Chesapeake versus the Mountain - The Crooked Tracks Sagarmatha 24-hour challenge
* In under 24-hours
* On the hottest day of the year (so far)
* With no specific hill training ('it'll be more of a challenge with no training...')
Stage 1 - 'Should soon smash that out b done in about 16hrs i recon'
11th January 2022 and a new Whatsapp chat group appears on my phone simply called 'Stupid idea', shortly followed by a message from fellow running club member Jamie: 'Ade u wanna join me, will n daz on this'. I take a look at the details. It looks a very long way to drive to climb a stupid hill and we're not exactly short of hills in Derby. 'Looks stupid', I say. 'I'm in'.
What follows is months of discussion including how the advertised hill steepness (33%) compares to that of local hills (they don't), what food and drink will work best (beer and burgers), and what our team name should be. After going through all the usual puns, Jamie suggests 'Sreknaw'. No-one argues with that and so team Sreknaw is official, comprising Jamie, Daz, Will and myself, all representing Chespeake Road Runners, accompanied by Daz's son Max who will be the official team chef for the weekend.
Without sounding cocky, none of us are strangers to Marathon distance events so the prospect of 60-miles between the four of us doesn't sound daunting at all - maybe 4 hours each to account for the incline? Maybe quicker - we'll make up the time on the way back down. With confidence, we add extra beer to make sure we don't go thirsty on the second night. It all seems very straightforward and, if nothing else, all a bit of a laugh with mates in a field down south.
In total 18 people actively choose to sign up for the July 2022 event held by Crooked Tracks in a field in Wiltshire close to the famous White Horse - eight solo runners, three pairs of two-person relay teams, and a single four-person relay team (us). We're officially category winners and we've not even started out yet - don't think it even crossed our minds that things could go any other way...
Stage 2 - The Reality
It's Friday night and with bottles of Budweiser in hand, we've all pitched our tents, put up the gazebo and raised the comically massive Chesapeake Road Runner flag. Someone asks if we are a team. 'The four-man team' we reply. 'So you're the wankers!' she says with delight. Ah, she's worked out the code - yes, we are the wankers. Also, yes, we're road runners and no, we've not put in any dedicated hill climbing. 'Good luck!' she says and genuinely looks like she means it.
Thanks to Max and his Hungry Horse discount card, we all enjoy a reasonably priced hearty meal and a couple more beers before heading back to camp in time to enjoy the sun dipping below the horizon. It seems like a good time to go and check out the route and so, with another beer in hand, we head over to try and find the route.
But this can't be right.... There is no obvious track other than a thin strip of trampled grass which looks to have been occasionally used by cows making their way up and down the hill. Certainly nothing that could be described as a trail that would be suitable for racing on in the morning. In addition the hill only gets steeper the higher we climb and soon, we're down to our hands and knees, grabbing clumps of grass to pull ourselves up, giggling as we go. We get to the top, only to find that there's no space at the top of the hill with a only a tree, a couple of bushes and a barbed wire fence in the way. We're clearly in the wrong section of the hill and so, with the last of the light fading, we head back to base to have another couple of beers before bedtime.
Neil Turnbull, the delightfully enthusiastic event organiser comes over to quickly say hello, but explains that unfortunately he can't hang around drinking with us as there's lot still to be done before the morning. Will explains our confusion and of how we went to have a look but couldn't find the route. 'No, that's the intended route' says Neil with a massive grin on his face. 'Okay...' we say, the reality of the situation sinking in. 'Good luck!' says Neil. A lot of people seem to be wishing us luck but perhaps, on the eve of this inaugural event, what we actually need is a more specific training plan and an extra 6 months.
So this is what we have in store for us: a relatively short flat section of grass which dips down to a gate to the base of the hill, which then rises up, increasing in steepness past the bush on the left (approximately a quarter of the way up), past the bush on the right (approximately half way up), up through the long section which occasionally requires you to be on all fours, and a final gravel section with several large step-ups. With chest bursting and legs burning, it's then round the bush and straight back down, ideally (according to Neil) on the even steeper section of grass adjacent to the ascent route. Finally, it's back through the gate and back up a relatively gentle slope before checking in at the start/finish line and either handing over to the next team-mate, or heading straight back out to do it all over again.
I look at my watch - we've been talking nonsense for hours now and it appears to be 1 AM. Not ideal just before a 24-hour event. Oh well, not much we can do about this now.
Stage 3: Saturday morning. 'At this rate, we'll be done by 4.30am'
Saturday morning and, apart from the usual creakiness that comes from camping, we all start the day with our choices of hot caffeinated drink and a freshly made bacon sandwich - cheers Max! The sun has long since risen and there's not a cloud in the sky. It's gong to be a hot one, for sure but it's a fairly generous 9 AM start and so there's a general calm in the air. Plenty of time for toilet visits and the usual pre-race rituals.
It's always nice to camp close to the start line of an event and for most of us, it's an even more leisurely start given that we're only allowed one 'runner' on the course at any one time. On this basis, with our estimate of 15-minutes per lap, it might be up to 45-minutes before the fourth person sets off.
Following Neil's heartwarming pre-race speech, Jamie promptly starts off at 9:02 AM with all of the solo runners and half of the runners from the two-person relay teams. With blistering pace, Jamie sprints off the start and leads the pack, climbing up to the top and building up a strong lead. A more restrained descent still leads him out front as he completes his first lap well under 15-minutes. Daz and Will also put in very strong starts and a visible 'trail' of sorts starts to emerge as the grass is trampled down.
By the time it's ready for my first attempt, the field is spread out with people sensibly settling down into a comfortable-ish pace. For all the confusion yesterday, there does seem to be the occasional step or feature which could be used to ease the ascent. Getting down the hill though, using any method seems highly sketchy to me when the drop from the top at the top looks so very, very steep.
Following the sections of tramples grass, there seems less consensus on the best route back down the hill but team Sreknaw, equipped with work gloves, have adopted a slip, slide, drop and controlled fall method that seems both fast and efficient. It is understood that there was some comments raised from a couple of other competitors about this method but event organisers confirmed that 'the only rule is that you get up the hill, and then back down the hill. How this is done is entirely up to you'. Ski lift perhaps?
It's a feature of the event that it's entirely possible to see practically the entire route from the campsite. This will assist during daylight hours at least to work out our timings for change-over - 'he's at the small bush on the way back down, now he's at the bigger bush...'. It also dawns on me that the time has passed where all four of us can talk as a foursome and decisions will now have to be made as we go, passing instructions on as we go. What it does mean that we get now regular feedback regarding track conditions - state of the ground, state of other people out on the track, perceived weather conditions, the pros and cons of using poles, etc.
We all do one more lap each. Now that we all have a much better idea of what we are up against, we make the decision to increase each stint to two laps each. We all agree that after the descent and flat section of the course, we're feeling sufficiently recovered to hit the hill a second time around but even better, this now gives us around 1 hour and 30 minutes of recovery between stints - more than enough time to eat, drink, freshen up, lie down (perhaps even sleep?!) and then prepare for the next shift. It's getting warm, very warm but currently we have shade, water, sun cream and make-shift neck covers made from buffs - can't be too careful on what is reportedly the hottest day of the year so far.
Very approximately, we need 4 reps per hour to stay on target and after 2.5 hours we have completed 12 laps which leaves us half an hour ahead of schedule. It's going to get hotter, and we're obviously going to slow up as the day drags on and so we all push on, onwards and upwards (and back down again, and repeat).
Stage 4: Saturday afternoon - 'This could actually go very, very wrong...'
It's mid-to-late afternoon and in the mad heat with quite a few laps under our belt, basic maths are proving to be a challenge. 92 reps are in required to meet the height and distance goal, and 9 PM will be the halfway mark but in the state we are in, we're currently struggling to a) divide 92 by 2 and b) work out how many reps we have completed already. The end seems a very, very long way away and the mood in camp dips for a while whilst a fractured discussion continues between whichever three runners are currently in camp. Do we stop, celebrate what we have achieved already and get back on to the beers? Do we continue and see how many laps we can achieve? Do we rebel against the organisers and insist that we continue until we meet our goal, however long it takes? On the plus side, although we were tired after each stint, and all covered in scratches from the rough grass, the worst of things seems to be Daz's Achilles, along with our own usual niggles, all of which are being kept at bay though these longer recovery periods and appropriate medication.
We're getting through the hottest time of the day and we get an update on how to prevent heat exhaustion or heatstroke, which included 'avoiding the sun between 11am and 3pm' (too late) and 'avoiding extreme exercise' (oh dear). However, there had only been reports of one solo runner dropping out with suspected heat-stroke. I Google the dangers of overdosing on electrolytes, taking note that the indication is that too few was definitely worst than too many.
My biggest concern at this point however regards sleep, or lack of. I didn't exactly sleep much the night before, and although I felt tired, I didn't currently feel sleepy. With a second night of limited sleep on the cards, it had the potential to be a particularly long night and running in the dark on a very technical slope would surely be slower, particularly when the sleepiness kicks in?
With no fourth person around to make a group decision, we take what is actually the easiest decision to make - to just keep on running. It would have been a shame to come all this way (from Derby) and not find out how far we could actually go in the allotted time frame.
We munch on burgers, and on we go into the evening, the heat of the mid-day sun lingering for far longer than pleasant. Estimates are that if we keep running at a pace approximating those from the start of the day, we'd unfortunately still be around 20 minutes over schedule. There will be no beer for us tonight.
Stage 5: Saturday night. "Tonight we're going to run with candles and burn this mother-f*cking hill down to the ground"
Not everyone is enjoying the hill quite as much as we are, but on we all go. The evening turns to night and the head-torches emerge. The temperature drops fast and the relief is swift. Having already run the hill at least a dozen times each, the head torches actually brings focus to the situation and, in the coolness of the night we keep going with a renewed sense of concentration. Amazingly, our times per stint on the hill have not only remained reasonably steady, but appear to be sufficiently fast to put us on to a pace that would put us on target to finish within the allotted time - but only if we can maintain this pace. However, we're all feeling the effect of the cumulative battering our bodies had taken over the course of the day, particularly the quads and an injury now, either from over use, or as a result of a fall from a lapse in concentration, could be enough to put us out of contention. I'm still not feeling sleepy though - what's going on?!
The wind starts picking up as the night closes in and the camp get really quiet with those who are in a position to sleep, trying to sleep. No longer can we rely on watching the progress of the people on the hill to judge hand-over time - the hill is just a series of distant white lights. Instead, we use a system of phone alarms to alert the next person that it's time to wander over to the start/finish line.
The wind really start to blow in the early morning but the reports from runners on the track consistently feed back that it's fine up on the hill - no need for anything other than shorts and t-shirt. Even in the dead of night, we're sweating buckets although I return to camp to find the gazebo partially dismantled, a couple of poles bucked from the high winds. I find it a struggle to sleep in my tent due to the noise of my tent sides flapping and the noise of a distant snorer who clearly isn't having any trouble. It seems strange that actually it's the still calmness of being out on the hill where life seems most straight forward. You have one job: you go up the hill, and you go down the hill - that's it. And that's what we do - perhaps we're getting the hang of all this at last.
Stage 6: Sunday Morning - 'It's going to be mega-close, whatever happens....'
It's 7 AM and somehow, unbelievably, race control can confirm that we've completed 86 reps which means (only) 8 laps to do in 2-hours. Easy to do yesterday morning but could we do the same again some 22-hours later with little-to-no sleep and battered bodies? After some discussion with Neil about cut-offs (if we're out on a lap at 9 AM, does the lap count), it's confirmed that there may be a little bit of leeway possible, particularly if it's coming down to the wire. We also recall that technically, the race started at 9.02 AM so perhaps there may be another couple of minutes available should we need it. However, did we want to 'finish' with a bit of a bit of rule wiggling, or would it be better to just go for it and solidly finish within the designated 24-hours? Hell, we were going to go for it!
The word spreads around the team - we're going to drop from 2 laps per stint, down to one fast one each in turn. No longer would we need to worry about long-term recovery, we just needed enough quick reps over the next two hours to make it work. And wow, with the end in sight, what a difference this makes to the team. We'd been complimented throughout the event on our general pace overall, but now we are flying. Unless something goes massively wrong, unbelievably, we might actually do this. Things are metaphorically, and literally heating up!
Each of us power through one more rep each and at last, it's on to each of our our final laps. Word seems to have got around that it's going to be close and other competitors on the hill selflessly move aside to let each of us through. We all patiently wait at the start/finish line - no need to return to camp now. Daz sets off fast but maintains a fantastic pace, finishing just as strong, clearly giving it his all right to the end. Next up is me, still feeling sore, but reassured with the knowledge that each section of the course is now final, never ever to be repeated. Not quite as fast as my previous lap, but hopefully this should be enough at this late stage. Next up, Jamie who appears to be going just as fast as his very first lap - unbelievable, especially given as I hear he managed to slip in an extra couple of reps during the night. And finally, Will who appears to be bounding up the mostly empty hill at an astonishing pace, before hoping down the steepest sections of the hill at a rate that hardly appears possible. With a final sprint finish, Will crosses the line at around 8.40 AM, an incredible 20-minutes ahead of the 9 AM target.
We can't believe it - in under 24 hours, we'd achieved our aim of running 92 reps of the hill, covering 100km whilst climbing over 29,256ft of elevation - slightly more that the height of Everest. We'd gone in to this whole endeavour, massively underestimating the challenge ahead, starting strong but at times felling overwhelmed by the enormity of the task ahead, but we'd persevered through the heat of the day and the long, drawn-out challenge of the night, seeing it through to the fairy-tale outcome that no one 24 long hours earlier had believed possible.
We congratulate each other and our fellow hill-climbing companions - our time on the hill is finally done. Medals are passed round, burgers are eaten, the tents are dismantled, we head home. And now we sleep.
The Aftermath
It's Monday and the Whatsapp messages are once again in full flow. None of us can use our legs properly but already the suggestions are coming in regarding what event we could do next....
We're all still massively overwhelmed by the whole experience and the outcome. Despite the adverse conditions, we acknowledge that we even managed to enjoy parts of the course at times (although the common answer at the time was nearly always "horrendous").
None of the photos come close to showing just how steep this hill actually is but retrospectively, we did find out that there is a Strava segment for the hill itself known as 'White Horse Hill (Steepest Point) Climb'. Details for this segment confirm that whilst the overall gradient is 33% as advertised, much of the climb is in the order of 40 to 45%, peaking out at 49%. This is not a complaint - this is the challenge in hand.
So, how did it all come together in the end? Firstly, our strategy for starting out with single reps, followed by doubles and ending up with a few final 'sprint' single reps gave us just what we needed, physically and mentally, at every stage of the event. In addition, our hand-overs between runners was immaculate - literally at all times during the entire duration of the event, someone from the team was out on course, chipping away at the distance.
Next up was nutrition with Chef Max on standby for hot food and drinks on demand, and a massive selection of snacks and cold drinks to choose from, topped up with cold lollies and even more snacks laid on for all competitors.
Finally, although our darkest hour was perceived by the team to be that period just before dark on the first day, at the point when there literally did not appear to be sufficient time to finish, each member each and every time, without complaint, headed over to the start line to do what needed to be done, over and over and over again until the job in hand was complete.
So, big thanks for Neil and Crooked Tracks Wiltshire for believing in the concept of the event and seeing it through lock-down to become a reality. To all of the enthusiastic volunteers who kindly gave up their time to encourage us through the day, into the night and out the other side. To the other competitors for their grit and determination who kept on going the hottest times of the day and the smallest hours of the night - some outstanding achievements from everyone. To Max, who cooked the most amazing burgers, always lending a helping hand and keeping us company throughout the weekend. And finally, to my teammates, Jamie, Daz and Will - you are all legends.
(and not forgetting to our family and loved ones who let us go out and do stupid stuff)
RIP to my Altra Lone Peaks and my lucky merino racing socks - you served me well.
Event Page:
https://www.crookedtrackswiltshire.co.uk/sagarmatha
Event Results:
https://www.crookedtrackswiltshire.co.uk/2022-results-sagarmatha.
Words by Ade, photos from Facebook
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