Running for Han"N"ah Challenge - The Norfolk 100 km !

I arrived in West Runton Friday evening, in a disagreeable mood, after a long and busy train journey from London via Norwich. What logic is there in having a one carriage train on at rush hour on a Friday? What!

Anyhow. Immediately that I got off the train in West Runton, my mood lifted, and in a flash I liked the place. 

A tiny village where the train station had only one platform, and I could see my hotel from it, down a poppy lined lane. I stayed at The Links Hotel, which was a beautiful old building, and brought to mind Agatha Christie sitting in an armchair by the fire writing Murder On The Links. I'd unpacked and had tea (still working through rations) by 8 pm, and feeling nervous for tomorrow I decided to go sleuthing for where I had to catch the coach at 5.30 am the next morning. I found it OK, about a 10 minute walk from the hotel through the village, and feeling a bit more relaxed went back to The Links, where I firmly locked my door, should any Christie characters be poking around, and worked out a vague plan for my pace tomorrow. There was a cut off time of 16 hours, which I had no idea if I could do or not. But, I had to, somehow! This was the second N of my Running For Hannah Challenge, and there was no way I was not going to do this! 

Up at 4 am after a few hours sleep. I was reassured on the murder front, the old building was so creaky no one could move around without waking the whole place up, as I discovered on my slow and noisy journey down four flights of stairs.  The run route was a linear one, so the organisers (Positive Steps) had put on a coach to take runners from the finish (West Runton) to the start (Castle Acre), then we could run back to cars/ accommodation at the finish. The bus journey was fun, but I started to feel a bit anxious about how far it seemed, and this wasn't even as long as the full route was. 

When we finally made it there, it was a fab surprise to see Sarah who was crewing for some members of her running club. I hadn't expected to know anyone, and was feeling really nervous about that, so I instantly felt better seeing a familiar face. Checked in, bag dropped, and sun cream applied. Ready! ...ish.... Oh My God. Everyone else looked so good. What was I doing here?? This was my first ultra of this long with such a short cut off time. Plus! On the coach, I'd realised the closing time for CP5, which on the instructions was at 82 km, was 18.00. Which meant only 11 hours to do the first 82 km (51 miles), but 5 hours to do the last 18 km (11 miles). Which didn't seem to make much sense, and meant my vague plan of pacing was now useless.

I made a snap, and rash, decision, to run to the coast as quickly as I could, and make up all the time in the starting sections. Because that's the sensible thing to do at the start of an ultra. Right? 

The route was basically a loop around Castle Acre (a beautiful village), then straight up the Peddars Way to the coast at Holme Next The Sea, at about marathon distance. Then it turned right, and the rest of the route was all along the Norfolk Coastal Path, until the end at West Runton. 

Once we started off, everyone seemed to be going so fast, so I tried to as well. The Peddars Way is pretty, mostly along a hedge lined footpath with poppies and wildflowers scattering the landscape, and the miles seemed to pass easily. Although, I'm pretty sure everyone says Norfolk is flat like a pancake, but it's not! It doesn't have mountains, but it has undulations. It does, it does, it does! The Peddars Way follows the route of a Roman road, although it might be even older, some (Wikipedia) suggest it was an ancient trackway that was remodelled by the Romans. 'Pedestar' is Latin for 'on foot', which may, or may not, be where it's name is from. It's also meant to be the haunt of the Black Shunk, a ghostly East Anglian hound. 

A pug was watching (not by itself, but with it's owner, whose partner was running), but the pug looked quite solid and not at all ghost like, so got to CP2 at Holme without seeing any ghosts (or Romans, or Roman ghosts), in just over 4 hours, which was far too fast to do a marathon at the start of 100km. I was pleased I now had plenty of time for the CP5 cutoff, but also thinking I'd probably messed it all up by going off too fast. It was nice to be by the sea now, in any case, the skies were bigger and the air different. But an immediate and obvious problem presented itself. We could see where we were going for a long way ahead. I suddenly started to feel tired, seeing all the miles of coast stretch off into the distance.

Soon the route went inland for a bit, along the longest uphill road in Norfolk, possibly even the world. After eternity had passed, and then a bit longer, CP3 near Titchwell materialised. On the instructions, it said this was at 52 km, so I was pumped to be over half way! Until, I saw a sign that said '45 km'. What was going on? How could it have been only 4 km since the last CP?? I was so confused, even more so than normal. But I was distracted by the friendly marshals and watermelon (hurrah!) and jammie dodgers. 

Then it was back out to the coast for what felt like a really long, but very beautiful, section to CP4 at Burnham Overy Staithe. 

It was so hot, I was drinking loads, but not eating much as I felt sick, so was low on energy and every step was dragging. Plus not knowing how far I had run was really messing with my head. I was planning on emergency bananas and custard at the next CP (where our drop bags were) but couldn't even face the custard. Things were looking grim! I managed to eat the banana though, a cheesy pastry foot (haha!) and a mini peanut butter sandwich. 

We temporarily got caught up in a triathlon that was going on in Burnham, and I worried someone was going to make me swim, or worse, cycle for ages, but we made it back to the coastal path still on our feet. The next bit was through sand dunes and then along a tree line, which was so pretty it hurt to look at it. The route had been really easy to find so far, following the acorn signs...

...but suddenly the acorns stopped, and a I had a complete navigational failure for the rest of this entire section. I'd gone wrong twice and got back on route, then managed to do another massive mistake and added on about a mile running around the wrong side of a camp site. When I got back to the right track in the woods, I hit a rock with my foot, and had a total breakdown, where I kicked at the rock (what great solution), cried, said some bad things to the rock (fortunately no one heard), and when I failed to get any apology from the rock, turned my back on it, and stomped, stoney faced, through the wood. Fortunately, Sarah was the other side of the wood, which really cheered me up - thank you Sarah for your support throughout, you don't know how much it helped!

Buoyed, I caught up with Paul, who I'd met earlier before becoming lost, and ran quite lot of the rest of the way with him. Running is always easier with someone to laugh with. Cheers Paul! Plus, other people are always so much better at things than me. He set his alarm every hour, and had an energy gel and was very disciplined with his eating. What a great idea! I was impressed, and am going to try the alarm thing. Plus, he'd also looked at a different source of route info and had the right KMs for the checkpoints, and soon after we ran into James who I'd met on the bus, who had a GPS watch, and who knew exactly how far we had come. So, my conclusion is, I need to invest in some technology. 

Soon after we made it to CP5, which wasn't at 82 km at all, but at about 75 km, and I made it there way before the cut off of 18:00. I was so relieved! I finally thought I might be able to do it now I wasn't going to get kicked out. It was getting harder though. I felt the faster marathon at the start in my legs which were heavy, it was hot, I had a headache and was feeling tired, and my foot hurt (thanks, rock). But so what? I chose to do this, and I'm lucky to be able to do something that I choose to do and that I love doing. It's nothing really is it, being a bit tired and sore. So what. I thought of Hannah, and sent my thoughts about the day to her (I edited out the bit about the rock) across the sunny skies (which was how we were communicating today) and I knew she was thinking of me too 💜

We got to CP6, the last checkpoint, at about 17:00. CP6 was magic. The marshals were brilliant, and Sarah was there, and Paul's family, and it felt like a big party in a car park by the sea with cola and crisps and hugs and laughs. The marshals even gave me a goody bag to take for the last 8 miles. Just 8 more miles!

Four of them were along a shingle beach. 

Oh.

These four miles have catapulted right up to the worst four miles of any run in my whole entire life. It went on, and on. And on, and on. I could see the cliff where the path left the beach, and it never got any closer. Fortunately the tide was out, so at least the wet pebbles closer to the sea were a bit harder to run on, but still. I started to imagine the pebbles were cancer, and I was kicking them and stamping on them, and hating them. It was kind of hypnotic, I was in a bit of a trance, kind of like a really really not relaxing at all meditation session. Then, the last mile, there were lots of sea fishermen further up the beach, with their long fishing lines thrown into the sea. The lines were transparent, so you couldn't see them until the last moment, so the thrill of almost decapitating yourself by running into one jerked me back out of my trance, and back to the pebbles.

After an hour, the beach was conquered, and then it was up for the last four miles onto the cliffs... 

.....and over the Beeston Bump, for a final downhill to the finish. 

Great atmosphere at the finish! Thank you to Kevin at Positive Steps and your brilliant crew. My first Positive Steps event, but I will definitely be back! Thank you Sarah for you support the whole way around. The other people who gave support too, and the other runners I met and ran with along the way. I was worried about not knowing anyone, but as always at running events, it's such a brilliant and welcoming community, that that never matters once you've got there. 

 I finished in 13 hours and 13 minutes. The last 100 km I did (Trailwalker 2009), was in 26 hours, so this is a new personal best of a personal best for me. And I came second lady and got a medal for it. 

I feel this is likely to be the most successful I shall ever be, so I shall now retire on a high, sell my medal, and live off the profits.

Only kidding! I've always said running isn't about times or positions, and it's not. Running is about pushing your own boundaries, enjoying yourself, and looking after your body and mind. And, more importantly than all of this for my current challenge, it's about using something that I am fortunate to be able to do, to raise money and awareness, and show support for my fabulous friend Hannah 💜💚💛💙

So, I am proud to have completed runs H, A, N and N of my Running for HANNah Challenge! 

Thank you very very much to everyone for all your support, sponsorship, messages.... you are the best! 

The last two runs Hann"AH" will be in three weeks time, on the same weekend - the Hallow 12 Parish Challenge on 13.07.19 and the Andredsweald Circuit on the 14.07.19......

💛💛💛 https://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/runningforhannah 💛💛💛