2022 Top 10 Races (and runs!)
My Top 10 races (runs
and even a walk) for 2022!!
1st - 5th Sep. – 10th Sep. – Montane Dragon’s Back 6 day stage race
2nd - 18th June 2022
– West Highland Way Race
3rd - 28th May 2022-
Salomon Skyline route
4th - 29th Apr. to
3rd May 2022 – backpacking the Skye trail
5th - 9th Dec. 2022 -
East Highland Way – Fort William to Newtonmore
6th - 6th Feb. 2022 - Falkirk 33 Ultra
7th - 22nd Dec. 2022 -
Winter WHW Support Duties
8th - 12 Nov. 2022 –
Ayrshire Cross Country on home turf at Rozelle Park, Ayr
9th - 23rd April 2022
- WHW Fling
10th - 6th Aug. 2022
– Devil O’ the Highlands Race
The plan for 2022 was to put in a couple of long races but the main target from the start of the year was the Montane Dragons Back 6 day stage race in Wales in September. So most other races were viewed as “training runs”, which is always easier said than done!
A few details, some pictures and links to blogs
below in date order!
This was the Falkirk 8hr Ultra but this year, they had
changed it to 33miles which worked out at 8 laps.
All went well for the first 5 laps, all roughly getting completed in 31-33mins, unfortunately it went a bit downhill from there, with a 36min, 41min and a 44min lap. I had decided not to use a bag and just grab food and water on each lap but had intended to use a bag for later laps but for some reason I never did. I think I pretty much just ran out of fuel.
It’s a great event – and one year we will get decent
weather for it. Some people dread doing races which are laps but I quite enjoy
lapped events – not quite so happy this year since they changed the route to
include a much larger hill, which resulted in almost 3,000ft of ascent over the
33miles.
Anyway, I managed to sneak a 1st V50
place and was 8th overall, so was happy enough with that!
Ranking -
6th
23rd April 2022 - WHW Fling
After a 2year break due to covid, I was back to do my 3rd Fling. I had felt training had gone reasonable well, but race never went quite as well and I was feeling pretty drained from Balmaha onwards. I managed to grind it out for a finish in 10:39:36, in 68th position (a 4min 20sec PB on 2019 event).
I certainly felt I was fit enough and capable to go
faster than that so was pretty disappointed in how it had all gone.
The good news was that due to excellent running by
my two team mates Mark Caldwell and Davie Jones – we managed to scoop the
Scottish Athletics National Ultra Trail Championships 1st male team.
As always a great well organised event and great to
share it with some of the Ayr Seaforth team. Both Susie Hubbard and Karen Adams
were completing it for the first time, but were also very much focussed on
their WHW entries later in the year – it was great to see them both smashing
the event!
Ranking – 9th
29th Apr to 3rd May – backpacking the Skye trail
I
know it is not a run or a race, but it’s my blog so it is getting included.
Mark Canning who has provided support to me a number of times (When I was
support runner Jack Scott’s SUW FKT, for my Ayrshire Coastal Path FKT and this
year for my WHW) joined me to back pack the Skye trail which pretty much runs
from top of Skye to Broadford. I’ve decided that the trip was worthy of a blog in its own right, even just for the photos.
On completion of the walk Mark went back to complete the bit he had missed and I had a cracking run from Sligachan hotel to Camasunary Bothy loop via the bad step! The “bad step” was nowhere near as bad as I thought it might be (my plan had been to do an out and back if it had been!)
A stunning part of the world to do some walking and running, as long as you are prepared to put up with a bit of weather and a few midgies.
28th May 2022- Salomon Skyline route - taking in Curved Ridge and Aonach Eagach ridge (from the bottom of the Devil so missed out the Kinlochleven to Devil sections both ways). The previous day I had done the Ben Nevis Ultra route (but taking the bad weather route via the WHW back to Kinlochleven) so my legs were a bit tired. Colin Anderson had bravely promised to take me round, and I was approaching it with some trepidation, as my head for heights is not great! I was keen to see how I would get on as it would let me know if I could ever enter the Salomon Skyline and also it would give me a bit more experience for Crib Goch later in the year.
The route starts easily enough with a good path to
the base of Buachaille Etive Mor, and I was trying my best not to look up the
cliff we were about to ascend!
After the first few scrambles, I soon realised that
for me there was no turning back, as descending was going to be much more
challenging than keeping on going up. There were not many sections where I
never felt the need for at least three points of contact and there were a
couple of sections where I was struggling to get hands and feet where they
needed to be – fortunately after a couple of tries I got there! The already
tired legs from the day before, were getting even worse with the amount of
nervous energy I was using. On a few of the safe spots between pitches, I was
able to look around and admire the climbers doing some of the harder routes. It
is a pretty impressive mountain and route!
The route then takes in Stob Coire na Tulaich
(903 m), Stob na Doire (1,011 m), Stob Coire Sgreamhach (1,072 m), Bidean nam
Bian (1,149 m), (race route then takes in an out and back to Stob Coire nan
Lochan, which we skipped), Bidean nam Bian West Top (1,141 m) and Stob Coire
nam Beith, before dropping down onto the A82. This was all perfectly acceptable
to me and although it was warm and sunny we made pretty good time.
Once across the road the route takes you up Sgor
nam Fiannaidh. At the base we were both struggling a bit, I don’t think we had
been eating and drinking well enough (and I was just about out of food) as it
was a hot day. The path starts of gentle enough but then just gets progressively
steeper and steeper until you are on a pretty steep boulder/ scree slope. I was
still struggling at this stage but Colin appeared to get a second wind and steamed
on ahead. If I am being totally honest, this really steep terrain was probably
the place I was least comfortable all day, although I still had to conquer the
iconic Aonach Eagach Ridge. After the challenge of Curved Ridge there was
nothing I was totally uncomfortable with, as most of the ascents and descents
you have to make have pretty good hand and foot holds. I did decide I was much
more comfortable when the exposure was only to one side of me – for example
behind or to the side. I struggled at the small section where there is exposure
on both sides and made it across in a low crouch. Perversely the worse you are
with heights the harder you make it for yourself, and most of the sections if
there had not been the exposure I would have quite happily stepped from rock to
rock. After me asking Colin, what felt like numerous times – are there any hard
bits left we eventually got to the end of the ridge.
We had been kidding on earlier on if either of us
had a head torch (not that we thought we would need it as we started before 8am
and it was light till late), I had a very small emergency torch with me. It is
still a fair walk out from the ridge and we were both pretty tired so it was a
bit of a relief that we got to the top of the Devils staircase. A quick trot
down the Devil and we were back at the car, just as light was fading.
As we were getting changed, Colin shouted over and promptly
proceeded to remove a length of rope from his running bag – his back up if I
had panicked on the steep terrain! I am sure he must have cursed me and the
extra rope a few times during the day – so a huge thank you Colin!
At the end of the day I was pretty chuffed to have
done both Curved Ridge and Aonach Eagach ridge – two of Scotland’s iconic
routes. It was well out of my comfort zone, and I am not sure now that I would
want to race the route – if I did I think I would have to do a few more reccies
to build up a bit more confidence!
Ranking – 3rd – such a stunning route on a great weather day!
18th June 2022 – West Highland Way Race (95miles)
I had been lucky enough to secure an entry for my 2nd WHW race after completing the race in 2019 in a time of 26hrs, 36mins. Although I was trying my best to talk myself into the fact that this was “just a training run” for Dragons Back later in the year, the reality was that I was keen to get under 24hrs, but knew that based on my Fling time this was by no means going to be a certainty.
Fortunately my plan to stick to a 130 heart rate
all the way to Tyndrum worked well for me, and even with all the weather that
was thrown at us after Glencoe I got a finish in 22hrs, 30mins and 47secs – 43rd
place overall and 7th V50. A 4hr and 6min PB is not to be sniffed at
and full blog is here!
Ranking – 2nd – it was a pleasure to almost finish in daylight and not have to go into a 2nd night!
6th Aug 2022 – Devil O’ the Highlands Race (42miles)
With the Fling and the WHW already completed I was
all set to complete my 2nd triple crown. With only a month before
the Dragons Back this was definitely down as a training run. My brother, Alex, who had been support
runner for this section on the WHW race had also entered and we ran most of the
section to Bridge of Orchy together. From Bridge of Orchy onwards I was
struggling and Alex pressed on ahead to finish his first Devil with a cracking
time over an hour ahead of me. By Glencoe the muscle cramps were setting in and
my usual coping strategies were not working, and this continued all the way
over the Devil, into Kinlochleven and up onto Larig Mor, making for a pretty
uncomfortable section (thanks to the various runners who tried to help me at
various points).
Eventually I managed to work out a run / shuffle technique where I ran till I could feel the cramp setting in and then shuffled along and then eventually back into a run – but it was slow and painful process. By the time I got to Cow Hill I was well past caring who was going past me and just to add insult to injury when I got to the finish, the inflatable finish had deflated and was lying across the finish. I debated hurdling it but wisely decided that was not going to happen, I then thought about going under it but eventually decided a step over would be the obvious choice!
Finished in 8hrs 19mins and 51s (87th
place and 14th V50) – but worst of all a whole hour and 8mins behind
my brother – we are not comeptative at all!
As well as having a pretty unpleasant race – mainly
due to cramps and feeling weak, I was pretty tired and sore afterwards.
Not to be unexpected you could say, but in a few
weeks time I was going to have to do the same distance with much more elevation
for six days in a row at Dragons Back.
Let’s just say the confidence was at rock bottom
and I spent most of the evening searching Ourea events cancellation and
deferment policy.
With a clearer head in the morning, I realised
there was no easy way out, without loosing all my registration fee so made the
conscious decision that there was no turning back and even if I had to walk
half of it, I was going to get my Dragon.
Although disappointed
in my Devil race I knew something was not right and a few days before the Devil,
I had been at the Dr complaining about feeling tired and drained all the time.
The Dr took me seriously and arranged a range of tests and tried to work
through all the possibilities. After a rearranged blood test, he phoned me on
12th August to confirm I had tested positive for Lyme disease!!
The relief was instant – I knew I had not been 100% and it was great to finally find a reason! Treatment was 3 weeks of antibiotics which gave me 2 days free before Dragons Back started.
Ranking 10th – cramps made this a pretty miserable race!
5th Sep – 10th Sep – Montane Dragon’sBack 6 day stage race
Although the confidence was low, I was hopeful the
antibiotics would have done the trick and I was reasonably confident the
training and the races I had done would be enough to get me through the week. I
also knew what to expect (from Cape Wrath in 2021), and what I had to do in
camp to give myself as good a chance as possible. Having said that I did have a
serious case of “imposters syndrome” at the race registration.
Full race review is here - the full race report covers the highs and lows and I am not going to go back over them here.
Day 1 I found really tough, it was hot when we were
out of the wind, I was getting bothered by cramp (again) and Crib Goch in the
wind was not my favourite place! When I finally got to camp I realised Mark
Smith and Glenn Christie had finished over an hour ahead of me (we had all
finished pretty close together at Cape Wrath). The head went down a bit again,
but I resolved to run my own race – work at getting through each day, and being
able to get in and recovered ready to get back out the next day.
One of the highlights for me and a part of the
route I would love to go back to is on day 5, after Storey Arms. After the climbs
of Corn Du (872 m), Pen y Fan (886 m), Cribyn (795 m), Fan y Big (717 m), Gwaun
Cerrig Llwydion (730 m) and Bwlch y Ddwyallt (754 m) you get to a beautiful,
runnable and flat ridge line – the sun was out, a big black cloud was chasing
me, it was pretty wild and windy and I was verging on being cold and needing a
jacket on, but I was pretty much on my own, no fellow competitors either side –
it was beautiful – the only problem was it was painful to run!! For some reason,
although I was suffering with a very sore shin, this particular section has
stuck in my memory more than most.
I did eventually finish after a slow day 6 and proudly
collected my Dragon.
27th place overall, 69hrs, 27mins and 55secs. My placing each day was gradually improving, until day 5 and 6 when running became painful – 90th, 44th, 27th, 22nd, 26th and 36th respectively.
I found this a seriously tough race and for a few
days it was definitely a case of “never again”, but as time passes I start
thinking – a bit more training in the hills, no Lyme disease to hold me back, no
sore shins - maybe I could have another go! Who knows – never say never!
One of the true highlights of this race was getting to go on the Young Hearts Run Free pod cast and talk about Dragons Back and all things running - thanks John and Steven!
Ranking – 1 –
a seriously tough race – whether I enjoyed it or simply endured it, I am not
quite sure.
(I would say Cape Wrath is way easier (and more
enjoyable) for a number of reasons)
12 Nov. 2022 – Ayrshire Cross Country on home turf at Rozelle Park, Ayr.
This is in here not because it was my best race of
the year, it was probably the worst!
After Dragons Back, my shin took a while to recover
so I planned to get in a weekly routine of two leg strength session per week,
an upper body strength session (which I usually neglect), a long run on Friday
and then if there was a XC on, then I would do it. The Ayr Seaforth team spirit
at XC’s are great, you turn up, warm up while usually cheering on the ladies
race and then get to run around some muddy field or park, before heading back
home – usually with a fair dose of banter thrown in, so I had managed to fit a
few races in, but still very much on recovery mode!
When you run locally you usually know who should be ahead of you and who should be behind you, but on the three loop Rozelle course, I was pretty firmly not where I thought I should be. It’s a tough wee course, lap one you get to experience, lap two you hate it because you have another lap to do, but then by lap 3 you are just keen to finish!
After finishing I was a bit despondent about having
what I thought was a poor run!
It was only after I was able to put it into a bit
of context – I was probably still recovering from Dragons Back, we had been
away in Crete in October and come back with a bit of a sniffle, the day before I had done a 14mile route on
the Southern Upland Way and fallen and bashed up my right ribs – I was really
in no great shape to excel at a cross country!
I think all runners are pretty guilty of giving themselves
a hard time and sometimes you need to step back and look at the bigger picture.
I was still recovering, I had nothing really to train
for, and I still had a great day out with club mates!
Ranking 8th – this is really my shout out to local cross country
and hill races!
9th Dec 2022 East Highland Way – Fort William to Newtonmore (59 miles)
The take it steady training regime never lasted
very long (and anyway it had already got a bit disrupted by life!) and Colin
Anderson and I hatched a plan to do the East Highland Way which is an 82mile
route from Fort William to Aviemore (I think it was originally my idea, but
Colin was up for it, on hindsight he may have preferred if he was not!).
With busy schedules the best we could manage was
the bus which got into Fort William at 9.15pm Friday night, our last train from
Aviemore on Saturday was 7.34pm with a later bus at 8.10pm but which would
leave me stranded in Glasgow, unable to get to Ayr. It was tight, but doable or
so we thought!
Although bitterly cold the weather forecast was
good and it was a full moon.
A wee trudge along the High Street to get to the wee WHW man which we reckoned was the official start of the East Highland Way.
Colin was a bit wary that after a great year, he had not been doing much training so we started off at an easy pace. We soon left Fort William and got onto the forest roads, off which there were plenty on this route. There was an inch or so of fresh snow which was nice and grippy underfoot. I was struggling a bit to get into a rhythm – my left toe was sore, my “old man hips” were sore, my bag (weighed down with food and extra layers) was too heavy and my stomach was not great, so I was fine with the easy pace. We soon realised that the nice easy running on the snow was not nearly as great where there had been vehicles on the road, as the tracks were extremely slippy. This pushed us off onto the middle or side of the track onto the rough stone which after mile upon mile of track got a bit tiresome! Having said that it was a lovely night, and occasionally we were able to switch the head torches off and run just with the light from the moon – which was pretty special.
Like seasoned pro’s we had downloaded the route to our watches – but we were not actually sure we had downloaded the route from the same source! Generally, it worked out ok but we did stumble about a bit prior to the first main river crossing, it is never as easy working things out when you can only see for the length of your torch beam! I had a bit of a slip on the river crossing where I thought I was going to take a proper fall, fortunately I was able to save myself and no real harm done apart from wet feet.
As the night wore on the cloud came over, snow
showers came on and it got colder and colder. I was running with three layers
on and added a jacket, and was also using two pairs of gloves – so everything
you needed to do was an extra faff!
As we progressed through the night, although my
stomach was not great (I did eventually cure it with some Imodium!), Colin was
suffering more than me and was gradually slowing down. (It turns out he had the
start of a chest infection and ended up off work for the next week).
Daylight appeared just before we got to Laggan!
Usually when the sun comes up you get a wee lift, but on this occasion it was
still just as bitterly cold and there was no respite.
We stopped briefly at the café at Laggan and I used
the community toilet – let’s just say I was glad I had put in my bag at the
last moment a small tube of sudocrem!
At Balgowan you head north up onto the moor and the route got slightly more interesting (up till this point it had pretty much been endless forest tracks and single track road – my least favourite running!). It was probably at this time I realised we would not be able to get to Aviemore in time for our bus home. I did briefly ponder saying that I would crack on, but with the weather and our tired state, that would not have been a sensible plan. We had a quick mouch around the Dalnashallag Bothy before crossing the multiple tributaries of the River Calder. By this stage river and bog crossing were becoming extremely frustrating as sometimes the ice would hold and other times it would not – causing some bashing and bruising of the ankles!
I managed to lead us into a fenced off area and
after a good few hundred yards of plodding through bogs, got us to a dead end
with 2m high deer fences. Words were spoken, but we managed without falling out
(just!) and the clamber over the fence was not as bad as it had first looked.
Eventually you reach the road and there is a long plod
down to Newtonmore – by this time I was pretty cold, and I half jokingly said to Colin – fancy getting a pint and a bit
of grub in Newtonmore? That was the plan until we realised there was a train
back to Glasgow in half an hour.
The overall objective of completing the East
Highland Way was not done, but we had completed a pretty epic overnight run in
some pretty tough conditions. I am pretty sure we could have completed the
route, but we would then have been stuck in Aviemore for the night – which neither
of us was keen on!
The positives were I got back to Ayr in plenty of
time for a fish supper and if we had pressed on Colin might have been even more
poorly than he was the following week.
East Highland Way – if you enjoy running on forest
tracks (which I don’t really) it is a great route! I would say it is probably more
suited to being a great cycle route! One day I may get dropped off at
Newtonmore to run to Aviemore to finish the route!
Ranking 5th – up here just for the madness of planning to run
82miles through the night just for the hell of it!
22nd Dec. - Winter WHW Support Duties
Thinking that the running madness of 2022 was
finally over, I got a message from Mark Caldwell, who was planning a winter
WHW. Initially I said I would do from Fort William south till about Tyndrum as I
needed to be back in Prestwick later Friday afternoon for a night out. Mark had
planned his dad as support driver, but then he could make not make it. After a
bit of discussion, I suggested that I could drive and then do out and backs
along the route and that way Mark would have a bit of company plus all the kit
in the car.
With that plan in mind, Mark set off at Fort William at 10.21pm, I then drove round to Kinlochleven and started running north. I was never sure how far I would get but I had in my mind getting past the ruined cottage, which I did manage. It is always amazing at night how close you have to be to see an approaching head torch. Mark was moving well and we made good time into Kinlochleven. I had never done the official WHW route at Kinlochleven before, having always taken the route via the ice factor which you take on the Devil, so I nipped round there with Mark just to see it and then jumped in the car to the bottom of the Devil.
Again, my plan was to at least get to the top of
the Devil and I managed to get to the top and down a bit on the other side
before meeting Mark. Next stop was Glencoe ski centre, and I decided that as it
was only a small section I would just wait in the car. Probably not the best
idea as I got cold and think I had a wee sleep, but was awake enough to get
Mark back on his way again.
Next agreed stop was Victoria Bridge. By this time
it was about 3.30am and I was a bit surprised to have a car follow me along the
single track road, which was pretty slippy with black ice. I pulled into the
car park and turned to park near the road, and the car pulled in behind me –
why I have no idea!
With the choice of leaving my warm car, with a “stalker”
nearby or heading out to meet Mark – I headed out! We were using life 360 to
track each other and I was getting quite good at working out how far away Mark
was. Back to the car for a re supply and next stop we agreed was the railway
station at Bridge of Orchy. As I was going up the hill, I realised it was black
ice and managed to reverse and park in at the fire station. I was then
panicking about how I was going to get back down to the main road safely. Mark
appeared pretty quickly, and I let him know I would run out from Tyndrum again
to meet him. On the road up we had noticed the snow was still pretty thick
around Tyndrum so we put ice spikes back in Marks bag.
The challenge of getting out of a warm car was
getting harder and harder, as the night progressed, but I made it! The route
north from Tyndrum was pretty icy, which had been a theme for the night. Most
of it you could avoid but sometimes you just had to pick your way through. I
was finding the slippy terrain quite tiring so I am sure it must have been way
worse for Mark to endure it all through the night. When I met Mark this time it
was just starting to get light and it was daylight by the time we got back to
Tyndrum.
Next meet up point was just north of Beinglas and again I forced myself out of the warm car. I had planned in my head that I might get to the low bridge, but there was deep snow and trees down in the rollercoaster and Mark was making slow progress – eventually we met half way through the roller coaster. By this time Karen and Kirstin had found my car and were ready to take over. Kirstin ran with Mark and drove round to Beinglas campsite to switch kit over into the other car.
A long night and a total of 32 miles of out and
backs completed.
Just enough time to get home and washed, a quick
hour sleep and then dinner and drinks with friends! Mark successfully completed
his winter WHW later that night!
Ranking 7th
Reflections
On the surface the above looks like a great year
but the reality is I have struggled for most of it. I think a large part of
this is probably having Lyme disease and not knowing about it for much of the
year, which made training pretty tough (and not as enjoyable as usual).
It is so important that you actually enjoy both the
training and the races and don’t find them just a chore – so the focus for last few
months and for 2023 will be to get back to enjoying just being out whether that
is in the hills or at a club session!
Things I want to do better in 2023!
- After most of the races this year my hips were extremely
painful afterwards so I am now working on a hip flexibility / strengthening regime
which I am already hopeful is helping!
- this was on last year and I almost feel this has
got worse - sort my head out so I can run roads / forest tracks on ultras
rather than having an overwhelming urge to walk! Put me back on harder terrain
and I start running again!
- enjoy running again just for the sake of it!
If you got this far – thanks for reading and
maybe see you at a race sometime soon! Occasional poster on twitter – mainly of
running give me a follow at @ameldrum7
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