2019 – Running + extras

I was out on my run this afternoon, thinking about all the random stuff that one thinks about while running and it came to me that I hadn’t written anything running related in over a year. So with that, I came home, had a shower & dinner and have sat down to write this blog over the next couple of hours.

Where you left me last year was at the finish of my first 100 mile race and since then a lot of exciting things have happened, and believe it or not, I’m still running.

Injury update: In August 2018, I got a stress fracture in my right Tibla just below the knee. This sidelined me for 8 weeks and left me to ride my bike and swim.

Life update: After recovering from my injury and finishing high school, I moved to England. I’m living in Kent where I work as a gap assistant in a local high school. In my free time, I travel, eat, see cool places, meet people and run. It’s the perfect job for a kid doing a gap year. Oh, I also turned 19 in March too.

Running update: I got fit again. Grew my hair out. Ran further and raced a bunch over summer. Keep reading for some inside knowledge on my summer of travel, running and racing – I’m sorry for the length!

Following a pretty crappy injury in the back-half of last year, I made it my goal for the first couple of months in England, to get fit and get my body back to where it was pre-injury. This included, slowly increasing my mileage, a trip to the Lake District during February half-term and a tough half marathon as a tester, in March. I hadn’t raced a road half marathon properly since September of 2016 so the plan was to see whether I still had any speed in me. I managed to clock 1:33 on a hilly course which I was very happy with.

April, May, June was about slowly upping my milage. I went from running pretty average 50-60km weeks to running between 80-100km’s a week with a mix of fast short runs and decent long runs. I felt much fitter and as a result of this increase, I lost a significant amount of weight. Looking back, it may have been a bit too much, but I was happy to be in a better running state than before I injured myself. It was also during these months that I planned my races for summer and of course, the travel too.

I won’t go on about my travel – you can find that on my Instagram instead. However, I managed to tick off a number of countries and enjoyed an amazing summer exploring Europe!

My two events for summer were the Youth World Skyrunning Champs in Gran Sasso at the start of August and UTMB’s #YCC in Chamonix at the end of August. Leading up to these events I was training a lot. Notably, the three weeks before Youths, I hit at least 115km+ per week (I think I topped out somewhere around 120km). I felt strong on the hills and on the flats I was faster than I had ever been.

The event consisted of two races, the VK and a Skyrace. For those who are new, a VK (Vertical Kilometre) is a race that climbs 1000m vertically in as short a distance as possible. In this case, it was 1000m in 3.5km of distance. Having never run a VK, me and the Australian runner there, Brayden, were small fish in a big sea. Surprisingly, it went better than expected and I topped out at the top of the climb in 48.57. Faster than I expected and it gives me hope for racing in the future!

After a day of resting and hiking, we toed the line for the Skyrace. This raced was 22.6km long with over 2200m of climbing. We would race up the VK we’d climbed two days before, around some mountains, up some mountains and then back down into the small village where we started. Sounds easier said than done! The race started out quick and with a tough climb at the start it was entertaining to watch those who went out hard, drop off the pace slowly. I reached the top of the VK a tad faster than expected, in about 50 minutes.

I was running in a strong pack of about 5 blokes through the middle section of the race. Interestingly, I thought they would all be very good descenders, but I managed to make up a few minutes on them in the first descent, which then lead into the next climb – a nasty climb to the highest point of the race at 2550m. I definitely lost a bit of time here. As we climbed higher, the route got more technical, to the point where we were hurling ourselves up the rocks with the aid of ropes and climbing instructors who were there to help us.

Following this, we descended off the high point and ran the last few flat kilometres along the ridge to the last aid point. Luckily the race had nine aid points over the 22km, so I only had to carry one soft flask and a few gels. Over the 3 hours I raced, I think I spent about a minute all up in these checkpoints. After dropping back down to the top of the VK, we ran along the side of the hilltop and descended down a zigzag track that led us back into the small village. Originally, my plan was to make up some time here, but after all the climbing, my legs were hammered and I just ran my guts out, down to the bottom.

I finished in about 3.09 for 31st place – I was stoked. I remember saying at the end that I was literally smashed. I had nothing left. I think I spent a good 10 minutes lying on the ground at the finish! Following a shower, pasta feast and an athletes party, I made it into bed and ready for my next stint of travelling.

After Youths, I took a few days off and then continued training for #YCC. I clocked 118km two weeks out and then 93km with 4k of vert in the week before. I arrived in Chamonix a week earlier and so I spent each day exploring the mountains – to be fair, what else can you do in Chamonix?

#YCC was epic – not only was I racing a UTMB event, but I was also able to catch up with a bunch of friends who I had met earlier that month at Youths! The race consists of a Prologue – 3km road sprint in Chamonix the night before and then a longer race the next morning. After the Prologue, which I completed in about 12 minutes, I was sitting at about 80th place overall and 47th junior male – less than ideal, but I had another race to improve it with! The main race is 15km’s long with 1100m of climbing and is a lot tougher than one thinks. It starts in Courmayeur (Italian side of Mont Blanc) and after a fast few kilometres through the village, it starts to climb nearly 1000m up the mountain. I set myself a goal of two hours and knew that I’d be lucky to go under that, given the tough course.

The climb was one of the hardest climbs I’ve ever done and I know for a fact that I lost some time going up – not only was it incredibly steep, but it was slippery and technical as well. After reaching the end of the climb, we traversed along the side of the mountain, through a couple of aid points and then up one last climb before descending back into the village. Before the descent, I was running with about 8 lads who were all very strong runners. But as we started to head down, I managed to drop them all and make up some serious time.

Descending 1200m in about 6km’s is never pretty, but I managed to run fast and make up for the average climb earlier. Most of my kilometres were under 4.30 with one sub 4. I finished in Courmayeur in 1.52 which put me 49th overall (out of 160 odd runners) and 29th junior male (out of about 80 junior males) – I was pretty stoked.

Looking at my training in the lead up to the event, those tough runs and big weeks had defiantly helped me get the results that I wanted. While I would’ve liked to have raced a bit more over summer, I knew that realistically with the travel and training, another race would’ve been too hard to fit in!

Post #YCC, I decided to take some time to relax – my body was very tired after all the running and I knew that it was time to eat some good food and soak up the goodness of UTMB week! I literally spent the next week in Chamonix, stuffing myself with bread and cheese, fanboying, getting photos with some amazing runners and hanging out with friends! It was the break I needed and those two weeks in Chamonix were definitely some of the best weeks of my life – I loved every moment of it (except for the rain).

And that was summer really…! I took two weeks off after #YCC and the body feels a lot better now. I’m now sitting back in a cold and rainy Kent, writing this blogpost. Summer’s gone and the days are getting shorter and shorter. While it’s a shame to be back at work after 8 weeks of good times, it is nice to be back in a routine and in my own bed.

Looking forward, I plan to run some more and see the year out! In late December, I’ll come back to New Zealand and get myself back into the Kiwi lifestyle after being away for a year. 2020 is lining up to be a pretty exciting year and I’m looking forward to seeing what’s next for me!

There we go – the mega blog post is done and I promise I’ll be more frequent with these (I doubt it… but I will try). For more frequent running bits and bobs, you can find me on Facebook or you can find all my training on Strava! Thanks for reading and happy running ✌️