Ep 39 - Today’s Session is 432 x 400 metres

Kev takes on the Sri Chinmoy self-transcendent 24 hour track race incorporating the UK 24 hour track Championships. This episode goes around and around and around 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:10

Like it's like it.

SPEAKER_01 0:32

This episode is about running round in tiny circles on dead flat terrain for a full day, seeing if you still have some sanity or are even more insane than you when you stupidly signed up to enter the race in the first place. This is the twenty-four hour track format. I became interested in this ultrarunning format after I read Darren Had Finn's book, The Rise of the Ultrarunners. I liked his description of the atmosphere of the event and how it drew him in and how he had to attempt it. I had to admit that I also took some motivation from the fact that he achieved eighty nine miles and I thought that a hundred miles had to be a good target for me. This episode uh should have actually been about my backyard ultra exploits at Suffolk and Fakum, which I did back in early June and July. And to be honest I lost some of my joke mojo around the podcasting at this time, which I will explain in episode forty. However, backyards gave me a good block of running around in circles training. I had to adjust the circumference of the circles, get them smaller and smaller, go a little bit quicker without disappearing up my own exhaust pipe. To do this I switched all my training runs to flat road, hard packed trail, flat grass playing fields and wore tighter shorts. These runs included running along the Basin Soaks Canal through local housing estates of Fleet and a 4 hour and 2 hour non-stop 400m loop session on a grass running track. I also included more of the Hart Roadrunners speed sessions and hard bike spin sessions. Before I get into the race, I'll explain some of this ultra running format. Track ultras have been around for over 150 years. Indeed, there were very big events when leather boots with tacks in were the super shoes of the day, and half a pound of liver and a pint of stout was all you needed for in-race nutrition. Some notable track races in the UK these days are the Gloucester 24 hour and 48-hour races. I think they run those 48-hour every other year or something like that, because I can't imagine there's an awesome lot of demand. There's also Crawley 12 and 24-hour races, the Centurion Track 100, but that has a 17-hour cutoff. I mean, it's a 100 and not a 24-hour, but it's a long distance track race. But the 17-hour cutoff precludes sort of older age groupers, slower runners like me, and of course it's also invite only, anyway. And then you have the race that I did, the Shri Chamoy 24-hour track race. It's been going since 1989. I can see the old cooling towers of the Battersea Power Station and all the modern developments now in front of it. Loads of apartments. And uh there are 47 entrants. I think they take 50. Don't know why three haven't uh turned up the look of it. Um and what was rather nice actually, which I haven't had done in ages, was about 10 days before they sent out a whole bunch of race numbers, your race number, uh, and a program. And I haven't seen a race program in Donkey's years. And it had all the competitors listed in it, and a bit of a bio on us on our Ultra History, which was really quite good. Gave me a chance to have an insight into some of the people that are running this thing. Um, and uh there's some very interesting people, and the age group spans from about 24 to 83. There's a woman from Finch Coasters doing it who's 83 years old and has done it many times before by the look of it. Um and there might be some quite useful distances, I think. I don't know really what a good distance is. I know the world records something just under 200 miles by Alexander Sorikin, and that was about I think he did 198 or something, so I don't think anybody's getting anywhere near that, but I would have thought somewhere in the 150, 160 mark would probably win it, and I think there's some people here good enough to do that. I know it's done a lot of the um the bios of people that uh there are uh quite a few people who'd run centurion events. Somebody has done the Thames Path hundred in uh a long 13, 13 hours 40 odd or something. Um so there's some quite useful people here. Uh there's a good old mix, there's about I think there's three in my age group, which is 65 plus. So at least there's some competition. Um just to put it in perspective, the world record uh for 65 plus is 134 miles or 135 um 220 kilometres, so that's pretty useful at the age of 65. So uh I don't know you might have heard that on the mic, but they're just about to start the race briefing, which I have to attend, so I'll come back on in a moment.

SPEAKER_00 8:17

Okay, so we've just got a couple more runners coming over the grass. Um, so first up, welcome everyone to um our self-transcendence 24 hour track place, which also this year is the UK Championships, which is very exciting. Um we're delighted to have you all here. First of all, um the direction. So the start is up there where the um the banner is across the track, and we'll start clockwise, and we'll change directions every four hours. So our counters um they will move according to which direction you're running in. But to start with, they're at this near tent. When we change it four hours, they'll move round to the other tent. Um and uh once we're finished this briefing, you can go up there and just um introduce yourself and um learn who's counting you. We have more counters on the first um first four hours and then they will slim down. But that doesn't mean that we're taking our eye off you at all. Uh they're basically running a check the whole time, looking at you know what they're they're seeing you do um as according to what the chip timing uh is is doing. So they're they're back up to the chip timing. If you leave the track, whenever you leave the track, please rejoin it at the same point. So if you come off there to go to the toilets, don't rejoin it here, rejoin it at the same place that you you left the track. If you are on a break or you are off the track, um when the change of direction happens, you come back onto the track at the same point, you complete the lap in the direction you were going, even though it's the opposite to everybody else, and then you turn the turnaround point is under the banner. If you disappear off the track for more than two hours without having told us, and we don't know where you are, um we will just you know we will take you out of the race. Helpers cannot run with you, cannot walk with you at all, not even for you know 20, 30 metres. They must hand drinks and food to you from obviously not the first two or three lanes of the track because then they're gonna be getting in the way of everybody else. Um but they can come to you, but they have to be in a stationary position. So we do have a physiotherapist on site from 3 p.m. Um through to the end of the race. Well, not the same person, but um physio coverage. And we'll be keeping an eye on you throughout the race. If at any point we've got concerns about um your medical, your medical or your general health and well-being, if we're really, really concerned, um we'll obviously we'll we'll talk with you, and if that escalates, we will we do have the right to for force you, tell you, take you out of the race for your own safety. Obviously, I'm having never actually had to do that. Finally, just to say, those of us here from Tree Jimmy Maragin team, we are here to serve you. You're the only you're our sole um thing that's important to us this weekend. So, whatever you need, let us know, and we'll do our best to accommodate and uh wish you a fantastic race. And yeah, we will get started at midday. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 11:24

So that was a rafe briefing. Hopefully it gives it gives you an idea of what one of these 24-hour events involves and what they do for you and uh what you're supposed to do to keep within the rules. Um I think I was saying about the world record holder at Men's Veterans 65 Plus, um it was a guy called uh Mannix Christian, I think, a French guy, and he set the record 20 years ago. So that is quite a long-standing record, and no wonder because 135 miles in 24 hours at that age is pretty amazing. Um I've for myself I just I mean clearly I want to do 100 miles, 100 miles in 24 hours is always a thing. Um so that would be nice. Beyond that, I have no idea what happens if you can get to that point. Um clearly getting inside, you know, even if you get in, if it takes you 23 hours to do a hundred miles, what are you gonna get? Another four miles, five miles if you're lucky at my pace. So we shall see um how it goes. Um and I'm not expecting any record-breaking stuff, it's just gonna be a completely new uh experience. Um quite excited because it's on a track and it'll be floodlit tonight. Um, you don't have all the issues of carrying um race vest packs and poles and all those sorts of things, so unencumbered running for a change. Um most people have got a crew set up uh with gazebos or tents and quite a lot of support. There's probably I don't know, something like ten of us who are individuals on our own, unsupported, um, without gazebos or tents or cover. Um all week it's been forecasting thunderstorms overnight Saturday night for about six hours worth of the night. So I have no idea what the organisers are gonna do if it gets very electrical. Um but um as the race director said, they will tackle that when they get to it, I guess. I've I've been worried the whole time that we would end up in a situation where um the race got abandoned due to electrical storms, but there's nothing you can do about that. Just go out and do what you can do. I guess they would shorten it and just class it as a I don't know, six hour, twelve hour, whatever we get done. Uh but that's by the by. I'm hoping to record as I go round. Um feel very self-conscious about doing this with all these people. They'll be passing on a 400 metre track, we're gonna be seeing an awful lot of each other. Um, but that's all part of the fun and the new experience, I guess. So we're 15 minutes away now, um, and I shall come back on it sometime later. Now during the race, I've got a small microphone that uh lapel mic uh set up that I carry with me, and unfortunately I had issues with that. Um so some of the commentary you're gonna hear on here is on my other handheld device, uh, but I didn't realise I was having problems until about halfway through the race. So I'll just give you a quick fill-in. We started the race uh bang on 12 o'clock midday Saturday. Uh it was warm, it was about uh 23 degrees, sunny. Uh there were 42 that actually made the start line, and I think ten of those were women and uh off we went. And I was quite interested because there's you know quite a few different characters at um well as if Ultra Running wasn't full of strange people anyway. This event attracts uh quite a few, even more of us stranger people. Um I was more interested as I was started jogging off in the 400 metres to see what people's shoe choices were because um I'd been in a bit of a quandary over whether to try out running in super shoes for this or just stick with uh a normal low profile shoe. I don't do a lot of road running, so I don't really own loads of shoes uh suitable for road. All my shoes are trail and mountain running shoes basically or cross country. So I decided to go out. I just went out, I had an old pair of Hoker Max, and they're the original ones, they're not got a number, they're just Hoker Mac, and they're now up to Mac version 6, so I don't know whether that's six years worth of shoe. So I went out and bought the Mac 5 um and alternated between those and my old Macs in um in my training sessions. I didn't wear the new ones a lot, but just enough that they felt alright for the race. And I wore those and one pair of socks for the whole race, didn't need to change them, no blisters, so that was all good. But anyway, getting back to the point, um I wanted to see there was I suppose there must have been about a dozen people who were wearing super shoes of some form or another with a carbon plate in them. Um interesting enough, there was one older chap who spent most of the time uh speed walking at best, shuffling round the track in a pair of super shoes. Um I'm not sure what advantage that gained him, but it was quite interesting to see what uh people were wearing. Um I don't know there was any great advantages. I'd never um run in a super shoe. Um I was didn't want to bother getting used to one uh to run in it for 24 hours. But I imagine if you started in them and could wear them as long as you could suffer them, you could switch over to uh something else more comfortable later and you would get some advantage early on in the race, I guess. Anyway, we got to our first turnaround point and it was quite warm by now. I mean, I said it was 23 degrees, but it must have been warmer down on the track. The sun was directly on us all the time. Nice bright day. Uh so I stayed on top of my electrolytes and hydration. Um, and I was taking uh salt tablets, uh eating crisps, pretzels, salty food, uh drinking quite a lot. Um, interestingly enough, the um the a lot of people had support crew. Um I didn't, I think there were about five or six of us that didn't have crew supporting us in the race. Um and uh they were able to drive onto track, they were in around about lane six. Um they had uh most of them had a car uh parked with a gazebo over the rear tailgate, um, and they were all set up there, and uh but that allowed me to put my chair and box and uh box of food and clothing and equipment in lane six, and I could just scoot off to the side and pick it up every 400 metres if I wanted to. So it was quite easy to stay on top of the hydration. Okay, we're just about to hit the eight hour mark of the turnaround, so I thought I'd record this. I've my watch is at least two miles out and I've got 4135. So somewhere around, I don't know, 38, 39 miles. And we're coming up to change direction again for the second time and go back the original way of clockwise. So exciting. Okay, okay. So that was it, big deal. That's a turn around. Ten hours done. Only another 14 hours to go. Um we've had our first flash of lightning away in the distance, so hopefully that's not coming this direction. Staying away, I'm up to somewhere around 48 miles, maybe a bit more than that. Um been making slow progress, running around about 11 minute uh miles, and uh just a little walk lap. I've just actually just had 10 minutes stop, got my first ibuprof open down um and had uh flask of coffee, so hopefully that'll kick in. Uh as we go into the night, um just passing all the crew points. And uh all looking good. There's um well a fox that's used to humans anyway running around the track every now and again. He's obviously looking for runners food and everybody's been chasing him off. Um also there's been a Oktoberfest in the park down by the lake in Basassi Park, and they've been playing some loud but very great sing-along tunes, which has been really good. Just sort of keep you going a bit more if you're not listening to music. Um I don't do that anyway. Well, spend most of my time talking myself on air. Um so I need to get back into some uh running now. I'm hoping that through the night I can start to pick up. I was at 34th on the list out of about 45 after something like five laps, and then I was 31st. I can't remember how many laps that was after, and now I'm it's currently on actually it might have changed because we've done 10 hours now, not laps, hours. Um ten hours and ten hours, where am I? Uh I'm still 27th, 48. Yeah, so I did 48 miles in uh uh 10 hours, and that puts me 27th position, but I'm hoping that through the night I can move it up a bit. Keep moving. So I'll get off of here next time I'll be able to turn around at twelve o'clock. Should be halfway exactly. So it's twelve o'clock. Halfway, and we're out to do the turn the opposite direction again. Well done. Well over halfway. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So I've done I don't know because my watch is about maybe probably three miles out now. I've got 61 on the watch. I'm gonna take it I've done fifty-eight miles in 12 hours. We've got a bit of rain at the moment, which is really nice. Cooling me down. I've been running whole time in my club heart road runners vest, never had to change it. Loads of people have put waterproofs on, those that are doing a bit more walking, but it's only light stuff. It's really warm still. So that's it. That's the turn round. Hello to the podcast! We've done twelve hours. Twelve hours, well done. That was a great point. They've all been out twelve hours as well, so I could do that well done for them. And just gonna keep plugging away now. I've had a few sort of ten, thirty minute miles, and then a few slower, obviously, with a walk every now and again. But I'm going pretty good. I'm just gonna shut off now and speak later, maybe two o'clock. So we went quite a way into the race and uh I did get back on due to the rain which became torrential after we had the the lightning in the distance um from 1 a.m. Uh the rain became torrential for six hours and it didn't relent until daylight around uh 7am. Uh so everybody was under waterproofs, uh all covered up, all under their hoods, you couldn't see who was who really. Um and uh there were we all seemed to be trudging round, although there were about three people who never seemed to trudge. One of those was the winner, Sarah Von der Burke, and she just kept banging out the laps, really uh seemed to be rapid to me anyway, and past me plenty of times. In twenty-two hours and twenty-one minutes. Um quite happy with that. And basically got another hour and forty minutes to get the thing done and clock up some more miles. I'm not walking at the moment. Um but there was a chap who half a lap behind me um also clocked a hundred. So I thought, well I've got to keep him behind me, so I went and caught him up to make sure that he couldn't get away from me in the next two hours. But he's behind me now, so I think he went for a cup of tea, so I should be able to hold my position, I hope. Um I think I'm 12th, but who knows? It's a long time since he updated the leaderboard, and there's no mileage on it. So I'm not sure what's going on, but I know there is a guy in my age group who's about six laps ahead of me, so I'm not catching him. And that's it, it's stopped raining, it's starting to brighten a bit. Um, and uh tracks dried out, and there are people still going round and round and round. Most walk a lot of walkers. Um the race is being led by a Sarah Vanderburke being an absolute machine.

SPEAKER_03 29:54

Well done 34, brilliant.

SPEAKER_01 29:56

Thank you very much. That guy has been the life and soul of the place all night. Number 18, Crystal Palace Fun Runners, uh giving everybody loads of support and every lap talking to everybody. It's been really good. Anyway, waffling a bit, and uh probably get back on here at the end. Um I did manage to hold off the chap I was describing, his name is Ian Jack of Herd Hill Harriers. Uh he had a very strong last hour beating me to the eleventh spot by just point one four of a mile. Um yeah, just couldn't hold him off, so I had to bower to his superior finishing speed to me. Um I also have to mention Richard Hall Smith, Crystal Palace fun runners, who was so encouraging to everyone in the field. Having a very great upbeat attitude definitely helps to grind out this type of event, and he was calling out everybody's number as he went past or their name as if he knew them. Uh, and it was really uplifting. So, to summarise the event, uh the Sri Jamoy organisation, as you would expect, is fantastic. They've been doing it for years, they're all over it, they know exactly what they're doing. Um, we had uh timing chips on a number that you cross them at every 400 metres and it logged you. Um and that was great because it provided a timing split. I've got 432 uh 400 metre time splits, which is really quite um nerdy, uh, but I seem to get into looking at them. Um but also they had a human element to it because they had a human lap counter or lap counters um who just were there to check um that uh nothing went wrong. If anything went wrong electronically, they could still count them out. And every time you went past they called out, got you Kev or some such encouragement, um, which was also fantastic. Um couldn't believe how often it was okay to get spoken to over 400 times in 24 hours, but uh yeah, all part of the strange quirkiness of running a 24-hour track race. Uh the key prize winners were Sarah Vanderburgh, who ran 131 miles, nearly 211 kilometres. Uh Sarah is from the USA, so um she although she won the first female in the Shri Jamoy race, uh she couldn't be first female in the UK championships, and that went to Joe Newens, who ran 108.8 miles or 175k, so well done to Joe. Um the first male was Brian Rob with 123 miles or 198 Ks. And I looked at Rob's um 400 metre splits because this is really sad, but he did about 77 laps before he did a lap over two minutes, and he did a way up into like getting near the 200s or so before he got into three minute lapping. Uh so he kept it very steady and strong throughout the race, although he did seem to lose his running form, got more and more stooped and was travelling slower, but he still seemed to be grinding them out well, and that's obviously what got him the win. As for me, I did 107.374 miles or 172.803 Ks, uh which, as I've said, uh equated to 432 laps of 400 metres. And it was that precise because towards the end they gave us a little uh jar full of beans of some sort, um, and uh with a lid on it, and our number was on the lid, and when we stopped when the whistle went at the stroke of twenty-four hours, or twelve o'clock midday Sunday, uh you put your jar down at your rear foot, um, and then they went out and measured the actual uh exact distance past the case that you'd done once crossing the mat. So um very accurate measurements, uh which is something I'm not used to, but then that's how it works with 24 hour races. They do it with the bike racing as well. Um, because I have done a 24 hour cycle race before where they've done that, so yeah, another type of measurement as opposed to running to um times all the time. Uh in terms of the splits I did, I covered 50 miles in just under uh 10 hours and thirty and a hundred miles in twenty two hours and twenty minutes. So I slowed by about one hour fifty over the second fifty miles, which represents a slowing down of about 2.2 minutes per mile, or almost 33 seconds a lap, which is quite a large difference, really. I'm not sure whether negative splits is possible in a 24-hour race. Um I stand to be corrected, but it'd be amazing if uh anybody was able to do that. Uh my fastest lap was the first lap in 221, and I was holding it back really, and you know, obviously he wasn't going to go racing off. Uh, and my last lap was 233 because I was still trying to chase uh Ian and get that 11th spot. Uh, but there were a lot of slower ones in between there, because I took two rest breaks of 10 minutes and about four other stops of about three minutes, and I averaged uh three minutes twenty for the four hundred and thirty-two laps with an average speed of I don't know what, something like thirteen thirteen and a half minutes a mile, or something like that. Uh the interesting splits for me are around my race position. Um at 50k in a field of 42, I was 32nd, at 100k I was 20th, and at 100 miles I was up to twelfth. Um, and I guess some of that's to do with the dropout rate, um, but also uh steady and strong tends to win these races. It very much is a tortoise and hare type event, unless you're really, really good. Um and you've got to just have that ultra running hanging in there determination. Uh 13 runners retired early, uh, which as I said will have helped with my progress at the leaderboard. Um the age range was a 25-year-old up to an 84-year-old. Uh the 25-year-old retired just shy of 50 miles, while uh Patricia Seabrook, the 84-year-old of Finchamstead, her club is Finchampstead Coasters, coasted to over 51 miles, proving that uh the long game favours the experienced ultra runners. Uh there were 10 women athletes in the event, which was just under a quarter of the field, and of course the winner was a woman, Sarah Vanderbank, who won the the race outright. So, how was I feeling uh post-race? Today is um Tuesday, and so I'm in my second full proper day of recovery. Um I had some lifelong friends contact me about two weeks before the race and said, Were we around, could they stay the night come and see us? Which of course I was going to do, no question it. Um, and I also booked uh in a local curry house, the Chennai Express in Fleet High Street. Um and I can hardly recommend that. And uh I had kept it down, it was a buffet evening, so I was able to uh hold back on what I ate and control the the quantities because my stomach wasn't ready for a load. Um and I started with half a beer and later had the other half, so I did get um a beer down meat post-race without being too ill. Um I haven't had any swelling in the feet or ankles or any blisters at all. Um quite a bit of the usual quad pain, but with no climbing and descending, um, I think this would be a lot less as well. So certainly I think that this type of race is a lot less punishing um from a physical aspect on the body than my normal uh hundred-mile uh trail running ultras. Um it's uh not a lot less punishing mentally though. Interestingly, on Monday yesterday um I had coached a track session for our club at Aldershot Military Stadium, um, and the last thing I wanted to see was a running track uh in the pouring rain again. Uh and uh but while I was there, a club mate of mine, Andy Danson, said his wife had asked, What did I think about when I was running round all those laps? Um, and I struggled to give Andy an answer, um, because I really don't know much of what I think about at the time. But I've had a little bit of think about afterwards, and um of course I don't listen to music, so that doesn't distract me, uh, although of course I have been known to talk to myself uh in these races, hence the podcast. Um I looked at my watch a lot, every lap in fact. Uh I did pointless timing calculations, and they really are pointless. Um I listened to the music in the park. There was a Oktoberfest in Battersea Park, uh, and they were playing loads of sing-along tracks, and the whole audience was singing. There was a quite a crowd there, uh, so that was entertaining up till about 10 o'clock at night. Um I planned what I was going to eat and drink every hour, so I was thinking about that sort of thing on the way round. Uh, just checking in with myself, feet and you know, legs and all that sort of thing, and was I okay. Um, I studied a lot of differing running gates and people's shoe choices uh to pass the time away. Um I didn't have any mantras, uh, I didn't think of family and friends, which is a bit sad, really, isn't it? Uh I did no future planning for life, um, and I did not uh contemplate life at all. And I most certainly uh did not self-transcend. However, I did get very annoyed about the amount of car horns that were being angrily blasted out all night. I couldn't believe how often they were going off. It was like every time somebody tooted at somebody, somebody else held their hand on the horn even longer. Um and I thought about 2 a.m. it would go quiet, but it didn't, it just went on all night. I couldn't believe it. Through to like 5 a.m. They were still tooting their horns. I don't know if there's a problem around the Chelsea Bridge area or something like that. But a piece of property advice don't buy one of the new apartments built around Battersea Power Station. Would I do it again? No, that is that box ticked. Thanks very much. But the 48 hour box is blank. Well, long to the next bloody hate station.