When I set out to try and complete the Marathon des Sables I'd never intended to seek to raise money for charity by asking for sponsorship. But as my wife pointed out, this seems a waste of an opportunity when undertaking the biggest physical challenge I've ever taken on.
The charities I traditionally support are already well-supported, well-known and well-funded.
This time I've decided to support two particular charities that aren't well known and so struggle to raise funds for the invaluable work that they do.
These charities, Unique (whose mission statement is to inform, support and alleviate the isolation of anyone affected by a rare chromosome disorder, and to raise public awareness) and The Dame Vera Lynn Trust for Children with Cerebral Palsy (whose School for Parents works with families to educate children under 5 with motor learning difficulties) receive no Government support.
For these two charities it genuinely is a case of every penny counts.
Please sponsor me here!
I have funded the entire costs associated with undertaking the Marathon des Sables myself so the money you pledge will directly benefit these two charities. For which, thank you in anticipation!
Tuesday, 31 January 2012
Sunday, 29 January 2012
Back-to-back food test
Just over 52 miles this week.
The back-to-back was a 25 miler (7.1kg rucksack, 2531 foot of ascent) followed the next morning by a 15 miler (9.2kg rucksack, just 771 foot of ascent).
Towards the end of the 25 miler I decided to put my iPod on as I started to tire. I heard a huge double-boom noise, I felt it through my chest and the ground literally shook. I whipped off my earphones wondering what the hell had happened! I could hear a jet screaming away and trotted on; other walkers further along asked if I'd heard it. The next day on the news I learnt what it was: a Typhoon jet had been authorised to go supersonic. It was very impressive!
I trialled my MdS food intake for this back-to-back:
25 miler
I tried Extreme Adventure Foods Hot Cereal with Sultanas (800 calories). Unfortunately I was gagging after 4 or 5 mouthfuls of the stuff and stopped! This might have been because the dry wallpaper paste consistency was a result of me not adding enough water, but either way the taste wasn't great. Instead I raided the larder of the remnants of a box of Quaker Oat Crunchies so started the day with barely 500 calories.
During the run (726 cals):
- SIS Go Gel;
- Peperami;
- Maxim chocolate and caramel energy bar;
- 100 grams of Peanut M&Ms.
Immediately post-run I had a ForGoodnessShakes Vanilla recovery powder drink (261 cals) then my main meal, an Extreme Adventure Foods Mexican Chilli Con Carne (800 cals). This was quite tasty and, although resembling more a hot soup once made up, went down well.
The total weight of just these items was surprisingly 627 grammes giving me a total 2587 calories for the day (the breakfast (assuming I'd eaten it!), the "on-the-go" snacks, post-run recovery drink powder and main meal). I'd actually burnt off 2960 calories just doing the 25 mile run alone!
But I really can't increase the rucksack weight to try and up the calories. Already, 627 grammes is about 14% of my intended total weight to be given to food for the 7 days (i.e., 4.5kg maximum).
While I felt satiated I could easily have had more: by bed-time I was hungry again . . .
15 miler
. . . and completely ravenous by breakfast!
The Extreme Adventure Milky Cereal and Raisins went down better. My "on-the-go" food was a lower calorie intake to reflect today's lower mileage. Another recovery powder drink after this run was followed by the Extreme Adventure Italian Spaghetti Bolognese; again, this was quite a watery meal and didn't taste of much though I still managed to get it all down.
Unfortunately I then suffered a typical response to too much freeze-dried foods most of the rest of Friday and Saturday morning!
So I'll try again on the food: I've ordered the Mountain House brand for the next step.
Based on the calorie figures I've given above it's quite likely that, even assuming that for the rest of each MdS day I simply laid down and did nothing, my daily calorie deficit will be roughly 2000-2500 . . . minimum.
Mmmmm . . .
The back-to-back was a 25 miler (7.1kg rucksack, 2531 foot of ascent) followed the next morning by a 15 miler (9.2kg rucksack, just 771 foot of ascent).
Towards the end of the 25 miler I decided to put my iPod on as I started to tire. I heard a huge double-boom noise, I felt it through my chest and the ground literally shook. I whipped off my earphones wondering what the hell had happened! I could hear a jet screaming away and trotted on; other walkers further along asked if I'd heard it. The next day on the news I learnt what it was: a Typhoon jet had been authorised to go supersonic. It was very impressive!
I trialled my MdS food intake for this back-to-back:
25 miler
I tried Extreme Adventure Foods Hot Cereal with Sultanas (800 calories). Unfortunately I was gagging after 4 or 5 mouthfuls of the stuff and stopped! This might have been because the dry wallpaper paste consistency was a result of me not adding enough water, but either way the taste wasn't great. Instead I raided the larder of the remnants of a box of Quaker Oat Crunchies so started the day with barely 500 calories.
During the run (726 cals):
- SIS Go Gel;
- Peperami;
- Maxim chocolate and caramel energy bar;
- 100 grams of Peanut M&Ms.
Immediately post-run I had a ForGoodnessShakes Vanilla recovery powder drink (261 cals) then my main meal, an Extreme Adventure Foods Mexican Chilli Con Carne (800 cals). This was quite tasty and, although resembling more a hot soup once made up, went down well.
The total weight of just these items was surprisingly 627 grammes giving me a total 2587 calories for the day (the breakfast (assuming I'd eaten it!), the "on-the-go" snacks, post-run recovery drink powder and main meal). I'd actually burnt off 2960 calories just doing the 25 mile run alone!
But I really can't increase the rucksack weight to try and up the calories. Already, 627 grammes is about 14% of my intended total weight to be given to food for the 7 days (i.e., 4.5kg maximum).
While I felt satiated I could easily have had more: by bed-time I was hungry again . . .
15 miler
. . . and completely ravenous by breakfast!
The Extreme Adventure Milky Cereal and Raisins went down better. My "on-the-go" food was a lower calorie intake to reflect today's lower mileage. Another recovery powder drink after this run was followed by the Extreme Adventure Italian Spaghetti Bolognese; again, this was quite a watery meal and didn't taste of much though I still managed to get it all down.
Unfortunately I then suffered a typical response to too much freeze-dried foods most of the rest of Friday and Saturday morning!
So I'll try again on the food: I've ordered the Mountain House brand for the next step.
Based on the calorie figures I've given above it's quite likely that, even assuming that for the rest of each MdS day I simply laid down and did nothing, my daily calorie deficit will be roughly 2000-2500 . . . minimum.
Mmmmm . . .
Monday, 23 January 2012
Getting the food in . . . and more kit!
MdS regulations state that competitors must be able to show they have a daily food intake of 2000 calories, minimum, for each of the 7 days of the MdS.
The easiest way to get this food in is a main meal for breakfast and again in the evening after each stage. While exercising it's difficult to take on a huge number of calories (particularly in heat) so rather than stopping to waste time and prepare a lunch it's easier to snack over the miles until the day's stage is over.
The keen-eyed amongst you will have noticed that some of my blog entries for events I've run show the calories I've expended, usually over 2300 each time (while the Yorkshireman Off-Road Marathon burnt off over 5000 calories). Obviously the body keeps on burning calories outside of any exercise period so if I'd wanted to replace my entire daily calorie expenditure on those days I quite likely would need to have taken on at least 4000 calories.
But carrying calories (i.e., food!), along with all the other kit, is heavy work across 150 miles of the Sahara.
You can see the problem!
There is no way I'll be able to carry enough calories for each day of the MdS to replace the calories I've lost, so weight loss is inevitable. I've heard some stories of competitors losing up to a stone in weight over the 7 days and looking very different on getting home (though some of that will be down to dehydration).
The other problem with the inability to carry all the food ideally needed is that the body gets progressively weaker as higher calorie demands are made of it which aren't being met by food.
My plan for the MdS is to aim to take on board between 2500 and 2800 calories for each stage of the race, with about 3500 calories to get me through the Stage 4 50-odd miler.
This will be roughly made up of about 800 calories for breakfast, 500-1000 calories of snacking during the day's stage, with 800-1000 calories for the late afternoon/evening.
The best way to achieve this is by using freeze-dried or dehydrated foods. There are numerous brands with apparently varying degrees of tastes and texture; some taste like cardboard, many get the calories from a high fat content and many give the trots after a few days of use!
The brands I'll be looking to try are: Expedition Foods, Extreme Adventure Foods, Mountain House and possibly Fuizion.
I've ordered some Extreme Adventure Foods today as I'm planning on having an MdS food trial-run this week: I'll restrict myself consciously to about 2500 calories for each of my back-to-back long days this week and see what the reaction is.
I've also ordered other MdS kit:
- a Thermarest NeoAir Xlite sleeping mat (the small size, it packs up to the size of a small water bottle) to give some degree of comfort from the stony desert floor as I try to sleep at night: this will cover the length from my head to just below my hips; any longer is really an unnecessary luxury!
- a lightweight powerful head torch, the Petzl Tikka XP2 (a torch is a compulsory item);
- a titanium spork and titanium stove (titanium is very light and also has the highest strength-to-weight ratio of any metal);
- Eletewater (an electrolyte fluid to drop in to water to ensure electrolytes (sodium, potassium etc. etc.) lost through sweating are replaced);
- UnderArmour HeatGear shorts . . . to see if these are any better than my Nike Dri-Fits in removing any chaffing risk;
- Injinji toe socks (these are socks which have pockets for the toes, like a glove!): I haven't suffered from any blisters on any of my runs and hope that continues. I'm going to try these for size to try and ensure I remain blister-free in the desert.
Sunday, 22 January 2012
Upping the weight and distance
Last week I just managed a few thousand metres on the rowing machine. That easy week meant I started this week quite refreshed, though I am noticing the residual tiredness after an easy week steadily increasing. I need to be careful not to end up being overtrained after my 3 week build-up cycles, which is difficult considering I still have about 6 or 7 weeks of tough training still to come.
I covered 50 miles this week on runs, run/walks and a walk, which started on Tuesday/Wednesday with a (respectively) 23.1 mile and 14 mile back-to-back outing.
The 23.1 miler was over the bleak Rombald Moors in the freezing cold with a 5.7kg rucksack, a weight which I barely notice now, covering 2795 foot of ascent in 6h16m and 3435 calories burnt off.
This is a tough route I've designed for myself, beginning with a descent to the lowest altitude I can get before climbing all the way up to Bingley Moor, descending down the other side and coming back up and over Addingham High Moor, the plantations and through the village of Addingham. It was hard work across the very boggy ground; the exposed higher peaks of the moors were particularly cold and windy. This is the second time I've done this route and while it felt a little easier this time my legs certainly know I've done it by the time I've finished.
The 14 miler the following morning was largely flat, just over 1000 foot of ascent. To make it harder I carried my heaviest weight to date at 11.1kg and kept a speed-walk going with a few minutes of running thrown in: 3h11m. My upper back only felt tired for the last hour or so and I'd started feeling very comfortable with the weight.
Another walk today (just 8 miles) was with 9.7kg in the rucksack.
On checking my running diary I've noticed a few encouraging points:
- the last time I covered more than 50 miles in a week was almost 10 years ago when I did my last 24 hour track race (and had severe Achilles tendon problems thereafter);
- my fitness has improved so much that my heart rate monitor now regularly records a drop of up to 20 beats per minute on some of my run routes when compared with the same route just a few months ago (those of you who started reading my blog from the beginning will know that one year ago I was just finishing an enforced 3 week lay off as I couldn't actually run or walk much at all);
- in 10 months I've lost a stone in weight (and, unsurprisingly, 4lb of that in the last 3 weeks alone).
Crucially I need to maintain this work rate without getting injured.
This week I also decided to start panicking about all the other MdS kit I haven't ordered yet!
I covered 50 miles this week on runs, run/walks and a walk, which started on Tuesday/Wednesday with a (respectively) 23.1 mile and 14 mile back-to-back outing.
The 23.1 miler was over the bleak Rombald Moors in the freezing cold with a 5.7kg rucksack, a weight which I barely notice now, covering 2795 foot of ascent in 6h16m and 3435 calories burnt off.
 |
| Colour in the sky with a black pencil, remove the stone's shadow, and that's about right! |
The 14 miler the following morning was largely flat, just over 1000 foot of ascent. To make it harder I carried my heaviest weight to date at 11.1kg and kept a speed-walk going with a few minutes of running thrown in: 3h11m. My upper back only felt tired for the last hour or so and I'd started feeling very comfortable with the weight.
Another walk today (just 8 miles) was with 9.7kg in the rucksack.
On checking my running diary I've noticed a few encouraging points:
- the last time I covered more than 50 miles in a week was almost 10 years ago when I did my last 24 hour track race (and had severe Achilles tendon problems thereafter);
- my fitness has improved so much that my heart rate monitor now regularly records a drop of up to 20 beats per minute on some of my run routes when compared with the same route just a few months ago (those of you who started reading my blog from the beginning will know that one year ago I was just finishing an enforced 3 week lay off as I couldn't actually run or walk much at all);
- in 10 months I've lost a stone in weight (and, unsurprisingly, 4lb of that in the last 3 weeks alone).
Crucially I need to maintain this work rate without getting injured.
This week I also decided to start panicking about all the other MdS kit I haven't ordered yet!
Tuesday, 17 January 2012
Compulsory kit!
The rest of my compulsory kit arrived today from Likeys, the ultra-race specialists:
- an anti-venom pump to remove poison from the stings and bites of desert nasties;
- a signalling mirror for blinding aircraft pilots when I get lost;
- an aluminium survival blanket;
- a Victorinox Swiss Card (compulsory kit requires a knife: this clever piece of kit the size of a credit card has a knife, biro, scissors, nail file, tweazers and tooth pick); and
- a small waterproof medical kit bag (I'll need to decide on the medical bits and pieces I want to take).
 |
| A dress-rehearsal for being bitten by a camel spider |
 |
| That's all there is to the Swiss Card! |
Sunday, 8 January 2012
31 miles of hard work and pain
46 miles this week. It finished today with an easy 10 miles, a mixed run and walk.
On Wednesday, just three days after Sunday's 20 miler (itself after Saturday's 10 miler), I decided to go for a hard 31 mile walk. I told myself no running was allowed at all.
In brief, this was a miserable 8 hours and 40 minutes.
The ground was awful and made walking up or down grassy and muddy inclines tough. This was the day after serious gales made the news headlines, and strong gales continued today. I'd decided before setting out not to bring my iPod for this long, long walk which I've rarely done anyway for the longer training sessions, instead building the mental stamina of dealing purely with what I can see and hear around me: with trees being felled all over the place I figured it was best to have my ears unobstructed.
Although there were light showers for the first couple of hours thereafter it was a drenching, driving rainstorm. I had to stop and battle to put on waterproof trousers over the top of a pair of running longs and running shorts, but the waterproofing didn't last long. My upper body (with 3 thick layers of clothing) was also drenched after a couple of hours and I had to keep my work rate up to maintain some body heat. As I tired this became progressively more difficult and so the cold gradually set in.
I also had 10.6kg in the rucksack, the heaviest weight to date.
After about 4 hours I became aware of a real stinging pain in my nether regions. My soaked waterproof trousers, tight running longs and running shorts had conspired together to start causing the friction that was giving me some serious chaffing. This was a real disappointment because I thought I'd found the answer to these problems in my Nike Dri-Fit shorts. By the time I'd recognised this, having been zoned out for the last several hours, it was too late to do much about it. Not quite having reached my half way point (15.5 miles) I plugged on, grimacing. No amount of adjusting my gait was making any difference to the sawing action my shorts were now making on raw skin.
By now very cold I reached my half way point and turned for home . . . only then realising that my route outwards had been wind-assisted. I then faced just over 4 hours of walking into the gales and driving rain. I took on some food, finished off my 2 x 750ml water bottles and exchanged them for my reserve 2 x 500ml water bottles.
Head down and plugging on . . .
About an hour from home it was dark, so on with the head torch to cross the fields which weren't far off from being flooded.
Having the knowledge of being almost at the end of your destination after a long session does odd things: suddenly the last couple of miles became almost unbearable; questions like Why am I doing this? popped into my head; I became aware of muscle and tendon pains that weren't there before.
It's a bit of a mental battle to swap those thoughts for the reminder that, as soon as you stop, everything feels so much better and it's all over: that feeling of a deep relaxation on stopping, of a sleep-inducing hot bath and good, hot food.
Dr. Mike Stroud's excellent book Survival of the Fittest makes the point that it can't be because of an accident that human evolution has meant our body's longer term memory of these post-exercise "feel good" feelings successfully drown out the shorter-term memories of pain and discomfort from strenuous exercise. Without this survival mechanism our ancestors' first efforts at chasing a woolly mammoth for several days for the cooking pot wouldn't have been repeated. You can imagine our ancestral cave dwellers:
"Fancy coming out woolly-mammoth-chasing for a few days? I'm starving!"
"Nah! Can't be faffed. Last time we did that I got some serious crotch rot from this Nike Dri-Fit loin cloth and those wretched bison waterproofs, I was freezing cold, couldn't move for days and felt half-starved. I'll just sit here and wait for Tesco Direct to be invented."
Hence, so the theory goes, human evolution saw to it that our ancestors' poor short-term memories of pain and discomfort allowed them to get up a few days later and go woolly-mammoth chasing again.
With woolly mammoths now found just a couple of miles away in the local Co-Op or whatever we don't really need to satisfy the body's evolutionary desire to go hunting and gathering for days on end, hence (apparently) we have a theoretical evolutionary reason for why we desire to do daft things like train for 10k races or marathons etc.
I finished my own day's woolly-mammoth hunting of grimness and crawled up the stairs with a satisfying degree of pain in my hamstrings and various tendons from having worked my walking muscles very hard. Slipping into a hot bath was utter agony though, with hot water and Radox stinging some quite serious chaffed raw skin.
Of course, I'd forgotten about the pain a couple of days later when I went out for my shorter sessions to finish the week!
I've now finished a 4 week build-up (with weekly mileages of 31.2, 35.1, 41.8 and 46), rather than the 3 week build-up I was supposed to stick to, so I'm taking a week off if only to allow my chaffing to heal properly.
On Wednesday, just three days after Sunday's 20 miler (itself after Saturday's 10 miler), I decided to go for a hard 31 mile walk. I told myself no running was allowed at all.
In brief, this was a miserable 8 hours and 40 minutes.
The ground was awful and made walking up or down grassy and muddy inclines tough. This was the day after serious gales made the news headlines, and strong gales continued today. I'd decided before setting out not to bring my iPod for this long, long walk which I've rarely done anyway for the longer training sessions, instead building the mental stamina of dealing purely with what I can see and hear around me: with trees being felled all over the place I figured it was best to have my ears unobstructed.
Although there were light showers for the first couple of hours thereafter it was a drenching, driving rainstorm. I had to stop and battle to put on waterproof trousers over the top of a pair of running longs and running shorts, but the waterproofing didn't last long. My upper body (with 3 thick layers of clothing) was also drenched after a couple of hours and I had to keep my work rate up to maintain some body heat. As I tired this became progressively more difficult and so the cold gradually set in.
I also had 10.6kg in the rucksack, the heaviest weight to date.
After about 4 hours I became aware of a real stinging pain in my nether regions. My soaked waterproof trousers, tight running longs and running shorts had conspired together to start causing the friction that was giving me some serious chaffing. This was a real disappointment because I thought I'd found the answer to these problems in my Nike Dri-Fit shorts. By the time I'd recognised this, having been zoned out for the last several hours, it was too late to do much about it. Not quite having reached my half way point (15.5 miles) I plugged on, grimacing. No amount of adjusting my gait was making any difference to the sawing action my shorts were now making on raw skin.
By now very cold I reached my half way point and turned for home . . . only then realising that my route outwards had been wind-assisted. I then faced just over 4 hours of walking into the gales and driving rain. I took on some food, finished off my 2 x 750ml water bottles and exchanged them for my reserve 2 x 500ml water bottles.
Head down and plugging on . . .
About an hour from home it was dark, so on with the head torch to cross the fields which weren't far off from being flooded.
Having the knowledge of being almost at the end of your destination after a long session does odd things: suddenly the last couple of miles became almost unbearable; questions like Why am I doing this? popped into my head; I became aware of muscle and tendon pains that weren't there before.
It's a bit of a mental battle to swap those thoughts for the reminder that, as soon as you stop, everything feels so much better and it's all over: that feeling of a deep relaxation on stopping, of a sleep-inducing hot bath and good, hot food.
Dr. Mike Stroud's excellent book Survival of the Fittest makes the point that it can't be because of an accident that human evolution has meant our body's longer term memory of these post-exercise "feel good" feelings successfully drown out the shorter-term memories of pain and discomfort from strenuous exercise. Without this survival mechanism our ancestors' first efforts at chasing a woolly mammoth for several days for the cooking pot wouldn't have been repeated. You can imagine our ancestral cave dwellers:
"Fancy coming out woolly-mammoth-chasing for a few days? I'm starving!"
"Nah! Can't be faffed. Last time we did that I got some serious crotch rot from this Nike Dri-Fit loin cloth and those wretched bison waterproofs, I was freezing cold, couldn't move for days and felt half-starved. I'll just sit here and wait for Tesco Direct to be invented."
 |
| Note the absence of rucksack, water bottles, trainers, GPS watch, heart rate monitor, energy gels . . . |
With woolly mammoths now found just a couple of miles away in the local Co-Op or whatever we don't really need to satisfy the body's evolutionary desire to go hunting and gathering for days on end, hence (apparently) we have a theoretical evolutionary reason for why we desire to do daft things like train for 10k races or marathons etc.
I finished my own day's woolly-mammoth hunting of grimness and crawled up the stairs with a satisfying degree of pain in my hamstrings and various tendons from having worked my walking muscles very hard. Slipping into a hot bath was utter agony though, with hot water and Radox stinging some quite serious chaffed raw skin.
Of course, I'd forgotten about the pain a couple of days later when I went out for my shorter sessions to finish the week!
I've now finished a 4 week build-up (with weekly mileages of 31.2, 35.1, 41.8 and 46), rather than the 3 week build-up I was supposed to stick to, so I'm taking a week off if only to allow my chaffing to heal properly.
Sunday, 1 January 2012
Getting serious now
Having maintained a good base now without injury (barring any worsening problems with my knee) the serious training starts.
A good start in the week up to New Year's Day (41 miles this week):
- a couple of faster runs to keep the base speed maintained;
- New Year's Eve: a 10 mile session of 5 minute run/5 minute walk with a very light 1kg rucksack;
- New Year's Day: after a late night, up early to drive to south of Dewsbury for the Long Distance Walker's Association's "New Hangover Hike 2012".
As a Challenge event this 20 miler was open to runners. I carried 5.7kg in the rucksack for the 1662 foot of ascent and covered the ground in under 4.5 hours, a steady pace. 2757 calories of Christmas excess disappeared, largely comprised of my mum-in-law's chocolate log (which I've been fueling myself with this week for this event). The terrain was tough under foot: I was slipping and sliding all over the place.
I had been chasing along with a fellow runner for most of the route until the last 5 miles or so, by which time I started getting very tired as my legs were a little zapped. The other guy had a lighter rucksack on: that's my excuse! Within half a mile of the finish he took the wrong turn so I sped up to catch him, thinking this was my opportunity to finally beat the guy.
We agreed the right turn over the canal was the right route and off we sped. At this point it absolutely bucketed down with a hard rain storm. Not long after this sudden burst of speed on my part I was devoid of energy to beat him so he got in a couple of minutes before me!
A good start in the week up to New Year's Day (41 miles this week):
- a couple of faster runs to keep the base speed maintained;
- New Year's Eve: a 10 mile session of 5 minute run/5 minute walk with a very light 1kg rucksack;
- New Year's Day: after a late night, up early to drive to south of Dewsbury for the Long Distance Walker's Association's "New Hangover Hike 2012".
As a Challenge event this 20 miler was open to runners. I carried 5.7kg in the rucksack for the 1662 foot of ascent and covered the ground in under 4.5 hours, a steady pace. 2757 calories of Christmas excess disappeared, largely comprised of my mum-in-law's chocolate log (which I've been fueling myself with this week for this event). The terrain was tough under foot: I was slipping and sliding all over the place.
 |
| 5 minutes before this photo and the finish I was pretty much dry! |
We agreed the right turn over the canal was the right route and off we sped. At this point it absolutely bucketed down with a hard rain storm. Not long after this sudden burst of speed on my part I was devoid of energy to beat him so he got in a couple of minutes before me!
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