Written by John Hunt - https://johntrac.wordpress.com
Warning
Very long arc of attrition post
RAMBLINGS OF A BEARDED SEAL WHISPERER
When I worked my way up the ultra ladder to 100 miles my plan was to do an ‘easy’ 100 first ie flat easy navigation etc then attempt a tougher one before I went on to 100+ milers.
So after completing the Thames path 100 in April of 2016 thoughts turned to what 100 miler I could do that was a bit harder I thought about the ndw100 sdw100 the white Rose 100 and a few others but when my fellow idiot Bob Wild suggested doing the arc of attrition which is 100 miles from Coverack to porthowen along the southwest coastal path 4000m of ascent over tough terrain and possibly awful weather I thought it sounded ridiculous and way out of my comfort zone so naturally I signed up.
The more I heard about the race the more I regretted entering it with my favourite story being that the race in 2016 was hit by a named storm and battered the runners for 36 hours with some of the worst weather the south west coast has ever seen and as a result only 25% finished the race!
With about 20 weeks until race day I decided to write up an 18 week training plan that had 3 hard weeks followed by an easy week that gradually increased in mileage which was almost identical to the training plan I used for my first 100
The only problem being that I live in the flattest place on earth that has no hills and no trail to speak of so the chances of replicating in training what I’d be doing in Cornwall were well zero so me and Bob decided a couple of trips to folkestone to do a bit of hill training on the north downs, that’s pretty much the same as the swcp right?…right?
Anyway I deliberately wanted to add more volume to this training cycle as I knew I had a potential 36 hours on my feet and managed to do a couple of 100+ mile weeks with no problems (it’s all about time on my feet) or so I kept telling myself
I had no other races in prep for the arc so I could concentrate on training 100%
I also had to think a bit more about kit as it’d be in February and very likely wet and cold especially at night we also had to carry all mandatory kit which included full waterproof cover,an emergency survival bivvy bag,waterproof gloves (I got some really good ones for about a fiver)34 headtorches and a partridge in a pear tree among other bits and bobs
I was going to stick with my Adidas kanadia tr7s which I find pretty good on dry and wet terrain although more importantly I had no idea how good they would be on jagged rock and stone
I also invested in a pair of hiking poles (or cheat sticks if you prefer) because it was going to be up and down the whole way round and I think I read somewhere that using cheat sticks will take 800million per cent pressure off of your legs or something like that
Along with the cheat sticks I got a new 1000 lumens headtorch which I used on some training runs and it was brilliant it was like running in my own personal globe of daylight
In some of my training runs I noticed my toes were rubbing together causing horrendous blisters so much so that blood was soaking through my shoes so I tried some running toe socks you know like gloves for your feet they weren’t injinji ones either! Bollocks am I paying 20 quid for one pair of socks I’m far too tight, so got some cheap knock offs made in China probably by an 8 year old for 7p per week but possibly not
They worked really well and no more blisters
I’d be using my radlight pack with two 750ml front mounted hard bottles due to the mandatory kit list requiring the ability to carry 1.5 litres of fluids.
We were also really lucky to have Sharon Foster and Mark Foster agree to crew for us again which was a massive plus,these guys are worth their weight in gold for something like this and makes it that much easier, definitely the hardest working crew on the planet and just two really really great peopleI was over the moon to have a team ‘lucky gonk’reunion
In the build up to the race when I was tapering on a slow 4 mile run I started getting sharp pains in my ankle so had to take 4 days enforced rest which sent my head spinning had the previous 18 weeks training gone up the spout,would I even make it to the start line?
Well yes I did and I suspect some of the pain may have been psychological we all know about the taper madness don’t we?
So with training/kit/crew and taper madness out of the way we travelled to Cornwall from thanet which took about 5 and a half hours, the closer we got to our destination the stranger and stranger the names of towns and villages became (middle wallop???)
Get to the b and b which was the house from the amytiville horror films and was run by a very sweet old lady who couldn’t do enough for us.
We unpacked walked to the local pub I was hoping for some kind of pasta based meal as is the norm for me before a stupid long run but had to settle for pie and mash which was wonderful!
I only got about 4 hours sleep the night before the race as I was in the death grip of pre race nerves, miles from home, possibly the toughest race in the country that is so far out of my comfort zone it’s unreal! It’ll be fine it’s just a long run right?
The next morning the alarm sounds at 6:15 am that wakes me up from my horrible broken sleep and awakes bob from his 43 hour slumber I swear he has narcolepsy and can drop to sleep at the drop of a hat.
We all had a full English breakfast and made our way to race registration which was at the finish in a beach bar called the bluebar in porthowen and a 10 minute drive to where we were staying, it was when we arrived here that all of my nerves disappeared and we’re replaced with an eager excitement to get the race started (oh John you poor sad fool if you knew what was to come…)
We had a kit check to make sure we had all the mandatory items
Emergency survival bag
Waterproof coat
waterproof trousers
2×headtorches
Waterproof gloves
Flare gun
Bear spray
Shark repellent
OK the last 3 were made up, or were they….
We had the tracker fitted to our packs which had to go on the left shoulder for some reason so I had to have it ready attached when I noticed it was on my right shoulder strap
We had a race briefing from the 3 race directors that was at times hilarious and at times scary (don’t wonder off of the trail as you’ll fall down at abandoned tin mine and die) and things like that.
We got on a coach to make the hour long journey to the start at coverack with Sharon and mark meeting us there, Bob slipped back into his slumber and in was taking in the atmosphere on the coach hearing stories of other people’s previous races that included utmb,ll100 and other insanely hardcore races shit! I am so out of my depth!!
We arrived at our destination,got off the coach and got our last bits of kit faffage done and it was at this point I noticed how windy it was which made it very chilly which got me thinking about my kit choice of just wearing a thin windbreaker to start with but in knew I’d warm up after a couple of miles.
We said our goodbyes to the crew and got led to the start line by a bagpiper in full kit, so here we were at the start line with a minute to go until we were thrown into the unknown, the wind blowing a gale you really can’t explain the feeling at this stage unless you’ve been In the situation knowing you’ve got the toughest 36 hours of your life ahead of you and genuinely not knowing if you were going to finish or get hypothermia and air lifted to hospital how exciting! What a journey we was about to embark on!
The countdown was over and we were off we were led out of coverack by one of the mud crew team as getting lost this early on would be embarrassing, Bob and I had planned to stay together as it would increase our chances of finishing and make things much easier for Sharon and mark to crew us and me being the faster runner (sorry bob but we all know it to be true) and bobs far superior experience and navigation skills we make a pretty good team,the start was mildly rolling on single track type trail I thought “ah this is lovely the southwest coastal path isn’t as bad as everyone made out” then the first of the jagged rocks started appearing oh I hope we haven’t got this for another 98 miles #shit
It was after about 4 miles I had my first fall it wasn’t a bad fall just slipped on some gungy mud and I bounced back up like some kind of lycra clad ultra ninja it was around here that there were some wild horses running about and and few people stopped to take pictures and must admit it was absolutely glorious,just stunning views in every direction you couldn’t help but stop and take a look around.
I started the race with my poles folded up in my pack but it would soon become apparent they would be an essential part of the next 30 odd hours so the first chance I got I took them out and it was much more comfortable using poles over the rocky terrain and just made the chances of falling over a little slimmer.
Is can’t remember much about the early miles I know our crew met us at about mile 10? Which was lizard point With a massive steak pasty because you can’t come all the way to Cornwall without trying one can you?
I must say I’m a bit rubbish at getting food inside me early on as your body doesn’t need it yet but it’s best to get the calories in while your stomach is still fine and this is where Sharon and mark are brilliant they will force you to eat something at every opportunity and I intended to have a bite out of it but it was so nice I damn near inhaled the whole damn thing and possibly 3 of marks fingers fantastic about 800 calories in 7 seconds I’ll be alright for a while,Bob had a couple of bites of his and we pushed on to the first checkpoint at porthleven at 24 miles and at this stage my legs were in quite a bad way I think all of the ascending and descending were just killing my quads and gluten and I started to get a bit of pain in that big thick tendon thingy at the back of my right knee which may or may not have had something to do with a fall I had going down a steep descent where I pretty much folded myself in half backwards on the way into meet our crew,as I was picking myself up I could hear a shout from Mark down below that may have been “get up and stop f***ing about” or something similar. It appears nobody was impressed by my breakdancing backwards down a rocky hill.
It was about this point where a guy walking a border collie kept overtaking me what the shit!!!! I’m a bloody hardcore ultra runner in an extreme winter 100 mile race and a random bloke with a dog called poppy (or something) was just smashing past me as icng I didn’t exist fantastic!
It wasn’t mandatory to go into the checkpoints as they didn’t have to scan us or whatever but I’m sure if we went inside the arc angels would have catered for our every whim so we just carried on and made our way to penzance at about 38 miles I can’t remember much about this section other than we had to put our head torches on as it was getting dark but we were both moving OK, running where it was runnable and hiking where it wasn’t, the terrain was consistently up and down and rocky and slippery and we were both very aware of the effort we were having to put in there was no ‘cruise control’ as soon as we came across a section that we deemed runnable it ended after 50 yards with technical terrain it was almost impossible to get any kind of rhythm going.until we got to Perranuthnoe where we had planned to change into road shoes as we had about 6 miles of road until the wonderfully named Mousehole,it felt so good yo get out of the muddy trail shoes and put on some nice cushioned road shoes and fresh socks it was towards the end of this section I started to suffer from nausea and just feeling like utter crap so had to have some enforced walk breaks when we should really have been running but bob had very few complaints about walking for some reason.
A couple of miles away from the penzance checkpoint the path turned into very runnable prom and cycle path but me being a big fat baby and feeling poorly didn’t fancy it
At this point we passed another runner who was struggling with muscular pain and ‘needed pills’ so we wished him well and pushed on to the checkpoint where we decided to pop in and get a sugary cup of tea, I really couldn’t face anything to eat so guzzle some fizzy ginger ale (jesus juice) to try and settle my rebelling stomach I also took some orange segments with me just to get some sort of calories inside me
I will say the checkpoints were second to none tons of people to give you whatever you wanted hot/cold drinks pasta,rice,curry everything and the arc angels doing what they do best, these events only work if you’ve got people willing to sacrifice their own time to look after the runners and I think there worked out to be one helper for every runner on the course now what other event can say that? Well done mud crew!!!
So still feeling like shit ran over twice we pushed on to lands end via a quick change of shoes (3rd pair so far) before Mousehole
Bob had worked out a time schedule for us which had us at lands end for 4am I think? My nausea had subsided and I was feeling relatively good other than my toes really hurting aqrnd my legs screaming at me for the love of god please stop this torture!
I think the terrain turned very gnarly very quickly with the trail turning into rocky streams,more technical ups and downs and I’m sure this had a section that went through a wooded trail then down some metal steps onto the rockiest ‘beach’you’ve ever seen, Bob and I were stood at the bottom saying ‘no bloody way is this the trail, it’s just a random rock strewn beach in a cove’ then we saw some lights shining from the other side it was some mud crew people signalling that it was the correct way so bob led the way and found some flattish rocks to stumble across and reached the other side.
I’ll just add here that I’ve probably got some locations and distances mixed up as on races like this it and tell tends to blur into one long stretch of suffering.
I think it was on this stretch towards lands end bob started to get into a bit of difficulty with sickness and nausea and generally struggling a bit but he was still pushing and was spot on with navigating, I would have got lost on so many occasions without his nav help so thanks Bob.
This part was very tough going and very frustrating as we could see the lands end visitor centre lights from miles away and every time we descended it just disappeared for it to reappear 20 minutes later but no closer.
It was dark,cold and we were on cliff top moors and lands end was laughing at us from miles away I think we we were both a bit tired and pissed off at this stage
When we were about half a mile away we decided to push on to the checkpoint so could let mark and Sharon know what bob needed (2 cups of tea and some chips smothered in salt and vinegar)
It’s amazing what you crave in a 100 miler especially when you feel a bit rough a bind I later learned that bob would have killed for one of them twizzler ice cream lolly things.
I got to lands end and was cursing to one of the ever cheerful mudcrew volunteers that lands end kept running away from me whenever I got away bit too close
I found Sharon and mark understandably snoozing in the car so very rudely woke them up and told them about bobs issues and we’d be spending 20 minutes at the checkpoint to sort ourselves out.
When I arrived inside the checkpoint it was like arriving in shangri-la sort of
Arc angels rushing about dealing with tired,hungry and broken runners it was a sight to behold but unfortunately they had no chips for bob so I got us each a bowl of chunky chicken soup which was absolutely sublime and I devoured it but bob didn’t agree, had two mouthfuls then ran outside to promptly empty out the entire contents of his stomach, now this was not a good situation for bob with no food in his belly and unable to get anything else in this was going to be very very tough going for him.
While this was going on I was inside drinking tea feeling really really good although very concerned about bob and the fact we had to leave in 5 minutes so we can keep to our very tight schedule
It was while I was waiting one of the arc angels slipped on the muddy floor whilst holding a bowl of chicken soup, she went flying and looked painful but she didn’t spill about drop of that soup in what was the greatest abothletic achievement of the entire weekend bravo!!
So we plodded out of lands end at 4am giving us 10 hours to cover the 24 miles to st Ives easy peasy lemon squeezy loads of time*
*loads of time on fresh legs feeling great on a flat road maybe but after 52 miles of leg smashing terrain,tiredness and in bobs case suffering indescribable things then this was going to be tight
We were able to meet Sharon and mark twice before we got to a 14 mile section where we were on our own so the last meeting point we put on some more layers and thick waterproof mitts as we were going into a freezing wind now and loaded up with food for the long section.
I’ll just add here that I think we both coped very well with the night section maybe because of the extra light from the full moon or maybe because we had a lot of other things to keep us occupied
Whilst it was still dark there were loads of ups and downs on uneven steps that took so much effort to go up/down them there was literally nothing runnable that it can remember.
It eventually got light but with it came none of the elation that usually comes with sunrise after running through the night it made no difference at all and I think this is about the time bob emptied his guts again in in a loud and painful gutteral cry
He was in a a bad way but massive credit to his resolve he kept moving forward albeit very slowly he was just tapping out the miles I was staying ahead oft him to try and give him something to follow and it may have worked I’m not sure though.
We kept plodding and the terrain got gnarly as f**k it was almost like the trail was a sentient being who knew your deepest fears and kept throwing them at you!
The terrain was a mixture of boggy path and jagged boulders with not much else it really is desolate and looks like people of any kind have never set foot here EVER! it was a along here that I came and cropper, I had to loosen my shoes as my feet were swelling up and pretty sore and I put my foot down into a bog and brought it out without the shoe attached
Now as I stood there watching the stinking bog water start to ooze into my shoe I had a bit of an low moment and think I shouted f**k this f***ing race and bob snapped out of his long spell of feeling like crap to take and photo of me in this ridiculous situation
Thank god his phone ran out of power!
So on we plodded limited to a maximum 3mph mostly due to the apocalyptic terrain,wind,rain and partly due to bob taking up an extended residence in the pain cave but what am warrior he was still going forward
With about 6 miles to go to St Ives there was a lady on the trail with some snacks and I’m not sure what happened if she misses understood the cut off time or I missheard but she said just over 2 hours to cover 6 miles you can do it
I done a bit of maths in my head….shit shit bob at the speed we’re going we will miss the 2pm cut offs,he was adamant we had more time(and he was right as i found out)but he convinced me to go ahead without him which i was reluctant to do as he was still suffering but I was so scared at missing the cut offs I’m ashamed to say i left him
I’ll just explain bob was in no real danger here and he would be fine he has plenty of experience in ultra running and is a big boy who can take care of himself
So off I went like an absolute lunatic over previously Un runnable terrain I was clamoring over boulders and jumping over rocky streams and up and down hills like a man possessed iw overtook about 5 runners here and linked up with a couple for help with some navigation and at one point my watch clocked a sub 8 minute mile, I’d put far too much time,effort,training and money into this race to dnf I would have killed myself to get there.
I finally made it to st Ives checkpoint with about an hour and 20 minutes to spare I decided to wait until 2pm for bob as I’d knew he’d need a lot of help to get back out onto the trail with a mind bending potential 10 more hours not something to look forward to when you’re body is wrecked
This was a good chance for me to change into my 4th and final pair of shoes for the 22 mile stretch to porthowan I ate some biscuits with a cup of tea and a few mouthfuls of chilli and waited for bob now it may seem a heroic thing to do waiting for an hour but it really wasn’t I needed his nav skills and company too and I think running together would get us to the finish quicker
Bob turned up with 15 minutes to spare after ahnndndlso bit of confusion finding the checkpoint but still a bit of a wreck and unable to eat/drink and also couldn’t even swallow an ibuprofen tablet and if i was in his position probably wouldn’t have been able to continue…….
But continue he did unbelievable resolve!there were a few runners who bailed out here as the prospect of another 10 hours running on an already tired mind and bashed up body is just a terrifying thing to wrap your head around and you have to dig very very deep to drag yourself outside again
We both plodded outside and then I realised I’d somehow reset my GPS sat nav thingy so was without a nice pink line to follow now but bob still had his one so we’d be fine, we got back onto the trail which was about a 3 mile road section that looped around an estuary and i was staying ahead of bob just too try and get him to keep up with me but I kept having to turn around and ask which way to go which was possibly very annoying for him
We came to the dunes of doom which is about a 3-4mile section of sand dunes that were really well signed and twisted and turned all over the place, I remember thinking it was never going to end at this point I was unintentionally getting further ahead of bob and was stopping to let him catch up but in doing so I was getting cold and it would be getting dark again soon so I made the decision to crack on ahead (selfish bastard) I knew by this point we would both finish, we had plenty of time and the course was very runnabe from the dunes to the finish ( oh John you naive little fool)
I got to the end of the dunes and met sharon and mark and told them I was going to push to the finish and for them just to concentrate on bob as I was feeling fine and moving well and had only 12 miles to go on runnable coastal path (idiot)
I think I saw them once more after that and then I was on my own as we entered the second night so I stuck the headtorch on again and anything flat or downhill I was running I couldn’t believe how well I was moving after 28 hours on my feet at times 10 minutes per mile felt easy and very very bizarre
It was just after the dunes that I saw a couple of guys photographing the sunset or birds or whatever and I asked them how far to porthowan?
They replied about 5 miles!! I couldn’t believe it only 5 miles to go I thought I had about 9 I’m nearly there yessss!
I was elated I was running well I was overtaking a couple of people and I’d be finished in about 90 minutes (oh John how wrong could you be)
A little while later a couple of mudcrew guys were on the trail so I asked is it really only 5 miles until porthowan?
Turns out the guys I asked before told me the distance to PORTREATH not porthowan which waa actually about 10 miles away
This was my lowest point of the race and this information broke me, from being almost finished to having another 4 hours of running left knocked me for six I could have cried.
I didn’t cry instead I decided to carry on running as best as I could and not think about the finish just think about the next town,the next post, the next step this section was all clifftop trail that was fairly easy nav from what I remember with a couple of very steep ups and downs into coves (I thought by this time I’d seen the end of these gits) I was also getting hallucinations here as I was ascending some steep uneven steps I was looking skyward and it looked like I was under a massive white bridge, I thought where the f**k does that bridge go and why’s it so high up?
I was a bit tired by this stage and also took a wrong turn that ended 2 feet from the cliff edge oops best not tell the wife about that one (if you’re reading this many it was actually about 30 feet from the edge so no real danger la La La la)
So turned back on the right trail to another up and down and came to Portreath.
The signs confused me a bit here and I took a wring turn down a little slipway I headed down until something hissed at me I thought it was a cat or something but shone the beam of my headtorch down to find a baby seal staring at me with its big black eyes but not moving I nearly shat myself as in my tired hallucinogenic state I thought it was a monster but when I realised what it was I wondered If I was hallucinating it, I was going to touch it but was worried someone might see me stroking a big rock or something and look like a mental case so just turned around and ran the correct way(for the record I think the seal was real although others didnt)
There was a mudcrew guy waiting who told me the route to go and I unexpectedly bumped into sharon and mark again it was lovely to see them and they made sure I had all that I needed and sent me on my way they told me bob was doing well and that set my mind at ease.
Another gut met me and walked me up lighthouse hill? A really nice guy who was very chatty and quite impressed with all the runners.
He showed me on to the trail and wished me luck only about 4 miles left nearly there.
It was in this section that the southwest coastal path stuck the knife in,twisted it and then snapped it off
There was one last big descent and ascent up some horrible steps bloody evil things I overtook a couple of people here but they didn’t seem to mind I wished them well and moved on and hooked up wits another guy on the final long rocky path that nevery seemed to end I kept expecting to see thehe lights of porthowan but they never came….
Until oh my god I see the finish one final downhill to negotiate then a hairpin left down the finish straight dodging massive puddles and finish right outside the bluebar,handed an enormous buckle by a very cheerful looking lady and led into the race hq to a massive cheer and round of applause
What a weekend
What a race
What an adventure
Unbelievable
I sat down in a daze being very well looked after by the angels,holding my buckle trying to process the previous 32 odd hours.
Bob finished an hour or so after me and my respect for him increased a thousand fold after battling through what he had to and still get a finish almost defied belief
A very very tough (old) man and was a pleasure to go on this epic journey with him.
And I think me and bob both agree that it wouldn’t have been possible without our sublime crew of sharon and mark,they worked their socks of to ensure we were OK and I can’t thank them enough for everything.
Also thanks to everyone at trac and everyone who followed on Facebook and the messages of support
Mudcrew have a truly special event in the arc of attrition and for me deserves iconic status on the ultra running calender it’s a well oiled machine and as tough as they come.
It’s billed as the southwest coasts toughest footrace but I think it has to be up there with the toughest in the country a wonderful brutal experience that I was honoured to be a part of.
And lastly a shout out to my wife who supports me on these stupid things when the money/time could be spent on much more productive things thank you mandy your support is everything to me
So what’s next?
Who knows there’s a few things in the pipeline so watch this space