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7:50pm, 25th Jun 2023 | London Ultra 55 | 32 Comments
Blog by God Rest Ye Merry Pothunter
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That’s how many steps my Garmin recorded yesterday!
I was due to run the Ultra London 55k in October 2022 but came down with Covid 4 days before the event. Soooo frustrating! I signed up for the “tell me when entries reopen for next year” and in January got the message that the 2023 edition would take place on 24 June.
While Covid itself didn’t hit be too hard my motivation went out the window so my mileage through Nov and Dec was rather low. Jan and Feb picked up a bit but then I realised I had 16 weeks to go so better get moving with some decent mileage! A steady build in March followed by 150 miles in April and 210 in May (thanks to WSW for that!) meant that by June I was ready to taper down nicely (with a WAVA PB at both parkrun and 5 miles thrown in).
The weather forecast in the buildup was ominous. Race day was predicted to peak at 27 with a “feels like” of 31! By Friday it was clear that this wasn’t a mistake and we would be in for a hot one!
With over 300 entrants they split the start into at least 11 waves of about 30 people each, with those who predicted the slowest finish times going off first to give them the best chance of finishing within the 11 hour cutoff. I was allocated wave 6 with a 7:50 start time.
Alarm went off at 5:30 in order to get some breakfast down. Also needed to FaceTime call my dad for his birthday
An Uber down to the start meant I got there in time to see wave 1 get their briefing and to meet and have a brief chat to Vixx. With a big cheer they were off and I went back to the hall to get ready. Met up with a guy from parkrun who was in the wave behind me.
At 7:40 I gathered with the rest of wave 6 including kstuart. After a short briefing explaining the course, the risk of ticks and caterpillars in Richmond Park, and to please give the deer right of way we were off!
First real hill of the day came at about 3.5 miles as we climbed Shooters Hill up to Sevendroog Castle. Although very early on and still relatively cool it seemed prudent to walk it so I did. At 7 miles we went about 150m from my house and my family were there to cheer me on.
First checkpoint was at just before 9 miles. A piece of watermelon and a cup of coke diluted with water and I was off again. Didn’t stay very long as I still had full water bottles. Thought I’d taken a pic but obviously not!
Next few miles were along familiar territory with a mixture of paths and pavements. Slight uphill through Beckenham Palace Park (and past some marshals for the local parkrun) but nothing too challenging. Beautiful scenery!
Crystal Palace however is very hilly! By this stage the sun had burned through the clouds and the temperature was climbing rapidly too. Checkpoint 2 coincided with the start of the 25km option (although by my calculations it was a bit more than 25km to go). We got a huge cheer from the waiting runners as we arrived which was lovely. I spent about 8 mins here refilling water and a quick visit to the portaloo. The official results recorded my time leaving the CP as 3:10:47
Straight out the CP we carried on going up! But fortunately not long after that we had a long steady downhill through Streatham Common. A wiggle through some suburban roads heading towards Tooting Bec Common. I think it was here where we ran past a lady getting into her car who said to her friend “I wonder if there’s some sort of mini-marathon going on” Mini! Bloody cheek
Leaving Tooting Bec is roughly where I passed 700 miles for the year so as is tradition on the 700 thread I was on the looking for a good bin for a photo:
The net-downhill of this section meant I was feeling great at this point. It was very warm but a bit of cloud cover protected us from the harshest of the sun. Through Wandsworth Common, past the cemetery and on towards Wimbledon Park. I saw a Co-Op up ahead so popped in for a bottle of water and a Calipo! I wasn’t the only runner in there As I was finishing the Calipo we went into Wimbledon Park itself. There was a childrens’ playground with the most inviting splash pool and fountain I’d ever seen! Although a lady runner and I agreed we’d probably not be particularly welcome in there in our present state
Having run downhill for pretty much 6 or 7 miles we were about to start going up again! Past a nondescript fence we hit the marathon mark without so much as a route marking ribbon. I’d passed into longest time run nearly an hour earlier and was now in the longest distance territory too.
The next 2 miles to the third and final checkpoint were mostly up, including a nasty 36m rise at 4.5%. The checkpoint couldn’t come soon enough. I was running low on water and it was still getting hotter. The scenery through Wimbledon Common was stunning though. The checkpoint finally appeared like an oasis. Water bottles refilled and a handful of crisps sent me on my way for the final 10km or so.
Across the car park and into another wooded section and mercifully downhill! At the bottom of the my GPX pinged that I was off course and there was no sign of the course ribbons. Another lady runner had the same thing so we called to a guy just ahead and he came back to us. We turned back to try find the route again. We followed the GPX directions but still no sign of markings. We knew we were going in roughly the right direction and eventually saw other runners coming up on our right. I suspect we took a slight shortcut but time-wise it was probably neutral as there was a bit of dithering around.
Eventually we crossed into Richmond Park and a couple more steady climbs which were not particularly welcome! The scenery did make up for it though. At this point I had my final gel but it didn’t go down very well. Fortunately I only felt rough for a few minutes. At about 50km there was a really steep downhill. I started off gingerly but decided to just relax and freewheel down! I was a bit concerned about falling but the ground was good so I just went with it. It gave me a good boost and I was able to ride that feeling almost all the way to the end.
Out the park and onto the riverside walkway through Richmond town. Lots of people-dodging required along this stretch.
Eventually we turned right away from the river into the Old Deer Park towards the finish. Gentle uphill but knowing the finish was close kept me moving. Off to the left was a gathering of people. Aha, the finish I thought. But the route markings took us straight past! A false finish! Fortunately only another 500m or so and there it was for real this time!
Across the finish line to huge cheers from the waiting crowds
Official time 6:18:06. Over my A-goal of 6 hours but given the heat I knew early on that that wasn’t going to happen. It was a negative split based on the midway timing mat, but that was just over half way I think. Even so, very happy with that!
60th position overall out of 278 finishers
Overall impression of day was that although it was hot, it was great fun. My preparation had gone really well. If I do this again (and I’d like to) I’ll do more hill work but otherwise wouldn’t change much else. Race organisation was good, course was excellent and the volunteers very friendly. What more could you ask for!
I was due to run the Ultra London 55k in October 2022 but came down with Covid 4 days before the event. Soooo frustrating! I signed up for the “tell me when entries reopen for next year” and in January got the message that the 2023 edition would take place on 24 June.
While Covid itself didn’t hit be too hard my motivation went out the window so my mileage through Nov and Dec was rather low. Jan and Feb picked up a bit but then I realised I had 16 weeks to go so better get moving with some decent mileage! A steady build in March followed by 150 miles in April and 210 in May (thanks to WSW for that!) meant that by June I was ready to taper down nicely (with a WAVA PB at both parkrun and 5 miles thrown in).
The weather forecast in the buildup was ominous. Race day was predicted to peak at 27 with a “feels like” of 31! By Friday it was clear that this wasn’t a mistake and we would be in for a hot one!
With over 300 entrants they split the start into at least 11 waves of about 30 people each, with those who predicted the slowest finish times going off first to give them the best chance of finishing within the 11 hour cutoff. I was allocated wave 6 with a 7:50 start time.
Alarm went off at 5:30 in order to get some breakfast down. Also needed to FaceTime call my dad for his birthday
An Uber down to the start meant I got there in time to see wave 1 get their briefing and to meet and have a brief chat to Vixx. With a big cheer they were off and I went back to the hall to get ready. Met up with a guy from parkrun who was in the wave behind me.
At 7:40 I gathered with the rest of wave 6 including kstuart. After a short briefing explaining the course, the risk of ticks and caterpillars in Richmond Park, and to please give the deer right of way we were off!
First real hill of the day came at about 3.5 miles as we climbed Shooters Hill up to Sevendroog Castle. Although very early on and still relatively cool it seemed prudent to walk it so I did. At 7 miles we went about 150m from my house and my family were there to cheer me on.
First checkpoint was at just before 9 miles. A piece of watermelon and a cup of coke diluted with water and I was off again. Didn’t stay very long as I still had full water bottles. Thought I’d taken a pic but obviously not!
Next few miles were along familiar territory with a mixture of paths and pavements. Slight uphill through Beckenham Palace Park (and past some marshals for the local parkrun) but nothing too challenging. Beautiful scenery!
Crystal Palace however is very hilly! By this stage the sun had burned through the clouds and the temperature was climbing rapidly too. Checkpoint 2 coincided with the start of the 25km option (although by my calculations it was a bit more than 25km to go). We got a huge cheer from the waiting runners as we arrived which was lovely. I spent about 8 mins here refilling water and a quick visit to the portaloo. The official results recorded my time leaving the CP as 3:10:47
Straight out the CP we carried on going up! But fortunately not long after that we had a long steady downhill through Streatham Common. A wiggle through some suburban roads heading towards Tooting Bec Common. I think it was here where we ran past a lady getting into her car who said to her friend “I wonder if there’s some sort of mini-marathon going on” Mini! Bloody cheek
Leaving Tooting Bec is roughly where I passed 700 miles for the year so as is tradition on the 700 thread I was on the looking for a good bin for a photo:
The net-downhill of this section meant I was feeling great at this point. It was very warm but a bit of cloud cover protected us from the harshest of the sun. Through Wandsworth Common, past the cemetery and on towards Wimbledon Park. I saw a Co-Op up ahead so popped in for a bottle of water and a Calipo! I wasn’t the only runner in there
As I was finishing the Calipo we went into Wimbledon Park itself. There was a childrens’ playground with the most inviting splash pool and fountain I’d ever seen! Although a lady runner and I agreed we’d probably not be particularly welcome in there in our present state Having run downhill for pretty much 6 or 7 miles we were about to start going up again! Past a nondescript fence we hit the marathon mark without so much as a route marking ribbon. I’d passed into longest time run nearly an hour earlier and was now in the longest distance territory too.
The next 2 miles to the third and final checkpoint were mostly up, including a nasty 36m rise at 4.5%. The checkpoint couldn’t come soon enough. I was running low on water and it was still getting hotter. The scenery through Wimbledon Common was stunning though. The checkpoint finally appeared like an oasis. Water bottles refilled and a handful of crisps sent me on my way for the final 10km or so.
Across the car park and into another wooded section and mercifully downhill! At the bottom of the my GPX pinged that I was off course and there was no sign of the course ribbons. Another lady runner had the same thing so we called to a guy just ahead and he came back to us. We turned back to try find the route again. We followed the GPX directions but still no sign of markings. We knew we were going in roughly the right direction and eventually saw other runners coming up on our right. I suspect we took a slight shortcut but time-wise it was probably neutral as there was a bit of dithering around.
Eventually we crossed into Richmond Park and a couple more steady climbs which were not particularly welcome! The scenery did make up for it though. At this point I had my final gel but it didn’t go down very well. Fortunately I only felt rough for a few minutes. At about 50km there was a really steep downhill. I started off gingerly but decided to just relax and freewheel down! I was a bit concerned about falling but the ground was good so I just went with it. It gave me a good boost and I was able to ride that feeling almost all the way to the end.
Out the park and onto the riverside walkway through Richmond town. Lots of people-dodging required along this stretch.
Eventually we turned right away from the river into the Old Deer Park towards the finish. Gentle uphill but knowing the finish was close kept me moving. Off to the left was a gathering of people. Aha, the finish I thought. But the route markings took us straight past! A false finish! Fortunately only another 500m or so and there it was for real this time!
Across the finish line to huge cheers from the waiting crowds
Official time 6:18:06. Over my A-goal of 6 hours but given the heat I knew early on that that wasn’t going to happen. It was a negative split based on the midway timing mat, but that was just over half way I think. Even so, very happy with that!
60th position overall out of 278 finishers
Overall impression of day was that although it was hot, it was great fun. My preparation had gone really well. If I do this again (and I’d like to) I’ll do more hill work but otherwise wouldn’t change much else. Race organisation was good, course was excellent and the volunteers very friendly. What more could you ask for!
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God Rest Ye Merry Pothunter
Regular runner at Greenwich parkrun. Enjoy 10k and the occasional HM too. VLM 2017 and 2021 completed. Hope to do an ultra in 23Profile | Blog | Other Blogs