From Andrew Merrick…
Photo credit: Montane Lakeland
The Montane Lakeland 100 … and the F word (105 miles – 22,500 ft)
The Lakeland 100 seems to have a lot of social media exposure and a big reputation as an iconic Lakeland event. Consequently it had made it to my list for this year, having been successful in the ballot last September. It was some time later that I found out that I had made it into UTMB again at the end of August so the timing was a little imperfect but I decided I would keep my entry open and if I only used it as a 50 mile training run, there was limited downside. Happily Ritchie Williamson had also entered, and Kate Archer was committed to the 50 after a challenging experience last year. So the three of us planned to travel together – the 50 starts at 11:30 on the Saturday morning (6pm Friday for the 100) and uses the last 46 miles of the 100 route.
We had a few inauspicious moments before the start… I woke up with quite a sore throat on the Friday morning, and then remembered the very crusty pork pie I hadn’t chewed enough the day before – so more eating disorder than covid happily. I was a few mins late picking up the gang for our afternoon drive, and it was 10 – 15 mins into our journey before Ritchie remembered that his fully packed running vest was still at home – oops! Who would have thought that the traffic would be quite bad on a Friday afternoon heading to the lakes. So we arrived at 4pm, later than planned, just in time to miss registration cut-off, having to park Frankie (the camper van) reasonably close to the far end of the second camping field. Ritchie and I set off for registration hoping they would be helpful, me failing to remind him to take some ID. Happily the support crew were very understanding and did the full kit check…. and while Ritchie headed back to the van to get his ID I headed into Coniston to buy some leggings. I had read “Spare base layers” on the kit list several times, without managing to understand this meant bottom as well as top!! So finally all sorted and we were just in time for the pre-race briefing in a very warm hall at the school which was the race base, with some pre-race faffing still to be done. We then headed back to the van and were finally fully faffed out and ready to go by about 5:40 on a pleasantly warm evening. Starting the race was a bit of a relief and Ritchie and I wished each other a good run as he headed off into the distance.
I had made a (slightly arbitrary) plan to at least get to Dalemain (just over half way and where our drop bag was) and if I felt ok, try to stick to about a 30 hour schedule and a midnight finish. Importantly there was no beer cut-off since the main event tent was open all night. Navigation was largely ok given the numbers on the earlier legs so it was just a question, as always, of enjoying the experience for as long as possible and getting to the next check point. Helpfully the CPs were no more than 10 miles apart with 14 CPs in total between the Coniston start and finish. The route is described as rugged; other words could also be used, but certainly quite typical loose stoned, rocky, narrow Lakeland paths which are not always easily runnable. Virtually all of the 15 legs involve some reasonable level of climb. The recent rain, followed by persistent rain pretty much from dawn onwards made for challenging conditions but progress continued, helped particularly early on by re-visiting some locations I had recently seen on my Bob visit, including Wasdale Head with no Yewbarrow to climb, Keswick and Blencathra also without summiting. By the time we left the Blencathra centre 41 miles in, a very cloudy dawn had broken and we had done the hilliest third according to those around me. So I let the 30 hour plan become my focus – for me, that became helpful, it banished any thought of not finishing, and (rather sadly) it gave me some maths to do to occupy by brain for a while (what pace do I need to do for the rest of the race to hit midnight?). It also stopped me getting into race mode, which was an important part of my finish in one piece plan. In the miles leading to our drop bag at Dalemain, I tried to banish thoughts that we were only about half way (105 miles is the actual distance) and promised myself a compeed when we got there. I finally made it to Dalemain about an hour or so before the 50 mile runners start (although they do a 4 mile loop to start with) so 46 miles left for me, and I set off after some veg soup and a change of shirt in reasonably good spirits… From then on the rain was pretty incessant, although it remained pleasantly warm so much taking on and off of waterproof jacket – I didn’t feel the need to try out my newly purchased leggings…. Generally I found the food pretty good at checkpoints, although I would have personally preferred more fruit early on. In the first couple of CPs I resorted to cake and sweets in the absence of a better plan, and drank quite a lot of coke, Dr Williamson having educated me on the scientific benefits (yes, really!).
The next part of the route took us on a reasonable climb onto a ridge before a long descent into Howtown. By now my feet were beginning to hurt a little but I found my speedwalking with pole support pretty effective uphill, and for the first time, having overtaken a few people on the climb up found myself alone on the descent. I hadn’t found time for any recceing so realised full concentration was required, although despite that came slightly off the route and was rescued (with CP directions) by a woman who had come to collect her husband who had determinedly removed his tracker before anyone of us could change his mind. Whilst the food could have been slightly better, the check point staff were fantastic pretty much everywhere (it always helped when they are staffed by runners), and they kindly sorted my bottles whilst I had a quick cup of tea, so I could set off again. One small further navigational error, easily self-corrected, on the start of the next leg, which was 9.4 miles and had 2500 ft of climb, after which the legs and climbs were shorter I had to remind myself! The other largely good news was that at some point on this leg, I would see the first of the 50 mile runners and therefore I could relax again on navigation. This was slightly double-edged of course since it felt like we had an obligation to keep out of their way so there was much sidestepping into the bracken on the narrow twisty descent to Mardale Head, which felt endless. I was very much in “keep on keeping on” mode by this stage with my feet making any downhill running painful and climbing pretty sore too!! For the last 4-5 ultras I have had very little in the way of foot issues, and my preparation was the same this time…. When I wasn’t doing maths or thinking about navigating, I was reflecting on why my feet got so shredded this time (Ricky and many others had the same experience). Clearly it was mainly due to both the underfoot and overhead conditions so very very wet feet, plus the terrain with lots of rocky descents and opportunities for grit to get into the shoes to compound the challenge. The next CP came and went, more vegetable soup and coke, with the minimum of time spent hanging around although it was lovely to see Kate there, who was clearly going well, her only challenge being some random bloke wanting to interview her at the CP!! Then I was on the route to Ambleside which was starting to feel like we were getting closer to the end. I was pretty much moving at my own pace at this point but surrounded by other 50s and a few 100s. When I got to Ambleside (the same CP the Lakes in a Day team use), there was fantastic road support all the way through the town which was lovely, the only downside being if I wanted hot food I had to go up some steps in the main CP building…. Whilst there (more soup, although I did also have a couple of bowls of pasta along the way somewhere) I asked about the route from here hoping that there wouldn’t be too much in the way of climbs over the remaining three shortish stages. There were of course decent climbs on each, however, the next leg was to Chapel Stile, and I knew most of it (apart from the climb) since I had based myself there last year to cheer on Jane, Kate and Ben. Slightly surprisingly that knowledge, coupled with the relatively flat terrain after Loughrigg made a real positive mental difference with no “I can’t believe we’re not at the CP yet” thoughts. So despite my feet and the rain, I was in a good place when I arrived at the Chapel Stile CP and was in let’s just get this done mode. I decided not to sit down and just grab a quick cup of tea to go (we had to take a non-collapsible mug with us) and was surprised to see Ritchie sitting there as I was waiting for the cuppa. We said a quick hello and I felt a little guilty for heading straight out, determined to get us far as possible on this leg before darkness fell.
This leg was the absolute lowlight with the meandering climb up to Tilberthwaite largely on narrow windy, fiddly trails, in some cases having got bored of their day job, moonlighting as part time water falls. My mood was not helped with some people enjoying the cooling effect of a forced dunking, whilst my shredded feet had rather different ideas of whether it was fun or not…. For the final boggy climb up to the “virtual” CP (a bloke in a car) and the actual CP at Tilberthwaite I hooked on to a few 50s who seemed quite chatty, were moving at a pace that worked for me, and knew where they were going. This meant half a cuppa at the final CP, before heading off again up the final steep in places but less-messy-than-the-previous climb. One of the 50 runners had the same feet challenges so we shared experiences and weird pole supported descending as we took on the final rocky, slippery descent before hitting the tarmac (I didn’t think I would look forward to tarmac). I even managed a (still painful) jog on the road to the finish just outside my 30 hour plan to be presented with a very heavy medal, and have my photo taken again before being “introduced” into an area of the marquee filled with cheering support recognising the effort we had all made to get there. One man was very happy for me to have a celebratory sip of his beer.
The remaining challenge was to find Frankie – the camp site look very different in the dark – which I eventually did with the aid of someone who had a more functioning brain. Then it was back to the main site to join the queue for the 5 showers before the full pint of Fell Racer Blonde that I had been promising myself for some time (28 hours approx.), supplemented by some vegge chilli. I was happy to see Ritchie back at the camper van (communication with him having been challenging due to a phone problem he had) before I crashed out for the night.
All in all a rewarding but challenging experience; the route would definitely qualify as rugged and the 40-50% drop-out rate is not a surprise! I am very happy that all three of us finished, and that Kate had such a good run (first V40); she was the only one who could walk normally on Sunday morning, Ritchie and I and many others suffering from feet shred! Happily my legs are still in decent shape.
It is a serious physical and mental challenge, with (in good weather) some lovely lakeland views, the Ullswater section being my favourite. I happy to have completed it and shared some of the experience with Ritchie and Kate, and the camp camaraderie and support crews were fab too. I don’t have any plans to do it again!