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Snowdonia Marathon 2017
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oh t rex!!! I had a small glass of white and I am waiting with baited breath....
I had been in this sort of position once before, but that was only when faced with a canal. This was several magnitudes worse.
I lowered myself into the water. The ground underneath was very soft and unstable, but walkable. I wasn’t sinking in, for the moment anyway, but what if I sank in when further out? And got stuck in the mud and couldn’t move? The water only came up to just above my knees, which was a relief, and the current proved not to be as strong as it appeared. But what if it got deeper and faster further out?
I made it to the footbridge, 50m away. The steps were underwater and the slats of the walkway were exactly at water level. Beyond the bridge was more water. I could just make out the headtorch ahead, which had moved quite far out to my right, and yelled across to it, asking for the next set of directions. Faintly across the water I could hear, The wall - you can walk on it.
Looking across, yes, there was a wall. Down the steps and back into the water I went. This was a longer stretch but it again proved passable and I scrambled onto the wall thankfully. It was a long wall, ending eventually in a small area of foreshore still uncovered and impenetrable undergrowth straight ahead and to my left. To my right I would have to go - the headtorch had gone this way, it seemed, but it was no longer in view, and this was another person I never saw or heard from again.
The little bit of scrubby foreshore had a few gnarly little trees and was littered with flotsam and other rubbish. It also soon ended and once more it was back into deep water, now reaching to the bottom of my shorts. There was a cliff to my left with woodland above it. This I followed, wading and holding onto the bank. It went on for ages. I had no idea where I was, or where I was going. I was completely alone. I was starting to get cold.
Eventually, I came to a gap in the cliff and what looked like a little path going up into the woods. But what was that I could see? On this path were a couple of orange flags! What relief! How I loved those little flags!! And the person who put them there!
Now I don’t usually enjoy very steep, muddy paths through woods but I couldn’t go up this one quickly enough. And get away from that watery nightmare.
This was meant to be the ‘high tide route’ but I had completely had enough of it. I feared for the runners behind me somewhere. There was not a sign of any.
The remaining section of the ‘high tide route’ went back down on a track the other side of the creek where it re-joined the coast path. Looking at the map the terrain looked identical to what I had just been over – woods to the left, salt marsh and presumably sea, to the right. I deliberated at the turn off the road whether or not to go down the track. Do I bottle out and go off the race route and follow the road back to the HQ, less than 2 miles away? Or take the official route, slightly longer but full of inherent danger?
I chose the danger and descended steeply, the wood to my left. At the bottom of the track I came to a little terrace of houses and indeed the sea was now covering the entire track and lapping against the wall, which was the garden wall of the houses. There was just about enough ground to walk on by the wall.
This section, though wet, proved to be passable – nothing like what I had just experienced but enough to raise an eyebrow were you ever to come across such conditions in a road marathon. Things were all relative now. Once away from the woods it was onto a forestry track and a long uphill toil through sand dunes up to the cliff and a descent to race HQ. Someone came out to run the last few hundred metres with me.
The finish – at last. 13hours, 18 minutes, and 37 seconds for 87/147. The time didn’t matter. Nor the position. Nothing mattered except that I was safe, with a meal beckoning and a nice hot shower.
I tried to explain the conditions out there to the organisers but they didn’t seem to be taking it in. It was their high tide route. I must have wandered off the route? I informed them that there would be very likely a large gap before any more runners came in. I doubted very much anyone else would have followed me. I shouldn’t have followed me.
There was in fact a gap of 25 minutes before the next harrowed faces emerged into the hall. There were all sorts of stories about turning back, climbing cliffs, and blundering through farms. Most later finishers it seemed took a road route and avoided the coast altogether. Groups were still shuffling along the road as I left HQ to drive home, about 2230.
It’s a good T-shirt, though. And an experience to remember.
I suspect I would've turned back, though also know I've done plenty of things during races that I wouldn't do at other times and would most definitely advise others not to do!
Have you tried to work out where you went at all on a map? (Did you have any gps tracking on you?). Just curious if you did actually stray off course, or if there was a problem with the route for some reason - heavier rainfall making even the high tide route foooded for example. For what sounds like a very well organised race it seems a bit strange that the route was apparently so potentially dangerous, and the lack of concern at your comments about the conditions a bit alarming.
Re the double there has been a change of circumstance which may mean that I don't run it I'm afraid. I was coming up with all the family but now because of Lili being at Middle school she has class first thing Monday so staying at home with Kriszti. I'm coming up with Jasper age 6 now and planning a boys weekend. Even getting the Virgin train direct from MK. He's excited about that. So the long and short of it is that I may be leave him in the house and room at 4am in the morning to head off into the hills. We shall see but now likely just to go one way. Really sorry.
Getting left behind was possibly part of the problem. The two of us thought the first person going off was reckless, and then I thought the second guy following him was also being a bit dismissive of the risk. I felt both of them had a sort of 'finish fever' (like a climber's 'summit fever').
Just about being able to follow them made it easier. It would have been a different thing if I had arrived at the scene completely on my own. Not sure what I would have done - probably turn back and look for a different route, if in fact going back was possible. If it were not I might have had to have made some phone calls.
panad - yes, I can see from the map that I was following the course of the coast path 'high tide route'. The 'low tide route' was way to the right over some stepping stones across the main river in this area of marsh. We were expressly forbidden to use that route, and it would have been of course well underwater. It seems it must have been an exceptionally high tide that night.
I usually give feedback to race organisers, but this one is going to be difficult. What do I say? I enjoyed your choice of biscuits at the checkpoints, but I didn't like the danger of drowning at mile 47.
Wow TR. How do you find these races or do they find you! Another great tale. I honestly hope you are keeping copies of these stories for the much anticipated book. Love the idea of "finish fever". A perfect way to describe how most approach the last two downhill miles of SNOD. Looking forward some more stories from your SNOD "taper".
I'm sure most people know.. but the tracker is now up and ready for download for the race.
I've spent the year basically resting a very troublesome Achilles, which started at SNOD four years ago when my calf detonated and has been a big pain in all senses of the word ever since. Tried resting before (Obviously never long enough), tried racing it (Oddly enough my current 10k pb was set in March this year, go figure) still had an issue so pretty much gave up. Those that know my strava/garmin/FE profiles would have seen over the last couple of months a few long runs one a week as I was booked in for York mara last weekend that I had persuaded a friend to enter so was keeping her company on some of her LSR's. It was also to see if I thought I would keel over before the end, or be able to walk the following day.
So, doing nothing didn't work, it still hurt. Doing lots regularly didn't work it still hurt. So how come doing nothing all week and then a LSR seems to have sorted it?
Last Tuesday morning I had to go to the dentist who gave me the choice of spending £1k on a tooth, which may not work anyway, or take it out. I opted for the take it out. From the time he started (TV on the ceiling showing BBC news channel) it was 40 minute of yanking, twisting, pulling before there was a loud snap. The snap was the tooth coming away from the roots. Another 20 minutes of digging around to get the roots.
Once the injection wore off it felt like my jaw had been hit by a truck. For the next three days I was taking paracetamol, Naproxan and codeine mixed with as much single Islay malt as I've had in the rest of the year, and basically not eating. Come Friday morning I'm back down the dentist as overnight my jaw had swollen up. So more digging around to get out whatever had got lodged in the gaping hole followed by more painkillers and antibiotics.
Friday afternoon my train goes to York. I'm completely out of marathon condition anyway, added to this now is that I haven't been eating. So I go anyway. I already knew I'd be in trouble in the second half, don't think this is going to make much difference now.
Saturday I think I really need to get some carb and protein on board. I popped into a shop near the b&b and saw some weetabix chocolate breakfast drink. Got a decent amount of each so got six to drink through the day, as least it's something.
It wasn't until 2am when I realise I'm halfway from the bed to the toilet and it then crosses my mind that yes, there was carb & protein in them. There was also shed loads of fibre. Something I was continually reminded of numerous times over the next five hours. At least it stopped before I was due to race, if it hadn't it really would have stopped me.
I really had no idea how to pace it. I knew whatever pace I set off at I wouldn't be able to keep up, even if I started it at walking pace. I did Notts half a few weeks back as a tester, 1:50:30, and I was collapsed on the floor type fackered at the end. Set off with the thought of doing 9m/m to halfway and then seeing how it went from there. My train home wasn't until 15:41 so I knew I had spare time in hand, and could just pull up at anytime. 55m 1st 10K, 50m 2nd 10k, half came up at 1:58. All pretty much bang on 9m/miling. Felt good, well, a damn site better than expected anyway.
That lasted until just before the 15m mark when my body waved the white flag. Should I have given up as my prep wasn't what it should be added to the trials of the previous week? Probably. I didn't, just kept going, though a tad slower. 3rd 10K was 1:08, 4th was 1:08. I crossed the line at 4:16:16. When I've done this race before I've walked to the train station to stretch my legs (About 2 miles). This year I didn't, I got the bus. I think if I'd done 10m/m for the first half, overall I would have been a few minutes slower. If I'd tried 8m/m I would have been a lot slower, or may not even have been able to keep going enough to finish.
Looking back, I think this was definitely as fast as I could have gone on the day. Don't think I've ever been able to say that about a race before.
Monday I did nothing, Tuesday I walked the dogs, yesterday I walked the dogs with a bit of jogging. Today I will go over to Rotherham to recce my 3 mile section of the RRR I'm doing for my club on Saturday.
I'll start doing some actual regular running next week. I have Thoresby 10m trail race Sunday 22nd then a few jogs and I'll be good for SNOD. That's my 3 week training plan.
After my experience at a very flat York mara, my prediction for me at SNOD this year is somewhere over 5 hours. 55mins to Pen-Y-Pass, 2:20 to Beddgelert, 3:00 to Rhyd Ddu, 4:00 to Waunfawr followed by a very painful hour or so to go a few miles up & down and back to Llanberis.
Oh, and I'm in for the trail marathon on 15th July next year, been meaning to get around to it. And hopefully I'll get in the International as well the following weekend. Did that race a couple of years back, good craic.
Chimney - nice to hear the update, my friend. Makes me wonder what you could do in the marathon if you were in good shape! Would be nice to have a lap two buddy - I'm aiming for 5:10. You're not actually doing the RRR, are you??
MadWelshWoman - if you're on the coast you might have seen us all battling along at some point. I think what happened on the north coast was because of an exceptionally high tide. I'm hearing stories of people trapped for hours by floods in the Crofty area, several miles east of my particular drama.
No more coastal running planned this season but plenty of scope for mishaps even on the gentle rises of the North Wessex Downs and along benign Old Father Thames. We'll see. Ponty Plod 11-mile multi-terrain race this weekend. That should pass without incident.
Very muddy but when you've been wading through salt marshes it bears no comparison.
Big one is next weekend.
Just decided that I will run this year. big injury earlier this year has resulted in very little training.
Managed to put 1 week of training together last week with by far my longest run since injury- so I am going to try but adjust my pace! 30 mins slower than last time I did it and I would be happy.
Anyway this leaves me needing accommodation on the Fri and Sat nights- any suggestions would be great.
Thanks