A familiar pattern has emerged over the last couple of years: I’ll have plans or intentions to head for the hills, and the weather makes it not worth going, so I end up doing something closer to home, and often on the South Downs.
This time the plan was originally to walk the Snowdonia Way, but as well as the weather, there were two other things that scuppered it. First was that as the time drew near, I wavered in my desire to walk the Snowdonia Way, and started hankering after a more straightforward trip to the Lakes. Second was that I got ill.
I got ill in the last few days of my holiday, and it was a corker (the illness, not the holiday). Near 3 weeks of being confined to barracks, including one whole week when I was unable to sleep in my bed due to coughing fits, and had to resort to a chair in my study. It was the most ill I’ve been for a few years.
This meant that I wasn’t going to be recovered enough for the Snowdonia Way – in terms of the timing, the duration and the physical demands of the trail, given that I wanted to do some of the high level route. So I rejigged my diary, went away with my running club for a weekend and threw together a plan for my usual fallback option.
The whole point of this late September trip was to do a bit of training for the upcoming Beachy Head half marathon, it being the last chance to have any impact on my fitness, as well as much needed to build confidence. Given that I’ve walked the South Downs Way itself nearly twice, my focus this time would be more of a “training camp” for running the trails. As well as simply an opportunity to spend a few nights in a tent.
I headed out on the last Wednesday of September, timing my arrival at my campsite for early afternoon. The tent went up and I simply lazed away the rest of the day, while deciding which of the pre-prepared routes I would attempt to run the next day.
In the end I opted for the “train out to Lewes and run back to camp” option, but at only just short of 14km it wasn’t long enough, so I solved this by simply getting off one station later at Southease, giving me what turned out to be an extra 7km of relatively flat and easy riverside running along the River Ouse to settle me into the run.
I arrived in Lewes at lunchtime, had a wander through the main streets, then started climbing up onto the Downs. I didn’t attempt to run uphill, this was very much time to walk. I stopped at The Salt Block cafe at a former stables and pushed on up to Black Cap and Ditchling Beacon, running the flats and downs and walking the ups.
Disappointed to see the Pink Pit Stop now only opens at weekends, I pushed onto the Beacon itself, hoping there would be an ice cream van in the car park. There was!!
Now at 17km in, my left foot started giving twinges, and I reduced my pace, even on the flats and downs, to a walk to look after it. I’d covered enough distance, so a simple walk out to camp was the order of the day.
Back at camp, it was a shower, dinner and early night. After a couple of beers.
Friday dawned, and with me taking longer to recover between runs post-illness, I opted not to run, or even do anything overly hilly. I had a lazy morning then walked a 6km circuit into Hassocks for a pint, picked up a few bits in the supermarket, then went to grab fish and chips for an early dinner, taking it back to the tent to wolf down with a couple of ciders.
Saturday is, of course, parkrun day, and I’d arranged to head into Brighton to meet my daughter for that, dangling the carrot of daddy buying brunch to secure her compliance. A train into Brighton, a short walk around to her house, then we piled into her car for the short drive to parkrun – for some reason she not being too keen on the 2km each way walk to and from parkrun.
As my daughter only does parkrun when she visits us or vice versa, the plan was for me to run with her at whatever pace she was doing, which would hopefully be slower than my usual pace. We toddled around the first 2 laps, and then decided we’d each finish at our own pace. I accelerated off to see what I had left, the 35 minute pacer that we’d fallen a long way behind being my principal target. I caught them and was feeling good so powered on to a 34:09. I got scanned and waited for my daughter to finish.
After a bit of milling about we headed for the car and home. A cup of tea and a shower, then it was time to fulfill my side of the deal and purchase brunch. We had dessert too. A good time was had.
I mooched around the shops a bit on my way back to the station, and had another lazy evening and early night.
For Sunday, the plan was a hike of some sort, but I had a poor night and really didn’t feel like it. I basically sat around all morning deciding what to do. I had one more night booked, but there seemed little point as it would be straight home in the morning anyway. There would be no more runs or hikes done either way. I could be home for dinner at very little additional cost. So that’s what I did.
Although, it seemed a bit of a long and extravagent way to go just for a trail run and a parkrun and quite a bit of walking to and from Hassocks, the trip achieved what deep down I wanted – to feel that I was recovered enough to actually be able to complete the race in 3 weeks time, and ideally within the cutoff time. The goal for this one is just to finish.
