to actually be in
the Thames, and then we were taken to the start line - actually two lines with
the word ‘START’ between them in multi-coloured chalk. At 10:30am we were off!
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| Somehow I had hoped for something more impressive (© Ben Lumley Photography) |
Shortly after the word ‘START’ the word ‘FINISH’ had also
been chalked on the path, followed by the words ‘Only Joking’. Suddenly my ‘1.84 mile fun run’ ‘joke’ didn’t
seem so bad after all.
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| That's more like a Start Line! (© Ben Lumley Photography) |
The T100 and the T184 start together and you would expect at
least some of the T100 runners to set off quickly and this was indeed the case.
I set off in my traditional style of far too fast and became part of a group of
three running behind the lead group. Sebastian was a T100 runner and Alex was a
fellow T184 runner. I had picked out Alex as a potential winner at the start,
he looked quietly confident and his equipment, whilst nothing special, had the
look of kit that had been well used and was fully race proven - unlike some of
mine…
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| And we are off! (© Ben Lumley Photography) |
We stayed together for the first part of the race (during
which I managed to run past the Greenwich foot tunnel whilst taking a
photograph of the Cutty Sark).
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| Not the best picture of the Cutty Sark and I went the wrong way... |
We stayed together to the first water point but by Fulham
they had left me behind. Although some development work was being done around
Craven Cottage the tap I remembered in the park was still there so I stopped to
drink and pour some water on my head.
What happens at the start of the race is one of those areas I need to
work on from a mental point of view. I usually run 50km trail races and so I’m
conscious of my position in the race from very early on and have a good idea of
who I will see later and who will leave me behind. When you are going to run
184 miles and take two days to do it, you really can’t read anything into what
happens in the first three hours. However I was already wondering if I would
see Alex again before the Stone.
That question was answered at the first checkpoint where,
much to my surprise, I caught up with Alex. He appeared to be sorting out his kit
and so I filled my water bottles and set out down Brentford High Street having
been given the instruction ‘turn left into Syon Park’ by the ever awesome
marshals. I had also had my tracker changed, which caused some concern to those
following my dot on the web and on the app as I appeared to stop at the first
checkpoint.
As I ran along Brentford High Street I thought I’d post a
quick update on Facebook, just to let everyone know things were going OK so
far. I pressed ‘Post’, looked at my GPS, turned round, ran back to the entrance
to Syon Park… When you have people rooting for you back home and following your
dot it’s nice to post the occasional progress update but really going in the
right direction should take precedence over all other activities. Anyway as I
entered the park I saw Alex a few hundred metres ahead of me. He didn’t appear
to be going any quicker than me so I thought I’d catch him up and see if he
would respond if I passed him. No, of course he didn’t, it’s only me that
behaves like a dog chasing a dustcart when someone passes me, everyone else is
far more sensible. As it turned out Alex would pull out before the next
checkpoint but I wouldn’t find that out until Saturday evening and so would be
wondering where he was for some miles to come.
I passed Sebastian some time later, he also would soon withdraw.
At Hampton Court the first of several memorable encounters
occurred. I’ve raced against Tim Haughton in many XNRG events and he has always
been most supportive. He lives in the Hampton Court area and had previously
asked when I thought I would be in the vicinity. As I approached the Great Vine
(apparently) Tim was there with a huge smile and many words of encouragement. I
took the opportunity to take a walking break as it was getting quite hot and
walked and chatted with Tim until we crossed Hampton Court Bridge at which
point he bade me farewell, wished me luck for the rest of the race, and told me
he would be watching my progress with interest.
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| Running or about to be run over? Hard to tell (© Tim Haughton) |
Shortly after the bridge is Moseley Lock. I recognised the
toilets from the T100 and again stopped for relief and to replenish some of my
water. I hadn’t really planned to take water here, the next water stop on my
(Mark’s) agenda was at Sunbury Lock but it was a very hot day and it didn’t
seem wise to turn down any opportunity to refill my bottles.
At this point everything was going well. I reached Sunbury
Lock and found the tap right where Mark had said it would be. It was here I
made my first error. When I ran the T100 I was completely out of water by
Checkpoint 2. Today was much hotter and here was an opportunity to completely
fill all my bottles - so why did I only refill two of them and leave the other
two half full? With over 6 miles to go to the second checkpoint I was getting
low on water and with over 3 miles to go I was completely out. I also don’t
remember going wrong at Staines but I’m following my GPS track as I write this
and something odd appears to have happened there…
On the T100 I ran into Old Windsor on the pavement by the
road rather than on the Thames Path. This was mainly due to trying to pretend
it wasn’t dark and not wanting to get my head torch out until I reached the
second checkpoint. The result was that I almost ran straight past the
checkpoint. This time I was there slightly earlier so it wasn’t dark, and I
knew the path was there, so I actually ran into the checkpoint from the Thames
Path as was intended. I was told I was the second runner through; the only
person ahead of me was Spencer Bunn, the current leader of the T100. I realise
that could be interpreted as a truly terrible ‘currant bun’ style ‘joke’ but it
was entirely unintentional.
On the T100 I had filled up an additional litre water bottle
at this checkpoint so I didn’t have to look for water in the night. I had the
bottle with me but I made the decision not to fill it. My main bottles held 2.8
litres of water as opposed to the 2.4 litres on the T100 and I also had some
hope of finding a tap near a church in 14.6 miles. Even if I didn’t I thought
2.8 litres would be just about enough, especially as I had a good drink at the
checkpoint to make up for the lack of water towards the end of the leg.
Once again I had trouble finding where the path went back to
the river after crossing the Albert Bridge at South Lea but I regained the path
and started to see the occasional flash of a light ahead of me. After a while I
realised it was Spencer. I caught up with him and he told me he wasn’t feeling
great. I told him that maybe he would start to feel better as the sun had gone
down and things were cooling off but unfortunately he didn’t and dropped out
sometime after. I was now in front of all the other T184 and T100 runners on
the road, the big question was, had I gone out too hard and was I destined for
a big fall at some point later?
I quite like running through Windsor as it always seems to
have a nice vibe at the time I go through. Maidenhead worries me a little more
just because it’s a bit later but apart from a few fishermen I didn’t see
anyone there and everything was fine.
At Cookham I realised the church was the one Mark had
indicated as a water stop, ‘on brick building behind church’. I didn’t really
want to be skulking round a churchyard at midnight but the Thames Path goes
right through the churchyard and the church is impressively lit, so much so
that I had no problem spotting the brick building or finding the tap on it.
Even better, a conveniently placed bench fully illuminated by the lights meant
I could easily add the Tailwind to my bottles.
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| A lovely church but what I liked best about it was the lights |
My new head torch was very comfortable but unfortunately it
doesn’t deliver a constant level of illumination as the batteries run down. By
Aston it was too dim to run by and I was using my back-up torch (actually the
one I used on the T100) as my main source of illumination. The Flowerpot Hotel
appears to be the sum total of buildings in Aston but it does have a convenient
outside light I could change my torch batteries by. It also has a dog that
barked through the whole operation, great guard dog but not so much use if no
one else is interested - fortunately.
With new batteries in the torch I was able to push on
through the night. It was surprisingly misty at times and there was a lot of
moisture around, however I reached Checkpoint Three without any incident - not
that I can remember anyway. It was here that I found Ben trying to get some
sleep in the camper van at the checkpoint before I turned up and woke him up. I
refilled my bottles and added double Tailwind to them as I wanted to make sure
my energy levels were maintained and I was drinking less in the cool of the
night. The marshal (sorry, one time I will do a race and actually take the
trouble to find out the names of the great people that look after me) showed me
the gap to second place on the tracker, which looked like between one and two
hours, decent but not enough that I could afford to be complacent if I wanted
to win. Apart from anything else there was still over a hundred miles to go to
the stone. I left the checkpoint and left Ben to hopefully get some sleep
before the next runner came through.
Leg 4 is the shortest leg of the T100 at a mere 20
miles, only the last two legs of the T184 are shorter. It also includes the only two hills of note on either of the races and
it includes the Reading Festival. Those who have had the misfortune to read my
T100 blog or to have had me tell them the story personally will know that I had
some trouble with the Reading Festival on the T100, as the organisers close the
Thames Path overnight until 6am. Last time I had to double back from the
closure and be given directions as to how to divert around said closure. As I
came into Reading I looked at the time, 4am. I knew there was no point trying
to get along the path so I took the previously used detour as soon as I came to
the appropriate point in Reading. It took a couple of minutes of staring at the
GPS and corresponding roads to make sure I was on the right route but once I
was sure I was on the right road following it to Tilehurst Station was
straightforward and lead to me being reunited with the Thames Path. In case
anyone is wondering whether I may have actually gained a sneaky advantage,
according to my map measurements the detour is actually slightly longer than
the official path but only by around 0.25 miles so in the grand scheme of the
T184 it was negligible – I added more than that to my run with my
self-inflicted detours at the Greenwich foot tunnel and Syon Park (these
weren’t the only errors in London either but they were the most stupid).
Anyway the Reading Festival had now been successfully
avoided and I was back on the Thames Path. This is obviously a good thing from
the point of view of actually being on track and going the right way but the
path almost immediately climbs up through a housing estate before descending
back to the Thames - this is the first of the ‘hills’. I didn’t really mind
though as the day was starting to dawn and I was only 10 miles or so from the
next checkpoint.
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One of the benefits of running all night is that you get to see the sun rise
(possibly the only benefit if I'm honest) |
The hills come fast and furious on the T100/T184. Well, the
second hill is less than 3 miles from the first one anyway. At Whitchurch on
Thames the path turns 90 degrees away from the river and climbs through the
village until it eventually becomes a really pleasant undulating path through
some woodland which has an overall downhill kind of inclination eventually
returning to the bank of the Thames. My crib sheet indicated that there was
another tap on the corner of an activity centre 15.4 miles after Checkpoint 3
but as this leg was ‘only’ 20 miles and I had run most of it in the cool of the
night I had sufficient in my bottles to comfortably complete it without any
intermediate stops.
Another couple of miles running saw me arrive at Streatley
where Jerry Hunter met me. Jerry is the only marshal whose name I actually knew
so at Checkpoint 4 there were two marshals, Jerry and Not Jerry. Sorry Not
Jerry for not knowing your name.
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Given I could see the checkpoint from here and Jerry is waving at me,
it's hard to work out why I was staring at the GPS so intently... |
I had arrived at Checkpoint 4, the end of the T100 about 10
minutes ahead of my time for said event in 2017. I don’t believe I was running
any faster, I saved between 20 and 30 minutes by making an executive decision
about my route round Reading rather than going to chat to a security guard in a
deckchair before diverting. However given I still had 84 miles to go some may
have been questioning whether I should have slowed down more – especially as I
was ahead of all the T100 runners too. I felt I had been running at a
comfortable pace, I had taken plenty of walking breaks and tried to keep my
energy levels up with regular doses of Tailwind so as far as I knew I was in
good shape for the remaining 84 miles. However given that Streatley marked just
about exactly the furthest I had even run before I had nothing to base this
assertion on other than hope. Oh well, off I go into the unknown…
The next leg was the longest at 30 miles. If you told most
people you were entering a race and it was 30 miles long with no checkpoints
they would probably think that was fairly hardcore. I think in many ways the
fact that just one stage of the T184 would be a serious ultra on its own – and
you have to run 100 miles to get to the start of it – really says a lot about
what a challenging event it is. Unfortunately my crib sheet just said ‘Tap 15’
as my intermediate point as Mark had lost his notes but I wasn’t too worried as
I expected to complete this leg entirely in daylight and was fairly confident I
could find water on the way. What else I would find on this leg was far less
expected…
At Wallingford the Thames Path leaves the riverbank for a
while and goes slightly through the town, along Thames Street appropriately
enough, before crossing the High Street and turning down a short lane where you
turn a corner back onto the bank of the river… and see a Little Baddow Ridge
Runners vest in front of you. To be clear, it is unlikely that anyone else
running the T184 will have the last part of that experience but once I had
stopped staring at the vest I realised Megan was inside it and Charlotte was
standing next to her, both of them grinning ear to ear.
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| Surprise! |
Although I had been posting updates on Facebook I hadn’t
been able to read all the comments or I might have known they were in the area
(on a houseboat, for reasons I’m not entirely clear about) and had decided this
was a perfect spot to ambush me. I have never been more delighted to be
ambushed than at that moment. We had a chat, took some pictures and I set off
again with my spirits massively lifted.
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| A thorn between two roses |
This leg turned out to be a great one for meeting people.
About 10 miles later I met Julie and Nicki, two lovely ladies I‘d never met
before but who were very interested in the event and who took the trouble to
find me on Facebook afterwards to send me a congratulatory message. With all
the mad, bad things going on in the world is great to know that there are some
people out there who will be supportive and positive without looking for what’s
in it for themselves, thanks ladies.
Shortly after I arrived at ‘Tap 15’. It turned out to be at
Clifton Lock, the lock had a lock keeper on duty who was only too happy to
direct me to the tap and tell me to let it run for 30 seconds before filling my
bottles. Needless to say I didn’t waste the 30 seconds of water and washed my
hands and splashed myself with water until I could fill my bottles and add the
next doses of Tailwind.
The most completely unexpected, random, amazing encounter
occurred a few miles further on at Abingdon. It was nice sunny afternoon and so
there were many people enjoying the river. The path was wide and I was having
no problem avoiding them as I jogged on until a lady turned to me and said ‘Are
you Colin?’ Yes, but who was this, possibly a friend of someone that was
tracking me? No, it was Kim. When Sharon and myself went to New Zealand one of
our activities was a boat trip around the Bay of Islands. We shared the boat
with (amongst others) Kim and her family, New Zealand residents but originally
from Essex. We kept in touch for a while but had unfortunately lost contact
until this very unlikely meeting on the banks of the Thames! We had a chat, I
told her what I was doing and continued onward.
As the day wore on the temperature continued to rise. There
was no shade and no breeze and so I was reduced to walking for much of the
time. The walking was taking its toll on my feet and they were becoming quite
sore. It was at this point that my lack of experience with sore feet became
apparent. What I should have done was to stop, take my shoes and socks off and
let my feet air for a while until the skin dried out a bit and became less
prune like. What I actually did was wrap tape around them to try and protect
them a bit. By the time I got to Checkpoint 5 at Oxford they were starting to
blister and I knew that the final 54 miles were going to be a slow painful walk
to the finish.
However Checkpoint 5 had a number of marshals at it (none of
whom I can name, sorry guys) all of whom were amazingly supportive and wished
me luck for the rest of the race. As the sun started to set I realised I was
broken. I also realised that although I was broken there was no reason not to
finish the race. Yes, it was going to hurt – a lot – but I wasn’t doing myself
any permanent damage and the pain wasn’t completely debilitating, just annoying
and reducing my love of life. The next 16 or so hours were going to test me
like I had never been tested before but I was fairly sure that with the immense
support I had from the people following my dot and my sheer bloody- mindedness
I would kiss that stone. Just before the sun set I looked down and saw a couple
of field mice playing in the grass. I’ve never seen a field mouse before and
whilst in may seem an unimportant event its things like that that just make
life better, especially when your feet hurt.
The intermediate water point was at Northmoor Lock. I think
I got there in the daylight and I have a vague memory of a fairly obvious tap
from which I filled my bottles.
I’m not entirely sure that the farmers around Oxford and
beyond are big fans of the Thames Path. Anywhere it goes through a field it
seemed to be either overgrown or full of cows. I crossed into a field and saw
the most bizarre sight. There appeared to be a whole bunch of people in weird
glowing costumes with strange green eyes moving around the field. After I
stared at them for a minute or two wondering what kind of strange cult I had
stumbled upon before my brain finally worked out they were cows. The eyes were
reflecting in my head torch, the white markings were almost glowing, while the
black parts almost vanished (they were Friesians). Unfortunately my staring had
somewhat attracted their attention and I had to take a slightly circuitous
route around them to avoid exciting them further.
About a mile out from my next checkpoint I saw a group of
people sitting having a picnic, probably a drink or two, I don’t know. 99% of
people are absolutely fine but unfortunately I am always aware of the 1% and so
I tried to walk past without attracting attention to myself. Equally when a
friendly sounding ‘Good Evening’ came out of the gloom I responded in kind. I
then had a chat with a group of people I couldn’t see, explained what I was
doing, explained why the offer of a Snickers Bar was much appreciated but I
couldn’t take it (my refusal was thoroughly approved of by one member of the
group at least) and went on with their good wishes accompanying me along with
the information that the pub was about a mile away.
The pub seemed to have huge camping grounds and some sort of
festival going on. I was less than popular with those heading back to their
tents as I was walking towards them and blinding them with my head torch.
Fortunately I quickly came to an oasis of (relative) calm in amongst the
mayhem, Checkpoint 6, only one more checkpoint before the finish! I was offered
the opportunity to lay down for a while but I felt that I was so near to the
finish I just wanted to keep going. When you are running an ultra it frequently
takes on its own reality into which occasionally real reality intrudes. It was
at this point that the real world enquired at what point did my reality get so
messed up that I was excited that there was ’only’ 29 miles to go? Anyway I
left the checkpoint to take on the shortest leg of the T184.
It may have been the shortest leg but it was also the
hardest and the one that came closest to breaking me. It was entirely in the
dark and so I only have a series of impressions of most of it. A lot of it
seemed to involve following a narrow rough path between an electric fence and
some bushes beyond which I guessed was the river. I didn’t know, I didn’t care,
one foot in front of the other, slowly painfully, just keep going. Gates, so
many gates on this run. Pairs of gates with wooden bridges between them with
impossible steps or no steps at all onto the bridge. Tracks through grass,
losing tracks through grass. To be fair other stages had had most of these
things but by now it was hard to do anything more than just keep moving
forward. At one point I was convinced I was going round in circles and when I’d
done 13 miles someone would come and fetch me and take me to the next stage.
At Inglesham, just past Lechlade the Thames Path had been
improved. It used to follow the A361 for a while, a fairly fast main road. I
knew there was a permanent diversion, unfortunately my GPS didn’t (nor did my
map, had I got that desperate).
Fortunately there was a sign warning me of an impending footpath
diversion, unfortunately I missed the actual diversion. I could see where the
path used to go onto the road but I really didn’t want to go that way. This was
another one of those moments where I have to thank someone else. Chris Prevett had recced the new path and
posted some pictures in the T-Series Racing Facebook group. I thought the fence down the edge of the
field I was in looked a bit like one in his pictures and so I followed it until
I came to the diversion. Once I was on the diversion it was well signposted. To
be honest the first bit was probably signposted too but when you are tired and
its dark anything less than 20 foot high flashing neon sign saying ‘Thames Path
- This Way’ is likely to be missed.
I followed the path to the final Checkpoint at Castle Eaton
but before I get there I would like to say a word about hallucinations. I
haven’t mentioned them so far but the second night was full of them. On the
first night I only had a couple through Reading, as on the T100 everything was
people. Interestingly one was the same litter bin as on the T100 and two men
dancing in fluorescent jackets were actually two posts with reflectors on them
when I got closer. On the second night I saw people at every gate and across
every field. Along some sections I was convinced there were rows of office
blocks and factories just beyond the trees (there weren’t) and at one point I
was convinced I was in Spain. Fortunately when this happens about 20% (maybe
less, could be only 10%) remains rational. In my mind it’s a small part at the
back on the right. Anyway what this means is that I can kind of enjoy the hallucinations
because I retain enough of a sense of reality that they don’t become
overwhelming. People in my hallucinations make no noise, that’s how I know they
are not real.
The reason for mentioning hallucinations here is because
Castle Eaton was going to test me like nothing else. It is about 4 ‘o’ clock in
the morning and I am seeing people everywhere and I walk into a village
holding….. a scarecrow festival. I now really have no idea what’s going on,
cars have started rolling backwards too, that was new one. The rational part of
my brain worked out that only the scarecrows had numbers so if it had a number
it was probably real. The jesters on the ‘Pick and Mix’ stall were entirely
mine (a bush and a line of litter bins on closer inspection) but generally I
was so confused that when Liz approached me at the checkpoint I stared very
hard at her and said ‘Oh good, you’re real’. She laughed at me and enquired if
I was hallucinating yet – yes thanks. I filled my bottles for the last time and
hobbled off into the dark to take on the last 16 mile stage of the 2019 T184.
Actually I got about 200 yards down the road and stopped to
take a large dose of painkillers and caffeine tablets to try and keep me going
for the last push.
The Thames got narrower, the sky got brighter, I got slower.
I went through Ashton Keynes into the water park. I tried to sleep and walk
through the water park, it didn’t work. Everywhere felt uphill, I felt so slow
I wasn’t sure I would ever get there. Eventually I had to have a word with myself
and tell myself to stop looking at my watch all the time. I was crossing a lot
of fields by now. My strategy was that I would pick my route across the field
to the next gate and then I wasn’t allowed to stop or look at my watch until I
got there, then do the same again.
 |
I posted this on Facebook just to let people know I was still going and on the final leg
- I hadn't even noticed it was tempting me to go to the pub,
I must have been in worse state than I thought! |
As you may have realised there were a number of points on
this journey where things just happened that lifted me a crucial points,
friends, strangers, sunrises, sunsets, field mice, taps, they all gave me a
positive boost. I was about 5 miles from the finish and hurting a lot when I
met Dorothy and her husband running along the path. They stopped to chat, told
me how well I was doing and wished me luck for the last few miles. Dorothy was
another one that looked me up on Facebook and sent me a very nice message
afterwards.
Now it was just a case of left foot, right foot, breathe to
the end. Actually another of my friends had sent me a link before the race to an article about
Cliff Young, a man that won the Sydney to Melbourne ultra at the age of 61
because he just kept shuffling along while the other competitors slept. I
decided that as I was already doing the not sleeping bit maybe shuffling would
preserve my feet a little longer so I deliberately shuffled across the fields
until I reached the A433. This is a totally straight single carriageway road
along which the average speed appeared to be about 370miles per hour. My top
speed by now was about 370 feet per fortnight. I had to judge my road crossing
carefully but I made it.
 |
| Has anyone seen this sign? I can't find it... (© Ben Lumley Photography) |
I had looked at the finish quite a lot on Google Earth as
people had said it wasn’t as obvious as one might hope. I thought it was at the
back of the field against a barbed wire fence. Looking across the field all I
could see was a dry stone wall, no blocks of stone, no welcoming committee.
Maybe there was no welcoming committee, maybe finding the Stone was part of the
challenge. My GPS told me I was in the wrong place but by now I was having
trouble interpreting where it wanted me to go. This was my final moment
involving random strangers. A couple approached me and said ‘are you the
Running Man?’ I replied I was more of a hobbling man but I was probably the one
they were talking about. They kindly pointed me to a gate in the wall and told
me to go past the cows and I would be there. I thanked them profusely and went
through the gate - I could see the finish!
 |
| Trying to look good at the finish (© Ben Lumley Photography) |
I also couldn’t be bothered to walk round the cows so I just
shouted at them a bit and they moved. Then, just because I hate to walk over
the finish line of a race, I gritted my teeth and used the last reserves of
mental energy I had to run up to the Stone. I touched it, I kissed it, I kicked
it for being so bloody far away, then I kissed it again.
 |
| Finished! (© Ben Lumley Photography) |
 |
| Never has a block of stone looked so good (© Ben Lumley Photography) |
 |
| I needed this (© Ben Lumley Photography) |
 |
| Artistic or what? Great picture Ben (© Ben Lumley Photography) |
 |
| Trying to look cool and composed |
Liz gave me a medal and a hug, Ben took some photos for me
on my phone (he’s quite good with most cameras) and they took me back down the
hill to the Thames Head pub. On the way down Sharon came running up, she had
been stuck in Bank Holiday traffic and so - as is traditional - had missed me
finishing the race but it was still wonderful to see her again.
 |
| I really needed this (© Ben Lumley Photography) |
Once down at the pub I sat down outside Liz and Gareth’s
motor home and was fed sausage rolls, pork pies, cocktails sausages, tea, beer
and wine. I was offered ‘proper’ food but I love junk and after two days of
Tailwind and one packet of peanuts something solid, savoury, and fatty was just
heaven.
 |
| I really, really, really needed this |
We sat and chatted for a while, I was given a trophy and a
t-shirt and eventually we said our goodbyes and left for the Premier Inn
Cirencester, where I bathed, Sharon bandaged my feet and I hobbled down for my
first meal in over two days - and some wine. At about 10:30 I went to bed and
slept for the first time in over two and a half days (about 64 hours in fact).
Sore, tired but also the winner of the 2019 T184, and that will last long after
the soreness and tiredness has gone.
Epilogue
So one question I’ve been asked a lot is ‘would you do it
again?’ My first thought had been no, just because it had come so close to
breaking me I didn’t want to think I could go back and ‘tame’ the race. However
since then my answer is probably yes. You can’t ‘tame’ the T184 but I can learn
from my mistakes. The biggest one was my feet. I’m not used to being on them
for long enough to actually have to worry about them usually. Even on the Stour
Valley path 100km when an unwise shoe choice left me with bleeding ankles and
blistered heels I wasn’t running for long enough for it to be totally
debilitating. Obviously I can’t do better in terms of finishing position on the
T184. I may not be able to be any quicker; if I could have run more would I
have been walking at the end due to sheer exhaustion? Who knows? Having walked
so much I was quite fresh from a cardio vascular point of view at the end.
However I don’t judge my races on speed or finish position but on how ‘right’ I
get it and on that basis I can’t really give myself much more than seven out of
ten for this race - 50 odd miles on blisters due to bad foot management is not
a good result.
However a far more important reason for doing it again is
that it is a great race, well supported and superbly organised. Yes it is
tough, I’ve done the Marathon Des Sables twice and I would say the T184 is
tougher. However everyone involved in the race wants you to succeed. No one
listened to my complaints about my blisters, they just told me how great I was
and sent me off to the next checkpoint. I’m sure if I had been genuinely
injured they would have pulled me out but while I was still moving everyone was
willing me on.
People also keep asking me why I do these events and when I think
of the reasons they all come down to the same thing - to learn. On this event I
learnt that it is important to look after your feet. I learnt I can run 184
miles even if the last 50 were mainly walking. I learned I can go to some very
dark and difficult places in my mind and I don’t break. I even learnt I can go
64 hours without sleep - which was a big surprise as at work I have trouble
staying awake for 64 minutes. However the most amazing and humbling thing I
learnt was the amount of support I have for these ventures. When I posted the
tracking links I honestly expected maybe 5 people would follow me fairly
closely and another 5 to 10 would have a look. I don’t know exactly how many
people followed me all the way through but the number of comments and posts I
saw afterwards on Facebook was truly overwhelming. Add to that people coming
out to support me and even people I met on the way taking the trouble to find
me and message me afterwards and I realise how lucky I am to be able to do this
with that level of support. When things were hard and I was hurting I thought
about all of the people following me and thought ‘I can’t give up because I
couldn’t look those people in the eye and claim I’d done my best’. I know no
one would have criticised me if I had dropped out but that made it all the more
important to give it my best shot, not stop just because it hurt a bit. People
say ultra-running is 90% mental and 10% in your head, the further you go the
more true this becomes.
Anyway if you followed me through the race and have managed
to read to the end of this blog I’ve taken more than enough of your time. If
you’ve read this blog because you are thinking of doing the T184 then go for
it, it’s a doddle after the feat of endurance you’ve just completed.
Final words (honestly), to Sharon and everyone that
supported me, the win is for all of you, because without you it wouldn’t have
happened, thank you.
