Johnny Hall's Travels and Travails

It took me until about an hour into the race, when I finally found checkpoint two on Glas Bheinn, for me to realise that this was going to be a long day and to throw my schedule out the window. After taking almost 30 minutes for a short 15 minute section of the course, there was no way I was going to make that time up, with the conditions as they were - wet, low cloud and high winds. It took me until the end of the race to realise, daft as it might sound, that everyone else was struggling to some extent as well. When we arrived on the island on 2 days earlier on Thursday evening, the weather was very different - the sun was high in the sky. We could see the hills I was about to run over from the ferry to Islay and, from a different angle, the short hopper ferry to Jura. Friday was much the same - warm sun and a light breeze. More runners appeared throughout the day and I started to get the first inklings that the weather was about to take a turn for the worst. Despite years of climbing hills in terrible weather, I'm still far too optimistic when it comes down to it, so I felt confident that the conditions would be decent. I don't mind bad weather as long as the cloud doesn't descend too far - ultimately, wind and rain make the going slow but having to have map and compass in hand to navigate the course makes the going even slower. Of course, on Saturday morning, the weather was dismal. There wasn't a break in the clouds anywhere and it seemed to be lying very low, almost down to the sea. There appeared little chance of it lifting any time soon. In bad weather there is an alternative course, which avoids the higher hills but the wind wasn't too bad, so the full course was to be run. I had a race plan calculated which would see me get round in about 4:30 but this was ambitious anyway and impossible given the weather conditions. Unfortunately, I made my biggest mistake before the race had even started. I had brought two pairs of shoes - my Mudrocs and my Roclites, which were new. I wore the Roclites and suffered with a lack of grip all the way around the course, in the muddy conditions. The only time they were an advantage was the 30 minute run back along the road at the end of the day. I still don't understand what I was thinking when I chose to use them. The route to the first checkpoint drags on a bit and I tried to keep a steady pace and not to go too hard early on. The ground was very wet and I managed to get up to my knees in a bog after about 15 minutes, which wasn't pleasant. I hit the first checkpoint on Dubh Bheinn at about 45 minutes, more or less on schedule. Then, without looking at the map, I turned and set off after the runners ahead of me, quickly losing sight of them in the mist. CP1 to CP2 is probably the hardest bit of navigation on the whole course and I should have taken the time to read the map, take a bearing and calmly make my way to the next summit. I did none of those things and blindly followed feet before realising that I was... misplaced. I came on a handful of similarly misplaced racers (including the organiser) and luckily we'd found a fence line marked on the map, which allowed us to take an accurate bearing to CP2. We'd probably dropped about 100m too far but it could have been a lot worse - I met at least one runner who got lost there and had to give up, barely an hour into the race. The run to CP3 is pretty straightforward and there were plenty of others surrounding me at this point for me to not bother navigating. I maybe dropped a couple of minutes on schedule but I was more or less on track but of course, by this time, I had realised that this wasn't a normal day out and aiming for a time wasn't the point, just getting round would be a decent achievement, particularly since only a week before it seemed to be unlikely that I'd make it. The rain and wind had also picked up and forced me to put on my Goretex jacket. I picked a bad line down to the low ground below Beinn a' Chaolais and that cost me a few places, so I made determined efforts to keep the pressure on up the long 650m to the first Pap. I climbed pretty strongly for the entire race, only fading a bit on the last climb, when I found it tough. Again, I lost time here, probably most of it getting off Aonach Bheinn, where I struggled with my bone-headed shoe choice. The descent off a' Chaolais was fast and furious - it's definitely the easiest of the 3 Paps and a lot of it is scree which can be run at a fair chop if you commit to it, which I did. I was out of breath by the time I reached the col, which wasn't ideal but I had enjoyed myself! The climb up Beinn an Oir started slowly as I was at the back of a line of runners which was moving slowly. So, grasping the nettle, I jumped the queue at an opportune moment and got ahead of them. Any sort of effort at this point was starting to hurt though and I regretted it a little when we hit a boulder field, which was very hard work. I kept a decent pace on this hill though and lost only a handful of minutes. The descent of Oir was a bit tricky to find and involved some slow bouldery running. About halfway down, I had to leap a shallow gully and I led with my left leg and put it straight down a hole where I thought there was solid ground. I cut my knee in a couple of places and worse, I pranged my damaged left ankle again. For a short time, I thought that the game was up and I'd have to limp back down to the road but I took some painkillers and walked it off for a few minutes - by the time of the next climb, it had settled down a bit. I'd definitely lost some momentum though and the last big climb up the final Pap was a bit of a toil and I seemed to be on my own for most of it. The descent off that last Pap is brutal. The course takes you away from the last top, Corra Bheinn, to avoid some very steep, dangerous ground and it crossed a very slippery, awkward boulder field, which I had to traverse most of using my hands. Then, we hit a muddy path, but my Roclites wouldn't let me run it at pace and my left ankle was giving me trouble, so I slowed down quite a bit here. By the time I got to the top of Corra Bheinn, I'd lost another 16 minutes on the fast schedule. Of course, it's pointless to compare times against my plan but it will hopefully be of use for me to take a look at next year when I try to improve. Certainly, it will be useful to see that of the 63 minutes that I lost, 28 of them were on 2 short legs - from CP1 to CP2 (navigation) and from CP6 to CP7 (injury, shoes). Those legs were scheduled to take 46 minutes and actually took 74. Against that, I lost 24 minutes on schedule for the traverse of the 3 Paps which make up the bulk of the hard work. The last 5 miles are theoretically a lot easier that the first 11 but unfortunately, by the time you get to them, there is little likelihood of enjoying them. There is a long, numbing descent to the road, on rough, tussocky ground which gives way to one of the boggiest "paths" I've ever run on - it was ankle deep mud for most of the way. I kept the pace up here though and it's useful to note that I ran more or less to plan. In drier years, I'll be able to make up time here. The last 3 miles are on the road and I started fairly well but my heavy pack was bouncing a bit too much and if I cinched up the waist belt, my stomach muscles started to rebel, so I had to give in a bit with about a mile to go and I was forced down to about 9 minute miles and lost a couple of places. Luckily, I gained another close to the line, which meant I finished in 5:33 for 99th place. In retrospect, I made a couple of rookie errors - shoes, navigation - and didn't have quite the fitness I needed after a poor April and May and a dodgy ankle. However, I'm pleased with my efforts - I got round in one piece, my ankle more or less held out (though it's swollen up again now, understandably) and my endurance lasted for most of the course, only letting me down over Shiantaidh and Corra Bheinn after I'd stacked my leg in a hole. Times were universally slow this year - the winning time was 40 minutes down on 2008 for both men and women, only 2 runners went under 4 hours compared to 26 last year and there were a fair number of DNSs, DNFs and timeouts, along with quite a few people who got lost. I'll definitely be back next year to try to get under 4:30 (or better). Now I have a wee rest to rehab my ankle (again) and then it's Yetholm, Loch Lochy and Glen Rosa in June.