They often say that in order to
get better at something. You have to push your limits. This was brought home to
me this week when I was recommended to watch a film by Alex Vero called “Running
to the Limits”. In the film, Alex starts off as a 16.5st smoker and attempts to
train to become an elite marathon runner.
It’s well worth a watch. I must admit for the running geek like myself,
there’s precious little on the actual training process (gets in the way of a
good narrative I imagine). Alex starts training, claiming to barely be able to
run a mile, seemingly six months later he’s running an 80min Half Marathon.
Uh-Huh. But as I say, it’s a good watch, I’m slightly (read very) in awe of
Bruce Tulloh. My coach Nick even pops up. It’s a family affair.
One of the main points of the
film seems to be - Just go for it, so this weekend I did. Earlier in the week,
an email went round my squad asking if anyone wanted to run the Moel Siabod
Fell Race in North Wales. I’ve always
wanted to give one of these things a go. This was relatively close (2hr drive)
and my training plan had a hill session down for Saturday anyway. After consulting with
Nick ("yeah, go and have fun") I was good to go. The Capel Curig Festival was
happening at the same time, so Steve came with me, a rare outing together for us at the
weekend.
We arrived and headed to registration.
The £5 entry fee seemed a bargain and next to the sign something caught my eye. It
was a pile of maps of the mountain and everyone seemed to be taking one. An adjacent
guide showed the location of a gate about halfway up, so like everyone else I
took one and used the provided marker pen to mark an approximate route. Then I saw the other notices and
suddenly went very pale. There were signs everywhere saying that cagoules and
waterproof trousers were compulsory, along with a compass and whistle. I didn’t
have anything like that with me. I’d just turned up like I would do at any
other race. I had vision of being hauled away and banned at the start. I
wandered quietly back to the car, not sure of what was going to happen.
At the car, I overhead the people
next to us talking. Seemingly, it was her first fell race as well and she was professing
to be a little nervous. That gave me some comfort, with her friend was saying that
she’d be ok and just take it slowly. Also, the runners milling around didn’t seem to
have all the extra, kit so I started to think I’d be OK.
It was interesting to note that
EVERYONE was in Salomon or Innov8 shoes. There was in my Brooks Cascadia trail
shoes. I know that shoes choice is a personal thing, but with EVERYONE in those
other shoes, I might as well have been in slingbacks. I felt every unprepared.
It was at that point I saw the
top of the hill…the mountain.
It was peaking over the top of a
wooded hill in front of us. Now, I admit I’ve never had reason to climb many
high things. In fact, you could go so far as to say I’ve actively avoided them. So when someone tells me there’s a climb of 700m involved I think ‘That’s nice’, but I have
no frame of reference to base any thoughts on. So when this 700m was staring me in the face, I felt sick of
the pit of my stomach. Oh. Dear. God.
It was at that point I said to
Steve “I don’t think I can do this”. I felt like I had bitten off far more than
I could chew. I had visions of being air-lifted off the mountain, or being
found huddled in a ball half (or quarter) way up.
The conversation with Steve continued, me basically on the verge of tears and am not afraid of admitting
it. Sometimes you have to acknowledge your limits. When someone says “Are you
Man or Mouse?” I’ll hunt for the nearest Cheddar and run up a conveniently
placed Grandfather Clock.
Steady as ever, Steve said “I know you can do this”.
I know that he was probably thinking “Once he starts he won’t want to stop” but
it was the vote of support I needed. This wasn’t going to be an event for winning
gold medals, just a steady climb and descent.
We made our way to the startline; the
field being about 100 people. Everyone looked suspiciously fit (of course they
did, they were the sort that voluntarily ran up Welsh mountains for fun) and there weren’t
any noticeable ‘back-markers’ I could stick with in safety. Simone, who I blame
for this whole debacle’, from PLS came over and wished me good luck. Soon enough
it was time to go.
I kept my pace steady through the
first wooded section, we were definitely going uphill but I was about 50m behind Simone
and feeling good. We carried on up and the terrain started changing. Soon
enough we reached a stile, “That was quick” I thought to myself. The stile on
the map was about halfway up. “Maybe this won’t be as high as I though”. Sadly
that was the first of four of them. Higher and higher we climbed, the terrain changed
and changed again. Every time I looked up, all I saw was a line of people
snaking ever higher. I imagine the scenery about me was lovely, but I was so
terrified I couldn’t bring myself to look. The last think I wanted to do was
freeze on the mountainside.
The camaraderie with other
runners was great, “what are we doing?!” was the general gist. There were a
couple of points where I was obviously going a bit slow for those behind. Much
huffing and puffing ensued. My aim was to get up and down, no heroics, so I let
them past. Not much of a racing mentality some may say. I reply, on that day
the opponent was the mountain itself not other runners.
Up and up we travelled over mud,
slate and scree. The wind was pushing us into the mountain, something I was
very glad of. After what seemed like an age, the front runners starting coming
back down and passing us. It was like there was no hill, they were running at a
speed that was roughly my 400m interval place. It was mind blowing. We still
had much more to climb though.
Eventually, I could see the top
of Moel Siabod. I knew I was nearly there, but also I was VERY high indeed. The picnickers
at the top seemed a very strange interlude as I clung on for dear life before
finally touching the Trig Pillar at the summit. Apparently, if I’d been able to open my eyes, I would
have seen 13 of the 14 highest peaks in Wales without turning my head.
But I’d done it , I’d got to the
top, now there was just the small matter of getting back down again.
The word of the
day was ‘Gingerly’.
I did run when I could, but if
anything I think it was easier to ascend than descend. At one checkpoint, a marshal
said “Please tell you are 55 (number was on my shorts)”. When I said yes, he
said “Good, I’ve been wondering where you were”. *coughIwasdescendingslowlycough*.
I joked with a couple of the marshals on the way down that this was an extreme
way of curing my fear of heights. I don’t know if they know I wasn’t joking…
I carried on down, having some
good little ‘race-within-races’ with other runners running across boggy ground. Finally, we can back to the
wooded path and I could build up some speed, passing a runner or two in the
process.
I was relieved at the finish.
The camaraderie of the race was great;
I tend to really like races like this, instead of the big city monsters. A
couple of the runners asked if I would be back next year, and do you know I can’t
say the answer is a definite NO. Dipping tired legs into the river afterwards
brought welcome relief as did the picnic I’d brought for us, which we munched
by the boot of the car, watching the carnival. That was lovely.
I challenged myself yesterday,
got out of my comfort zone, with everything in my body was screaming at me not to do it.
But a combination of ignorance of what I was letting myself in for, and support
from Steve and the other runners meant I got through it. Ok, I probably didn’t ‘race’
the event for the majority of it, but I tried my hardest and achieved something
I’ve not done before. That’s a win in my book.
Whilst I’m most definitely not a
natural fell runner, I’ll certainly be doing more Multi-terrain races next year
and building my confidence a bit more. Maybe I should walk up a few more of
these hills before I try and run up them.
