2 Grantham Canal 29 milers and 1 win!

Two 29 milers along the Grantham Canal were intended to be pure training runs; I find it very hard to motivate myself to do LSRs by myself now and needed to get a good double in. Running alongside 100 other people, somewhere new and with checkpoints to break up the distance and to provide water and food makes it much easier on the brain. That didn't make the prospect of running east along a canal for 5 hours, then for another 5hours in reverse the next day, any more exciting. I was falling asleep with boredom even before we got going.

There was a good TiT showing - me, Anna, Heather, Adam and Jim - and it was good to talk training and fundraising etc. There were also a lot of people training for Marathon des Sables, I'm so glad I don't have to carry a pack. In fact, it's a difficult call which is harder. On the one hand, we have considerably more distance, the monotony of the same route every day for 10 days, and a single hard surface. On the other, they get searing heat in the day, freezing temperatures at night, sand and terrible terrain shredding their feet, carry all their own food, have no access to a comfy bed, hot shower or clean clothes. I know which I'd rather do!

The route was dull but started off with 1.5 miles on road before hitting tightly packed sandy towpath. Somehow, I was in first lady position, a happy and entirely fortuitous coincidence with my strategy to run comfortably throughout, and to run as much as possible. By 10 miles, I was in 3rd, my mate Audrey and a red haired girl had gone ahead. I caught Red Hair after a while and lost her at CP3 at 14.5 miles. Then it got unpleasant. It was on grass. Nice, smooth, fairly dry grass, but I'm hopeless off road. I lost about 90 seconds per mile along the 10 or so miles of this in the 2nd half, but managed to keep moving. But, blinkin' 'eck, it was boring. No rhythm, flat fields, canal and lots of swans the only scenery, it went on forever. At least it encouraged me to keep running to get it over with.

By CP4 at 21 miles, I caught Audrey and we agreed to run together, but she dropped back for a walk break at 22. I was in first again. Blimey! That was proper motivation, as long as I was running I was maintaining the gap. Luckily we hit gravel again at about 24 which made things a whole lot easier. With no discomfort anywhere, no serious tiredness and a level of exertion so manageable it caused one bloke to ask me why I wasn't breathing hard, the last few miles passed quickly. I reached the finish in 4 hours 37 very very surprised and pleased, running through a tape completely made my day, and a very shiny trophy was a fab prize. I've never been 1st lady before, and certainly didn't think it possible in an off-road (admittedly off-road-lite) race.

I decided to take Day 2 easier, running comfortably but stopping for longer at CPs if I wanted to. Jen Salter had turned up anyway, looking for sub 4, so the pressure was off. I had my trophy from Day 1. Plus, with the grass coming earlier on at about 5 miles, I hadn't had time to build up more of a time cushion as I had on Day 1. Those 6 miles between CPs 1 and 2 were so unappealing that I decided to use my ipod for the first time in a race in ages and listen to an Italian language lesson that lasted exactly an hour with the aim to get to the next CP before it finished. It worked, though arriving saying "Dove posso comprare i franco bolli qui vicino?" raised the marshal's eyebrow.

After a good 7 minutes standing around drinking tea, it was back onto gravelly, sandy track, wetter and stickier than yesterday after the frost had melted, but still much more tolerable than grass. Time to see how obedient the legs would be. Luckily, there was no pain anywhere or even much tiredness so the 14 miles were pretty consistently paced, and I even managed to run the hill in the final mile back to the finish to have run the whole 58 miles. Day 2 done in 5 hours 1 minute gave me a combined time of 9 hours 39, enough for joint second overall with Audrey. My first 100 mile week, first double ultra (well, really long marathons) and first win, topped with super quick recovery, a very nice result :-)

Please forgive the impudence, but I'm now going to tag a little reminder of my fund raising to the end of my blogs. I'm raising cash for the Brathay Trust, so if you think my training for, and attempt on, 10 marathons in 10 days in May is worthy of a few quid, you can find the link on the right of this page. Thank you!