• Sunday, 7 Jul 2024 1:30 pm

  Durham Coastal Half Marathon

  Two races in one week! Sunday morning found me with a couple hundred other runners at Nose's Point in Seaham for the Durham Coastal Half Marathon, a trail-ish half following the line of the coast from Seaham down to Crimdon Dene, just outside of Hartlepool. We take Ghyll walking along these trails pretty often, so a lot of it is familiar territory to me.

  

  

  We started out under sunny skies but dark clouds in the distance forebode. I started near the back so for the first half hour or so I focused on trying to squeeze past folks and avoid stepping on any heels. Soon we were heading deep into Hawthorne Dene for a bit of a loop—slower going on the climb to the top of the dene but easy miles on the way out and along the relatively even clifftops heading towards Easington.

  At a small aid station I scarfed a handful of jellybeans and a cup of water and continued on my way. A short spell behind a slower runner on an overgrown path gave me a chance to catch my breath, and then it was into the up/down/up at the mouths of Warren House, Blackhills, and Limekiln Gill. This last is familiar territory, being Ghyll's favourite beach—today packed with dogwalkers trying to beat the ominously advancing bad weather.

  At Blue House Gill I'm passed by a man from Billingham Running Club who asks whether I was part of the group that got lost and ran down the beach instead of following the trail along the clifftops. I tell him no, and boil with secret envy at his avoidance of the awful overgrown climbs I've been navigating for the last half hour. A little while later, I'm overtaken by a European guy—Italian, I think—who seems to be taking at least twice as many steps as me. He encourages me vigorously and I run with him for a little while. I overtake him again just before we enter the holiday park above Crimdon but he keeps with me all the way to the end.

  The descent through the Crimdon Dene car park makes me feel like a movie star. People double-take and leap out of their way with strollers and pint-sized dogs; cars yield. (This is, I think, how people react to movie stars.) I hurtle down the final hill towards the finish line and cross at what feels to me like great speed but which, on viewing the footage that Sam takes of the moment, turns out only to be average speed. I come to an abrupt stop and collect a medal, three cups of red cream soda, and a lukewarm bottle of Staropramen lager. It tastes like victory.

  Durham Coastal Half Marathon on Strava

  Running Outdoors

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  Tuesday, 2 Jul 2024 9:30 pm

  Saltwell Harriers Fell Race

  A Tuesday evening fell race in Weardale saw me out in the light wind at the top of Crawleyside bank with some 80 other people to run across open moorland just about as fast as we can. A total distance of less than 10 kilometers promised a fast race, but the thick heather and tall swaying grasses would prove to put up a tough fight.

  The start of the run took us across the moor to the old mining road up ill-fated Collier Law, where once upon a time I broke a metacarpal. No such foul luck this time: I made it to the top of the hill with nary a stumble.

  Then following a fence along a gentle decline for a while: high knees required to clear the heather overgrowing the trod sapped me of my energy even while descending. By the time I reached Park Head I was puffing.

  A short traverse took me to a long grassy descent to Stanhope Burn. Reasonably clear quad bike trail here, which helped me catch my breath before a short, precipitous descent into the burn itself. By longstanding tradition, runners of the SHFR must climb into the burn, punch their race number on the far bank, and then continue on their way. I wondered privately if I would ever finish a fell run with dry feet.

  Soon we reached some old cottages on the burnside and hung a sharp left to start the climb back up to the finish line. I'd expected this climb to be a real doozy but I felt pretty good by the end, and even finished alongside another Strider, 10 seconds under the 1-hour mark.

  Saltwell Harriers Fell Race on Strava

  Running Outdoors

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  Monday, 13 May 2024 9:16 pm

  Why does anyone buy a Tentbox?

  Tentbox is a company that makes tents that you mount on top of your car. They unfold complexly and provide a sleeping platform high up off the ground for folks that want to spend the night out in the Great Outdoors. They appear to be spreading like wildfire among folks with Land Rover Defenders and Jeeps and vans with snow & mud tyres.

  But I cannot understand why they are spreading so rapidly, because as far as I can tell, they are inferior products sold for an inflated price. As of summer 2024, the cheapest Tentbox that you can purchase goes for just over £1,000. This gets you a 2-man tent that erects in "under 5 minutes" and only increases your car's drag coefficient by like 10%.

  Compare this with a reasonably luxurious backpacking tent. Compare this with the Vango F10 Xenon. You can tell that this is a good tent because of how many names it has. It weighs about 5 lbs and packs down to about the size of a sleeping bag. It has a generous vestibule for cooking and packing out of the elements. It has lots of headroom and is wide enough that you could sleep 3 people with flexible personal space tolerances inside. It goes up in under 5 minutes, and costs less than half of what the cheapest Tentbox costs. The Tentbox, however! requires that you climb up a ladder in the dark to access it.

  I simply don't understand. The only instance I can think of where sleeping on top of your car could be preferable to sleeping on the ground is if there's a significant threat of animal intrusion into your tent. Make no mistake, however: sleeping on top of your car is not going to stop a curious brown bear after a night of grilling steaks inside of your tent. They're famously good climbers.

  I feel like Tentbox is a trend, an offshoot of #vanlife: instagrammable, enviable in a sort of wholesome way, more affordable than finding a used Vanagon and more convenient than a retrofitted Fiat Ducato. It feels in the same way like purchasing a personality to sell yourself online. I suspect that in four or five years eBay will flood with secondhand Tentboxes used less than a dozen times.

  Lifestyle Outdoors

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  Wednesday, 10 Apr 2024 8:18 pm

  Lessons learned running 50 km

  

  I ran fifty (50) kilometres all at once last weekend. It was the first time I've ever done that. Here are some of the things that I didn't know, didn't appreciate, or plain old didn't do while I was out on the fells in the Yorkshire Dales.

  • You must replenish the salt you lose to sweat. I'm used to being able to power through it, ensuring that I'm drinking enough water to continue sweating. But after seven hours of sweating, that missing salt starts to take a toll.
  • If more than say 20% of the run crosses open moorland, fellside, sheep trod, or grassy bank—wear fell shoes. The biggest lugs that you can find. You may be comfortable in cushy trail runners on the road sections, but that doesn't count for anything if you're slip-sliding your way down from the tops.
  • Eat—more often than you think you need to. If you're used to eating once an hour on a regular marathon, then you will start to flag as soon as you cross kilometre 43. Eat every 45 minutes. Eat every half hour. If you can manage it, eat continuously.

  

  • Drink—there is no point in showing up at an aid station with water left in your bottles.
  • Don't underestimate the value of company. Having someone to follow through the bogs, to help pick lines, and to chat on about daft stuff helps the miles fly by.
  • Don't check your watch too often. The numbers go up more slowly than you expect. Focus on the gap between you and the next checkpoint. Try to appreciate the countryside going by. If there's no countryside to watch going by, you've either picked the wrong race or drawn the short stick, weatherwise.
  • Sometimes it will feel like you’re not going anywhere at all. Sometimes the hillside will seem to stretch on eternally with you eternally wrecked upon it. Try to remember that every step you take brings you closer to the finish.
  • Speaking of which, don't underestimate the weather. Running into a headwind gets unbearably difficult after a surprisingly short time.
  • It doesn't matter how fast you climb hills. You'll get there eventually.

  Running Outdoors

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  Tuesday, 18 Oct 2022 9:30 am

  2015 Gokibiru 30K trail run

  On 18 October 2015 (7 years ago today!), I participated in a trail run from Atsuta Town to Gokibiru Town and back—30 kilometers. I didn't do it particularly quickly, but I did it, and I think that at the time (as now) I'm more proud of it than I am of the Okhotsk Marathon, which I'd run a couple weeks earlier.

  I know that, with time, I'm going to forget the details—so I'm writing them down now to hold on to as long as I can.

  It started reasonably early in the morning; we all gathered at the starting line. I’d filled my Camelbak with Aquarius instead of water, and my backpack was full of SoyJoys. I was wearing my green Brooks Cascadia 10s, which I’d gotten especially for this occasion, and which, 800 km later, I still wear sometimes; and my red Salomon backpack, which I still use for bike riding and other light-backpack applications.

  I don’t remember feeling outclassed the way that I do nowadays whenever I’ve done a trail running event (Causey Pike, etc). We first ran up a hill, then down the back; then back up the hill and down the front, before a long run along the seafront.

  A little while in we came to a layby, where the Gokibiru Sandou started: a steep climb up into the forest and then a long run along a trail heavy with leaves; I guess we were getting on for fall and the leaves were turning.

  I don’t remember a lot about the run out to Gokibiru; at one point I had to cross a stream and for some reason it didn’t occur to me that I could put my feet in the water and I faltered while the marshal told me to just run through it. A little ways further on it occurred to me that we were using the trails that maintenance crews use to access power lines.

  Further on still I saw the leaders coming back the way they’d gone; I had the presence of mind at least to get out of their way as they came racing down the hill—they had more claim to the trail than I did, by virtue of their raw pace, I figured.

  The long descent into Gokibiru was rough on the knees, being made up of rounded-off stones; and then a little loop through the town where, at a set of fold-out tables erected by the elderly of Gokibiru itself, I drank probably more than my fare share of lukewarm Ribbon Napolin before continuing. The glucose would have been really good for me but the carbonation not so much.

  The climb back up into the hills was rough and I lost some ground to a guy who’d stuck nearby throughout most of the run; it turns out that he was a photographer from Yubetsu, whose services I’d use a few months later when renewing my passport.

  I don’t remember much of the run back. The weather started to turn just as I was nearing Atsuta Town—a light bit of rain. Coming back down off the hill was awful on my ankles, which were just about shot by then. I remember running along the seafront mostly on my own—everyone ahead had taken off, and everyone behind had fallen back. There were surfers out on the sea, I remember: people coming in off the waves and peeling wetsuits off next to Toyota Hiaces with the doors wide open, parked alongside the road.

  When I finished—I don’t remember the finish itself—I went into a gymnasium to record my arrival. It took me only 2 minutes less to run the 30 km than it took me to run the 42 km of the Okhotsk Marathon a few weeks earlier. Afterwards I drove back to Asahikawa to be with Sam.

  

  Links

  • The run on Strava
  • The event page
  • A write-up of an independent walk along the same trail

  Running Japan Outdoors

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