Ken Fancett

Although I had won the event last year I didn't go into the event with the expectation of winning again. For one thing I knew that there would be strong competition. But also I had been running rather poorly in the weeks preceding and, in particular had put up a poor performance in the Clarendon Way Marathon the week before. The reality is that ultra running is a bit like driving a car without a petrol gauge. One knows that one will run out of fuel eventually but can't be sure when it will happen. The "running on empty" feeling can happen without warning, and past performance is an unreliable guide. I always run at a pace which I feel comfortable with - rather than using target times to force the pace. I would, however, have felt rather embarrassed if I had failed to cover a hundred miles. Anything above that I considered a bonus.

The first four hours were uneventful and relatively painless. I don't have a clear memory except that I recall having run 27 miles at the four hour mark and being second place on the leader board. After that I became aware of a calf muscle cramp problem, and I also appeared to be constantly thirsty. I thought that the calf muscle problem must be caused by poor hydration so I stopped and walked for about an hour, chatted to some other runners, and made an effort to drink more. Fortunately the organisers had very thoughtfully made a wide selection of hot and cold drinks available. Someone also gave me some salt tablets. I recall the leader board showing that in that hour I had only covered four miles and had dropped back to sixth position. I wasn't particularly worried as a lot can happen in 20 hours and in any event is hard enough as it is without the pressure of trying to maintain the position from early on in the race.

After this break I started running again and I seemed to remain in sixth position for a very long time. I tended to drift off into my own dreams and was scarcely  aware of my surroundings. At some point I "came to" to discover it was dark and the floodlights were on though I never noticed it getting dark. I tried to be sufficiently alert to make eye contact with the lap counter as I passed but quite often I was in my own world and relied totally on trust. The fact that we can dream our way round the course makes me really appreciative of what the lap counters do. Of course, I value all the volunteers who make the day a success but I felt particularly appreciative of the lap counters who have to maintain their mental concentration. We only had to run and it seemed, and still seems, that our part was the easy bit.

Although the track is just off a busy main road we could neither see it  nor hear it,
except for when the occasional emergency vehicle went past. It seemed strange to think of all those people driving up and down the road unaware of the feat of endurance going on inside. and us, totally absorbed with our race and equally unconcerned about the world outside.

I passed the 50 mile barrier at just over 8 hours, from when I could look forward to 100K. After 100K there are not any obvious landmark distances until 100 miles which is quite a big gap. I planned my drink stops in advance which gave me something to which to look forward. At some point it started to rain. The forecasters had threatened us it would start raining from 17.00 but from what I can remember it wasn't until about 19.00 that it started. Fortunately it was a warm night and the rain never became seriously unpleasant.

By midnight I was aware that the lead runner was 10 miles ahead of me. I thought he would gain another 10 miles in the second half. At some point during the night I became aware that the two lead runners had swapped places. This suggested that the original leader was in trouble and would drop back further. this in fact proved to be the case and I moved up in to 5th place. At some point after that, I moved up against the other runners and went into second place.

As the night wore on  fatigue was not so much a problem as muscles stiffening up after a stop. Just stopping for a drink I would find it would take a lap or two of walking before I got going again. At 07.00 in the morning I became aware of the birds singing and the day was starting to wake up. For some reason (I am not sure why) I decided to run continuously for a whole hour, the only occasion in the race when I did so. It was a mistake and when I finally did stop my running muscles locked up completely. So here I was at 8.00, the floodlights had gone off and it was daylight, I was in second position but with three strong runners close behind, and me unable to run. Although I wasn't really worked up about position I would have been disappointed to have dropped

back in the closing stages of the race. So I was just going to have to fast walk the next four hours. I knew that one of them was only a mile behind and I thought it inevitable that he would overtake. This competitive finish was quite different from last year when I had ended up ten miles ahead of the next runner.

Fortunately I still had a fair amont of energy left and it was a question of walking as
fast as I could make my joints work. About half an hour before the end some club members came in to see the finish and take me home. I couldnt look at them as I was totally focussed on locomoting myself as fast as possible.

Then the next thing I knew it was all over. I felt very pleased to finish second with
such a strong field of competitors. At one point the leader was eleven miles ahead of me, and I was pleased to have narrowed this to 8 miles. I was pleased to have maintained my second place when it seemed inevitable that I would lose it.

I should end by saying again how very grateful I feel towards all the volunteers who made the day a success. The organisation was absolutely splendid.