After my last attempt at this race, I expressed no desire to attempt it again. Even now, I prefer races around the 50 mile distance, but I still had an itch to scratch with this one. When entries opened last year, I finally decided to give it another go and put my name down.
After successful completion of the Hardmoors 60 and Hardmoors 55 in 2020 and a number of solo, self supported ultras, I felt like I had a bit more experience and mental fortitude to get me through this race successfully.
Preparation
My HM110 specific training started in December 2021, immediately after the Hardmoors marathon series finished (I was lucky enough to be transferred places for six of the seven races by my good friend Linda so had an unexpected full year of racing). I sat down and planned what I wanted to achieve each week, building up distance by 10% per week in three-week blocks with the fourth week of every block being a rest week or a cutback in volume depending on how I felt.
As part of that, I planned to recce the entire route prior to the race and did this in the largest chunks practical. In February, I planned to do 55 miles on the coastal section of the Cleveland Way with a group of friends, but as the day approached, the numbers waned and the run was pulled. Instead, I decided to run the Way of Love from Hartlepool to Durham and back, a distance of around 60 miles, albeit a bit less challenging than the Cleveland Way. I was joined by Aaron Gourley and Eric Green who did Wingate-Durham out and back and clubmate Rob Wright for the Cassop-Durham out and back section. Having completed that, with horrifically wet feet, I added plans for dealing with my feet to my HM110 prep.
A month out from the race, I had planned to do a 50 miler and that coincided with a low-key backyard ultra called Survivor organised by Craig Davie, so I used that for my 50 miler. I stocked my car in the same way as I hoped to stock the crew van for the 110 and the race went well, I reached 50 miles comfortably, coming second in the process, thanks to a glut of dropouts around the 40 mile point. Following that, I made a few tweaks to the things I wanted in my food and kit boxes.
My plan for the race was to completely ditch my usual approach of planning as much as possible. I had included food and kit for pretty much every eventuality in my kit boxes, so put a very high-level plan together for my crew, Matthew Swan and Dave Cook to follow on the day.
The plan was basically a list of meeting points with what I hoped to do at each (pick up food/drink, pick up poles, change clothes etc). The plan also included the following in bold font:
DNF Decision to be taken by the crew – The only criteria for stopping me is mechanical injury or physical illness e.g. broken ankle, sickness, diarrhoea, organ failure etc. Any other moans, boot me out of the van and send me on my way!
Warning, I will lie, beg, cry and appeal to your better nature to let me stop. DO NOT HAVE A BETTER NATURE!!!!
I left my general race aims at the bottom, but apart from these broad targets, my plan on the day was to make things up as I went along to achieve these.
- Ravenscar by 4h:35m (12:35pm)
- Saltburn by 14h:00m (10pm)
- Lordstones by 25h:00m (9am)
- Quick turnarounds at stops apart from Robin Hood’s Bay (10 mins), Saltburn, Clay Bank (both 15 mins) and White Horse (10 mins)
- Have a good laugh
- Finish within 36h:00m
My whole strategy was to be as relaxed as possible during the race and only focus on the running, with any real thinking being left to Matt and Dave.
The night before the race, I was picked up by Matt in his camper van and we spent the night at Filey Brigg in a nice relaxed manner, comfortable in the knowledge that all we had to do was roll out of bed in the morning and we were only a short walk from registration.
Race Day
Race day arrived after a great night’s sleep and I put my running kit on while eating a breakfast of porridge before Matt and I wandered over to registration to get signed on. Dave arrived and we chatted with each other and all of the other people we hadn’t seen since the last race.
While standing around, I found that it was a lot colder than expected and my fingers were cold, so I decided to put on my gloves, which resulted in the first and most annoying injury of the day. Somehow a splinter found its way under one of my fingernails, which caused me minor irritation for the first 24 hours of the race.
It wasn’t long before race director Jon Steele gave his race brief and we were lining up to start.
Filey to Scarborough Spa – 12.5km
My aim for this section was to get to the roundabout at the Spa Hotel inside 90 minutes, however, I have form for going off stupidly fast in races and I was determined to follow the advice of Survivor winner Mick Browne and start nice and slow, so I had set interval alerts on my watch to remind me to run for six minutes then walk for two minutes before running again for this entire stretch. This often meant that I spent time passing large groups of runners, then being overtaken by them, and then catching them throughout the whole stretch which didn’t really allow me to get into conversation with anyone, but I was able to exchange words with a few people as we passed back and forth.
Having not run for eight days prior to the race, I expected to be slightly lethargic, but my legs felt immediately willing and I was running at a quick, but comfortable pace, reaching Blue Dolphin in 21 minutes, which translates to about 6m:15s/km, something I was quite happy with. I slowed to a walk to climb the steps up to Lebberson Cliff and at the top, I was able to look behind me and in front and see that the race was starting to thin out into single file and that I was around the middle of the field.
I ran over the clifftop to start the hill climb into Cayton Bay alongside Brian Cutmore and Jamie Sowerby-Steel and spotted Sam Midgley and Adrian Martin at the top of the hill, which was a welcome bit of support.
I had a nice running spell to the steps back up to Osgodby, then walked up the steps eating a Snickers, hitting the top of them at the hour mark. At around this point, I started singing the Typically Tropical song, Woah, I’m Goin’ To Barbados, but replacing Barbados with Scarbados and got the tune stuck right in my head for a good 10-15 minutes before breezing through the first checkpoint at Holbeck Hill and eventually catching Eric Green on the prom near the Star Disc. Upon catching Eric, I sang my tune to him, therefore getting it out of my head and into his, leaving him cursing me as I trotted along on my final six minute interval before reaching the Spa roundabout in 1h:28m achieving my first goal of the race.
Scarborough Spa to Scalby Mills – 5km
I gave myself an on the spot target to reach the Sea Life Centre car park at Scalby Mills in 30 minutes. This would be my first crew meetup point and the only instructions I had given Matt and Dave was that I wanted a water top up, additional baby food and Snickers but I’d forgotten to tell them that I wanted a Chia Charge protein bar too.
When I’d recce’d this section in March, I’d continued to run 6/2 intervals, but it had felt draggy and awful, so for the race, I’d reverted to my favourite Scarborough ploy of running for 10 lamp posts then walking for 5. As well as slightly changing my run/walk pattern, counting the lamp posts gave my brain something other to focus on than the growing crowds along the seafront and the awful underfoot surface.
To help with the surface, I ran as much as possible on the tarmac sections of the road or in the gutter, rather than on the concrete of the prom.
As a result of my shorter run/walk pattern, I found myself passing back and forth with the same runners and had a bit of chat with several runners including Wayne Patrick.
The Scarborough section seemed to pass really quickly and I was just about to dump all my rubbish in a nearby bin when Brenda Elsley breezed past me looking really happy and positive, which clearly continued for her as she got her first 110 finish on this race.
I reached the Sea Life car park at 2h:02m on the race clock, a little bit over the 30 minute target I’d given myself (around four mins over) but I wasn’t too worried about that. At first, I couldn’t see Matt and Dave but they shouted me over and I handed them my water bottles to refill while I ran to the van to grab the Chia Charge I wanted. I’d asked for Dave to meet me at Cloughton Wyke with my poles, but the next scheduled crew stop was Robin Hood’s Bay. When they asked me what sort of food I wanted there I just blurted out more baby food and Snickers without really thinking things through. Dave told me he’d bring some water to Cloughton Wyke as it was getting hot and I’d already ditched the gloves that I had started running in. I also ditched my cap in favour of wearing a damp buff over my head, which could be put back around my wrist easily if the conditions dictated it.
After a total stoppage time of two minutes, I was off and running again.
Scalby Mills – Hayburn Wyke 8.5km
I gave myself a target of 1h:20m to get to Hayburn Wyke and set off walking up the steps away from Scalby Mills. At the top of the steps, I turned the interval timer on my watch back on and cracked on with 6/2 intervals again. The field had really thinned out now with runners every 100m or so. I could just about see Jamie Sowerby-Steel in the distance, recognisable only because of the Liverpool flag sticking up above his pack. I decided that during my running intervals, I would try and maintain or even close the distance on Jamie to give me some motivation to keep moving as this was an easy section to find yourself trundling along slowly on.
Before too long, I passed Lynsey Blyth who had been on the go for just over 26 hours as part of the Hardmoors 200. She told me she wished she had the positivity I had right now and I told her I’d see her at the finish before pushing on with my run interval.
I was drinking a lot more than planned as the weather had turned out to be a lot warmer than expected and I was glad that I was going to see Dave at Cloughton for a water top up. When I thought of Dave, I realised that I had my mobile phone in my shorts pocket and could have a proper think and text ahead to tell them what I wanted at Robin Hood’s Bay, so in my next walk break, I sent a list asking for:
- Water with High5 tabs in
- 3 Snickers bars
- 1 Chia Charge protein bar
- 2 pouches of savoury baby food
- 1 rice pudding pouch
- A Pot Noodle to be ready for me to eat
I ran a bit further on then sent an update asking for a sandwich bag filled with Swedish meatballs instead of one of the baby food pouches as I suddenly had a hankering for them.
As I finished texting, I decided to take a couple of quick photos as I don’t often take photos during races but thought it might be a good thing to do on this one.
I approached Cloughton Wyke around the two and a half hour mark with an almost empty water bottle and tried to spy Dave’s car in the car park, which I couldn’t see. I couldn’t see him on any of the paths leading from the car park, so I assumed that he’d be at the bottom of the steps. I bounced toward the steps and spotted him from the top, I descended carefully, to avoid any embarrassing trips, slips or falls this early in the race, picked up my poles and re-tied my laces while Dave topped my water bottles up. Having thanked Dave, I started off up the first really tough section of the race.
For the section between Cloughton Wyke and Hayburn Wyke, I turned my interval timer off and planned to walk most of the section. At the top of the steps away from Cloughton Wyke, I stopped to re-adjust my laces as I’d tied them too tight and was passed by Lena Conlin, whose pace I tried to match along the trail to Hayburn and when I realised, I couldn’t match it, I began to run in the sun and walk in the shade in an attempt to keep cool, which I enhanced by splashing my head, neck and arms with water.
It didn’t seem to take long to reach the top of the descent into Hayburn Wyke and I came to life a bit going downhill in the shade of the trees, overtaking several runners, all of whom I knew would be catching me on the climb out. I hit the bridge at the bottom 1h:18m after leaving Scalby Mills, just ahead of my target time. As I started the climb out from Hayburn Wyke, I did some mental maths and calculated that to reach the Ravenscar checkpoint by my target time of 4h:35m I’d need to do it in around an hour and 12 minutes, so I rounded up to 1h:15m for my target for that section.
Hayburn Wyke – Ravenscar 6.4km
Climbing the steps out of Hayburn Wyke is never easy, so I decided not to push myself and used the poles to their full effect as I climbed out. When I reached the top of the steps, I put the poles down and took a big swig of water and had some food. From various recces, I knew I needed to be mindful of eating and drinking while using poles because they occupy both of my hands and you have to make a conscious decision to put them down to eat. My plan was to get the worst of the climbing done and then get them stowed, at the absolute latest by the path that cuts across the War Dyke Lane (the old Hardmoors 60 route) but ideally before then. When the path started to level out, I re-started the interval timer on my watch, but at shorter 3/1 run-walk intervals to keep me running three times as much as I walked. The sun was getting really warm and the vegetation on the seaward side of the path was shielding me from the cooling breeze. I was drinking a lot and hoping that I was keeping on top of my hydration well enough, but at this point, things were feeling tough. However, this section had felt tough when I did it in March, so I knew there was nothing at all wrong with me, just the nature of the beast.
There were lots of walkers on this stretch, which gave me some mental distraction, by trying not to look utterly knackered and saying hello to them. Soon the vegetation gave way to open clifftop and the poles were stowed again for proper run/walk intervals. I had overtaken and was overtaken by Hannah McPeake, Phillip Kirkham and Daniel Walker several times then overtaken by Mark Williamson and Anna Jebson for about the 100th time of the race so far when Ravenscar started coming into view.
On the final climb toward Raven Hall, I had a slow walk and did a bit of a personal inventory, pulling all my litter into my shorts pocket to drop in one of the litter bins on the road and checked on my food and water supplies wondering what I could top up with at the checkpoint.
Once onto the road, I got a short run on before turning up the hill, greeting all the runners coming back down from the checkpoint as I walked up, dumping all my rubbish in a bin on the way. I arrived at the checkpoint at 4h:35m:30s, almost bang on my target time and at 1h:13m, two minutes ahead of my target time for that section. I was craving something nice to drink so I asked the checkpoint marshalls to fill my water bottle with plain water and the other bottle, which had previously contained water and High5 with orange juice. I spotted a bottle of Lucozade sport on the table and downed it in one to top up my fluids, as I was pretty certain I wasn’t as well hydrated as I should be, had a little bit of craic with Brian Cutmore and Jamie Sowerby-Steel and headed out of the CP singing Talking Heads’ Road to Nowhere just as Eric Green was arrriving, when he heard he told me to stop it and I ran out to enjoy the long descent through the village giving myself a target of 1h:10m to reach Robin Hood’s Bay.
Ravenscar – Robin Hood’s Bay 6.75km
I ran downhill for a solid 12 minutes down through the village and all the way down ‘Nemesis Hill’ catching up with a group containing Brian and Jamie just past the old Alum Works. I then ran/walked based on the terrain along to Stoupe Bank road, only really stopping for a call of nature along the way that gave me reassurance that I had almost got my hydration back in check.
I tried my best to run down the steps to Stoupe Beck and could hear voices below me that didn’t seem to get closer. As I crossed the beck, I could see runners up ahead, so I pushed on up the steps and could see Dave Hodgson and a few others ahead. I jogged the section along the top of the cliff and started the descent into Boggle Hole, passing some of the 200 runners, including Kev Tyerman and Barry Edwards at the bottom of the steps, only to be overtaken by them as I took the climb back out of Boggle Hole nice and slowly. Once back on the flat, I got another little run going and passed another 200 runner, Kendra Wedgwood who I hadn’t seen since Survivor. I said hello, gave her a hug then jogged on catching the other 200 runners halfway down the wooden steps into the village.
Once down the steps, I weaved my way through the crowds and started to march up the hill toward the grassed area where I expected to see Matt and Dave, I walked roughly in tandem with Dave Hodgson and picked the pace up toward the top as the steep incline began to flatten out.
When the grassed area came into view I saw that it was full of crews, most of whom were familiar faces, with Matt and Dave in the middle of a sea of Jo Barrett, Scott Beaumont and Lisa Cockcrofts so I did the only thing I could think appropriate and threw a big two thumbs up at them. I arrived at 5h:37m on the race clock, a split of 1h:01m, a whole 9 minutes faster than the target I gave myself so had no issue sitting in the chair that was offered to me while I eat my Pot Noodle, while Matt and Dave topped up my water bottles and food supplies. I even had time to drink a cup of Vimto juice and give Matt and Dave a proper list of stuff I wanted at the next meet (Whitby Abbey) while Dave made sure I had a fresh covering of sun cream.
Robin Hood’s Bay – Saltwick Bay 8.55km
I gave myself a target of an hour and a half for this section as it’s got quite a lot of elevation gain and loss for a relatively short section. The weather was still quite warm and I was conscious that I had been sweating a lot so wanted to ease back on the effort a little bit. I was already in a fairly comfortable position timewise in terms of hitting Saltburn for 10pm so I didn’t see the need to rush things.
As I was leaving Robin Hood’s Bay, I was overtaken by Paul Readman, who I’d run with a few weeks before at the Silverback Trails Wednesday Wander and wished him well as he powered on. I jogged through the fairly easy downhill section away from the village, punctuated by a number of gates before the terrain forced me to walk.
This section is quite exposed and although there was a breeze coming off the sea, there was a feeling that the sun was beating down on me a little, I also noticed that the sleeves on my jersey had a good coating of salt that I had sweated out during the day, so I was careful to keep drinking as well as enjoying the meatballs I had picked up at the last stop and taking a couple more photos.
I passed back and forth with Sean Boland, Kevin Blake, Mike Moloney, Jamie Bentley and Nick Summerton pretty much all the way along this stretch. I also passed Sean Higgins, who was running the 200, but I could tell from his body language that he wasn’t in a good place at that point and didn’t feel up to talking, so I wished him well and moved on quickly.
At around the seven hour mark, I was starting to feel the aches in my knees that often come with running these sorts of distances. I’d taken some paracetamol at the four hour mark and it had clearly worn off, so I made a mental note to take some at the eight hour point without fail.
It wasn’t long before the Whitby Lighthouse and Foghorn came into view, there was a formal checkpoint at the Hornblower Cafe there which I intended to bypass quickly, but they had sweets, so I grabbed some flying saucers and jogged along happily with the sherbet fizzing in my mouth.
On the approach to Saltwick Bay caravan park, I got a solid stretch of running done and arrived at the park gate at 7h:13m on the race clock, 1h:29m for the split, so nicely in line with my target. I knew I’d be having a quick rest stop at Whitby Abbey and the town itself was likely to be crowded so I gave myself a target of 1h:15m to get to Sandsend with the intent of walking all the way through town and running again once up on the clifftops again.
Saltwick Bay – Sandsend 7.6km
As I jogged through the caravan park, the change of surface alerted me to some hotspots developing on my little toes. I had a quick feel inside my shoes and could tell that my socks were damp with sweat, so I decided that I would change my socks early at Sandsend rather than Kettleness as planned (I’d have done it at the Abbey but I knew Matt and Dave would already have carried what I had asked for in Robin Hood’s Bay about half a mile to the meet point).
I ran a bit more of the Saltwick stretch than I expected to and soon spotted Matt and Dave waiting by the Abbey Gates.
I topped my water bottle up with lemon and lime flavoured water with a couple of High5 tabs in it. Matt expressed concern about the amount of salt on my clothes, so I asked him to put a drop of magnesium liquid in my next drink at Sandsend. I grabbed some more food and although I didn’t have any in my kit box, I had been craving a banana coming through Saltwick so I was delighted to see that Matt had brought one for me unbidden as a surprise. He had also brought my secret weapon for Whitby, a bottle of Erdinger Alkoholfrei beer. The idea of this, as well as being super isotonic re-hydration, I would have to slow to a walk to drink it.
I walked to the church gates with Matt and Dave then headed down the 199 steps happily swigging my beer, which was gloriously cool and stopped me from being frustrated by the crowds along Church Street which seemed to be building toward the Swing Bridge, as I approached the bridge, I realised it was just opening, hence the dense crowds.
I finished off my beer walking across the bridge sardine tin tight and dumped the bottle in a bin on the other side before jogging along the quay. I was overtaken by a relay runner as the crowds thinned then I slowed to a walk up the steps from Khyber Pass up the to Whale’s Jawbone while I eat my banana. As I reached the top of the steps, I spotted Kate Shaw sitting on a bench by the Captain Cook statue. So I said hi and pushed on with my tactic for getting through the next section of Whitby. I was going to run for three benches and then walk for one. A bit like with the Scarborough lamp posts.
I quickly realised this pattern of running was going to make me look weird because there were lots of benches all in a row, followed by big stretches without a bench, so sometimes I was running for ten seconds, walking for two then running again, other times I was getting a good minute or so of running done for a rest of a few seconds and so on. This saw me quickly up the slightly draggy uphill pavement section and onto the clifftop path getting past the remaining crowds of pedestrians and passing a couple of runners on the way. Dropping into Upgang Ravine I was again overtaken by Mark Williamson and Anna Jebson and was just being caught by Brian and Jamie again when I passed their ‘Ninja Crew’ parked up in the ravine. I was only in front of them by virtue of their ice cream stop in Whitby.
At this point, the fluids I had taken on board were making their presence felt, so I jumped into the bushes to sort that out then got a fast walk on up the hill to the main road down to Sandsend. I checked my watch and saw that it was around the 8 hour mark, so I took two paracetamol and started munching on a Chia Charge protein bar, as per my four hourly routine. Once on the road, I switched my watch back into 6/2 interval mode because the road to Sansend is a nice long downhill, on tarmac and even when it flattens out, still feels good to run on.
The paths were quite crowded, so I took advantage of the hatched space on the road separating the parking spaces from the road and ran on the tarmac almost all the way down which helped with the consistency of pace. There was a nice breeze coming off the sea and all was good with the world, apart from the growing soreness in my little toes, which I assumed were blisters coming to fruition. This made me grateful that I’d decided to change my socks at Sandsend as it would give me chance to deal with any issues there.
I arrived at Sandsend at 8h:22m on the race clock, 1h:09m for the split, six minutes ahead of my mini target, so felt that I had a few minutes to spare in sorting my feet.
Matt and Dave had a chair ready with all the kit I needed laid out ready, they had the food box next to the chair so I could pick what I wanted for the next section as the next meet up at Kettleness was one where we planned for only Dave to meet me. Matt and Dave sorted my bottles and food out while I, one foot at a time, stripped my socks off wiped the accumulated sweat and dirt with a towel, gave the foot a quick spray with isopropyl alcohol and gave it a few seconds to evaporate taking any residual dampness with it. I then gave the foot a dab with a microfibre cloth and checked the little toe (just a bit wrinkly but no blister, bonus) and re-applied the tape to my heels as it had come off with the sock.
Once both feet were done, I had a drink of Vimto, checked I had everything I needed and headed up the steps to the disused railway line which starts the next section.
Sandsend – Runswick Bay 8.43km
I gave myself a target of an hour and a half to get to Runswick Bay, so told Dave I’d probably make Kettleness in about an hour.
I got moving along the disused railway following a 3/1 interval pattern dictated by my watch. In the second or third interval, I started feeling some discomfort in my shorts, which was odd since I’d applied shea butter balm to the undercarriage liberally before the race and re-applied it at every opportunity during the day.
I made some adjustments and felt a breeze where there should be no breeze. Somehow, both the lycra liner in my shorts and the outer shorts had both split at the crotch. This was annoying not only because I had literally only worn these shorts three times (a training run, Stanhope Half and Survivor), but I now had about an hour’s worth of running with the risk of chafing happening and maybe some indecent exposure.
I rang Matt, who had all my spare clothes and asked if he had already split with Dave. He told me he had, so I explained and asked if he could get my spare shorts and under-shorts to Kettleness and he said he would sort it. Just then, I was passed by Mark and Anna who had a giggle when I explained my predicament.
A few years ago, this sort of thing would have affected my mental state negatively and caused me to slow down. I decided I couldn’t control the situation right now, but at Kettleness I could resolve the issue completely so I cracked on. At the Deepgrove Wyke steps, I slowed to a walk up the steps and was content to walk up the hill that followed them until the path flattened out. I decided not to run timed intervals, but instead picked a landmark in the distance and rewarded myself with a 30 second walk break when I reached it and repeated this several times before I reached the informal distance marker which showed how far I had come and how far I had to go. According to my watch, I’d done that 37 miles in 9h:05m.
After taking a quick photo, I got moving again and in about 10 minutes I could see the rooftops of Kettleness, in 15 minutes I was there and glad to see that both Matt and Dave were there with replacement shorts.
While I changed my shorts, applied a liberal layer of shea butter and transferred my race number to my number belt, Dave sorted my planned Pot Noodle.
I managed about half of the Pot Noodle before I couldn’t eat any more, then downed a can of Coke in one to chase the noodles down and hopefully give me a bit of a caffeine kick. I told them I would grab some food at the Runswick Bay checkpoint but spend minimal time there and gave them my wishlist for the meet up at Cowbar just after Staithes then got on my way after what felt like a long stop, but was only 10 minutes which wasn’t bad considering I had changed clothes and had some real food.
I ran the whole of the next section to the beach at Runswick on my own, which was my first extended period of the day where nobody was in close proximity, it was nice and I felt at one with myself and my running. I found that the outgoing tide had left a nice strip of wet sand which was good to run on and for the first time ever, I managed to run the entire length of the beach at Runswick, only slowing to jump over the various streams making their way to the sea.
At the bottom of the steep concrete climb, I spotted Kevin Blake looking a little confused, so I told him the turn was just ahead and watched him power up the hill ahead of me.
I walked slowly up the steep hill, finishing off my water so I could get it topped up at the checkpoint.
I arrived at the checkpoint at 10h:07m on the race clock, a split of 1h:36m, six minutes behind my mini target but with a slightly longer than planned stop at Kettleness.
While my bottle was getting filled, I browsed the goodies on the table and grabbed two Soreen bars, which was exactly what I fancied at that point and straight back out of the checkpoint in under a minute.
Runswick Bay – Staithes 6.33km
I gave myself a target of an hour to get to the bridge in Staithes and as I started jogging I was passed by some teenagers on mountain bikes, my brain made a joke with itself that I should offer to buy one of their bikes off them and I overruled the brain by telling it I didn’t need no stinking bikes.
The first section away from Runswick was nice and runnable, despite being slightly uphill, it was busy with early evening walkers, so it seemed like I was greeting people every few minutes, which broke up the time in my head. I was caught and overtaken by Sue Davies, who told me she was listening to loud music, which made me look forward to picking up my headphones and music at Gribdale Gate, but right now, I had to make do with the voices in my head.
I looked over my shoulder just before Port Mulgrave and saw Mark and Anna catching me again, but once onto the road section I ran all the way to the gate leading back to the trail and nexgt time I looked over my shoulder, I couldn’t see them, so I assumed they had met up with one of the crews I had seen waiting in Port Mulgrave.
I reached the top of the last big climb before Staithes and could see the village laid out below me before heading through the gate to run one of my favourite descents on the Cleveland Way. Even after a long day of running, the surface always seems to be very forgiving and even though it’s steep, it’s runnable and it felt nice to open the legs a bit after almost 11 hours on the move.
Once the route flattened back out, I slowed to a walk, got some more food and drink down my neck and decided that as well as the stuff I’d asked for at Kettleness, I sent Matt a text asking if he could sort me a bag of cocktail sausages out as I was craving some savoury food then started jogging again. I started to wonder if it was possible to hit the bridge by the 11 hour mark, which would be a few minutes ahead of my mini target so I pushed on a little harder, soon I was at the top of the steps, which I find to be quite awful on the Hardmoors 60, which is run in the opposite direction. I was able to maintain a reasonable pace going down them but was being very careful to make sure that I didn’t trip or turn my ankle on some of the broken surfaces.
I was quickly onto the cobbled streets of the village, shuffling quickly through the crowds, and hit the bridge at 11h:01m, a split of 54 minutes, regaining the six minutes I’d lost with the stop at Kettleness.
Staithes – Skinningrove 8.25km
I gave myself a target of 90 minutes for this section, a huge chunk of it is uphill and I knew that I’d spend a significant amount of time walking. I marched up the steep hill to Cowbar as fast as my legs could manage and was surprised how strong I felt at this point compared to my last attempt in 2018.
Matt had sent me a text telling me they were waiting by the bench on the Cleveland Way so I didn’t have to mess about going to the car park. When I got there, I picked up my poles and arm warmers as I expected the wind to be cold going over Hummersea as it’s quite high and exposed. I downed a sachet of rice pudding and chased it down with a can of Red Bull while my bottles were getting topped up then picked up my new stash of food and my poles then got going just as Wayne Patrick was passing so we chatted as we started off across the field on the way to the big climb up Boulby Bank. We were caught and passed by Bradd Braddock, whose bright pink shirt I had seen approaching for over an hour and Abigail Morgan and the three of them pulled ahead as the path steepened.
There was a crew waiting by the cottages and they asked if I wanted anything off their table, so I took a banana and shoved it in my pocket as I was fancying one again.
I took the climb nice and slowly and stopped halfway up to take a photo and get my breath back.
Once at the top of the climb, I stowed my poles and eat my banana before starting to run again, I was approaching the highest point on the East Coast of England when the drink made its presence felt again, so I took pleasure in relieving myself off the top of the cliff, before cracking on at a run as the path tilted downhill.
It felt like I’d got about 10 minutes of running done when I noticed that the 12 hour mark had passed so I took another couple of paracetamol, but didn’t feel like eating a protein bar. I eat a handful of cocktail sausages instead.
I ran pretty much all the way to the top of the steep steps down into Skinningrove which I tried to run as much as possible, but they were just a little too steep to run down safely, I arrived in the village at 12h:30m, a split of 1h:29m and jogged through the village, passing Bradd and Abigail who were having a crew stop. I’d decided not to bother here as I had plenty of food and planned on having a long stop to change clothes and eat pizza in Saltburn.
Skinningrove – Saltburn 6.85km
I gave myself a target of 1h:10m to get into Saltburn, I was already happy with the knowledge that I could take this section quite slowly and still get into Saltburn ahead of my 10pm target from my plan. If I hit my mini target, I would be around 20 minutes ahead of that.
Once over the beach section, I used my poles to get up the steps and stowed them once at the top. The uphill leading away from the steps is quite steep, but I decided to see if I could do some short run/walk intervals to keep the legs moving at pace. Once things flattened out I kept the running going before having a walk break at the 50 mile point. I decided to send a quick update to my work colleagues then made the mistake of checking Facebook and liking a comment made by Matt. About three seconds later, I received a text “Stop liking my incredibly humorous Facebook posts and get cracking. Your pizza’s in the oven”. I replied with a laughter emoji then put my phone away and started running. I was caught by a support runner whose name I didn’t catch and told him about my bollocking, then said I was going to take some photos of the Charm Bracelet as it looked like I was going to reach it around sunset.
I took one from a distance and when we arrived at the Charm Bracelet, he offered to take some pics of me before speeding off to Saltburn, which made for a great momento.
With the photos taken, I got a move on and started running towards Saltburn, making the most of the nice long downhill catching Wayne Patrick just before the Ship Inn steps and descending them with him, chatting as we walked through Saltburn and climbed the switchbacks up the road toward the bandstand, where I first passed Lisa Cockcroft’s van and saw Lee Williams lying down in a sleeping bag. I was disappointed for him having pulled out of the race, but he told me to go and get it.
I reached the bandstand at 13h:39m, a split of 1h:09m, almost bang on my target, but more importantly, 21 minutes ahead of my planned 10pm arrival.
I shucked off my pack and took off my short-sleeved jersey, which was soaked with sweat and covered in salt stains. I also ditched the arm warmers, as it was warm away from the exposed area of the coast. I dried my body with a towel. I asked Matt to check if I had any chafing on my back from the pack, as my jersey was so wet. I couldn’t feel any soreness and Matt said there were a couple of lines, but it didn’t look like chafing so I left it alone. I applied more shea butter to the unmentionables then put my lightweight cycling jacket on, opting not to put a base layer on as it felt quite warm. I sat and eat some pizza while Matt and Dave sorted my food and drink for the next section.
Once I finished the pizza, I necked another can of Coke, grabbed my head torch and struggled back into my pack for the night section, moving out of the checkpoint 13 minutes after I arrived, but more happily, around seven minutes before I had planned to arrive and have a 15 minute rest, meaning that I was going into the night section 22 minutes ahead of plan.
Saltburn – Slapewath 7.33km
I gave myself a target of an hour and a half for this section, expecting a slowdown in the dark. Even so, I was determined to put in a strong effort on this section as it was where the wheels started to come off during my last attempt.
As I dropped into the woods, the trees crowded out the fading daylight and I had to start using my head torch. I looked over my shoulder and could see a group of head torches behind me, but nobody in front.
I ran the downhills and walked the ups and soon I was under the viaduct, over the bridge and passing a group of teenagers who had a good campfire going before I got my poles out and started climbing the steps out of the valley.
I expected the head torches behind me to catch me during the long climb, but they stayed roughly the same distance away. I jogged the slight downhill under the bypass and into Skelton. I then got my poles back out for the climb through the streets along the diverted (possibly permanently diverted) section of the Cleveland Way that skirts around the edge of the new housing development that is being built. I turned my head torch off to save batteries while I could use the street lighting and marched on up the hill. As the road curved round, I looked behind me and saw the group was finally catching up with me.
Once back onto the Cleveland Way proper, I noticed some soreness on my back and shoulder so I stopped to take off my pack and apply some BodyGlide to the affected areas. As I was putting it back on, I could make out the familiar accent of Brian behind me, so assumed the group included both him and Jamie.
I got a bit of a jog on along a flat section of path and as I paused to cross the high street, the group caught me. Jamie was listening to the Liverpool match on the radio. The last report I had on the game was that it was 0-0 during a text exchange with Natalie just before Saltburn, but Jamie’s update was that Liverpool were losing and there was only a minute or so to go.
The group overhauled me on the steps away from the high street and pulled away from me going across Skelton Green, creating a gap of 20-30 metres by the time I reached the road crossing to get to Airey Hill Lane. I jogged along the lane behind the pub and caught the group as the road turned to trail.
The group were walking faster than me and quickly pulled away. I looked at my watch and saw that I’d just passed through 89km. I remembered from Hardwolds 80 a few years before that around the 80-90km mark I was able to run up hills like this using a 30/30 interval pattern, so I decided to give it a go here.
The first few intervals pulled me closer and closer to the group in front and soon I had drawn level. Brian commented that I was storming. The next run interval pulled me further away, but the walk interval saw them pull back some distance. After a few more intervals, I’d put some distance between myself and the group. Soon I was over the top of the hill and descending back through the woods and down the steps to Slapewath. At the bottom of the steps, I overtook a small group, which I think included Michael Hodgkiss, but being dark, it was difficult to tell.
I arrived at the van at 15h:13m on the race clock, split time of 1h:20m, 10 minutes faster than my target and feeling really invigorated. I jumped in the van for another bit of pizza and drink while Matt filled up my bottles and Dave got ready to do his first support running stint.
I’d asked that Dave run with me through Guisborough Woods and over the Three Sisters because both sections a tough in terms of the climbing, but in the case of Guisborough Woods, I needed a bit of a distraction to stop my mind from going back to my previous attempt where my mental state took a downward plunge. This time, I was confident that I had done all I could to ensure a good mental state. I had also been more on top of my eating and drinking, I had been consistently making sure I was on top of calories, which I know impacts my mood. Last time, I had struggled to eat after Whitby and that had impacted my mental state, but I wanted to have a bit of insurance against my mind playing tricks on me.
Dave and I set off together at 15h:17m and I gave myself a new target of 1h:15m to get to Highcliffe Nab.
Slapewath – Highcliffe Nab 5.3km
We walked most of the way to Spa Wood and through the first part of the wood because I was still eating pizza and after a pretty hard effort in the previous section. We were soon through the woods and walking up the concrete climb chatting away. I love running with Dave because he’s a great conversationalist, there’s never a dull moment. The first long uphill section into what used to be the woods proper, but has now been largely stripped of trees seemed to pass quickly and I managed to get a run going on the short path that drops down through the bushes before the next steep climb to the forestry road. Once up on the road, we got running on the long downhill section.
Looking over our shoulder, we thought we could see head torches in the distance, but it was hard to tell. We could see a cluster of lights ahead and decided to try and close the distance by running all the flats and downhill sections. On the last climb up toward Highcliffe, we hit the bottom of the climb as the group ahead hit the top section. Dave and I marched up as quickly as we could, and when we reached the top, we could see we had closed distance further. We reached Highcliffe itself, just as the group ahead were descending, at 16h:24m, a split of 1h:07m so a lot faster than target.
Highcliffe Nab – Roseberry Topping 4.18km
I gave myself a target of an hour to get to the summit of Roseberry as Dave and I started down the side of Highcliffe, catching the group at the bottom, which turned out to include Brian and Jamie.
Dave and I walked along the path to the gate onto the moors proper then got cracking running along the Black Nab path overtaking, then putting distance between Brian and Jamie’s group.
I felt like we were cruising along at a great speed, reliving memories of the night section of Survivor. I was grateful for having done Survivor because it gave me a massive familiarity with this section both on fresh and tired legs and in the dark. I knew exactly which parts to run and where to start walking and how long to walk for. Soon we were descending down the last section of Percy Cross Rigg towards the gate where we would turn left toward Newton Moor and Roseberry. A head torch came hurtling towards us from behind and caught us at the gate. It was Brian. He told us that Jamie had decided to call it a day so he was pushing on alone. With that, he was off into the distance.
Dave and I walked the uphill section of the path until we crested Newton Moor and could see Roseberry Topping with a trail of lights up the side. We jogged down to Little Roseberry gate and started our descent greeting all of the runners who had already been up and down Roseberry.
As we climbed Roseberry, we overtook Brad Boyd and discussed what the conditions up top would be like. We expected it to get windy and cold, but so far there was no sign of the wind, although did say it was impossibly not to notice the wind coming out of me since the effects of shovelling food down my neck for the last 17 hours had been making themselves known for the last couple of hours.
As we approached the top, it did get colder and windier, but nowhere near as much as it usually did up there. We reached the summit at 17h:19m, a split of 54mins, another target beaten by six minutes. One of the few timings I could remember from my 2018 attempt was hitting the top of Roseberry at the 18 and a half hour mark, so I was now more than an hour faster than my previous attempt, but feeling a thousand times better.
As we turned to run back down the side, I gave myself another mini target of 40 minutes to get to Gribdale.
Roseberry Topping – Gribdale Gate 3.01km
Moving down the side of Roseberry Topping was a lot easier than I expected. After a big climb, I expected to have heavy legs over 100km into the race, but apart from being more careful than usual to make sure I didn’t trip or fall, I felt like I was moving really well down the hill.
Once at the bottom, we jogged across to Little Roseberry, greeting people on their way down, but as soon as the path tilted up, the heavy legs kicked in. I used my poles and worked my way slowly up to the gate, and then we walked a short distance before getting a jog on.
We ran pretty much the whole way to Gribdale Gate until a short distance before Gribdale, I felt like I had a stone in my shoe. I took my shoe off and emptied it out then got going again. A short distance later, the pain returned. I moved my finger in the shoe around the spot and couldn’t resolve it. I assumed it must be a blister, so I told Dave I was going to change my socks at Gribdale and deal with whatever was going on.
We arrived at Gribdale bang on the 18 hour mark, just a minute over my target.
I jumped in the van and stripped my socks off. There was no blister, but my sock was full of grit and dirt and my foot was grubby. I wiped my feet down with a towel, then sprayed them with isopropyl again and let them dry while I eat more food, had a cup of soup and tried to drink an entire bottle of Erdinger Alkoholfrei. I only managed half a bottle, then dabbed my feet with a towel, put fresh socks on and fastened my shoes up.
I got the phone I had a memory card full of music on and got it set up with my headphones, then stowed it in my pack.
I changed my head torch battery as I’d been using the head torch for just over four hours, it probably didn’t need changing, but I thought why take the chance?
I stocked my pockets with four hours’ worth of food and asked Matt if he could re-seal the Erdinger. I really wanted to take it with me, but I didn’t fancy carrying the empty bottle all the way to Kildale and I couldn’t think of anywhere there was a litter bin before then. So Matt stored it in the drinks holder in the van, just in case I fancied it later.
After that, I was booted out of the van after a stop of 13 minutes with the strict instruction not to enter the village hall at Kildale because there was a risk, I would get comfortable and spend too much time there. I had all I needed to get to Clay Bank, so all I needed to do was to check in and move on.
Gribdale Gate – Kildale 4.21km
I gave myself an hour to get to Kildale, then boogied up the hill listening to Smell’s Like Teen Spirit followed by London Calling and The Weight.
I reached Captain Cooks barely feeling like I’d just done almost 15 minutes worth of climbing and got a run on going down the hill singing out loud to Hotel California, happy that there was nobody around to hear me.
Once through the wooded section to Pale End, I was on the tarmac for a glorious downhill run. My legs felt amazing and I blasted down the hill to the angry tones of Eminem’s Lose Yourself, already feeling that having music for this section was a genius idea.
As I got to the bottom of the hill, Eminem had given way to Bob Dylan and Desolation Row, so I walked quietly through the village to the checkpoint at the village hall, at first missing the signs directing me around the side of the hall to the side entrance and I spent a minute trying the locked main door before I realised.
I reported into the checkpoint at 19h:02m, a split of 47 minutes, comfortably ahead of target but I still resisted the offers of the marshalls to come in, have a sit down and get some food.
I turned away, put my headphones back in and headed up the road for the next section, giving myself a target of two hours to get to Bloworth Crossing.
Kildale – Bloworth Crossing 9.55km
This stretch is the bit that most people seem to dislike about the Cleveland Way in this direction, it starts with a steep road climb of about 1.8km up Battersby Bank, then is a gradual uphill climb on a gravel track taking you from 170m above sea level in Kildale to just over 400m at Bloworth. I generally don’t mind the section, but it’s not an easy section to get to run often and it’s very exposed. You often get extremes of weather, which might be why people dislike it, but there is something about the remoteness up there that resonates with my soul.
As I trotted away from Kildale, I got my poles back out for the climb, shoved an entire pouch of strawberry baby food down my neck and started off up the climb noticing that I was already losing ground to the head torches in front and being caught up by the ones behind. It was still dark, but the early signs of dawn were there, just a lightness on the horizon, but there nonetheless.
I bounced up the road to Rockin’ In The Free World and Love Shack, before being overtaken by Mark and Anna who must have had a long stop in Kildale for me to overtake them.
I was up on the flat section as the road bends right toward the moor and decided to give running a go and I managed to run all the way to the bottom of the next incline toward the cattle grid. I walked to the top overtaking Oliver Houlton by the grid then got running on the nice downhill road section, passing some crew cars before I went through the gate and onto the moor proper with the opening strains of Baba O’Riley in my ears.
I decided to play a game I used to use in training, musical intervals, one song running, one song walking. I ran the first interval downhill in the early dawn light feeling amazing. It was still not light enough to run without a head torch safely, but I could make out the moorland around me.
In the next walk break, I was overtaken by Bradd Braddock, and then I got cracking along again. I had great running intervals to Cream’s White Room and John Mellencamp’s Pink Houses keeping me in front of the group behind me before I turned my head torch off.
The weather was fairly calm but cold so I didn’t feel like I needed to drink a whole lot, so kept sipping at my drink in smaller amounts than previously.
I had a walk break to Rick James’ Super Freak, then a massive run to Jackson Browne’s Running On Empty, which seemed really appropriate. During that run, I overtook Mark, Anna and Neil Wilson.
A few intervals later they all caught and overtook me on the climb up to the green gate where I was slowed to a walk.
At the green gate, the route flattens out some, so I sacked the intervals and just ran what I could, singing along the Bruce Springsteen and Madness while Mark, Anna, Neil, Sue Davies, Jay Morfoot (200 runner) and Paul Horsewood (200 runner). I could see Paul Readman ahead of me as I reached Bloworth Crossing at 20h:45m, a split of 1h:42m, 18 ahead of my target. Turning the corner at Bloworth, I gave myself an hour to get to Clay Bank.
Bloworth Crossing – Clay Bank 5.28km
As soon as I turned the corner, it started raining heavily and I decided to stop and put my waterproof jacket on, then moved on at a shuffle. I had only been re-overtaken by Mark and Anna and was running near Paul Readman and Paul Horsewood when the bloated trapped wind feeling I had been having for more than an hour turned into an imminent code brown.
Panicked, I desperately looked around for any sort of vegetation cover and saw nothing but a tiny stand of heather on a small bank. I quickly diverted about 20m off the trail, hid as out of sight as the meagre cover allowed and got out my toilet kit, used my knife to lift a section of the topsoil and did what I needed to do, before replacing the soil as best I could.
As I got back onto the trail, I realised several runners had overtaken me, but I was almost at the top of the uphill section of trail that passes Round Hill, the highest point of the moors, so passing the face stone and touching it for luck I got myself running, noting that my stomach felt a lot more settled.
I used the downhill to good effect and managed to overtake Paul Horsewood quickly and could see Paul Readman ahead of me, but never quite caught him despite overtaking Fred Smith and Sue Davies on the way to the final drop to Clay Bank, arriving at the road crossing at 21h:46m, a split of exactly an hour as planned.
I had a 15 minute stop planned for Clay Bank, originally to have breakfast and change clothes, but the weather was still dull and cool, so I decided to stick with my warmer clothes a little longer.
I had a pot of porridge and a cup of coffee in the van while Dave got ready for his second stint of running.
We left the van 12 minutes after I arrived and I gave myself a target of two hours to get to Lordstones, which should see me there a whole hour ahead of my original target of 25 hours.
Clay Bank – Lordstones 5.6km
We started up the side of Hasty Bank really slowly as I was trying to conserve my legs, I had to stop halfway up to relieve myself then as I got moving again, I remembered that I had forgotten to brush my teeth as planned at Clay Bank and my mouth still felt like I’d been drinking through yesterday’s socks.
Dave patiently kept moving on a few metres then waiting for me to catch up. It usually takes me 8-10 minutes to do this climb, but this time, it took me 18 and a half minutes, but once at the top, I got a shuffling jog on, for all of 200m until I needed to answer another call of nature. My flow was nice and clear, so it seemed that I was well hydrated, but I was a little worried to be urinating again so quickly so decided to slow down my drinking.
We jogged along to the Wainstones and descended carefully through the rocks before moving a little quicker down the rest of the climb getting a bit of a run on when we reached the grassy part of the descent.
I slowed right down again for the climb up Cold Moor. This has always been my least favourite ‘sister’ as it’s an unpleasant climb from both of the Cleveland Way routes (although the climb from Chop Gate isn’t too bad, just long).
It took me 17 minutes to reach the summit, against an average of around eight minutes usually. Again I had to urinate on the way and this perplexed me as I had barely had a sip since the last comfort break.
We took the steep steps away from the summit carefully, then once on the grass, I opened up my legs again to take the descent a little faster (but nowhere near as fast as usual) and we then only had one sister left to climb. Once over the top of that, I would soon pass the 80 mile mark and be into my longest run ever.
The weather worsened as we climbed and another rain shower blew in and out. As we reached the summit, we could see that along the Tees estuary, the weather was sunny but looking ahead towards Osmotherley, we could see clouds and rain.
I got a nice shuffle along during the downhill section and once we got to the seat in memory of Alec Falconer, I tried to stow my poles but struggled with the loops on my pack. Dave helped and we got going down the bank and rolled into Lordstones at 23h:50m, a split of 1h:51m.
Once in the van, I brushed my teeth, picked out some food for the next stretch and made sure Dave knew what I needed for the meet up at Scugdale then picked up my headphones, which Matt had thoughtfully re-charged. I told Dave that I hoped to reach Scugdale in 1h:05m and hopped out of the van walking through the country park.
Lordstones – Scugdale 4.79km
I think I took off my waterproof jacket before the next climb, but I can’t remember exactly when I ditched it, it may have been later. I also remember not wanting to eat or drink because I was enjoying the fresh taste of toothpaste in my mouth. I had got it into my head, that my excessive urination was because of my frequent caffeine intake over the last 12 hours or so and resolved to avoid caffeine.
I used my poles to climb up the side of Carlton Bank, stopping halfway up to squirt an entire pouch of strawberry baby food into my mouth, trying to get it down my neck without touching my tongue to maintain the toothpaste flavour, then getting moving again.
Once over the summit, I was overtaken by Oliver Houlton and Paul Atkinson but I was back in the world of music, trying to push out a job to the beat but having to slow to a walk a little more frequently than I wanted to and my average heart rate for the last few kilometres was lower than I wanted it to be. In other races, I’ve found this to be the first sign of the inevitable slowdown that happens toward the end of a race and I didn’t want this to be the start of that now.
As the path rose again toward Live Moor, I pushed a little harder to bring my heart rate back up, then once on the top, I made sure to run the entire descent to the gate at Live Moor Plantation. I dropped through the Plantation quickly because the surface was nice and dry for a change and at the bottom, I decided to eat an entire sachet of savoury baby food all in one go to keep on top of my calories.
I jogged down the path feeling some pain in my knees but I had only had paracetamol an hour or so before I couldn’t resolve it that way. I decided to push on and ignore the pain.
I reached the road at Scugdale at 25h:04m, a split of 1h:11m, a bit behind my target but still in reasonable spirits. It was going to be a long time before I saw Dave and Matt again at Square Corner, so I topped up with what I could, knowing I had the backup of being able to use the checkpoint at Scarth Nick if required.
I told Dave I wanted to be at Scarth Nick by 10am and Square Corner by 11:30am, which were splits of 55 mins and 90 mins respectively then got myself going again.
Scugdale – Scarth Nick 2.84km
I ran down the road all the way to Scugdale Beck and opted for the bridge instead of the ford to keep my feet dry, then walked slowly up through the field. The weather was already feeling warm so I rolled my sleeves up a bit and got a bit of a stop-start jog/walk going on along the footpath through the woods towards what I affectionately call the steps of doom. I was caught at the bottom of the steps by Jon Pitchford who was moving well and told me that it was possible to walk to the finish from here within cut off, I looked at my watch and saw that it was just after half past nine and thought maybe. Ten and a half hours to go and I remembered that Dave and I had taken around five and a half to walk it in from Square Corner during his finish in 2016.
As Jon powered off into the distance, I continued to slowly pole my way up the steps, then at the top got them stowed in my pack, after more faffing with the loops then decided to run a 30/30 interval, then a 60/30, then a 120/30 which moved me along more quickly than I had been before the steps.
I reached the checkpoint at 25h:45m, 9:45am so a split of 40 minutes and 15 minutes ahead of my target. I had been looking forward to this checkpoint for a while because I knew it was being manned by Mick Browne and Michelle McKenzie. I did a quick inventory on arrival and realised that I had plenty of food and drink still. Mick urged me to double-check as it was a long way to the next official checkpoint. I told him I was good, and thanked him and Michelle before moving on up the hill alongside Jon.
I decided that I would still be happy with arriving at Square Corner by 11:30am, so allowed myself some extra time and gave myself a target of 1h:45m for the next section.
Scarth Nick – Square Corner 7.72km
As we started the climb onto Scarth Wood Moor, I was in a loose group with Jon Pitchford, Alan Robson and Christopher Watson. We passed some American tourists coming down of the moor on the way up who asked what we were doing then, as the path pitched upwards the group began to string out. I ran some more intervals to keep in contact with the group but once through the gate into Arncliffe Wood, the group pulled away and I stopped to answer another call of nature. I tried to remember how long it had been since the last time and couldn’t remember. I knew it had been quite some time, so decided that whatever had been the problem was starting to sort itself out and made a conscious effort to drink a little more frequently.
The path started to slope down towards the TV transmitting station and I got more and more consistent patches of running done and I was pleased to note that my average heart rate for the last couple of kilometres had crept back up.
I trundled down onto the rocky descent towards Mount Grace and realised that because of my music, I couldn’t hear the familiar drone of traffic on the A19. I couldn’t decide whether that was good or bad, but the music had now exhausted the entire playlist and started back at Smells Like Teen Spirit, triggering my memory and setting me off recalling events from the previous night, which occupied my mind as I exited the woods into the morning sun.
I caught up with Jon again at the bottom of Ruebury Hill and walked up the incline just behind him with the others in sight. Once heading downhill again, I started running and caught the group running through Osmotherley. I checked the app on my watch which gave me a running estimate of my time to the finish and finish time and saw that it was telling me that I would finish in 35h:30m. I wasn’t happy with that and decided to put a bit more effort in to bring that number down.
I overtook the group and pulled ahead going down the steps to Cod Beck, but once across the beck, the route started back uphill and they all overtook me again. Ahead, I could see that the gate onto Green Lane was locked and the group ahead were going through the ridiculously thin gap in the stone wall that I struggle to get through. I decided I wasn’t going to try and rolled my body over the top of the gate before running the short downhill to cross Burnthouse Bank, narrowly avoiding being run over by cyclists due to me running into the road without really looking trying to keep up with the group in front.
I held onto the back of the group climbing up through Oakdale during a short rain shower as I dropped off the back on the final section of the climb up to Square Corner where Matt and Dave were waiting. I arrived at 27h:33m, 11:33am, just behind my target.
Square Corner was very busy, so the van was a bit off the trail. I quickly got in and while Matt and Dave sorted my food, and drink and gave me a Pot Noodle, which I managed a whole half of, I ditched the headphones and poles, both of which had become a source of annoyance to me. I was convinced that the constant faffing with the poles was slowing me down. I grabbed a couple of packets of crisps to take with me as I was wanting a salt flavour and told Matt and Dave that I was avoiding caffeine because I thought it was acting as a diuretic.
My knees and ankles were feeling sore, but not as bad as I had expected, but I was looking forward to having some paracetamol in the next half hour.
I was just deciding on my next target when my watch started beeping at me to tell me I had been sitting still for too long. So I decided that my next target would be 90 minutes to High Paradise and got a move on.
Square Corner – High Paradise 8.3km
I started off up the trail towards Black Hambleton chasing Mark Milner and passed a familiar-looking man with his child. My brain assumed that he was supporting someone in the race, so I wished him a good day and pushed on after Mark, who had started to pull away. I was overtaken by Jon Pitchford again and I decided to take the climb easy, then get a good run on over the top and down the other side.
As I approached the top of the hill, my watch notified me I had a text from Natalie, so I checked my phone. She was asking why I had stopped moving, presumably because the tracker still showed me at Square Corner, so I told her I had been having food and was on the move, just feeling a little tired. She told me to ignore being tired, take a deep breath and get going.
Once at the top, I could see that the runners in front were now around 500m ahead of me so I set my watch to 6/2 intervals again and shuffled along at a slightly quicker pace than I had been, but in all honesty, probably wasn’t that much faster than a fast walk.
As I got to the turn at White Gill Head, I could see that I had closed the gap on the nearest runner to around 250m, so felt like the intervals were making a difference and pushed harder when the watch told me to run, assisted by the downhill. I had almost caught the runner in front when the route started back uphill and my legs seemed to empty of energy and I was back to walking.
I decided to run shorter 30/30 intervals like I had done on Airey Hill and to my surprise, my legs responded positively, and soon I had overtaken Alan Robson and as I entered the woods at Steeple Cross, I got past Neil Wilson too.
In the trees, I changed from running timed intervals to running from landmark to landmark. Tree to tree, gatepost to gatepost. I knew this section was runnable because Dave and I had run it a few weeks before at 10k pace. I could see runners ahead turning right and I knew I had reached High Paradise, arriving at the gate at 29h:13m, a split of 1h:33m, just over my target.
High Paradise – White Horse 9.64km
I had told Dave at Square Corner that I wanted to be through White Horse by 4pm so I tried to work out how long that was in my head and struggled to calculate the time required. I looked at the current time and saw it was a quarter past one so I was thinking I had over two and a half hours so I gave myself two hours to get to the checkpoint.
I ran down the nice tarmac downhill away from High Paradise Farm and slowed to a walk as I crossed the field back onto the trail. My watch told me that Nat had texted me again, so I checked my phone and she was asking how I was doing. I told her that I was aiming for White Horse by 4pm and felt good.
As I got to the top of the last hill before Sneck Yate, I could see Jon in front of me and got a bit of a jog on over the top while in the shade of the trees but couldn’t close on him because he was moving so quickly. Once across Sneck Yate, I tried to fast walk the grass climb up to High Barn. This climb is always a pain so I just resolved to get on with it. As I approached the top, I could see two lambs fighting with each other over something on the ground, their mother looking on unconcerned. As I got closer, the lambs stopped their fighting and ran to their mother.
I had a good swig of drink while walking in the shade, opened my jersey further and rolled my sleeves up as the heat was really starting to make me struggle. I couldn’t remember when I last eat, so I shoved some crisps into my mouth and let them melt there.
Passing through the dry stone wall into the next field, the path became congested as a group of walkers heading in the opposite direction and some mountain bikers all converged at the same point as me. I leaned against the wall and let them pass. As I turned to check behind me, I saw Penny Outhwaite and Oliver Houlton coming up behind me, so I let them pass too as they were going much faster than I was.
I slowed to a walk going up the hill and could feel my concentration wavering. I was struggling to focus on basic things, so I tried running to the next tree, but after a few steps forgot which tree I was looking at.
I swilled my head with water, then locked onto another tree and managed to run to it, but then slowed to a crawl again.
My phone kept pinging and beeping so I turned the irritating notifications off. My mind wandered from the race to things I had to do for work, things I had to do at home, whether I had left enough money in my bank account to cover the direct debits for the last few days of the month and all kinds of fleeting thoughts from very random and trivial to important but not at all relevant to the moment.
Once I could see I was approaching Sutton Bank, I forced myself to run more than I was walking and kept my head down to avoid having to speak to walkers and passers-by. At a really basic level, I recognised that my mood was at risk here, but I also recognised that I was really tired.
I resolved to get any caffeine that was on offer at the White Horse checkpoint and at my next meet with Matt and Dave at the Hambleton Inn, I would drink all the caffeine I had left in the van.
Neil Wilson overtook me near Garbutts’s Wood and I tried to focus on running again, making a real effort to push unwanted thoughts away.
Paul Atkinson passed me in the trees near Sutton Bank as I tried to get moving in the cooler shaded patches. All of a sudden, I was at the road crossing at the top of Sutton Bank. I checked my watch and saw I was at 160km. Only 1.1km to go to the 100 mile point. I jogged for a few seconds, then ended up walking again forcing myself to greet walkers and now the runners coming back from White Horse.
I focused on Neil Wilson’s back and tried not to lose distance on him. We came together on the rocky path down into the trees and passed the 100 mile mark together at 31h:01m. I told him I was knackered and tried to keep up with him, but when the path went back uphill, he pulled away.
I imagined I could hear the checkpoint and it seemed to take forever to come, I wanted to run but felt I had nothing left to give. Then the checkpoint came into view and I ambled in at 31h:19m. My brain couldn’t calculate the split and I was past caring, but I looked at the time of day on my watch and saw it was 3:19pm, a good 40 minutes ahead of 4pm. A wave of elation passed over me. Barring some sort of massive disaster, I was going to finish before the final cut off.
Michelle Boshier filled up my water bottle and my drink bottle with Pepsi while I drank some Pepsi to give me a lift. Then I decided to get moving. Michelle offered to do the steps with me, but I declined. I knew what was about to happen and nobody needed to see a grown man crawling up those steps.
White Horse – Finish 14.5km
I left the checkpoint at 31h:20m, I had 4h:40m to get to the finish. As soon as I was out of sight of the checkpoint, I slowed right down, I took a big swig of Pepsi and laboriously urged my body to walk up the steps. I’d manage a couple then stop, then a couple more, then one more, then I’d get as far as four steps. Time seemed to stand still, a minute felt like an hour and as I got closer to the top of the steps, I felt really short of breath so I got my inhaler out and had a good suck on the contents. It took me 9 minutes to cover the 120m worth of steps. For context, my fastest time up those steps is 2m:45s and my next slowest time after the 110 effort is 5m:38s during the 2020 Hardmoors 55.
At the top of the steps, I shoved a Snickers bar into my mouth and took another big pull on the Pepsi bottle as I walked the uphill section of the path, it was hot and I made an effort to suck oxygen into my lungs.
I switched my watch back to the finish estimate app, it said my estimated finish time was 35h:25m so, at each downhill section of the path past the Glider Club I made the effort to run, I focused on watching the aeroplane at the glider club towing a glider up into the air to distract my brain from what was going on in my body. Up ahead I could see Sean Higgins and I was over the moon to see him looking happier than I had the day before near Whitby.
I was soon back to the road and running along the verge to the Hambleton Inn where I could see the van. I got into the van and told Matt and Dave that I needed caffeine. They produced a can of Red Bull which I downed in one and a can of Coke which I sent the same way as the Red Bull.
In between juggling the remaining cans and dropping them on the floor, Matt managed to top my drink bottle up with Coke. While this happened, I spotted the last of the meatballs in my food box and wolfed them down. Dave told me that Rishi Sunak had been at Square Corner and all of a sudden the penny dropped about the familiar looking bloke I’d spoken to. I had an internal smile about what I might have said if I had recognised him.
Dave told me that he was going to drive to Cold Kirby then run with me to Rievaulx and turn round and drive to Helmsley to meet me near the finish. Matt would drive to Helmsley and run back over to meet me and do the final section with me.
I was then booted out of the van for sitting there too long. I looked at my watch and saw my finish estimate was back to 35h:30m so I ran down the road toward the racing stables and along the path to the trees and down the hill to the next uphill field crossing.
I was overtaken by Paul Atkinson at the field crossing and got running again on the downhill towards Cold Kirby, slowing to a walk as the path turned left again toward the village and having another good slug of Coke.
I saw Dave waiting at the village and decided to get running on the downhill section of road through the village, slowing to a walk on the rough grass at the end of the village and taking the climb to ‘Dead Body Farm’ nice and slow, stopping to relieve myself at the top of the climb and telling Dave that the barn door was open and there were pigs in there, making our night-time encounter in 2015 even more sinister.
The next section is a long steady downhill of just over a km. We ran most of this section, but we were plagued by flies and I resorted to taking my buff off and swatting them away. As we got into the shade of the trees where the horrible scrambly descent is, we caught Neil Wilson and chatted with him as we walked slowly and carefully through the rocks, then got moving again as the trail smoothed out.
A few minutes later by the gate by the stepping stones, we met Matt and Dave turned back. We moved along in a group with Jon Pitchford and Neil Wilson for a while, then once on the tarmac road, Jon pulled ahead and Neil dropped back. I was starting to feel much better and much stronger and tried to make the most of the nice road surface to make good time. I checked the app on my watch and my estimated finish time had dropped to 35h:15m. Matt was doing calculations based on how long it had taken me to do the last couple of miles, but working mostly in metric, my brain couldn’t make sense of them. Matt did think that under 35 hours was possible though.
Just before Ingdale Howl, 200 runner Barry Edwards stormed past us looking really strong and up to that point, I had been dreading the climb through the woods there. As we entered the woods I started swinging my arms and marching as fast as I could. On any flat-looking section, I tried to run, even if it was only for a few seconds and it felt like it was making a difference.
A few minutes later we crossed the down and up steps through Blackdale Howl, the last steps before Helmsley and in my mind, I knew it was only a couple of km to the end of the Cleveland Way. Ahead I could see Dave coming toward us and I forced myself to run the last little downhill section before the path turned left and uphill for the last little climb of the Cleveland Way.
Matt ran ahead to open the gate at the top of the climb and once through we were on a welcome downhill so I started running, Matt went ahead and got the next gate.
Once through the next gate, I thought I could see my daughter Martha in the distance, and then I saw Nat by the end of the Cleveland Way. I stopped for a hug and a photo at the trailhead marker stone, and then Matt and Dave got me moving again.
We ran through the streets of Helmsley onto Canon’s Garth Lane past the church. The road pointed uphill and we spotted Sam Midgley pointing her camera at us, so my thumbs went up again.
Once onto Baxton’s Sprunt we got running again, Dave told me I had to run all the way into the football club building to get through the finish gate. All the aches and pains dropped away and adrenaline carried me up the road. It wasn’t particularly fast, but it was a run and I got all the way through the finish gate to finish my first Hardmoors 110 in 34h:36m:34s.
Final Thoughts
From start to finish this was a brilliant race, one of those rare ones where almost everything went to plan and when it didn’t there was a contingency in place. Most of the hard work was done by an excellent crew in Dave and Matt who really did think of everything to make sure all I had to do was keep moving, keep eating and drinking until the end. The only thing I would have changed was my decision not to drink caffeine for several hours, that might have made the stretch from High Paradise to White Horse less unpleasant, but other than that, I was happy with the running that got done and the decisions that were made to make it a successful run.
I think the biggest factor in my success this time out was the conscious effort to protect my mental state before and during the race. Making sure that I took a positive view on things that didn’t go to plan and breaking the race down into bite-sized chunks and only setting ad hoc targets based on how I was feeling at the time really helped.
As always, I am grateful to Natalie for all of the support she gives me and all the times she puts up with this sort of madness.
To Dave and Matt, I couldn’t have asked for a better support crew, Matt now has a 100% record of crewing Hardmoors 110 finishers and really should start offering his services for money. Dave is probably the greatest support runner I could hope for, one of the funniest and chattiest men in the world and both are great mates.
As always, the race organisation, marshalls, helpers and everyone involved were brilliant. They represent all that is good about the trail and ultra community and they are one of the main reasons why this race is my favourite weekend in the ultra calendar.
To everyone who finished their race this weekend, a huge well done, to those who didn’t, well done for taking the challenge on. The reason we keep coming back to ultras is that they aren’t easy, none of us are certain we are going to finish when we rock up to the start line. If you feel the need to try again, then you will have valuable lessons to look back on in this attempt that will help you get to the finish next time.
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