2016

All good things must come to an end #PoppyChallenge

November 25, 2015

2015, 2016, Arse Kicking, bling, challenge, charity, Commuting, distance, endurance, endurance running, events, Inspiring, Instagram, London, medal, Mental, Mental Strength, momentum, Photography, Poppy challenge, Runcommute, running, saintelyon, training, virtual runner uk, VirtualrunnerUK

Bad mood, nope just pissed I failed to get a #VMLM place again

October 28, 2015

2016, challenge, distance, endurance, endurance running, London, marathon, medal, race run, Racing

Leave a comment

Dear VMLM2016,

As you know each year I send you a bit of a love letter to thank you for considering me for inclusion in your fun run. This year is no different but I’m going to add my usual slice of opinion and annoyance because I’ve applied 6 times now and had the same amount of rejections.

I know you’re a big marathon with lots of people wanting space, I also understand you’ve got thousands of charitable places raising money for good causes, I also understand you’ve got a reputation to protect.

However…

…there’s some problems, the London Marathon is becoming less about racing and more about raising money.

I often attend the race as a spectator and watch the spectacle of people darting between each other when actually they should be into a rhythm, a good well paced stride and what they are darting around often are the undertrained or the fun runners and even the walkers. Now I wouldn’t want to deter these people from competing in a marathon like this – it is after all ‘THE MARATHON’ but perhaps this race now needs to be run on two separate days, same day big gap between or twice a year – one for the ones who want to race the London Marathon and a second for those that want to raise money. Or perhaps it simply needs qualifying criteria to weed out those who don’t do the training – run a local UK (or your country of residence) marathon in the year before your VMLM attempt. This has the dual benefits of getting people ready for their special day but also supports the hundreds of other marathons that are put on around the country.

Ultimately I’m just jealous that I’ve applied so many times and never gotten in through a ballot place and that this year first time applicant accepted rates where at an all time high. Rather galling.

I also really don’t want to have to raise money (in the thousands of pounds) to run 26.2miles for one of the charities – to me that doesn’t seem fair, perhaps if it was 262 miles or 10 marathons in 10 days then I’d look to raise money but why should I harass people because I want to do the London Marathon. I run marathon distances regularly, I do it for fun, I do it for me, it’s me time and the London Marathon would be awesome to do but not under the conditions it currently offers.

On a final note VMLM I’ll say this, last week I entered the Isle of Skye Ultra Marathon – 74miles, £80, maximum 75 competitors, no fundraising involved, hassle free and an experience I’m hoping I’ll never forget. I’d like to one day say the same about your race so I’ll keep applying but unlike with Skye or any of the other races I do I won’t hold out any hope.

Yours disappointed

UltraBoy

PS. Why do you wait until October to let us know if we’ve got a place? That’s really fucking annoying as it makes early planning much more difficult.

PPS. As I stated I’m just jealous and congratulations to everyone who has ever run it, attempted it, will attempt it – you’re all awesome but the organisers perhaps need a bit of a rethink now running is at an all time high of popularity

#UltraRunning – the drive or the driven? I’d always been the latter but think I’ll need to become the former

October 21, 2015

2016, DNS, Driving, events, fear, GingaNinja, race run, Racing, running, UK ultra chat

2 Comments

It’s been a long time coming I suppose but I’d hoped to get to the end of my life without it but sadly it now seems necessary to preserve my rather full racing calendar. Yep, I’m going to have to learn to drive.Why? Well this weekend I’m missing Beachy Head and then the following weekend I’m missing the Hugin Challenge.

Beachy Head is unavoidable as it is in conflict with a wedding the GingaNinja is bridesmaid at and that’s fair enough but Hugin is a matter of logistics. I’m on solo parenting duty the weekend of Hugin (as unexpectedly the GingaNinja is working). Hugin was my replacement for Beachy Head so I was a little annoyed that her work was in the way of this race especially as I’ve been trying to run it for a little while now. However, I wasn’t to be deterred by something so small … No.

I started by confirming with the always awesome Rachel and Traviss if I could buggy run UltraBaby round the course – which they agreed to (they are mister and missus awesome). However, while this was good news there was less good news too, the problem was that it didn’t matter which way I cut it the South Eastern trains just won’t get me there early enough on race day and a hotel with UltraBaby isn’t a good idea as new places are always a challenge for her initially and neither of us would get any sleep the night before the event.

So disappointingly I won’t be able to run at Hugin.

The long term solution to ensure this doesn’t happen again is learning to drive. I’ve long put it off as I simply don’t enjoy driving, there’s no pleasure in it for me and in practical terms there’s never been a enormous need or pressure to learn. However, if I intend to keep racing then I need to be able to drive. This has an added benefit too – the GingaNinja can stop being quite so pissed off when I ask her to transport me to a race start or collect me from a race finish. Granted she’s always been awesome at the early starts, late finishes and checkpoint visiting but even I, with my blinkered view on running, can see it’s no fun for her and that has been unfair for a while now.

So come next year I’ll be learning to drive. It’ll be end of an era and I’ll probably shit myself more driving than I did on the Saltmarsh 75 and that is saying something! Wish me luck fellow runners.

I do love #racing and occasionally a gentle amble

September 8, 2015

2015, 2016, adventure racing, CCC, centurion, endurance, fun, preview, ranscombe, running, Trail, Trail running, training, Ukrunchat, ultra, ultra marathon, Ultra runner, Ultra running, ultraboy, ultraboyruns, Ultrachat, ultras

3 Comments

My next few months of running already taking shape, my failure in the CCC hasn’t dampened my spirits for running and has actually only hardened my resolve to run in races I think I’m going to enjoy and to run them my way (probably talking too much and taking too many photographs – if I listen to the criticisms often levelled at me).

To help me overcome the disappointment of CCC I’m a late sign-up to Saltmarsh 75 – my first multi-day adventure – taking place in October and I’m thoroughly looking forward to taking 75 miles of mentally challenging flat running – this hopefully will put me in good stead for training for what I hope will be a successful ballot entry to GUCR (but that comes later). Post Saltmarsh I’ll be joining the ever awesome Traviss Wilcox at the Ranscombe 8hr timed challenge event. Here I’ll be hopefully be joined straight off of Kilimanjaro by @chiltondiva as she moves from mountain mastery to ultra running starlet. I’ll be hoping to wend my way round enough laps to run 40 miles or so but we will see.

Staying with Traviss Wilcox and his oversized medals I’ll then be bumbling my way round the November Hugin Challenge looking for another 30 mile ultra distance and a 1:1 scale Viking ship sized medal – well I think that’s the scale!

Winter continues to be my favourite running season and I’ll be finishing the ultra year with the Saintelyon – my absolute ‘A’ race – this is the one I’ve been working towards and the one I’m looking forward to. I might even squeeze in a bit of pre-Christmas shopping while I’m there. I think failure here would be quite crushing but I really do have to turn up for this one as everything about it rings out ‘spectacular’ – well except the lack of medal. That should be the end of longer distance running for 2015, if it all works out that will have been 10 ultras attempted this year and 9 of them completed (fingers crossed).

However, I’m not leaving it there, January brings with it my second pop at Country to Capital (and I’ll be being joined again by the awesome @chiltondiva). I’m planning on this being an easy jaunt to get 2016 underway, perhaps run a better time and simply enjoy it a bit more. C2C is a personal favourite at a great time of year and it’ll be excellent to go back – though I’m hoping the toilet won’t be blocked this time around.

With C2C in mid-January I’m leaving February light on ultra distances as my own stupidity is likely to catch me out on the first weekend of March when I look to conquer the magnificent TransGrancanaria. I signed up to TransGC in a moment of madness the day before the start of the CCC when I saw Wendy offering a few euros off and a very blue t-shirt. Now I’m running the risk of another major ultra going a bit Pete Tong because of a lack of hot mountain experience. However, having examined the profile, done a bit of research and a ‘don’t give a fuck attitude’ I should at least make a passable attempt at TransGC.

And that’s my next six months sorted – obviously there will be an assortment of other races involved in keeping me active – I’ll probably do a Movember run, more than likely the awesome Vigo 10 miler and I’ll see if I can find a marathon to chuck in there too. But then what happens after TransGC?

I have some ideas – the Isle of Skye Ultra looks properly amazing but is at the same time as GUCR, Devil of the Highlands also runs into conflict with other races. My favourite ultra St. Peter’s Way would be a lovely addition and if it runs the Leeds-Liverpool canal run might make an excellent replacement for GUCR which I doubt I would get a place in anyway. However, I might get a London Marathon place which would make the Hoka Highland Fling a problem but of the two I think the Fling would be more fun. There’ll be no Centurion races either in 2016 so I could try the 12 Labours of Hercules and some other 50 or 100s but the big decision would be between the 86 miles of The Ridgeway and Ring o’ Fire (both of which have been on my hit list for a while). There’s just so many and I don’t want to be trying to run them all.

So which should I run and do you have any good quality recommendations that are a bit out of the ordinary, probably not that many competitors and have awesome medals? I’m curious to see what’s out there.

—UltraBoyRuns

Saving the world one run at a time

Archive