Training:
This one was very daunting at first, I wasn’t sure how to approach it since I no longer live in the mountains. Usually you want to train as specific to the terrain of the race as possible. Some days I dream of living back in the Sierra Nevada of California. I regret not running more then, I had such an insane playground to train on! But that’s not now. I’m in the West Midlands of England, probably only a few hundred feet above sea level, and there’s absolutely nothing close to a mountain nearby.
I initially scoured maps looking for any steep inclines that I could do laps on. I found a few but nothing ideal. Yes, there are fantastic mountainous areas here to run in but the closest was the Brecon Beacons at two hours away. However Church Stretton, an hour away, had some sizable hills. I ended up finding an out and back route that had more vert per mile than UTMB itself! And I could squeeze it in between school times when the kids were away. This ended up being ideal training. Steep climbs requiring poles and steep descents that hammered my legs. Perfect. I had to do up to six out and back laps but it ticked the box. I supplemented a handful of these big days out with my usual long run route near home, a burly muscular endurance strength routine, and anaerobic hill sprints.
One other key thing I added in were incline treadmill hikes with a weight vest. The climbs at UTMB are too steep to efficiently run, so training for hiking seemed like a great idea. I researched it and it seems a little will have a lot of training adaptation. I added this in as a second workout on some of my easy days. It wasn’t too taxing on my legs so I didn’t need to worry about injury. I’d do anywhere from 30 - 60 minutes, at about a 20% grade, with about 20 lbs of sand in an old race vest, at 4mph. This gave me between 2-4 miles and about 2000 - 4000 feet of vert. Solid supplement to the rest of the week! My heart rate was higher than normal, probably zone 3, but the leg stress was low. During the race I feel this made a significant difference in how I felt on the climbs. Considering you do walk a fair amount in many ultras I think using this for most races could be very helpful.
I definitely could work on my downhill technical running. Where it got technical I slowed down a lot in order to not get hurt. I have always struggled to push the pace through really rocky technical terrain. My normal training routes are very nontechnical so no surprises here, it’s very difficult to practice when you don’t have the terrain!
Looking back at my training I actually ran less miles but had more hours. So, slower paces due to higher amounts of vertical. I probably averaged around 50 miles per week and my vert was consistently 7000 feet, with a handful of peak weeks between 10,000 - 14,000 feet. My peak hours were around 10-12 hours per week. I normally train around 6-8 hours per week.
All in all I felt physically really good during the race so the training went well despite my huge doubts and anxiety not being in the mountains.
Food and nutrition:
I ran with water in my soft flasks and carried GU chews, Maurten solids energy bars, and Clif Bar peanut butter filled bars. All these were ok but they got old as usual. They all work fine, just meh after a while. Aid stations as I mentioned in my race report were lacking what I’m used to. I did enjoy the noodle soup, rice, pasta, but the fruit never satisfies and I craved salty chips! I meant to give some to my crew but forgot. A tube of Pringle’s would’ve been bliss! Coke was good as usual and one other drink was unexpectedly awesome. At some point I had a bunch of apple juice. It was refreshing, light, sweet. Definitely a great option I’ll need to remember. I was speaking with my boss about it, he’s diabetic and well educated in sugar content of things, he said apple juice is through the roof in sugar. Probably a good thing for ultras!
A full meal is what I craved late in the race. Cheese and bread worked but I needed it earlier on, plus I was reluctant due to trying to avoid meat and dairy. Planning ahead and using my crew more effectively would’ve helped here. Oh, and coffee. Any coffee is good coffee after or during an all nighter!
Food count:
GU Chews: 9
ClifBloks: 1
Maurten Solids: 2
Clif Bars: 1
Aid Stations: coke, broth, noodles/broth, pasta/red sauce, fruit, bread, cheese, apple juice, coffee
I need to focus more on eating. Maybe more caffeine too. What I need and prefer. The aid stations were close by so I didn’t need much outside of these stops but despite feeling good all race I think I can do better.
Kit:
No real problems with my kit. Leki poles were fucking awesome! Must be my Nordic ski background but they were so nice to have and use. Fantastic. I kicked down the money for the super pimp, ultralight, stiff Leki poles and they were totally worth it. I had to get a different size strap but no big deal. Makes me want to do more mountain races just so I can use them!
I ran in the Hoka Tecton X trail shoe. The tongues are thin and late in the race I found myself adjusting them a bit due to lace pressure on my instep but no problem really. I did have some odd pain that seemed to be shoe related on the outside of my ankle. I couldn’t pinpoint it but I’m guessing due to the fact that they are fairly minimal in support and materials and after such a long time on feet it added up. Otherwise the Tecton was great. I changed shoes and socks at Courmayeur and this odd ankle thing came on after that. Later on I changed back to my older shoes. Not sure if it made much difference but worth a try. Definitely didn’t need to change shoes as it was dry, but socks were a must since it was fairly dusty. I forgot I did have one blister start to form at the end, left foot, back of my heel. The sock liners in the Tecton are fairly minimal so I put a pair from my Saucony Endorphin Pro’s in them during training. Worked great but looked to possibly cause a pressure point on my heel. No big deal, just ran through it but good to note!
My Apex Pro watch died at 80 miles. This pissed me off. It also died early during the Arc of Attrition. Not that I need my watch but it’s suppose to last like 50 hours in full gps mode! I contacted Coros, the manufacturer, and they were able to download my race data and see what the drain came from. Supposedly it’s because I had the backlight on auto. So, every time I raised my wrist it automatically came on. They had sufficient evidence of this, the actual number of times it came on AND the seconds it was on for. I’ll chalk this one up to operator error on my part. Nice to see they can look into the watch like this. They were very helpful though. For the final 26 miles I didn’t even have a clock. It didn’t matter, I just rolled on. To this day I have no idea what time of day I finished, just that it was early morning.
Headlamp was fantastic. The Petzl Nao I got from my parents years ago as a gift. I’ve pimped it with aftermarket batteries from Germany and it lasted as expected, 8 hours. The reserve mode is indicated by a couple flashes. This was unknown territory for me so I left the battery on to see how long it would last. It’s at a reduced output but still plenty to run with. It surprisingly lasted about 40-50 minutes! Then the sun came up so didn’t need it. This was good to know as in the past I’ve changed the battery immediately which I now know was unnecessary. My backup light, Petzl Reactik, I used for the final descent. I can’t remember why I switched to it. Possibly because it’s a bit lighter and I was hoping it would work better with my hat. Either way it was fine but noticeably less lumens compared to the Nao.
Music. The past couple races I’ve neglected or forgotten to listen to music during races. It’s a scientific fact that listening to music reduces physical pain, obviously a benefit. I guess I’ve been with other people and not turned it on or it was early in the race. I did turn it on this time but ran into some issues. My old school iPod Nano still works, or I thought, but initially in the humid night air the dial wasn’t working with my finger so I was stuck on certain non-shuffle settings, couldn’t skip songs or mess with the volume. This was really annoying. At some point I swapped it for my slightly less old school iPod Shuffle. It’s all push button and worked great, but I still don’t think I took full advantage of the benefits of music. I also have some Shoks bone conduction headphones that I use on a daily basis, but, they only last 6 hours. The iPods I use a single earbud so I hear out of my other ear. Trouble with the Shocks besides battery life is they connect to either my phone or a tiny Mighty shuffle-esqe Bluetooth music player that’s capable of downloading Spotify. More battery concerns though and I’m just used to the iPods. No real point I guess to mentioning music other than I should use it rather than complaining about the devices. I only carried one at a time and had back ups with my crew.
Clothing seemed pretty dialed for the mountains. I still struggle in winter in the UK finding the perfect layering system. It’s an odd wet cold here in the winter. In the Alps, and in the UK, my usual orange Arcteryx Incendo light jacket still didn’t breathe enough. It seemed to get wet with sweat. However it was nice at Lac Combal in the wind! I even put the hood up and it warmed me up nicely, until I was too warm and it started to get wet. As much as I like that jacket it’s always been like that. Maybe time to experiment with other options. Everything else seemed ok. Minor chafing as expected on my inner thighs but I do luckily run with a tiny BodyGlide in my pocket that I’ll reapply as needed throughout the race. My super light Patagonia long sleeve was fantastic. Just enough to keep me warm at night but dried instantly not holding sweat. This has always seemed a tiny bit too thin for the UK. My hat was good but it still annoys me that when the bill gets wet (sweat or rain) you can’t flip it up, it just falls down. It’s nice to flip it up for a bit more air flow or visibility when going uphill. I struggle finding hats as I have a tiny head but the Patagonia Duckbill has been good other than the bill. Gloves were a bit too warm, should’ve grabbed my lighter ones. I figure better safe than sorry though and end up with frozen crab claws and I can’t get food packaging open! This was the first time I’d used a number belt for my race number. You are required at all times to have your number on the front and visible. Everyone has triathlon number belts so if you change clothes you just undo the belt, far easier than safety pins. The belt was too big so adjusting it was a pain in the ass at the start, and while in the front the number scrunched against my legs, so I’d rotate it to the side when not near a checkpoint. I guess it was convenient though for clothing changes if needed.
Performance:
Looking back you always see places where you could’ve ran faster. Could’ve spent far less time at checkpoints. I never really felt that bad or was in such pain I couldn’t run. This had been the case when I first started doing these. The muscular pain was so immense you just can’t run, you walk like a zombie until the finish, then hardly can walk for a couple days after! At UTMB though, it went well. Overcoming my mind when I’m exhausted is the next challenge. I know I can trust my training and I won’t be completely shattered if I just enjoy the run, now if I want to race, I need to push that limit and find the point where my legs are totally trashed again. Then I’d likely be much further up in the field, if that is my goal. Sometimes just enjoying the experience is the entire point however.
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