SVN Thankyou Run, Marathon, 27.09.2024

This weekend is the last weekend of SVN events before Rachel and Tills hang up their Race Director hats - they have been a really big part of my running journey, so I have mixed emotions of feeling very sad that SVN has come to an end, but also really happy for Tills and Rachel to be starting on their next and exciting chapters! 

Travel report: On Friday, I pottered over to Gravesend, via an almost all dry walk to Kings Cross, the fast train (almost missed it), and then a very, very wet and uninspiring walk from Gravesend to the Cyclopark. 

Weather report: The weather carried on being terrible all morning, so Sarah and I completed/swam a marathon through puddles (which turned into lakes) and streams (which turned into rivers), but that just makes it all the more memorable! 

Physical wellbeing report: 

- Our legs seemed to be feeling fine after last week's 100 miler, which I was (and am still) very excited about (I always think they will stop working/ fall off), and it was a really good run.

- Due to wearing waterproofs, we resembled boil in the bag fish by the end (actually, by quite early in), and had the sensation that we had evaporated somewhat. 

- We also had hostage (aka sausage) fingers from getting cold/hot/on repeat.

Snack report: The aid station was as amazing as always, and as it was our last time being treated to this level of awesomeness, we had a chocolate treat per lap. I will miss Rachel's rocky road (but I feel it is dangerous she has shared her recipe!).

Wildlife report: squirrel count - 2! Bedraggled dogs - many.

Post run report: its worth getting all wet and horrible, for how nice it feels to change into dry clothes! Orange hot chocolate for the walk (now dry) back to the station, to head back to London to meet Andrew for Humble Crumbles at Spitalfields market (thank you Sarah for my Christmas voucher!) 

Reflection report: I will miss SVN! I've done 47 of their events since 2016, and 6 of my 100 mile + events have been with them. Andrew and I also did an "accidental 10 in 10" with them in the winter of 2021, which is still one of my favourite/ most memorable holidays ever, and I will never think that ice cream is just for the summer ever again. It's been nice looking back through my reports of these events, I don't often look back at what I write. So many happy memories, and many friendships made! Thanks you Tills and Rachel for everything! And now, it will be great to hopefully share more adventures with you both on the trails :-) 

SVN Norman 100, 21.09.2024

The last of the SVN events at Samphire Hoe!

Samphire Hoe is my favourite location of the lapped events - it's a tough course with the hills, endless miles of concrete sea wall, and it's "unique and unpredictable microclimate". But I think that's why I love it, it's like nowhere else. SVN, Tills and Rachel are the best, and the community they have created is magical. I'm really going to miss them an awful lot. I was quite upset about this being the last time we would experience a 100 quite like this. 

Went down on Friday evening with Andrew to stay in the Dover Travelodge, via a cheeky Nandos with Jon. The Travelodge is in the Dover retail park, and, this does sound strange, but do I love the Dover retail park. It's not the actual place that I'm particularly enamoured with, more the memories it triggers of weekends/ holidays there based around SVN adventures, and in my particularly nostalgic current mood, it seemed even more weirdly lovely. 

The event started at 08.30 on Saturday, and there was a really fantastic turnout of runners, and it was great to see so many friends.

The event had a 32 hour time limit, during which you could run as far you chose up to 100 miles. Sarah, Gavin and I were aiming for 100 miles, and we ran all the way together, plus Andrew joined in for a marathon on Saturday evening, as part of the pacer challenge. Gavin and Andrew even embraced the outfit matching.

The route comprised of 4 big loops up on the cliffs (about 9.5 miles each), followed by 18 smaller laps (about 3.5 miles each) around Samphire Hoe.

I love the big loops. They are quite hilly, as involve getting up on to the cliff tops, and then an "up and downy" path along them, but being up there is so magical, with views high up over the sea, feeling like you are part of the big skies. Unusually, for Samphire Hoe, the weather up on the cliffs was beautiful. Even a bit too hot, one might say. It was actually quite nice going through the tunnel (which is part of getting up and down from the cliffs), to cool off briefly. 

As the run went along, motivational signs written in chalk started mysteriously appearing along the paths. The messages started off with a kind and motivational tone:

Later on becoming slightly more assertive in nature:

And eventually adopting more of the tough love approach:

This last one was was right next to a big pile of horse poo, so it was surprising that mystery writer had passed by the opportunity to chalk a "you are poo" motivational message next to it.

Baywatch the pony was nowhere to be seen, suggestions for his disappearance included:
- glue factory (Andrew's suggestion, obviously)
- retirement village inland (Gavin's suggestion)
- dyed his mane, so is actually the small black pony in the photo (Sarah's and my favoured reason)

Other Samphire wildlife spotting included the cows (chalk and real), sheep, seagulls, lots of dogs, overnight slugs (sometimes squished) and snails all over the nasty hill in the morning (cue some snail rescues, which we abandoned, once we realised how many there were), a chalk llama, and pampas grass. 

 

 

So plenty of wildlife to be seen, but we didn't see France at all. We concluded that (aside from the obvious weather explanations, which were, although meteorologically sound, quite frankly just things we've all heard before) that due to Brexit, the UK had been moved further away from all the countries we used to be close to, and was now stranded in the middle of a large ocean, thousands of miles from anywhere. It was likely that this ocean was further south than the UK's previous position, which would explain the unusually hot weather for Samphire Hoe, that we were currently experiencing. If we did see a shadow or a cloud that looked like land, we though this was probably on a rotation, like clockwork cogs, so that other countries could take it in turns to be next to us, so they didn't have to be embarrassed for too long, and it might currently be Portugal. This conversation wasn't even that far into the run, which was concerning. 

Other random conversations included night time sounds (zombie crickets), where had all the ships had gone, regular checking (and ignoring when we didn't like it) of the weather app, hash browns and maple syrup (and other breakfast choices).... the great overnight orange/tomato debate (morning verdict - orange)....

.... and smiley/ Harry Potter, aka the turn around cone.

The weather was really hot and sunny on the Saturday, and even most of the overnight was warm enough to run in a vest. There were some storms knocking about, and we were treated to some lightening shows over the sea and Folkstone, but fortunately they missed us. About 6am on Sunday there was heavy cold rain for about an hour (I think, I actually have no idea how long it lasted), which was quite unpleasant, but we were lucky it didn't last long, especially when thinking what some of the rest of the country got weather wise this weekend. Actually, for me, I think it helped a bit. I had just earlier been hit by a big bout of nausea (the usual thing that I find happens in the early hours of the morning on a long run). I was really struggling with it, and thinking I couldn't carry on for another 5 laps feeling like this, and wanting to curl up in a corner (preferably a non-rainy one, maybe the cave where the Samphire sheep take shelter) and pass out and wake up when it was all over. So I think a combination of suddenly feeling much cooler, and having something else quite dramatic to think about, plus the dawn starting to break (I would say the sun coming up, but it wasn't) helped knock that away, and fortunately it never came back. It all reminded me of a favourite quote. 

The sky got light, the rain stopped, and then it was a purposeful march to the end. 

 

Before finishing, I have to mention 100 mile potatoes, as requested by Rebecca. I made a big box of these (recipe - baby potatoes, cooked in the oven for around 45 minutes, in olive oil and salt), but then only ate one during the whole 100 miles. My nutrition was a bit of a shambles again this time, but my hydration went very well, meaning I was able to be fully competitive in the peeing contests Sarah and I have at each pee break.

Gavin, Sarah and I all finished together, after 25 hours and 4 minutes of a tough and epic adventure together.

Thank you Rachel Tills and the SVN team for a wonderful event. 

Track Wars - Indoor 24 hours, with Phoenix Running, 06.09.2024

Well, that was a very unique experience - 24 hours running around a 200m indoor track!

To be honest, I had reservations about this event. I really don't like running inside, and I was worried that this was going to feel like being on a treadmill for 24 hours, going round and round on such a small track. I knew the camber would be quite steep, so worried about that and if it might cause problems (as my dodgy hip gets a bit tight sometimes on the 400m track events). Plus, I had my bad experience on my last 24 hour track event a month ago, and was worried about a repeat disaster occurring. 

But, I was also very curious about doing such a quirky event! I also knew there would be plenty of friends there, and that the atmosphere would be good fun, as Phoenix events always are.

The event was at the Lee Valley Athletics Centre, in Edmonton. I live in East London, so this was really convenient to get to - a short walk, 20 minutes on the Overground, and another walk. I set a record for shortest time out of my house to do a 24 hour event (28 hours out of the house, from leaving, doing it, and to getting back in the door!) 

I met Sarah at Edmonton Green and we walked over to the Athletics Centre, set up our stuff, said hellos, faffed, found the toilets, looked around the centre, faffed a bit more, then I split my ginger beer everywhere, so had to empty my perfectly arranged kit bag and de-ginger-fy everything. On the plus side, being inside, you didn't need much kit, so there wasn't that much to rescue!

We set off at 8am. The 200m track has 6 lanes, and the 24 hour runners were in lanes 1 and 2, and the 6 hour runners (these events were running in the morning, afternoon, and evening) in lanes 5 and 6. 

The Start

As it's a short track, it has a camber, so the curved parts of the track are quite sloped. I didn't have too much trouble with it - my hip was sore from about hours 2-6, which worried me, in case it got worse, but I did plenty of stretching of it each time we stopped for drinks, and it settled down. The direction changed every 3 hours to start with, then every 2 hours, which helped too, I think. 

The Track

The "turn around" highlight was the final turn around, at 6am on the second day, when Gav put on Bonnie Tyler's "Total Eclipse of the Heart" before setting out the cone and we all sang (in tune, of course, and with moves) "turn around, every now and then I fall apart" as we switched direction!

Sarah and I got into a rhythm of running for 30 minutes, then having a refreshment break (and later on we ran with water bottles too, as we realised we weren't drinking enough doing it this way). Later on, as we got more tired and had to incorporate more walking, we followed the "tutu technique" (run two laps, walk two laps), and then we slightly amended this to "tu"-ing (run one, walk one). We changed vests every 6 hours, and put on mini-tiaras at 8pm, all ready for Friday night. I think, for events like this, when the route is exactly the same for the whole time, and there are so so many laps/ hours, that it would be completely overwhelming if you thought about it, that it really helps (me at least) to forget about all that, and split it into sections of time, and doing specific things at those time points. 

8pm outfit - unicorns and tiaras

It was, as expected, very sociable indeed, with a really great atmosphere and camaraderie between everyone. It was the best fun chatting away to so many friends, and making new ones. 

The Athletics Centre was an excellent venue. It had good facilities, and although it was quiet in the day time on Friday, after school finishing time, it really livened up, and during the whole evening there was so much going on! It was so nice to see so many kids doing all sorts of sports and having a great time. Gymnastics (surely it's not normal to be so bendy??), sprinting, drills, long jump, all sorts! My favourite mini-athlete was the tiny wee guy in a giant red top (which made him look even smaller), who I think was someone's brother, who was sort of running around everywhere doing his own thing and joining in with all the different sports going on, and all the older kids were really sweet with him and getting him involved. We'll see him I reckon at the Olympics maybe in 16 years or so. About 9 PM, everyone left and the centre was locked, leaving just us runners there....

....but the music still playing! The music on the speaker system was excellent, and the playlist was awesome! We did a lot of dancing and singing on the way round, which really helped to loops go faster! The staff at the centre were really kind, and they came out onto the track a few times, asking for requests for the music. 24 hours of almost all top tunes, and it is hard to remember them all, but highlights included Super Massive (chaffing) Black Hole (Muse), I'm Still Standing (Elton John), Don't Upset the Rhythm (Noisettes) ... Madness (how appropriate) ... Backstreet Boys (power ballads and key changes, very good for blasting round a few laps), Taylor Swift (dancing to Shake It Off)...  

,,,other entertainment included watching the W8 (a.k.a. WAIT!) buses going past outside (where do they go??). There was also a wildlife moment, when we saw a squirrel run across the gymnastic area. We actually did (I guess he must have run in through the door at some point)! There was also a beautiful sunrise (which I have yet to see on any outdoor track event)!

The things I found hardest, neither of which had really occurred to me beforehand, were:

1. How hot it felt running! When you were stood still, it didn't really feel that hot, but as soon as you started running, it was unreal how hot it felt! I was soaked in sweat within minutes! I guess, being inside, there wasn't any air movement like outside, so you don't have the same cooling effect. If I do another indoor event, I definitely would put more thought into how to prepare better for keeping cool; wet buffs, and ice bottles etc. 

2. How bright the lights were, especially at night time. Bright lights are a trigger for migraines for me, and I did find this quite challenging, but wearing sunglasses overnight helped a lot. And, on the plus side, it never got dark, and I didn't seem to get the 3am "dip of doom" that I normally experience when it does, so, negatives, but also definite positives! 

Huge well done to everyone taking part, everyone really gave it their all out (or in??) there on the track.

Sarah and I did 842 laps, which is 104.6 miles. Thank you Sarah for putting up with me for another 24 hours, making it fun, and for looking out for me... this takes our 100+ mile events together up to a total of 12! I celebrated finishing by spilling the remainder of my ginger beer all over my bag again (which had finally dried out from the previous morning's spillage) 

A girls podium for the 24 hours

I did much better with my nutrition and hydration than a month ago, so was really pleased with that, and I also didn't have most of the other problems I had then either, so have regained a bit of confidence. 

After being inside the same building for 24 hours, coming outside in the morning felt very strange! But then, we got to actually GET ON a W8 bus (thank you to the bus driver for waiting for us!) and so all our trackside dreams came true, and we learnt that the W8 does in fact go back to Edmonton Green station!

Shiny medal (blue ribbon, to match the track!)

It was tough, for sure, and I would say I found it much harder than the outdoor track events, but I also absolutely loved it. What a brilliant event! Thank you Rik and Team Phoenix, especially Gav for taking amazing care of everyone overnight!