How I Ran 200 Miles - Winter Downs 200

When I signed up for the inaugural Winter Downs 200 race, just days after it was launched earlier this year, I had no real idea if and how I’d be able to complete it. I just knew it was a challenge I wanted to take on. It would mean going twice as far as I had ever gone in a race before, in winter, and mostly in the dark. Sitting at home with my prized finisher’s buckle – one of only 56 awarded – I’m beginning to understand what got me round the 204 mile loop of southeast England. It was a combination of: preparation, caution, kit, support and luck.

Preparation

The first question people always ask when you tell them you’re running a 200 mile race – well, the second question, after “WTF?” – is “how do you prepare”? Until I crossed the finish line a little after midnight on December 17th I didn’t have an answer to that question. I knew what I was doing to prepare; I didn’t know if it would work.

For the first part of 2023, before the Winter Downs was even a thing, I’d been training for my A race, the Wendover Woods 100. Training involved consistent 30-50 mile weeks – fairly heavy for me – with regular trips to Wendover to improve my hill-climbing. I used marathons and short ultras as training runs. Running five or six times a week, my fitness was better than it had been for a couple of years, and I clocked a 50km pb at the Camino Ultra Lea Valley race in March.

In the event, I DNF’d WW100 – my first ultra DNF – due in part to dehydration in sweltering July conditions. I’d been inside the cut-off at halfway, but I didn’t have enough leeway to have time to rehydrate and reset. “People going at our pace don’t have a large margin of error,” said Brian Drought to me during the aftermath. It was a wake-up call. I needed to improve my base pace and increase my margin of error if I was going to be able to tackle WD200 with any confidence. To my mind, given my physical condition at the time, that meant two things: increasing my strength and reducing my weight.

I spent the next several months working with Metros clubmate Zahra Bassiri – a nutritionist and PT – changing my diet and incorporating regular structured strength training for the first time. Adding three strength sessions per week on top of my six runs, reducing sugar and increasing protein paid rapid dividends. Hill running became easier, and my base pace quickened. I completed both Ultra X Wales 50km and England 110km – both with thousands of metres of elevation – relatively untroubled. Without really trying, I ran my fastest parkrun in three years. The Camino Ultra Epping Forest 50km was my second sub-6hr ultra of the year.

It’s a cliché that much of the challenge of an ultramarathon is mental rather than physical. One’s mind can force a halt long before our physical resources are truly exhausted. Of course, my improved physical condition gave me confidence. Being familiar (though not, as it turned out, as familiar as I though) with a large chunk of the course added to my confidence. I also ensured I had a realistic pacing strategy and visualised a number of ways of dealing with inevitable problems and low points out on the course.

I stood on the WD200 start line at Juniper Hall confident I had the physical strength and endurance to cope with whatever lay ahead, and as psychologically prepared as I could hope to be considering I was about to take several hundred thousand steps in to the unknown.

Kit

It was during an all-night volunteering stint on the third leg of the Autumn 100 in 2019 that I learned the value of high quality kit in an ultramarathon. Relentless rain and cold winds cruelly exposed the folly of any runner who had skimped – consciously or otherwise – on the mandatory kit. Fatigue, water and cold is a recipe for failure, and good kit can stave off the latter two.

The mandatory kit list for WD200 was longer than for Centurion’s usual 100 mile races, if only because runners would be spending 16 hours a day in December darkness. Some of the kit I used I bought especially for the event, while other pieces were old favourites. Here are the ones that I relied on the most.

Black Diamond Carbon Z poles – One of my favourite pieces of kit. Beautifully designed, super-lightweight and robust. I usually use them only one steep ascents, but during this race they kept me upright on the muddy mess of the Vanguard Way, helped me clamber over stiles on the Wayfarer’s Way, and were essential depth-checkers when negotiating standing water.

Ottershell waterproof socks, with Injinji lightweight toe socks – My first time wearing waterproof socks in a race. My first pair were swamped in the knee deep wading section of the Mudguard Way. I made a tactical decision not to use the second pair until after the reported deep water at Chiddingly. It paid off handsomely, as the second pair kept my feet dry all the way to Farnham golf course. No significant blisters when I peeled them off at the finish.

ASICS Fujitrail race pack – I’ve loved the regular Fujitrail pack ever since it came out. Fits like a glove and has plenty of zipped storage – providing reassurance that I’m not dropping essential kit on the trail. I upgraded to the 20L version for this event (Thanks, Vicky (@mrs_led_runs), for the long-term loan).

Montane Prism waterproof gloves – Toasty, and pack down incredibly small. For someone who suffers from Reynaud’s during and after cold events, these were super-reassuring. Used with my trusty Montane Spine jacket and new Patagonia Stormshell trousers (both with 20,000mm hydrostatic head), I was untroubled by whatever wind and rain I encountered on the trail.

Garmin Fenix 5 – I’ve had this watch for years, and wondered if it was reaching the end of its useful life. Apparently not. OK, I needed to charge it a few times, but it recorded an 88 hour activity while in navigation mode, and kept me on track in spite of my own navigational failings.

Ledlenser NEO10 headtorch – At 600 lumens, feels brighter than car headlights. Good for avoiding night-time hazards and eye-strain. One rechargeable battery lasted through a whole night. I had a Silva Ultra torch, with regular and rechargeable pack as a back-up, and a new Petzl e+Lite as my red backlight and plan-C emergency torch.

ASICS Trabuco 11 trail shoes – I have two pairs of these, and I’ve run many hundreds of miles in them this year. My first pair got me to CP1 at 43 miles. The second pair took me all the way to the finish. These shoes are like family.

Powerbank portable charger – Possibly the most important piece of kit, ensuring my phone, watch and headtorch could be always-on throughout the event. I would have literally been lost without it.

Caution

With what seemed on paper to be a very manageable four day cut-off, I decided early on that a finish depended not on moving fast on day one, but on being able to move at all on days three and four. That obviously meant staying on top of nutrition and hydration – both relatively easy in cold conditions if I stayed organised. More importantly, it meant not getting exhausted, and not getting injured. I tackled the former by sticking to a conservative pace plan on day one, including taking any significant climbs as slow as possible, certainly slower than I felt able, and I was pleased to arrive at the first aid station just 20 minutes ahead of schedule. I addressed the latter by doing everything to avoid trips and slips. I usually enjoy going quicker than average on downhills, but I deliberately slowed down an any rocky or muddy trails, or where visibility was poor. A twisted ankle or awkward fall could end my race. In the event, I missed my footing only once, sitting down innocuously on my backside towards the top of Gill’s Gap. On the Wayfarer’s Way, an adductor problem that had first troubled me on 2022’s Thames Path 100 made itself felt, and made climbing the many stiles on that trail a challenge. During TP100 it had brought me to a literal standstill on the trail, and made me contemplate DNFing at 95 miles. This time round I made sure to lead with my left leg on any steps and stiles, and thankfully the pain never got too much. In the latter miles, it was relegated to second place in the pain table by strained ankle ligaments (a legacy of many miles of mud-slipping) doing a good impersonation of shin splints in my left leg. Adrenaline kept them at bay in the final miles; so much so that I had been sat down for fifteen minutes after the finish before I remembered to get a medic to come and look at them.

Luck

It was always clear that the race’s big variable – out of anyone’s control – was the weather. The average December temperatures in Surrey and Hampshire are between 2° and 6°C. Variation on the downside in temperature, rainfall or wind could make the difference between finishing and not.

For four days we were extremely lucky with the weather. Although the underfoot conditions were decidedly soggy, the weather was as benign as we could reasonably expected. Some light rain, with occasional heavy showers, temperatures well above seasonal averages and nowhere near freezing, and only light winds even on the heights of the South Downs. While I ran with three or four layers most of the time, I never took my extra windproof jacket out of my pack. I’d be surprised if any future iteration of the event has such good weather conditions.

I had more personal luck out on the course. Before getting off the North Downs Way on day one, while looking at my phone, I narrowly avoided stepping into a hole large enough to accommodate a small child. That would have been the end of my race.

Then late on Wednesday night/Thursday morning, I was at Berwick, a couple of miles from where the Vanguard Way meets the South Downs Way. I stopped to fill up on water from the tap in the churchyard. A sign said the church was always open to visitors, and when I tried the door handle, it proved to be true. Stepping inside, the church had automatic lights, was dry, and was certainly several degrees warmer than outside. I took the unexpected opportunity to sit down, gather my energy and add a mid-layer to help see me through the coldest hours of the night. Without being a believer, I felt as though fortune was one my side.

Support

I’d had a pretty low-key build-up to this race. Anxiety prevented me making too many public pronouncements about my participation. In responses to people’s queries and wishes of good luck, I was persuading myself as much as them that I was confident of finishing. I was genuinely taken aback by the amount of online support as start-time approached, and during the race itself. The community of ultrarunners is small, but it felt like anyone who had ever run or considered running an ultra knew this race was a big deal and was willing every participant to succeed. The messages of support on social media from Metros clubmates, ASICS Frontrunner teammates, BTR community members and fellow endurance runners were heartfelt, and kept coming in throughout the event. They lifted my mood in the hours before the start, and in the latter stages I was literally using them as a reward for a mile or period of forward progress.

Out on the course, while there were inevitably hours and hours of solitary running, there were also miles of shared time with fellow runners – sharing navigation responsibilities and keeping spirits up with gallows humour and general chit-chat. I ran many miles with Vicky Henderson in the early stages, Debra Bourne later on, as well as Jaco “there’s just one thing we need to do to finish, and we’re doing it” Swart and my BTR soulmate Sabrina Pace-Humphreys.

Then there were the crews. I was blessed to have Sarah Tizzard and Eros Adamides crewing me from Friday evening to Saturday lunchtime, provided pot noodles, coffee, sausage rolls, doughnuts and moral support at Bishops’s Sutton, Alton and Farnham. On day one, BTR fam Rachel and Mohson, crewing Sabrina, made sure I was looked after at Gill’s Gap. On day three, Paula Bedford from Camino Ultra, Sabrina’s coach and crew, was at Queen Elizabeth Country Park with tea and raspberries! The crews of other runners were always willing to help out with water and nutrition, recognising that most runners are competing with the course rather than each other.

Finally, and perhaps most significantly, there was the support of Centurion staff and volunteers, both at the Aid Stations, and as a hovering virtual presence on the course 24 hours a day. I knew that staff had eyes on runners via our GPS trackers, in case we went drastically off-course or stopped unexpectedly for a protracted period, but it wasn’t until I arrived back at HQ that I realised they and earlier finishers were watching the progress of every runner on a large screen in a scene resembling an Ultra-running wargame situation room, literally willing runners to the finish.

In a regular ultramarathon – if there is such a thing – aid stations are maybe 10k or 10 miles apart. Here, they were 40 or 50 miles apart. As such, each aid station took on huge significance. A chance to refuel and rehydrate certainly, but also a chance to sleep, reset, recharge, replenish kit and supplies, re-evaluate race strategy and get some human contact after possibly several hours inside one’s own head. In regular ultras, I feel as though I’ve mastered the art of getting in and out of checkpoints quickly, without fuss. Here, the issues were different. How much of the one, three or six permitted hours should I stay inside with the weight off my feet? Should I try to sleep, and for how long? These were issues I hadn’t dealt with in a race before. And the further into the race I got, the more difficult those decisions became. Lack of sleep and simple fatigue impaired cognitive function, so that simple choices – tea/coffee, sit here or there – became problematic. Centurion staff and volunteers have a long-standing reputation for quality and care, but here they surpassed themselves. It seemed like all needs were anticipated and catered for. At each CP I was welcomed inside, shoes off, stored with poles, shown to an allocated table and chair, where my drop bag was waiting. Simple, hearty food choices were offered and provided. Sleeping accommodation was allocated on demand, with a personal wake-up service, whether you wanted a 20 minute nap or a 2 hour snooze. If I ever stay in a hotel with better service than a Winter Downs aid station, I’ll be surprised. And that’s not just sleep deprivation talking.

It's invidious to single out particular volunteers, many of whom put in ultra-long shifts across several days – but I’m going to do it anyway. Lou Fraser at the finish was solicitousness itself. It was clear that my finish meant as much to her as it did to me. Paul Spooner at CP3 was a rock of reliability. Nothing was too much trouble, and none of my sleep-deprived requests were considered unreasonable.

Centurion staff did what they always do; put on a high quality event, a supported adventure, for runners, by runners, in which it felt like they’d thought of everything. From the detailed kit check from Louise at HQ, to Paul sweeping up my muddy residue at CP1, Neil running the bed-booking system at CP2, Louise again at CP3, Jan at CP4 and the hug from Nici at the finish, James put together a fantastic team, and they delivered a fantastic event.

There’s much more to tell about the story of my race, and one day soon I will tell it, but for now, if you’re planning to run a 200+ mile race any time, consider that the things you’ll need in order to succeed are meticulous preparation, a cautious approach, great support, good luck and high quality kit.