I intended to try and answer the question ‘What’s the difference between stage and non-stop racing?’ in my last post. However it turned into something slightly autobiographical. However it still didn’t really make the point that is relevant to the answer to the question. That point is that I am a stage racer. All my experience is of stage races. The two non-stop races I’ve done are the 100 and 184 mile events along the Thames. In both cases I did them without sleep or rest and so essentially turned them into single stage races.

So what is a stage race? to answer this I will describe the format of stage races I’ve done, others may be different but all mine have followed a broadly similar format. A stage race could be two days or it could be a week. The distance and start time of each stage is defined. Typically the stage might start between 6 and 9 in the morning and be around 50km in distance. The clock stops when you reach the finish of the stage until the start of the next stage. The Marathon Des Sables has always had a stage of 50 miles and many other stage races have copied the idea of having one ‘long’ stage somewhere in the event. In reality the long day of the MDS is followed by a rest day and the total time permitted for the stage does allow competitors to split it into two parts and sleep overnight at a checkpoint if they so wish. Generally there will be a number of checkpoints along the stage. Dependent on the race the spacing will generally be between 5 and 10 miles, although some might be closer and some further apart depending on safety requirements and the availability of suitable locations for a checkpoint. Water will always be available at a checkpoint. On the MDS only water is available, other races might have sweets, snacks, cola – an ultra-race has been described as jog between picnics!

Anyway the point of all this is to explain why part of the reason for my failure to complete the Spine Race was due to not appreciating the difference between a stage race and a non-stop race, and, more relevantly, not being smart enough to modify my behaviour accordingly.

So I am used to starting a stage at a particular time, running to the end, the clock stops and I then have until the next stage starts to recover – usually at least the evening and overnight. As a result I try and minimise the time spent in checkpoints and don’t worry too much if I reach the end of the stage perhaps a little dehydrated and under-fuelled as I usually have in excess of 12 hours to sort myself out before I have to run again. Checkpoints are places to spend as little time at as possible (even the ones with Freddo Frogs at them) as it adds to my total time, whereas once I finish the stage I can spend as much time as like eating and drinking without affecting my race time.

The Spine Race is a non-stop race. That doesn’t mean you can’t stop. The Safety Teams do not come out with whips if they notice anyone’s dot has stopped moving. If a dot stops moving for any length of time they will investigate but that is for safety reasons, not to satisfy any sadistic urges to make runners move. What doesn’t stop is the clock, it starts when the starter says go and it stops when you reach the Border Hotel, that is your race time.

If we try and map the Spine Race onto the format of a typical stage race then a Spine Race checkpoint is most like the overnight halt of a stage race. It has food, sleeping facilities and access to your drop bag, much like a typical stage race halt. The Spine Race equivalent to a stage race checkpoint is slightly more ad-hoc. Water may be obtained on the Spine Race potentially from Safety Teams or from taps or – if you are feeling brave and have a filter – from any natural water sources on the route. Shops, cafes, and pubs can also be used to buy provisions.

So much for the similarities, now we come to the huge difference and one of the reasons I ended up in such a delirious, sleep deprived state. On the Spine Race you can stop for a maximum of 6 hours at a checkpoint or until it closes, whichever comes first. This compares with anything up to 18 hours on a stage race – and that 18 hours doesn’t go onto your race time. Conceptually I knew that I would have to stop and sleep, unfortunately there was still a part of my mentality which kept telling me that resting was adding unnecessarily to my race time. Sometimes my brain is not my friend. Some people sleep out on the course. This was never my plan and I didn’t. Whilst planning the race I couldn’t understand why anyone would. However having run the race (most of it) I can now see why that might be attractive.

I arrived at all the checkpoints during the day. Ironically if I had made it to Checkpoint Five it would have been at night. However as it closed at 2am I would still have had to leave in the dark. The only checkpoint I spent anywhere near 6 hours at was Checkpoint Four. I think the transformation I underwent there indicates that if I had spent more time resting earlier on I could have been in a much better state later in the race and may even have been able to finish (although possibly not with the cellulitis).

As I’ve been writing this I’ve come to realise the reason I DNF’ed wasn’t because it was a non-stop race but because I didn’t take enough responsibility for me. As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve run a lot of Extreme Energy races. Their philosophy is that they will do all the organisation, you just turn up and run. The MDS is the most ‘self sufficient’ stage race I’ve run because I had to carry all my food and kit for the week. However you have tent mates who will keep an eye on you and make sure you eat and look after yourself. The Spine Race actually says ‘There is very little hand holding on this race. We expect you to travel with a degree of self-sufficiency and skill which sets this race apart from others.’ Either approach is perfectly fine as the competitor knows what is expected of them and what they can expect from the race.

My first error was even before I started. The event supplied GPX files for each stage, which was excellent. I did briefly think that waypoints at each checkpoint would help. There is no reason I couldn’t have added them, If I had I could have used my GPS unit’s ‘go to’ function to keep me pointing in the right direction when I was tired and couldn’t find Checkpoint Four for instance – but I didn’t. When my left foot developed its first small blister I got the medic to check the right one. He said it was battered but not blistered. This didn’t stop me from taking responsibility for my own foot and padding it – but I didn’t. On Blenkinsop Common another runner changed his socks. So did I but it really wasn’t a sensible idea for me. I could have thought for myself – but I didn’t. Later in the race when it was cold at night I didn’t eat or drink during the hours of darkness because I didn’t want to be fumbling around in the dark with my gloves on. I could have (for instance) made sure I had some concentrated Tailwind to drink, which could have provided energy, caffeine and liquid with no fumbling – but I didn’t. I could have tracked my time in checkpoints better and got more rest, in fact I could have thought about my total amount of sleep altogether more – but I didn’t.

The more I think about the event, the more ‘but I didn’t’ moments I find. It wasn’t one big thing that made me DNF, it was a whole sequence of events to which I failed to respond to correctly. The net result was a rapid decline in my mental and physical state. The more bad decisions I made, the more tired I became and the more bad decisions I made. The positive I can take from this is that I now know, deeply know, what will happen if I don’t take responsibility and look after myself. I only got as far as I did because Rachel and Felix effectively took charge of me at Checkpoint Four and repaired some of the damage I had done. Unfortunately by then it was only postponing the inevitable. If I am to succeed in 2022 I will have to channel my inner Felix and Rachel and look after myself right from the beginning, eat enough, drink enough, sleep enough, look after my feet enough. I’m not beating myself up about it, I just need to make sure I understand all the points I got wrong and work on my mental preparation so that by the 19th of June 2022 my mental attitude has adjusted enough to make taking responsibility for myself second nature. Two immediate changes are waypoints for the checkpoints and an instant, easily accessible energy source for times when I need a quick boost. I’m sure many more things will be added to the list over the next 11 months.

Anyway my recovery is going well. The blisters have pretty much healed although skin is still being shed. The cellulitis has gone, there is just a slight swelling form the original sting/bite. I’ve been for a few runs and I haven’t died yet. This is all good as in less than two weeks time I’ll be on the start line of the Lakeland 100. The Only Way is Pennine – but we are taking the scenic route!

I have been fortunate enough to take part in some amazing races around the world. For those that don’t know me I will digress a little and explain how I came to be at the Spine Race in the first place.

OK so for those that have never heard my story, I have been a runner of sorts for around 25 years. I started when I unwisely took up karate. I needed to get fit in order to be able to avoid getting hit too much so I started running as a cheap and easy way to build stamina. After a while I was much fitter but still getting hit a lot so I dropped karate and kept running. In 1998 I did my first half marathon (The Great North Run) and in 2007 I did my first marathon (London, like a lot of people). I kept doing the Great North Run, did London again, Edinburgh Marathon a couple of times, but I was exclusively a road runner and mainly stuck to 10km to half-marathon type distances.

Things changed dramatically in 2013. At the end of March 2014 I would be 50. This event had to be marked with a ridiculous, over-the-top, grand gesture. There was this race I’d heard about years before and had always kind of interested me. some of you may have heard of it, The Marathon Des Sables. I wasn’t interested in it’s billing as the toughest foot race in the World (it isn’t – controversial among some people I know but it just isn’t) it was the idea of running in the Sahara Desert that appealed to me. Bear in mind at this point in my life I’d done four road marathons and never run off road since school cross-country (my school cross-country is now almost certainly banned as a ‘cruel and unusual punishment’). However after spending six weeks in New Zealand doing a whole load of stuff I had no prior experience of (canyoning, white-water sledging, mountaineering (well, we had a rope anyway)) I went for my normal approach of sign-up first and ask questions later.

I asked a lot of questions. I got a lot of answers. Most were either, wrong, contradictory or wrong and contradictory. However it became clear I needed to do some ultra races. When I was advised to do ‘Druids’ and ‘Pilgrims’ I did start to wonder whether I was going to become an ultra-runner or a Wiccan but it turned out these are multi-day events run by Extreme Energy and are a staple of many peoples Marathon Des Sables training.

One of the best things to come from my running was my wife, Sharon. We both worked on the same site and had access to a gym. In 2007 the spring was lovely and I (and a few others) used to run from the gym at lunchtimes. Sharon was very jealous as she was stuck in the gym on the machines so I offered to take her running after I had done my marathon. To cut a long story short she went from barely being able to run half a mile in May, to 10km in October, the Great North Run the following year and her first marathon in 2010 – by which time we were married.

In 2013 there were still a lot of people at work running. I’d slightly changed my employer and now actually worked with the same people as Sharon. There is a local 5 (and a bit) km race held every year in Chelmsford called the Race For Business, which, as the name suggests, is open to runners from local businesses. I arranged a team for my business and yes, this does have some relevance to my story, it’s just taking a while to get to it.

At said race there was a small A5 flyer advertising the first running of the Saltmarsh 75, a two day event of 75 miles duration (it was 76, it’s always (at least) 76) around the coast of Essex. This looked like an ideal event to start my ultra career with and so it proved. I had another blog at the time of my MDS training, which includes much rambling and race reports so I won’t go into to much detail here (I can hear the sighs of relief). Go to http://colinsmds.blogspot.com/ if you really want to read about my early adventures in ultra running but as you’ve got this far I would recommend wading through the rest of this blog post first (or going for a nice cup of tea, probably the best option of all).

The net result of all this was that I was hooked on ultra-running. That was never the plan, the MDS was supposed to be – as it is for many – a once in a lifetime thing. I’ve done it twice. I’ve run in Hungary, Bhutan, Spain, Cambodia, and Sao Tome. I’ve also done the previously mentioned Pilgrims and Druids many times and even occasionally won trophies for being old. I’ve done numerous trail marathons, 50km races and a few 100km races. I’ve done one 100 mile race and a 184 mile race (of which, more later). In 2019 I completed my 100th ‘marathon’ (I was actually averaging 38 miles per marathon at this point) and joined the 100 Marathon Club.

Anyway I’m supposed to be explaining how I ended up in Edale on the start line of the 2021 Summer Spine Race, so lets go back to my 100 mile race…

There was some banter on Facebook about a race I wasn’t even slightly interested in doing which resulted in me being told I couldn’t enter it anyway because I’d never done a 100 mile race. True – I’d never wanted to, sounded horrible. However it became a bit of an itch that needed scratching. I had a few good results on my ultra races, on my 100th marathon I was third overall and first place male over 50, but the lack of a 100 miler on my running CV was bit of a gap that I was starting to think should be filled.

OK so find a 100 mile race and get it over with. Most were sold out but I found one that ran from the Thames Barrier to Streatley along the Thames Path called the T100. I entered and, to my utter amazement both enjoyed it and won. There is an account of the race here https://colinrunning.blogspot.com/2017/08/the-t100-or-how-i-learned-to-stop.html.

The T100 has a big brother, the T184. This goes all the way to the source of the Thames (or at least, to a stone that probably isn’t really at the source but claims to be). when I finished the T100 another itch started, I hadn’t really finished had I? 100 miles was OK but I really needed to do the full thing. So a couple of years later I did – and that also went very well. Race report here https://colinrunning.blogspot.com/2019/09/the-t184-from-barrier-to-source.html

So I’m on a roll, loving this longer running and looking for my next challenge and this is where I should have calmed down and had a bit of a think and not done what I did next…

I’ve never fancied the Spine Race. I mainly run for location and scenery (hence the MDS). 6 hours of daylight and blizzards don’t appeal. However a summer version with 6 hours of darkness and (hopefully) no blizzards, that sounds nice. So I signed up, again with about as much idea of what I was letting myself in for as when I signed up for my first MDS. But I was feeling confident – however to quote Dilbert ‘It’s too bad being smart doesn’t come with some sort of good feeling like that’. Covid put paid to the 2020 Summer Spine Race so I was transferred to the 2021 edition – by which time the feeling of confidence was wearing off. The T184 is quite hard but it’s 184 miles, has two small hills and is basically flat. The Spine Race is 268 miles, has nothing but hills and has one or two flat bits just to remind you how hard the hills are.

I should explain I didn’t enter the Summer spine Race because I thought it would be easy, or that I was likely to do well in it, quite the opposite. As I’ve said, I’ve had some good results in some of my races and it’s easy and fun to keep doing those races, and I do. I’ve done about 30 events with Extreme Energy and I still love them. However I needed to get out of my comfort zone, stop being a largish fish in a medium size pond. In the pond that is the Spine Race I wasn’t even a minnow, I think I was a stickleback at best. In many ways not finishing was the best result for me, it’s made me think again and realise just how unprepared I was and how different the challenge is to what I was expecting. This blog post was going to be about one of those differences but veered of into some sort of autobiographical ramble. Hopefully it was a bit interesting to some of you but the next post will be back on topic and attempt to explain one of the key things that I didn’t really fully get until I ran the Spine Race, the difference between stage racing and non-stop racing. Until then, the only way is Pennine!

When I started my first post about my 2021 experience I intended it to be single post detailing the various errors I had made. This all seemed a bit negative so it kind of expanded into a more narrative tale about my race. I was intending Part Three to continue until the end and my inglorious withdrawal but there are a few people who made a significant contribution to keeping me going, and who deserve more than a passing mention, so this final section will acknowledge those as we get ever closer to my demise…

When I arrived at Checkpoint Four I was in a pretty bad way and fairly despondent. I knew that at my current pace I stood no chance of getting to Kirk Yetholm within the cut-off time. I was exhausted, my feet were blistered, how could I possibly carry on?

Angels, that’s how. At CP4 I was lucky enough to be looked after by two simply amazing people that truly deserve to be referred to as such. Rachel took me into the checkpoint and got me sat down with food and drink. CP4 is famed for its lasagne and deservedly so, that made me feel better straight away. I don’t think I’ve explained exactly what happens at a checkpoint (if I have, sorry, I’m about to repeat myself) so as this was the last one I would make as a competitor I’ll do so now.

I don’t know if the way things were done was due to Covid or if this is usual (I’ll find out next year), but by the time I was at any checkpoint there was a seat and a table allocated to me with my drop bag next to it. You are escorted to it by a member of the checkpoint team and provided with whatever food and drink you need. Rachel gave me hot chocolate (I was intending to sleep so I didn’t want coffee), lasagne, watermelon (which I didn’t realise I wanted but ate gratefully when it was given to me) and possibly something else but I’ve forgotten. She also checked what else I needed – a medic and a bed. After I was fed and watered she took me to Felix, possibly the finest foot-fixer on the race and definitely another Angel. He had a look at my feet and said I had a very small amount of infection in my blisters. Normally this would be the end of the sufferers race but as it was very small he photographed them so he could consult his boss to see what could be done. He cleaned up my feet and gave me some codeine and paracetamol to help me sleep and said he would come up with a plan for after I had rested.

CP4 is about the best checkpoint to need to sleep at, it has proper beds. Rachel took me to a bunk, made sure I was OK and left me to sleep. I had spent one and a half hours getting sorted, I wanted to give Felix plenty of time to fix me up after my rest so I decided on three hours sleep.

Three hours of deep dreamless sleep later I felt much better. I got up, wandered around a bit and was once again met by Rachel. She took me to see Felix who said I was allowed to continue but if I made it to CP5 my feet would have to be assessed again. He cleaned and drained my blisters whilst Rachel provided me with scrambled eggs and bacon – and coffee. I was in a somewhat more positive frame of mind than when I arrived at the checkpoint and reckoned if I could keep moving forward at an average pace of two miles an hour I might have a chance…

To be honest. re-reading that bit, I don’t think I’ve really managed to convey the absolute dedication I felt from Felix and Rachel to keeping me going, it was immense and whilst I ultimately didn’t get much further, from my perspective it was worthwhile as I did get some enjoyment out of some of my final miles and it allowed me to find out more about some areas I really need to get out to and recce.

The path continued to follow the route of the river to the wonderfully named Slaggyford.

It was here I met The Angel of Slaggyford. When the Spine Race isn’t happening she is called Natasha but during the race she is an Angel with pizza, coffee and Bourbon biscuits for passing competitors. I really did think she was an angel when she addressed me by name – I kept forgetting that the tracking is completely open to anyone to view and so she had watched me approach and come out to meet me. The Spine Safety Team arrived shortly afterwards as they were concerned that I had stopped moving…

I left Slaggyford in a happy contented frame of mind – even if I did lose my sunglasses somewhere en-route. However darkness was falling and I was starting to struggle a little. Hartleyburn Common (South Side) was fairly straightforward but once I crossed the A689 things started to go badly wrong. I veered off the Pennine Way onto another path and crossed the Black Burn on the wrong bridge. You know its the wrong bridge when you have to cross a barbed wire fence to get to it. This left me on the wrong side of a dry stone wall. Had I looked at my map I might have realised this wasn’t actually a catastrophic error as I could have rejoined the Pennine Way after only a couple of hundred metres. I climbed the wall instead – which, to be fair, was much easier than the barbed wire fence. I have no explanation for why i walked in a complete circle at Batey Shield.

I struggled to find the path across Hartleyburn Common (North Side) but eventually came to a dry stone wall – I say ‘dry’ but everything was sopping wet by now – with a stile over it onto Blenkinsop Common. It was here I made a really stupid mistake. someone else had caught me up and decided to change his socks – so I changed mine. Why? I was still on the Commons, it was still wet and within 50m I now had another pair of wet socks. Blenkinsop Common is not a great place to be on a grey miserable dawn. There was no life on the Common at all. I decided this was probably because if anything had evolved to live there it would be extinct – because it wanted to be. I may be being unfair, Blenkinsop Common may be beautiful in the sunshine but on a cold grey morning it felt like the most miserable place on earth.

Eventually I found my way off the Common and crossed onto Haltwhistle Golf Club, which was clearly not impressed at hosting part of the Pennine way and left the most overgrown track I’d seen on the whole of the Pennine Way to exit its grounds on.

By now I was feeling better and even took photograph of Thirwell Castle on the grounds I would look at it later – I didn’t have time at the moment.

Shortly after I was met by a member of the Spine Safety Team. She was aware of my blistered feet and my navigation issues and suggested I might want to call it a day. As it was now getting sunnier and warmer and I was in a positive frame of mind I said I felt I could continue. We compromised with me stopping for a 15 minute power nap and a coffee at Walltown.

I was warned that the next section along Hadrian’s Wall was ‘undulating’ and that some people liked it and some hated it. I really liked it, much of it was grassy which was welcome relief for my blisters.

The weather was constantly improving, the path was pretty much impossible to lose and my feet and blisters were drying out – I was very happy at this point. However at Turret 39 near the fascinatingly named ‘Once Brewed’ (Twice Brewed appears to be on the opposite side of the road) I was met by two more members of the Safety Team. I was taken to a car park where I was forced to have coffee and cake and a nice chat. It was clear I was in a much better state than I expected. The male member of the team (I’m sure he introduced himself, I’m just not that good with names at the best of times) said he was expecting something much worse and he called in to say he was happy for me to continue. I then had a nice chat over coffee with the female half of the team (who could have been called Liz but probably wasn’t) and apologised profusely for not being very good at navigating and became a little depressed that I appeared to be being told I wasn’t really good enough for the Spine Race. On reflection I don’t think that is what I was meant to take away from the conversation, the fact was I had made some slightly bizarre navigation errors and been very slow over the Commons so it wasn’t at all unreasonable that they were concerned about me. To be brutally honest I wasn’t good enough for the spine Race at that point and hadn’t been at many points before. One thing I need to do before 2022 is to both recce the trickier sections of the route and spend more time with the map becoming familiar with the various places and where they fit into the overall scheme of things.

Anyway I was allowed to continue and my spirits gradually rose again as it was a nice day and there were lots of people on the wall, many of whom wished me well and some even applauded as I walked past them. I saw one or two runners as well. One addressed me by name, it was Felix, my foot fixing angel from CP4. I didn’t recognise him as he had been wearing a mask all the time he was fixing my feet and appeared to have grown a beard underneath it, which I was hitherto unaware of. He had escaped for some exercise on the way to his next checkpoint but stopped and walked and chatted with me for a while. At this time all was well with the world. I knew I was in a bit of time trouble but I was making reasonable progress, the sun was out, I was on course, what could go wrong?

Well…

At the briliantly named Hotbank Crags (there are so many great place names on the Pennine Way) the Pennine Way turns away from Hadrian’s Wall and goes North again toward Haughton Common and some woods. To save time, wherever I write ‘Common’ think ‘Bog’ and you’ll be about right. Then it started to rain. My feet became soaked, my blister dressings moved about, my feet hurt like never before and I was still about seven miles from the checkpoint. Another runner passed me and mentioned Horneystead Farm was nearby. This is owned by a wonderful lady who provides food and drink to Spine racers 24/7 during the race. I missed it. It was getting dark. I started trying to run. I started imagining the land I was crossing was owned by a friend of mine, I was having a conversation about how she might like to improve it a bit as it was part of the Pennine Way – in my head. Running – possibly. People, roads, junctions never getting nearer, always at the bottom of the hill, follow the line, find the checkpoint.

At some point my final Angel appeared in the shape of Les Binns. I could write a lot about Les Binns but suffice to say if everyone was like Les the world would be a much better place. He had already helped some Challenger runners he came across much earlier in the race and now he was helping me. I told him I needed to get to Checkpoint Five. He knew the way, he opened gates for me, he directed me, he gave me hope. However I was now hallucinating so much I had no idea what I was running over, I’m fairly sure it wasn’t the pretty gold and silver foil I was seeing. Wherever I was it wasn’t on the seafront as I thought. However Les was keeping me going and giving me a chance until…

You may remember after my delirium after coming down off Cross Fell my rational brain finally made contact. It happened again. I realised it didn’t matter if I got to CP5 or not, I was done. My feet were in ribbons, I had no idea what was real and even if I did get to CP5 I’d have at most two hours before it closed and there was no way I would be able to convince myself I was in a fit state to continue, much less the Safety Teams.
‘Les, I can’t do it’
‘You sure mate?’
‘Yes’
‘OK, I’ll call you in’
Les called Spine HQ and got me picked up. He used the phrase ‘Rag Order’ on the phone and when I looked it up it was pretty much the perfect description of me at that point. Its often associated with hangovers but it exactly conveyed my mental and physical state at that point – Rag Order.

I have mentioned some of the great place names on the Pennine Way. I retired at Shitlington Crags, which somehow seems appropriate.

I was taken to Checkpoint Five where I met Les again and was able to thank him for his help and have chat with him whilst I was being fed and watered. Then I fell asleep. It was such a deep sleep I awoke to find my feet had been bandaged and a line drawn around my left ankle. The line represented the limit of the infection in my foot – cellulitis, it was bit swollen. I was fed again and the medics reappeared to dress my feet again and take pictures as I had the worst blisters they’d ever seen apparently. They also advised I go to A&E to get the cellulitis checked out. After this I was helped to the toilet (standing unaided wasn’t really possible) and then placed in a comfy chair to wait for Sharon.

Whilst I was waiting an Angel reappeared. Rachel had heard I was at Checkpoint Five and had come to make sure I was OK. Obviously I wasn’t OK but I was able to chat to her (I have no idea how coherent my conversation was) and told her about my foot woes. It may be the sheer intensity and brutality of the race that makes people care so much, I don’t know but Rachel cared enough about the idiot she tended to so well during my stay at Checkpoint Four that she even tracked me down on Facebook to see how my foot was doing after I said I didn’t know if they might keep me in for IV antibiotics (they didn’t)

After a while and with no help from me on the directions front, Sharon found me and took me to Carlisle A&E where my feet were rebandaged and I was give a course of antibiotics. We then went to Penrith where a pair of size 10 slippers were purchased from Morrisons to give me something to put on over the bandages, followed by a pair of size 12 from Sainsbury’s when the size 10s proved a little tight. We checked into the Premier Inn at Penrith for the night and I spent the evening eating all the food Sharon had bought from Morrisons, had a glass or two of wine and then slept – a lot.

So that is the end of my 2021 Spine Race. not as I wanted, I managed to cover about 220 miles in around five and a half days. There was absolutely no chance of me getting further as the weather had deteriorated and everyone was being made to put on their warm kit and full waterproofs before leaving the checkpoint. Add to that the shredded feet and rapidly developing cellulitis and its fairly clear that two hours would have been no where near enough recovery time, even if I had the full six hours I think it would be unlikely.

Those that have read the full story of my journey might be forgiven for thinking I didn’t really enjoy it. I did, well the bits where I wasn’t hallucinating anyway. The positives I take from my journey are that I wasn’t physically incapable of doing it and I was mentally strong enough – some might say too strong, I should have stopped at he first road crossing after Hadrian’s Wall really. Anyway I think I learned a huge amount about the race and am now in a much better position to succeed – which is why, as I hinted earlier, I have signed up for 2022.

For many people this will be as much of my blog as they want to read – thank you for reading this far. However it will continue. I have some thoughts on specific aspects of my race I want to share, including what I really didn’t get about the difference between a stage race and a non-stop race. There is much to be written about kit – mine wasn’t bad but it could be better. There will be recces and other races, The journey will be recorded because after all, the only way is Pennine!

So I left checkpoint three in a positive frame of mind. The sun was shining, the next part of the route was fairly undemanding and very pretty, what could go wrong? Well, quite a lot actually. Firstly I had a bit of a panic when I left the checkpoint and couldn’t get my GPS to display the next part of the route. I’d turned off the CP3 to CP4 section to make it easier to find CP3 and it wouldn’t display again, despite claiming it was. Fortunately the traditional method of fixing things by forcing an unscheduled hardware reset (turn it off and on again) soon had the track on my display. I was also having a few pains in the top of my left foot which lead to me spending some time fiddling with my laces again. I’d been told before I started by a couple of previous finishers ‘don’t faff about in checkpoints’. I’d managed to follow this advice so far but is suspect that in reality it included ‘don’t faff about in the first hundred metres after leaving a checkpoint’ as well.

Anyway Low Force and High Force were both very popular with tourists so I wasn’t at all lonely or struggling to find the route for some distance out of Checkpoint Three.

The number of tourists decreased as I progressed along the river. The path was mainly quite easy with just one or two boulder strewn sections to make life more interesting.

Eventually Cauldron Snout came into view. Hugely impressive, I knew I had to scramble up the rocks beside it to continue. To be fair the scramble was some distance from the waterfall (I guess it may be nearer in winter when there is more water falling) and my vague plan of ‘keep going up and see what happens’ successfully saw me negotiate the climb to the top and onto a very obvious track.

The path across Dufton Fell was mainly easy to follow – I did have to convince myself that it was highly unlikely that the Pennine Way would be down a massive scree slope at one point (it wasn’t) but generally navigation was OK and I met the Safety Team in Dufton. My big mistake here was not taking advantage of the fact they were at a pub and going in for a drink.

So far this part of my journey reads a bit like a cross between a tourist information brochure and a seven year old child’s ‘What I did on my holidays’ essay. However that was all about to change most abruptly…

One of the more sensible things I did during my excessively short stay at Checkpoint Three was change into running tights and a long sleeved top. Cross Fell is the coldest place in England and inevitably I would be crossing it in the dark.

The climb was long, hard and didn’t reward me with any views. Hallucinations were starting to set in a bit but after giving myself a bit of a talking to and stopping myself slamming my poles into the ground on every step and making myself walk like a normal(ish) human being instead, I slowly climbed up to Knock Fell. Navigating to Great Dun Fell and it’s strange giant golf ball radio installations was OK and I continued to Little Dun Fell.

At this point things started to fall apart. There was a wind shelter, which was nice. There was a second wind shelter, which may have been a figment of my imagination, and there was a large amount of loose rock, which my GPS track had me going straight through.

I didn’t want to leave the comfort of the wind shelter, I didn’t want to cross the loose rocks in case that wasn’t the right way and the hallucinations were now quite bad – I’m fairly sure there were not several dozen people having picnics on Little Dun Fell that night….

Fortunately two other runners appeared who seemed to know what they were doing so I followed them. I had to move quite quickly to keep up but I was desperate not to lose them so I followed them over the Fell (through the loose rocks) along some limestone paving and eventually to Greg’s Hut. I felt I would be OK from here and so I slowed down and let them go on. My feet were now very sore but at least I knew where I was right?

Now begins one of my darkest moments on the race. I have very little idea what happened to me for several hours after reaching the hut. In my head I kept getting messages telling me where the checkpoint was and I kept running down various tracks looking for it. At one point someone told me which track to take, but I don’t think he existed. If he did I didn’t understand what he told me and kept running in circles. I think. My watch died before all this. I might be able to recover something from my GPS but the bottom line is that I have no real idea what happened or where I went. I know that what went on in my head wasn’t real but I have no idea what reality was at that point.

At some point the very small section of my brain that was still functioning attracted my attention. It pointed out I was actually doing the Spine Race, not living in some kind of bizarre fantasy that most people would need a significant quantity of illegal drugs to achieve, and could we please get on with getting to Checkpoint Four or it would all be over.

I was on a quite clear track towards Garrigill and, after exchanging a few words with quite a bewildered passer-by, was met by one of the Spine Team. By now I was in the real world and fairly lucid so he was happy for me to continue and directed me to Garrigill. From here it was quite straightforward to take a signposted path along the river to Alston.

Except for me it wasn’t. I had misunderstood the directions and was expecting to find the checkpoint on the river, which it basically was but the path didn’t follow every turn of the river and so I had to leave its banks. This lead to me walking backwards and forward along part of the river and phoning Spine HQ to ask where they had hidden the checkpoint. Eventually a very patient man gave me some directions which sunk into my addled brain and I finally struck out in the right direction. Garrigill to Alston is less than four miles along a well walked path but it had taken an age for me to work in out. I arrived at Checkpoint Four with my feet in bits, having lost several hours of time (and my life). I was fairly certain my race would end here. I was tired, in pain, and moving too slowly to have a hope of finishing in the time available, things did not look good…

“Spine Runner Heading North!” was the shout from the marshal as I left Checkpoint Two. It was answered with cheers and shouts of encouragement from the other volunteers and competitors and gave me a tingle down my spine (where else – this is the Spine Race after all). Partly this was because cheers and encouraging words never cease to have a positive effect on me, but mainly because this was the point at which I became a Spine Runner. Up until now I was running the same course as Sprint competitors for the first leg and Challengers for the first two. This was the first leg that was the exclusive province of full Spine Racers. This is in no way intended to suggest that Sprinters or Challengers had an easier task, they were different races run in a different way to the full, but now I was exclusively running with people heading for Kirk Yetholm.

Before I continue, there were a few errors towards the end of the last blog post. My blogs are like a very bad run, you wish they were over but you want to get to the end. At least that’s what writing them feels like so the end can be a little rushed. Firstly the checkpoint was actually in Hardraw, not Hawes, Hardraw is the finsih point of the Challenger Race. Secondly, I appeared to forget I was at CP2 and suggested this would be all about CP3 to CP4 – sorry, you are getting the CP2 to CP3 section first.

So this leg was one I was quite excited about as I would pass the Tan Hill Inn – the UK’s highest pub. I was hoping to get a drink in it and was fairly optimistic about arriving there before 10pm – not that I had any idea what the opening hours were, or indeed if it was even open. In line with the common theme of this race, the Pennine Way had other ideas. The terrain included some steep climbs and narrow stone littered paths. however there were also some relatively easy sections on which I could make good time. I should apologise at this point for the vagueness of much of my narrative, it is now almost two weeks since I started, over a week since I pulled out, and much has happened in between – although in the last week mostly I’ve been eating and sleeping.

Eventually I was on Stonesdale Moor, the underfoot conditions were good and I was pushing hard (at this point ‘pushing hard’ actually means getting up to a little over 4 miles per hour but it felt hard). I realised I wasn’t going to make it for 10pm but maybe 10:30 would be OK? I looked up and saw a building with bright pulsing lights on the outside. This wasn’t a hallucination though, this was the Tan Hill Inn! Surely if the lights were on the pub must be open, right?

I reached the Inn, burst through the doors and incoherently asked if I was in time for a pint of Coke? Yes! Not just a pint of Coke but a free pint as one of the gentleman at the bar bought it for me when I explained what I was doing.

I was a bit less impressive shortly afterwards when three other runners appeared and I discovered the Spine Safety Team were also in the pub in a room round the corner. No matter, I’d got my drink in the highest pub in Britain!

When I left the pub it was definitely dark so I decided to just haver a small wander round the car park before rejoining the Pennine Way… The next section was the notorious Sleightholme Moor – which actually I didn’t find at all notorious and crossed without too much drama. I had a little trouble following the path to God’s Bridge but then met up with a couple of runners that were planning on bivvying in the A66 underpass and followed them as far as there. Cotherstone Moor didn’t present too many challenges – one section was challenging to find a route that retained dry feet but I found one – and as the sun rose I found myself in good spirits.

My good spirits were possibly not appreciated by the local sheep population as I decided to sing quite a lot along the next few miles of my journey. ‘Sing’ is being a bit generous but I was making the most of the solitude and making loud noises anyway. I was brought down to earth when one sheep, instead of running away, looked at me, listened for a while, and then did the most enormous poo – I think that was the most eloquent criticism of my singing I have ever witnessed.

Mercifully for the sheep I arrived at Middleton in Teesdale and embarked on the final path towards the checkpoint. My feet were a little sore by now and it was quite hot so it took me a while to cover the last couple of miles but I was met by a marshal that guided me in to the camp where I could eat, rest and get my feet looked at again. All this was very pleasant but this begs the question – as it was so pleasant why on earth did I not stay longer and rest more?

So I’ve completed over half the race, in good spirits and things seem to be going quite well. However things were to take a darker and more frightening turn on the next part of my journey…

People have been really nice about the fact I failed. I’ve been told I shouldn’t see it as a failure, that I did really well and, yes, 220 miles was a pretty impressive effort but in the results list for the Summer Spine Race 2021 I am a DNF – so from that perspective I failed. It was also my fault. By the end I was blistered and disorientated and in no fit state to carry on. As other people finished I can’t blame the course or conditions, I just didn’t look after me well enough.

OK so having established that, in order to prevent it happening again I need to understand where I went wrong.

It’s possibly fair to say that Covid didn’t help, we started in the afternoon so I’d already been up for a while. I had also given a wildly optimistic time for the first leg and so was in the starting wave with all the fast guys. The net result was I set off far too fast in order to try and get to Hebden Bridge in the eleven hours I claimed I could do it in.

After five and a half miles I’d already tripped numerous times, scraped myself, my GPS and dislocated my little finger (I put it back before I had too much time to think about it). By fifteen miles I was fairly sure I couldn’t do this but it seemed a bit premature to pull out so I carried on and after 26.8 miles I’d done 10% of the race and was falling over less so I carried on. Nicky’s Food Bar was a welcome sight, bacon roll and coke helped no end. Falling in a bog attempting to regain the trail didn’t.

Then it started raining… It was by now dark and I kept drifting off the trail around Stoodley Pike, not far off but I had to be very careful to keep an eye on the GPS.

Eventually I was on a very obvious trail, spotted the Spine Race diversion signs for Checkpoint One and arrived there almost exactly 12 hours after leaving Edale at dawn.

I was able to hose my legs down and clean off most of the peat. More importantly I was wonderfully looked after and given food and drink. I also took the opportunity to sleep. This was my first error, I only slept for about 45 minutes. I could have had a good three more hours at CP1 and should have done, especially given the previously mentioned start time.

Quite a lot of the next bit was bit dull – or I just wasn’t paying attention. Actually Withins was very nice. I believe Emily Bronte was very fond of the area

What wasn’t at all dull however was the ‘pop-up’ checkpoint run by the Craven Energy Triathlon Club. Coffee, a bacon sandwich and rice pudding with jam – suddenly this was all very pleasant!

Things were definitely looking up. The weather was improving and the scenery was good. After a while the Pennine Way started to follow the Leeds and Liverpool Canal through the double arched bridge at East Marton

I was rapidly approaching Gargrave, home to the most famous Co-Op in the UK if you follow the Spine Race. I however was more excited by its phone box.

This was my next mistake. I never felt low on energy but on reflection I really should have gone into the Co-Op and bought food rather than posed for selfies with a phone box.

It was after leaving Gargrave I had to stop a few times to adjust my laces on my left shoe as they appeared to be pulling on the top of my foot. I would only discover the significance of this after I had retired…

Malham also had a phone box but it is more famous for its Cove. The Pennine Way runs right through Malham Cove on its way to Malham Tarn and the intermediate checkpoint. However Malham Cove can’t be dismissed that quickly.

CP1.5 provided hot water for the freeze dried meal I’d taken specially for the occasion. I think I also got my feet taped up.

It was beginning to get dark by the time I left. Ahead was Fountains Fell and the notorious Pen-y-ghent. I have to admit that prior to entering the Spine Race I was under the impression Pen-y-ghent was in Wales. it isn’t, its on holiday in Yorkshire. I was going to have to climb it in the dark. Strangely this made things a little easier as my big fear is of falling. In the dark I couldn’t see where I would fall and so didn’t worry about it. I did haver a little trouble finding the path, as did the next couple that caught me up. fortunately the next couple included someone that has done the Spine Race before and he pointed out the next part of the climb. After that the final ascent was quite straightforward.

Then it was down to Horton in Ribblesdale and another phone box…

There may have been some nice parts after this but all I remember is the Cam High Road – about 5 miles of utterly pointless misery and probably my least favourite placed in the entire world. I was cold, my feet hurt and the ‘road’ appeared to have been built by an imbecile. actually some of it was Roman which might explain why it appeared to go straight over everything rather than round anything.

Eventually the Way turned off the Cam High Road to Gaudy Lane. this should have been a nice little downhill romp. Unfortunately I was now paying for an error on the first leg. I descended Torside with a couple of other competitors and hence raced down as fast as I could. I was aware before the event that my local ‘hills’ would in no way provide adequate training for the hills of the Pennine Way and so had incorporated so leg strengthening routines into my training. That seemed to work OK but what I hadn’t considered was the relentless pounding the quads take on steep downhill running. My run down Torside had wrecked my quads and hence my ‘run’ into Hawes was much slower than it should have been. i was also starting to feel the beginnings of a blister on my left foot – I really hate the Cam High Road!

As I entered Hawes I was greeted by Adam. Adam is the boyfriend of Jackie Stretton, a phenomenal runner and friend who had just come second in the Spine Challenger, a race from Edale to Hawes. He directed me through Hawes where I met Jackie and her dog, Jake.

What I really needed was some Deep Heat or similar. Some how I found a tube of Bio Freeze whilst walking with Jackie…. After some goodbyes it was a short walk into CP3. I ate, got my feet looked at, slept in a tent and generally tried to get myself ready for the next leg. Still didn’t sleep enough though…

Well this was supposed to be a dispassionate analysis of my errors during the Spine Race but instead it’s turning into another overly long race blog. I think I’ll call this part one and save the horrors of CP3 to CP4 for another day – thanks for reading!

So I’m writing this blog whilst still not exactly recovered from my 2021 attempt at the Spine Race. I still have blisters, my left foot is swollen with cellulitis and most worryingly there is a huge pile of fetid running kit in my lounge which looks like it might evolve into a fairly belligerent life form if I don’t do something with it soon…

So why am I writing this blog rather than applying a flame thrower to my running kit, I mean, it’s not as if I’m going to be stupid enough to try again is it? Well yes, I am. Why? Because I made some fundamental errors on my attempt which were down to a combination of overconfidence, a failure to understand the difference between stage and non-stop racing and most of all a failure to realise just how brutal the Pennine Way is. I think I can improve in all those areas and successfully reach Kirk Yetholm in 2022. This blog is to analyse what went wrong last time and how to do it better next. It will also cover (probably) kit choices, recce runs and thoughts on strategy. I know a lot of people watched my dot during the 2021 event, this blog is my ‘dot’ as I approach the start line in 2022.