3. The One Where My Feet Got Wet

26 July 2015

This was my first ever back to back run!  In honor of the same, I decided that it would be sensible to do a 10 kilometre run, a little shorter than I have been doing.  I had to meet my lovely friend Sarah and her GORGEOUS nine-month-old twins for lunch, so I was restricted to running in London, and I thought it would be sensible to use my second home gym to shower in so that I could get up a little later, but the only problem was that my gym is on Strand which is flat as a pancake and full of people to boot.  

However, a little visit to GoogleMaps soon sorted that out - I could run to Primrose Hill and run back and it was exactly 10 kilometres, plus it was uphill on the way there and downhill on the way back.  Perfect!

One thing I hadn't banked on was the weather - it was POURING.  Real, proper, horrible, cold, wet rain ... however, on the basis that there is a chance that in October in England it might, in fact, rain on me on the ultra, I set off anyway (I'm so hench).

All I can say about this run route is NEVER AGAIN!!  The route looks fabulous on paper - basically straight up and then straight down - but in practice it's horrendous.  Even at 10:00 on a Sunday morning the roads were rammed full of people (and in the rain, all of them had umbrellas up so they took up the entire footpath and I couldn't avoid them).  Worse though is the enormous number of cross-streets - London is full of them!  This meant that I couldn't get a good rhythm going because I couldn't run more than 200 metres without stopping to cross a road (which had it's benefits, I must say, but still ...).  Once I got over Marylebone Road it was better, but I still wouldn't do that route again.  I didn't take any pictures because the weather was too horrific, but this is what my feet looked like afterwards - bloody soaking!



On the upside, it was exactly the distance I wanted to run (once I'd looped Strand a little bit at the end) and it served its purpose.  So not all bad!  Plus I got to eat a delicious Pad Thai with Sarah in the Selfridges food court and not feel guilty and that is definitely the right thing on a Sunday afternoon!

2. The One Where I Ran Around A Field

25 July 2015

Since I had a BBQ to go to in the afternoon in Harpenden, I decided to get up there to avoid the hideous traffic that Saturdays bring and do my next training run near the closest Virgin Active to Harpenden.  This turned out to be Hemel Hempsted.  Despite extensive - some might say excessive - googling, I couldn't find any massively inspiring runs, so I decided to ask the receptionist at Virgin when I got there.

Fuelled by some Oatso Simple and a handful of raisins, I got to Virgin Hemel Hempsted about 09:30.  By the time I'd interrogated the poor receptionist with my list of demands ("I want to run somewhere for about two hours, preferably quite pretty, with some hills, and in an ideal world off road please") it was 10:00.  The receptionist had directed me to a "field" which, in the face of my raised left eyebrow and general air of skepticism, she assured me was really nice.  She also assured me that despite GoogleMaps saying that it was a good fifty minute walk away, it was in fact just over the road.

Not massively convinced, I set off anyway since I hadn't got any better ideas.  The first piece of good news was that GoogleMaps had indeed been drunk (as seems usual these days, even on a Saturday morning) and the field in question was only ten minutes away.  The second piece of good news was that they do not make fields in the country like they do in London - it was enormous!!!!  In London that'd be an entire common!


The aim of the day was to go at least 15 kilometres and preferably 20.  However, I was constrained by time because I had to be changed and at the BBQ by 13:30 latest, so I only had a couple of hours.  In the event, I tottered around the "field" six times which, together with the runs there and back, came to 18 kilometres.  It was all off road, which was perfect, except for the runs there and back, and was perfect for me for the day - undulating but not massively hilly.  It was also full of the most gorgeous dogs, butterflies, birds and flowers, and I absolutely loved it.  I did find the run itself incredibly hard, as I was shattered (probably I hadn't quite recovered from the run the week before) but I at least managed to enjoy it (and to scarf another Bounty Bar, which gave me an impressive boost of energy for the last two rounds of the field).

After the run it was straight off to the BBQ, a few drinks and more to the point, another burger.  The post-run burger is definitely a winner - can't go wrong!

Distance:  18km

Terrain:    Off road

Profile:     Undulating 

1. The One Where It All Began

18 July 2015

My "friend" (her status is currently vulnerable) sent me a link to the Atlantic Coast Challenge a good few months ago as a joke.  At the time I goggled incredulously at the screen and binned the email before it could contaminate my lovely unhealthy inbox, but I wasn't able to stop thinking about it.  In fact, I bored people rigid for a good couple of months dithering about whether I might be interested in doing it.  It was like I was possessed by this race that I wasn't even interested in doing.

After going to Geneva for the weekend to watch friends racing the European Triathlon Union championships, however, I was entirely inspired.  The age groupers racing the champs are amazing and they manage to fit in all the challenges of training around work and socialising, and I realised that if they could do it, there was a fighting - albeit probably losing - chance that I could also fit in training and actually do this thing.  The final test, however, was to do a cliff-top run and see how I coped.  After a fair amount of googling from the comfort of my sofa, I decided that Seaford to Eastbourne was just the ticket - about 21km along the coast over the Cuckold Mere, the Seven Sisters and Beachy Head.  No matter that the furthest I've run this year was two 10 kilometre races over two of the flattest courses known to mankind (and they almost finished me off), I decided that this was the perfect distance and terrain for a test training run.

Getting to Seaford from London was at least super-easy - fast train to Brighton and then a slower train over to Seaford.  I scarfed a Pret porridge on the train down to fuel up, and arrived in Seaford about 09:00.  I was ready to run at 09:30, having popped to Morrisons for a nutritious Bounty Bar to take with me and - more crucially - found a loo.  Seaford is super-cute, like a totally cliche'd British seaside town, complete with brightly colored huts and a broad promenade.  However, it's a very very short way along the promenade before Cuckold Mere pops up, so by the time I'd stopped for a quick pic it was time to go straight up my first hill.  I'd already decided that my strategy was to jog as far up the hills as far as I could, then walk the rest, and run the flats and downhills.  That way I could try and conserve some energy, since I really didn't know how fast or far I could go.

  

The strategy worked well - helped out by fairly constant stops for photos, since the scenery was absolutely stunning.  It's the most gorgeous piece of coast, and I was so lucky to have an absolutely stunning summer's day to do it on as well.  I trotted over Cuckold Mere in fairly good time, and hit the pebbliest of pebble beaches at the bottom - I love pebble beaches but this was definitely an anklebreaker to run on!


There was also a stretch of water leading down to the sea with no massively obvious bridge over it, so with a bit of good old Kiwi ingenuity my shoes came off and I waded over the stream.  It was not what you would call warm, this being Britain and all - but it was definitely refreshing!!

Once I'd navigated that, it was back to the boulders pebbles and then straight up the first of the Seven Sisters.

The Seven Sisters were AMAZING.  They're so steep but they're rolling up and down so just as I felt that I couldn't go up any more, I'd hit the top and then have a lovely run down.  I could use the momentum from the downhill to trot up the first bit of the next hill, then slowed to a walk to repeat the same pattern again.  It seemed like hardly any time before I got to Birling Gap, a teeny tiny little village nestled at the foot of Beachy Head, the highest cliff I had to climb at all.  This has a lovely cafe, which was the perfect pitstop for some new water and another loo break.  After that, it was up Beachy Head!

Beachy Head is even lovelier than the rest of the Seven Sisters, partly because it's higher (I did not necessarily appreciate that at the time) and partly because you have the view back across the Seven Sisters to appreciate as you go.  I was going a little more slowly by now, but I loved it up there and my Bounty Bar soon revived me.

After even more photos, I ran down the other side and found myself in Eastbourne, which felt unexpectedly quick.  Eastbourne is like something out of a Miss Marple - so genteel.  I am not sure I fitted in, what with my sweatsoaked hair and porn star breathing (Eastbourne is flat, so I ran rather than walked the last part), but I styled it out and headed to the station in time to get my train back to Seaford for lunch.

Seaford has some cute cafes and what I felt as though I really needed in my life was a celebratory burger and fries.  Luckily I found a lovely hippie cafe which had the very thing which I ate while congratulating myself wildly ... not only on finishing the run, but also on managing to enjoy it!  The consequence of all this was that I decided to sign up for sure, so the enjoyment might have been a bit of a pyrrhic victory!