Endurance Adventures

Right, I am packed and ready to go... won't be doing any running for the next week which is probably a good thing as I've had a niggling at the side of my right knee when I've ran lately- not a pain as such and it doesn't get worse, but maybe a couple of weeks without running and more gentle walking will give it chance to heal... don't want it to get any worse.

I am back next Friday so will update and will hopefully have some good photos to upload! See you all soon!

Labels: Italy

This last week has been a fairly quiet one... decided not to do the Charnwood Forest Marathon as I am off on holiday on Friday and so am a little financially challenged at the moment... I hadn't actually entered it so no money lost.

At least the nights are getting lighter now which means more walks/ runs in the countryside and less pounding pavements! Last Tuesday I took my running gear to work and after my afternoon appointment I drove to Holme Pierrepont Watersports Centre, changed in the loos and ran twice round the lake- without stopping- just over 6 miles. Feels like I am building back up slowly! I have had a couple of fairly hefty gym sessions too- one concentrating on speed on the treadmill (getting up to the heady heights of 6.5mph then experiencing a woman getting onto the treadmill next door and immediately cranking it up to 9mph without even breaking sweat- I hate it when that happens!)

I practiced my swimming on Friday too, front crawl was difficult as my goggles kept letting water in and I feared for my contact lenses and I seem to pull and kick at the same time in breaststroke and apparently you are not supposed to. Now that I am doing it (slightly more) properly, my mum can swim faster than me!

I needed to go into town on Saturday so decided to walk in and back- a good 3 miles each way and I was back and forth across the city centre. One of my first ports of call is always Hotel Chocolat- they are usually giving away free samples!

I am going to Italy Friday- not trekking but sight seeing. It's a coach tour, we start in Rome, go to Versuvius and Pompeii before crossing over to the Isle of Capri, transferring to Sorrento and finaly driving up the Amalfi Coast. I am going with a friend- the same friend I went to Greece with 10 years ago, and although there won't be any real walking we will still have to walk round the sights so not entirely sedentary... so I may have a passing chance of burning off all that pizza, pasta and ice-cream... ooh feeling hungry!

The Valleys and Views takes place on Sunday 10th, and we get back late Friday 8th, so I will see how I feel...

Labels: Italy

My apologies, I've been a bit late writing this one up! It's tough to know how to prepare when you have two events on two consecutive weekends. I didn't want to just do nothing but didn't want to go mad either, so went for a couple of 4- 5 mile brisk walks and the gym. I also did some swimming- still got a triathlon in mind one day so I got my sister Katie (who's a competitive swimmer who has represented Leicester) to teach me proper front crawl.

Maybe with a bit of practice I'll be able to do a length without nearly drowning myself...

But I digress. I wanted to start around 8am (it's a rolling start between 7:30am and 9am with runners starting later). By the time I parked up and registered it was 8:06am- exactly the same as last year. The weather was looking a bit grey and misty but at least it wasn't raining. There seemed to be quite a few folks setting off and I overtook some of them in Froggatt.

                                          Froggatt Bridge

I had printed out a route description but as the route doesn't change I knew it pretty well, so didn't actually need it. I knew that we would be faced with our first steep climb quite early on and it was just as steep as I remembered it! I decided to jog downhill into the plague village of Eyam.

                                          Approaching Eyam

I have likely mentioned Eyam and the Plague before but it is a most fascinating village- I keep meaning to go back and explore it properly one day instead of just passing through but haven't so far. I stopped in the little shop and bought a cappucino like last year and sipped it as I walked through the village looking at the plaques outside the old stone cottages commemorating the victims of the plague who had died there (not sure whether I'd feel quite comfortable living in one...)

                                           Plague Cottages

                                          Stocks in Eyam

As I clipped my tally card at the self clip check point and climbed out of the village it was still quite misty. I knew we had a stretch of track leading mostly downhill to a busy road, so once I finished my coffee I jogged most of it. Then there was the long gradual climb onto Longstone Moor. The route went through a field with three ponies in it, two of them shetlands, and they were pretty taken with one of the walkers as he was offering them mints.

                                          Climbing Towards Longstone Moor

There is a manned checkpoint on one of the roads crossed, offering water, but nobody stays long as it's quite open and exposed. Quite a few runners had come past me, including a lady I chatted with briefly before she disappeared into the distance, so they must have entered as walkers.

Once on Longstone Moor it started to brighten up, the going was a lot drier than I expected too. I found the next self clip and jogged the track downhill into the village of Great Longstone. The route then follows the Monsal Trail ( I think it's the Monsal Trail, doesn't say on the route description...) to the next manned checkpoint. This bit always feels a bit endless but I ate one of the mars bars pocketed on the Belvoir Challenge and felt strong enough to jog most of the way. The runners were starting to come past, including the lady I'd been chatting with before who said she'd got lost and it had taken her 45 minutes to get back on route!

There was coffee and cakes at the checkpoint, which were very welcome. The sun was out by this time- it always seems to brighten up on the old railway- and I left the checkpoint for Bakewell and another steep climb up through the golf course. This was the muddiest part of the whole route but not as bad as last year. A few of the hardiest runners were actually trying to jog up this path!

After another self clip checkpoint the route becomes a lot easier- across a huge meadow, mostly downhill so very runnable.

                                          Looking Towards The Edges

I noticed that a lot of the runners who were now going past in force were calling 'well done!' as they passed and realised that they were just addressing me and not the other walkers. It dawned on me that they thought I was a 'proper' runner who had set off with them and had managed to maintain a lead on them until now... I felt quite guilty about earning praise under false pretences!

There were some lovely views of Chatsworth as we descended towards Edensor, but most of it appears to be covered in scaffolding and plastic which detracted from its charms.


The path through Chatsworth estate to Baslow always seems quite long, and my legs were starting to tire. I tried to walk bristly and then managed to jog to the next checkpoint- who were serving coffee and cakes. I decided to forego the coffee but selected a piece of  flapjack and left. I wasn't feeling great when I left the checkpoint- my legs were aching and I felt slightly sick- I nibbled on the flapjack but couldn't finish it, so put the rest away in my bumbag.

The next part of the route was the last steep climb of the day- up onto the Edges. I felt as though I was walking really slowly and it seemed a real effort. Runners were passing me, walking, so I must have been quite slow! The first part of the edge doesn't seem too bad (although if I am struggling I would rather not know how many miles I have done because I am always disappointed, but there is always someone who comes up behind you and casually informs her friend not only exactly how many miles you have done (and it's always less than you think) but works out how long it will take then to finish- and as they are about to pass you and disappear into the distance, you know that however long it will take them, it will take you far longer...)

The second part, though, after dropping down to cross a minor road and climbing back up again, seems endless... and also includes a bit of light scrambling! I usually have a backlog of runners behind me, patiently waiting for me to pick my way down.

                                           View From The Edge

After this it is just an easy rocky descent- but I was feeling really rough. My legs felt very wobbly and I felt almost light headed. I was really ready to finish and started to worry whether I was going to be able to do it. Maybe it was the combination of the Belvoir Challenge the week before and not much food- I forced the rest of the flapjack down and just gritted my teeth and tried to get on with it.

I don't think I was the only one though- a couple of runners passed me and as they ran by I heard the chap say to the woman 'Come on- we can sub four hours!' She replied 'I don't give a shit anymore!'

By the time I crossed the road and started to descend through the woods towards Grindleford I started to feel much better and actually managed to overtake some walkers and manage a shambling jog finish. I finsihed in 6 hours 9 minutes, faster than last year's time of 6 and a half hours, so I was chuffed.

Soup and cheese is served at the Village Hall but it was packed and pretty impossible to find a seat, but I collapsed into one somehow and by the time I'd polished it off with three chunks of crusty bread I felt quite normal (relatively speaking for me!) again...

I have had a quieter week as I developed a headache Tuesday and Thursday- some walking and some gym work. I had another swimming lesson from Katie today- proper breast stroke this time, does wonders for bingo wings I hope! It's amazing just how tiring it is doing the strokes properly. Managed a little 6 miler this morning across fields too- gorgeous morning.

It's the Charnwood Forest Marathon next Saturday but I am probably not going to do it as a) I am skint as I am going to Italy in under a fortnight and need to find some spends and b) Katie is swimming Saturday night and I'd like to go and watch. I will also be able to step up the training this week- doing events every weekend does limit what you can do in between.

Labels: Grindleford Gallop

As I have said before, the Belvoir Challenge is usually characterised by containing mud, mud and yet more mud- slippery mud, glutinous mud and plain muddy mud. And the 2011 Belvoir Challenge certainly did not disapoint!

As usual, I over-estimated how long it would take me to drive there and reached Harby at around 7:50am (for a 9am start). The weather looked slightly promising at this stage, almost as though the sun was considering coming out. There was a car park for the even on the Colston Bassett Road, which was the way I was coming in, so I decided to park there, quickly followed by several other people. Someone had decided to build an impressive metal stag close by;


As usual, it was very well attended, I think over 2000 people completed both routes although more completed the 16 mile than the 26 mile- I bet the residents of Harby dread this day! I checked in, was given a yellow tag with my number on and took a basic map of the route- the route changes each year and there is no route description, the route is marked by red and white tape and red and yellow signs. I took a cup of coffee and noticed that the 16 mile entrants had been given green number tags, most of them seemed to be runners.

Although the check in is at the Village Hall, the start is at the school which is just up the road. There was a split start  this year- the 26 milers and the 16 milers were starting on different directions, under either a green or yellow banner. I very nearly went wrong right away, as I assumed that as the 26 milers had been given yellow tags we would be starting under the yellow banner and the 16 milers with the green tags starting under the green banner. Wrong!! Luckily I realised my mistake just in time...

We headed off down the canal towards Hose and the runners started to snake off into the distance. I decided to jog the canal path as it would probably be the easiest terrain all day.


We turned off into fields, making our way towards Long Clawson, I was still jogging quite a bit at this stage so was actually ahead of most of the walkers. It started to drizzle and apart from a few clearer spells it was more or less set in for the day. We were taken around Long Clawson through the first real mud of the day- I was following a girl through until she lost a shoe!

The first checkpoint was here and the faster walkers started to overtake me. We were soon headed up and over a steep hill before dropping down into Old Dalby. The next few miles were undulating and there would have been some pretty good views if it hadn't been so misty.


There was also some more rather spectacular mud- one guy just ahead of me ended up losing his shoe! It felt as though everyone else was passing me now as the mud was really slowing me up.

The second checkpoint, at Grimston, was quite a civilised affair- there were toilets and hot coffee! I saw Stuart Ashley, who organises the Ponton Plod, and heard someone telling the organisers that there was a runner in trouble further back, with a suspected hamstring injury.

The route kind of set off at a sharp angle after the checkpoint, and I must admit I was following three guys in front- we missed one of the markers and realised that we had picked up the track we had followed into the checkpoint (at least I took their word for it as it didn't look that familiar to me!) One of the guys got out the map provided and realised he'd picked up the shorter route- apparently he is a scout leader so was in for a bit of ribbing from his friends!

Once we were back on track, it seemed a really long stretch to the next checkpoint at Scalford at 15.7 miles. We went through Ab Kettlebly  and by it's quaint church;


Soon after I could see a village in the distance I assumed was Scalford and we seemed to be heading for it; I had visions of hot coffee and sandwiches dancing around in my head, but to my utter dismay we were suddenly directed away from the village (which I realise now was Holwell) and through more mud! The rain was keeping up a steady drizzle, and after what seemed an eternity of muddy wet fields we reached the outskirts of Scalford.

                                          Scalford Primary School

I'm not sure whether they got the distance wrong but I heard several people comment that it felt a lot longer than it should have done. The checkpoint was in the Village Hall, and although I did get a hot coffee, the sandwiches had been donated and there were no veggie ones so I improvised by taking the last ham and cheese one and removing the ham. I'm an adaptable veggie! The cakes did make up for the lack of sandwiches...


I almost didn't want to get going again and must have looked rough as when I passed the guy outside the Hall taking numbers, he said 'Do you want to carry on?' before giving me directions for the next part!

I must say, this next part went quite quickly and was slightly easier as although it was undulating it followed quite a lot of tracks. Unfortunately the rain started to come down in earnest and I was grateful to reach Eaton. I allowed myself another cuppa here (trying to delay the inevitable plunge back out into the rain and mud) and ignoring shouts of 'We have a vehicle leaving if anyone wants to give up here!'

But the remaining 5 miles needed to be done, so I forced myself back out into the cold, conscious that the rain would mean darkness would come early, and came upon this sign which amused me;


We followed a track towards the woods, which then became a very steep, slippy and muddy downhill path. We were now on the route taken by the 16 milers earlier, and dropped down into Stathern. All that was left was a few more muddy fields and tracks to Harby- I looked at my watch and realised I could be on track for an 8 hours 30 minutes finish, so started jogging- yep even through mud! I reached the village at the same time as a chap, and we power-walked to the finish, finishing in 8 hours and 31 minutes, so I am happy with that. Five minutes slower than last year, but it was a different route and I did linger over a cuppa at Eaton...

I no longer had shoes- just two blocks of mud! They are clean now but I am expecting a bill from Severn Trent for blocking the drains!

Grindleford Gallop next weekend...

Labels: Belvoir Challenge