Country to Capital(or, ‘the story of a first-time ultra runner’)

Lee featured in my write up of the Country To Capital, and he’s finally written up his own race report. This is a guy who I’ve only actually met twice before, at the Lakesman Triathlon and again at Outlaw last year, yet he’s a damned good mate. Honoured to feature in his thoughts, and for him to have been concerned about me when it went wrong.

Well worth a read, so put the kettle on, because it’ll take you about as long to read as it took him to run the race…

trihardermonkeyboy

Why do I do these things?? I’m asked this often, and there’s a knee-jerk retort that is oft spat out because it’s the easy, blasé line:

“because I can!”…….

So. I’ve said over and again: “I’m not a runner” and I’ve meant it. Distance running does not come easily to me, though I understand why others may beg to differ. 8 stand alone marathons and maybe 20 half marathons, let alone the ones within the 5 x IM(140.6) or 8 x 70.3 distance triathlons, suggest my self appraisal is wrong. I do actually make a good stab at running, and am no slouch, certainly not at half marathon or shorter. But…. the longer the distance, the more it hurts me, on a negative sliding scale that does not look or feel good. But still, I try. Harder. Ultra running is something I’ve had one eye on for a good…

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Country To A Bit Closer To The Capital…

Time for a few words about the Country To Capital ultra that I took part (emphasis on part) in at the weekend. As with a few of the others that I was doing this with, I turned up to the start line with no real expectations. There was no target finish time or average pace, and there was no illusion in my mind that finishing was a certainty. Infact, it was shrouded in a lot of doubt. It was a race that I entered on a bit of a whim, and then for various reasons the build up to it was far from ideal. I got some decent training runs done, but a bout of man flu a month or so before race day resulted in the final few weeks being an exercise in trying not to make the situation worse. And so, for those who can’t be bothered reading on, at around the 15 mile mark (on a 43 mile or so run) I made the decision that I was withdrawing at checkpoint 2, which was at 17 miles. My right quad was wrecked, making even walking slow and painful on the flat.

5 Days To Go…

I look at my Garmin watch on my wrist, and see a bit of info that fills me with dread. At the bottom of the watch screen it states “Country To Capital: 5 days to go”. When I drunkenly entered it seemed an age away, and now it’s the Monday of the week of the race. On Friday I’ll be loading my kit into the car and driving darn sarf ready for a bit of a long run on Saturday…

Country To Capital – Wendover to Little Venice in London. A nice little 45 mile jog. Smoke me a kipper, I’ll be back fro breakfast…