The 2011 Thunder Run 10k

Here is my report from the 2011 Thunder Run 10k – covering the weekend of 30/31 July – one that I will remember long past 2011 as being a fantastically rewarding experience.

Thunder Run 10k official website: http://www.tr24.co.uk/

In a nutshell the concept is a team relay running from midday Saturday to midday Sunday. It was many months ago when I saw on a friend’s Facebook wall that they were about to become part of a ‘Thunder Run’ team. I’d seen the event advertised in previous years and so said that I’d love to join them.  Some brief correspondence and I’d sent a cheque off in the post and promptly forgot all about it.

The event, now in its third year, is held in the grounds of Catton Hall, between Birmingham and Derby, some 145 miles from Central London.  In order to get there and set up in good time, I needed to leave work on Friday, and travel up some 40 miles to Arlesley in Central Bedfordshire, where I met up with the rest of our 6-person team.   I’d last seen Pete some 14 years previously, and had only been in e-mail contact with some of the others.  But on that Friday evening we met up in a local pub to have a quick pre-race get-together, to check mainly that we’d got a roughly similar approach to the race, and that between us we’d packed enough kit and provisions to last the weekend.

Linda, the only female on the team, had done the race in 2010 and a proven marathoner.  Pete is a personal trainer. Stuart and Rakesh are into martial arts. Chris is in the army.  I felt like we were a good combination of skills. We agreed that the team goal would be 24 laps in 24 hours – based on an average of 1 hour per 10k. We’d been told the course was technical – i.e. tough.  I hadn’t looked at the race info in much detail but felt that (a) we’d experience the course on Saturday soon enough and (b) for every ‘up’ there is a ‘down’ on an out-and-back course, so what the heck.  We made a relatively early night because of the need to drive a further 100 miles to Catton Hall, departing 6am on Saturday morning.

The weather was bright blue skies and it was hot.  Stopping only to pick up a copy of the Saturday Mirror (which carried an article about my tube running exploits), it was Linda/Pete/me that arrived to a large field where many tents had already been pitched, and teams of runners were marking out their ‘territory’ for the duration of the race. The tactics here were to pitch somewhere not too far away from the ‘handover’ zone of the race; not too close to the noisy and potentially smelly toilets; and also not too close to ‘noisy’ areas such as the shower units and/or food stations.  It was a good friendly atmosphere, with lots of runners and their supporters (families and/or friends that were crazy enough to want to join runners for a weekend away camping) helping to put up tents and share experiences and expectations about what was to come.  We put up two tents, one gazebo, and ‘reserved’ space for Stuart/Chris/Rakesh to join us. They put up a further gazebo and tent and we pootled off to the start area to pick up race numbers, timing chips, and our goodie bags.

The race order had been determined with us each taking one lap in sequence, with Pete going first because he had an ankle injury picked up recently.  As we approached midday therefore he set off to the start, and we were left to man the camp. As I was the 5th person in sequence, although I’d eaten a breakfast suitable for running a marathon, I wasn’t going to be running until well into the afternoon so decided to treat myself to a sausage and bacon sandwich.  The catering was excellently prepared for an endurance event with pastas, jacket potatoes, rather than just burgers and chips.  There was no alcohol sold on site. Amazingly none of us had brought any either but this was probably wise, as the temptation for those not running would be to sit in the sun or the shade, enjoy the ambience of being generally near a sporting event, surrounded by lycra-clad sexy athletic women (and men I guess for the purposes of equality) and forget that we each had the challenge of running a 10k, four times, over the course of 24 hours.

The race actually passed within about 20 metres of where we’d camped so we approximated the time that Pete would be passing.  His injury hadn’t prevented him from running a pretty good pace and he was in good spirits when he passed us.  We have photo and video footage which will be published in due course!   The next runner (Linda) was already heading towards the handover station to receive the wristband from Pete.  We all wore separate timing chips so basically it was not possible to cheat the system.

Back at the camp Pete took us through how the course was indeed technical with lots of twists and turns. In the typical Adidas fashion they had taken to ‘branding’ certain parts of the course – e.g. Formation Flats – so they could subtlety drum in the names of their shoes as we slogged around the course.

At the estimated time we headed over to catch Linda but were surprised that she’d zoomed past just as we’d got there. As the course was about 8.5km through the 10k course, Chris, runner three, needed to get over to the handover station. There was an awkward gap of perhaps one minute or so where Linda had returned but had no team member to hand over to. For some teams, this would have been a very serious issue.  A couple of minutes here or there over the course of a day wasn’t so bad for us. Some teams had big support teams of people with clipboards, on-site massage therapy after every single run, and supplies of big tubs of carbo powders.  Our more modest provisions consisted of a lot of biscuits, rounds of tea, jelly babies, and Snickers. In terms of preventative care we had a bandage for Pete’s ankle.  Hmm, perhaps better preparation needed thinking ahead.

Chris returned soon enough and Rakesh was next up.  Following that it was me – and so I got to experience the course. It started off on grass then veered up into a forest, with a dusty/dirt track darting back and forth up quite a demanding incline straight away. Now a 10k race wouldn’t normally start at 5pm after the heat had beat down on the landscape all afternoon, and my usual excitement about an event had been waned away by the mellow atmosphere in camp.  So these woods took me by surprise a bit!  Whereas at midday everyone on Pete’s leg had started at the same time, by this fifth leg the 200 or so separate teams had spread out quite evenly across the never-ending relay course.  As with a triathlon it wasn’t clear who was actually ‘ahead’ or behind.  There were teams of between 5-8 people – obviously those with 8 had more time for members to recover between their stints. Smaller teams of four, three, or two had more arduous challenges ahead.  There were even ‘solos’ – i.e. people who did the whole thing by themselves.  For them it was just one never-ending road. They could choose to take a rest to eat, sleep etc., but any stationary time meant time that they weren’t out completing laps.

After the first wood the course opened up to a general cross-country course, in and out of the edges of fields and tracks, much like the Kent countryside. There were precious pockets of shade; there was one water station at 5km. Some additional marshals at key points but generally the use of tape and the continual stream meant that there was little chance of getting lost.  There was one part in the woods where it looked like you were queuing for a ride at an amusement park, where the course was made entirely of tape making a maze of 90 degree turns left, right and left through the woods. Immediately people wondered how they would tackle this through the night shifts.

I completed my first left in some 55 minutes, and handed over to Stuart.  I strode back to camp triumphantly to compare and contrast my experience with the others.  I believe that I bought a jacket potato (with tuna and cheese) to refuel.  I felt good, but knew that my efforts would be needed again at approx 9pm per our standard timetable. The thing was that everyone was coming in under time, so the time at which we’d be needed for our second leg was dropping by about 5 minutes each person.  For that reason, I was next needed about 8:30 in the evening. At this point it was dusk, and course guidance suggested the use of a head-torch. A purchase made many months ago now became more useful than just peering into the attic.  At the start of my second leg this was unnecessary, and I tried wherever possible to keep the light off and rely on natural light to navigate my way through the place.  By after 9pm it was definitely the need for ‘lights on’.  I’d run once or twice with head-torch during the winter but this was in a race environment.  The prospect of running through a dark environment with someone running up behind you, with the only clues of how far behind they were being the dancing of their own light – was something to get used to.

I was still able to complete my lap in less than an hour but appreciated that the course required a lot more attention – especially with unusual gradients through the woods, and the branches under-foot.  As usual I handed over to Stuart.  I returned to camp – now about 10pm, feeling quite a bit more tired than before. I needed to sleep but the ambience in the camp was that people were only just settling down and not necessarily quiet. I took out my contact lenses, got into my sleeping bag, (with my race kit on underneath, GPS watch on as well), and put my headphones in to block out the noise.  I think I must have got about 1-2 hours sleep maximum.  As the hours went on, Pete was out next, and he returned to camp, got into his sleeping bag then moments later I could hear some kind of writing and yelps of pain. There were some thuds and a crawling out of the bed area. I looked out and it appears he’d zipped himself up into his bag, then suffered some hamstring pains – but being locked in Houdini style, he couldn’t stretch to get out of the pain!  A top tip for the future – don’t do that!

Linda came back from her leg later than planned and advised us that she’d fallen and twisted her ankle on the course. Understandable as pitch black, and she’d said that she was worried about the reduced visibility. From what I recall she still did an impressive time.  It was agreed that she’d rest on it and see how she’d be for her forth leg.  Rakesh was up next. As I was also awake (this was about 2am) and there wasn’t anyone else awake to chat to, I walked with him up to the start area.  The videos will testify that this is the epicentre of the Thunder Run and the mood of it changes over the course of the day.  Off Rakesh went and I pootled around for a bit, then went back to camp, then returned to the handover station for the approx 55 minute time that we were clocking.  Now in contrast to the 30+ degrees in the daytime, at night it was cold. I had changed into a long-sleeve T-shirt with a short-sleeve over this, and had my fleece top on over that.  People were coming back from their legs saying that ‘you don’t need to be wrapped up’ but when you’re waiting around standing still in the cold, there’s definitely a chill factor.  I waited 60 minutes, then 65, then 70, then 75 – and was getting worried (and colder!)  Finally Rakesh came in – explained briefly that he’d fallen somewhere.  I just wanted to get on so made my way into the darkness.  Running in this level of darkness was more severe than my dusk run, and it seemed quieter all round.  This course already had become the 10k course that I was most familiar with and I almost knew what lied ahead.  It was a surreal experience passing people doing ‘walking’ in the night, some with walking poles, others just purposefully making their way round.  The ‘solos’ were indicated by having the word scrawled on their arms/legs. They got maximum respect and in contrast to other races, it became customary to say hello to almost everyone (except for those very serious club teams) as we were all in it together.

It was an incredible experience running in the dark in a race through the woods. I felt safe that there were other people there with me. I believe that I also completed my lap in less than an hour. I passed over the baton to Stuart, and returned to camp. There Rakesh was sitting in a chair in a sleeping bag.  Given that my inflatable mattress had deflated, and I needed to be warm, I decided to sit – also in a sleeping bag – and chat with him for a while. After this we both fell asleep in our chairs. I woke up a little later with an achy neck, and moved to the grass, just sleeping under the skies.  At about 5-6am the sky suddenly lightened and as our team members returned from their legs – with Linda and Rakesh out of the frame it was for the four remaining members to press on.

My forth leg was at around 8am.  The camp was waking up with the ‘normal’ people that slept conventionally through the night going through their morning ablution regime. For me, an 8am run wasn’t particularly out of the ordinary. Just not something that you’d do on about 3 hours sleep.  So I set off once-more on the course, recognising familiar faces and surprised as to how those people that passed me seemed to be so speedy – as even if they’d been in an 8-person team, they’d have been through the same level of sleep/energy depletion.

On this leg I passed by a guy who I started conversation with who was at that time 2nd in the leader-board for the ‘duo’ team.  His name was Robbie and it turns out he lives not far from where I do now. We got chatting and because I was feeling strong, we kept an incredible pace and I came in under about 53 minutes. I wished him well and returned to camp to assess the situation.

It was now clear that there was the opportunity to run a fifth lap. For me, the prospect of running over the distance of a marathon in a single day – having already covered 40 of 42km (as Pete pointed out), was really appealing. I wasn’t going to sleep given it was daylight and with two or possibly three team members down, our team goal was at risk. Chris also seemed up for doing a fifth lap – and he went before me.  So at approx 10:30am I was at the handover pen again.  As I picked up the baton and made my way towards the first woods, I felt a tightness in my chest that I’d never experienced before in a race – this worried me. Was this the first signs of complete exhaustion?  I took it easy – just needed to get round before midday, and I’d be able to hand over to someone else.  The course was as hot as hell again – over 30 degrees surely, and people on the course that had not already declared were taking it carefully. Lots of friends on the course now and lots of saying thanks to the marshals (many of whom had camped out overnight to keep watch over us). I finished my last lap without walking, but was tired and dehydrated. I took two cups of water from the 5k station and knew looking at the 50% split time that this wouldn’t be my fastest lap. I returned to the start/finish line with big crowds assembled – including the rest of the team, now dressed in finishers t-shirts, to a big cheer at around 11:30am.  I turned to the handover pen to look for the next team member but it transpired that quite wisely, Stuart who would have been next to run to 50k would then have to drive 100 miles back home – and so sensibly we decided to retire there and then.

More photos/videos/thoughts to come on this in due course.

I’d love to do this again next year. I really want to improve on 5 laps. With some focused training and better logistics and recovery, I think we could make a really good impression in 2012.  I believe everyone else on the team feels the same quandary in that it was such an amazing experience to be part of and yet such an exhausting one that they would both definitely and definitely not do it again.