MARCHing to Namibia #3

The MARCH is now taking on the Namib Desert, in Namibia. 5 desert marathons in 5 days.

Thought to be the oldest desert in the world. We have already MARCHed across the hottest (Sahara), the driest (Atacama), the windiest (Gobi) and the trendiest (Wadi Rum, Jordan where Lawrence of Arabia hung out). The Namib will make for 1,220 km of desert running and a new addition to our ‘est addiction. And we’re going to plog the adventure…!

Read our thoughts as they were recorded in real time – from the bottom up below. And to see everyone’s comments in reply at the time go to www.facebook.com/MARCHAdventureRacing

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29 March 2013

The Desert is done for one & all.

Time to move on – planning & dreaming of the next MARCH adventure.

And the only way to close this plog?? Well, with Big Daddy of course! The photo (taken part way up) doesn’t do justice to the immensity of this beast – one of the biggest sand dunes in the world & part of the race course! Like climbing a small mountain!

Top effort from all & a big thanks to Terry & Nell from Kinetic Enduro events for putting on a great Namib Desert Challenge 2013.

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28 March 2013

51 degrees Celsius in the sun at 2pm. Official temp in the shade that day was 42 Celsius so the sun temp looks right. But that wasn’t the hottest day & nor was it the only challenge offered up by a timepiece….

While running through the Wadi Rum Desert in Jordan last year I plogged about the sensation that I was running up the inside of an hour glass. That the endless desert dunes felt like I was stuck inside an infinite hour glass – where more grains of sand fell than each step dispensed with. That the pile of sand before me seemed to grow, rather than diminish, with each falling second.

The more time I spend running deserts, the deeper the metaphor holds. For it is not just in the kinetic sense of painfully slow motion but also, in the horological sense of laboured time. With a target of 5 to 6 hours on a normal day and 12 to 15 on a double day you find each grain gains a lunar force – resistant to the normal gravitation pull to drop swiftly & force time to pass. While happily descending during periods of rest, during each daily struggle time slows and each grain of sand must be manhandled downward to mark the passing time.

And so it was today in Namibia. With the longest day of 55km to face time slowed both in perception and reality. Canadian Christine reports “it was a long haul, with long flat runs on the road, that never seemed to end”. But she worked her way up & over that infinite hour glass of sand to retain her first placed woman ranking! 7.5 hours of slog delivered her to the finish at Dune 45, which had to be climbed to the flag and back down. So with time now accelerating as she rests, it is a big big cheer for the MARCH’s favourite athlete in Namibia. One day to go. A tough final day taking on Big Daddy – one of the largest Dunes in the world – but the race has been broken. The hour glass has nearly run dry!

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27 March 2013

1. Thank you for the lovely comments you fabulous people! Feel worse today. Like I’m listening to everyone underwater. My legs have been swapped for an old mans & coughing is my new mode of communication. It was the right decision.

As you all say, we move on – we MARCH on – all is fine in the world. So here’s a shot of my wee home in the desert. The race field was smaller than expected so I got my own tent – that’s a first! You normally sleep up to 10 in a big sweaty stinky sardine like tent. Temperature in the 50’s Celsius but I’m a Kiwi – so it’s still All Black for apres!

2. With the African sun setting on my Namibian adventure (sorry the view justifies the cliche!) this is a plog of 2 parts….

Firstly, a final thank you to all for the sound words & super support, as I box this race up & store it away. I’ve always wanted, but never managed, to understand classic poetry. But I do find amazing poetry in the words of great mountaineers. Those who travel through & beyond the Death Zone have a way of putting things – a way that is both understandable & compelling. They speak of mountains but like all great poetry it applies deeper & further. I thought I would finish this part with the words of Anatoli Boukreev, for me the hero of the ’96 Everest tragedy (but for some the villain). Like most great mountaineers he is no-longer with us, but he put it like this – “Mountains are not stadiums where I satisfy my ambition to achieve. They are the cathedrals where I practice my religion.”

Secondly, the race MARCHes on! And I am getting updates from my racing companion Canadian Christine, who I previously raced with in the Atacama & Jordanian Desert. She is still going super strong!! She is still first woman & today she smashed it! She reports a very long & hot day where 11 of them got lost but she put the hammer down & came in 3rd overall! Smashing almost all of the men in the field & coming in only 20 minutes behind the 2nd placed man. A legend of the sand. Go Go Go Christine!!

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26 March 2013

Err, Day 2 is NOT done…!

I’ve pulled the bloody pin. Body just isn’t right. Done enough of these to know I’m crook so made the hard decision at about 29/30km today.

I’m not going to wax lyrical about the lessons learnt from failure. I just don’t think there’s any poetry in the matter. I may well learn from it but it’s pretty basic & pretty mechanical for me – and I’m not going to justify it with a teach-in. I’ve had a great run of 4 great multiday desert ultras but my 5th – at least in Namibia – wasn’t meant to be. Some races just don’t work out. You push pretty hard, normally searching for and overcoming your limits, but sometimes your limits get their own back.

I could stop there really. A postmortem isn’t always appealing, and no doubt reads like an excuse. I guess in some ways it is an excuse. I prefer to call it a reason, but there is a fine line between the two – I’m aware of that. All I know is I have done a bunch of stuff over the years and this felt wrong – badly wrong and I wasn’t comfortable with how things were going. As much as we should MARCH hard, sometimes the limit is harder. Read on only if you care for the gory details – be they excuses or reasons!

There were 2 issues. I’ve moaned a little about the achilles. It was a little worse than I had put it. I did it about 3/4 weeks ago. Last time I did it, 9 months of treatment resulted. This time I gave them 3 weeks. The medics said I shouldn’t go but of course I ignored them. They had done a great job as I could walk without pain when I arrived, I just couldn’t run. But I had to run. I’m a runner. And it’s so hot you gotta get to the finish as soon as you can. There was a cost to pay and soon I couldn’t walk without pain either.

But pain is part of the ultra deal. It’s tied up in the bargain. That was fine, but today the pain started traveling up my leg, and then I started to shake and shiver (its was 54 degrees c in the sun today so the shivering seemed a little odd).

I pressed on running the first 2.5 hours but there was another issue I hadn’t mentioned. On the day I left London I picked up the perennial cold currently traveling round London. I joked that on that timing, it would hit its peak on day 1 or 2 of the race – and so it was. The hacking cough was a drag, but one I could live with. But the congestion was tough. The blocked ears and the mucus and the hard breathing was starting to drain me. But the final decision was made at about 30km. There was steep sand due out of CP2. I wasn’t sure I could make it to the top. I just had nothing in my legs – it was the viral load that took me to the limit. I had been climbing mountains in Scotland a month ago with ease. I had run 44 miles non stop the month before that and felt fine. But suddenly I felt like a wee child – overwhelmed by it all. My quads are normally my strongest muscle and greatest friend – they love being hammered. But today, on that sand dune, they deserted me in every respect. I started to feel scared. A weird sort of fear. I didn’t understand why my body was failing and I started to worry. Really worry. A fear crept over me. I had no power to get out of trouble. I had no power to step forward. I felt weak. I felt vulnerable. I felt like I had never felt in a race before. It had to stop. I had to stop. So I did.

I’m sorry to my fellow MARCHers, particularly my family. And most of all my wife. The Good Dr – Babes – Nicola. You have suffered more than me with 4 month old Dulcie and 3 year old Finlay to juggle. I am sorry I could not repay your suffering with a finish. I have loved having everyone’s support from around the world. We will MARCH again!

Life goes on. It is what it is. I feel gutted. I feel a sense of loss and failure. But I should. I did fail and I did lose. But only here, now, in this race. I am ok calling it what it is but then putting it in a box and knowing it was only what it was – nothing more, nothing less. To coin and adapt a famous mountaineer’s conclusion to an equally famous book – there are other deserts in the lives of men.

Kia kaha

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25 Match 2013

1. Day 1 done! Fairly tough session. Temperature in the sun at 2pm was 52 degrees C ! Hot baby hot!

Mixed terrain. To CP1 (17km) pretty good underfoot – hardpacked with light dusting of an inch or so of sand. Ending with a tough unrunable climb over a small rocky range. CP 1 to CP 2 all soft sand. The dreaded dried river bed. Short’ish at about 8 km but a hard slog. CP 2 to Finish (17km) was a mix. Long slow climb of about 5 km. Runable if it was training – not so runable on day 1 of an ultra. Ran bits of it. Achilles was pretty vocal by then so CP2 to finish involved a lot of walking for me. I probably walked something like 15 of the 17km. Unusual for me but the tendon was talking & I was forced to listen! After the long climb there was a steep rocky section and then a long gradual downhill drag to the finish. Achilles pretty sore now so tomorrow may be interesting.

Winning time was 3 hours 20. Respect! He’s running Western States this year so he’s the real deal. Think I trundled in at about 5 hours 36. Like I said before arriving, for various reasons this has had to become an adventure rather than a race. That’s fine. She’s gonna be all of that!

Time to find some shade, put my feet up & talk myself in to enjoying some energy powder!

(oh, naughty iPhone will NOT do what it should & find a data link so struggling to upload photos!)

2. Camo getting ready to start day 1 in Namibia

2.MARCHing into the African sunrise ultra marathon style

3. The top of what we say was the unrunable rocky ridge – see day 1 update above. The only person that ran it is the guy in first place.

4. Thanks 4 the comments + following fellow MARCHers. This little MARCHer is hitting the sack – well actually its too hot for that – shirtless in my tent lying next to my ‘sack’ + still too hot at 8pm.

2 k longer tomorrow – 44km + sand dunes. Bring it on!

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24 March 2013

1. Kit check cleared, camp set up, back to lodge for last supper! Just eat Zebra! And Springbok! Not sure how I feel about that – 5 days penance in the desert should resolve matters! Day 1 starts at 7am. 42km. Only 2 checkpoints – must watch fuel + water consumption.
2. Camping in Africa proper, after a dinner of game, feels a bit ‘different’ to the other desert ultras – can’t imagine how my flimsy tent will keep out the Big 5?! Maybe I could throw some of the rocks I’m sleeping on at them….All in the mind, of course, but the thought has just disturbed my plan for an early night. Luckily I’ve got my pre race stout to send me off to the land of nod!

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23 March 2013

We plogged the importance of foot care below, but food probably comes first. Screw up either and the race is dead – but screw up ya food and you are too!

Two general rules I stick to:

1. If it tastes like crap on a 1 hour training run it’s gonna kill you on an ultra. Forget it. Go for something you can stomach. Ignore the scientific, calorific justification – you’ve gotta eat it. A multi day desert ultra is an exercise in suffering. Your brain is screaming out reasons to stop. Throw some rubbish food in to the mix and you’ll stop in your tracks. Carbo gels make you want to heave? Me to! Black listed.

2. More is more. I’ve done less is more – in ultras it aint. During the Marathon des Sables across the Sahara I went super light and super stupid. I lost over 5 kilos in 7 days. It certainly didn’t help my running! I was broken and breaking further. I now eat a lot, even when I dont want to. Every hour something goes in my mouth – whether I feel like it or not.

So, what about the specifics??

Well, as always, it’s pretty personal. But having done a bunch of these things across a bunch of different deserts I’ve got it wrong enough times to know the following works for me:

1. Breakie

Tried cereals. They work well but you gotta mix them with something really. To start with I carried powdered milk. Then I got sick of the weight so started mixing it just with water. See rule 1 above. I now cant eat cereal – ever! So I go for these cereal bars. 2 for breakie plus a sugared coffee (that’s just me – I gotta start with caffeine).

2. Powders

 

 

Right, there’s plenty out there. I’ve tried a few and settled on Hammer from the USA. Natural, organic everything – and most importantly, a very high calorific value per weight.

I mix the Perpetueum with my water throughout the day. Lots of it. I’ll get through 800 calories per day just from Perp.

Crawl across the line at the end of each die feeling like death? Yep, we cant change that but as you’ve gotta do it all again the next day you gotta get some complex carbs, protein and aminos in to you quick. Recoverite will do that.

The flavours in both are mellow so they’ll stay down and do the job.

3. Electrolytes

DO NOT forget about our little friend sodium (salt) and his pals. Miss them out running across the desert and you could wake up dead – or worse. In Jordan last year it was hitting mid 50’s celcius in the sun (which is where you run incidentally – forget the weather report temperature in the shade – there isn’t any).

Drinking water without replacing your sodium is deadly. They call it hyponatremia and it’s no fun. We know someone who suffered from this in one of our races. After 9 months in hospital he was still battling through rehab. Really really horrible and so so tragic. You must replace your salts! Hammer Endurolytes do the trick well.

4. Day food

Like I say above, I eat every hour, and I dont stop to eat. I have to be able to reach it in my belt pocket and stuff it down my throat on the hoof. I mix technical and simple. I use a technical energy bar from Hammer. They are tasty (see rule 1) and very soft. Forget hard bars like powerbars. You dont have the energy to chew hard and by the time you have found it, you will have choked. I can’t stand carbo gels but you do need a quick release carb for those really low patches. I find the pure simple sugar kicks of sweets and jelly beans too manic. Boom and bust. I think you need something a little more linear. I find Bloks work well. Like a scientific wine gum. Tasty but a little more sophisticated in their energy kick.

I then throw in some salted cashews and macadamias. I like the taste. The salt is good and there’s protein there too. And for a ‘sweet’? Yoghurt coated cranberries. Hmmm tastes like heaven when you’re sick of everything else.

I keep all this stuff on easy access in belt pockets and over the course of a 6-15 hour day this is what I eat, along with my Perp, which is also delivering me a lot of calories.

5. Evening food

The Namib race is different to the rest I’ve done as they are supplying the evening meal. Normally I go with a high calorie dehydrated number – aiming for 800 cal in a pack. Not sure what they’ll give us this time. But I have decided to throw in a couple of soups, just in case….More because I find deserts get cold at night and a hot soup really picks me up. Not really looking for much food value particularly – just heat and flavour. The miso is a new addition post Jordan. One of our mates had some and the flavour was so different to everything else I just craved it. You soon start obsessing about any flavour enhancer after days of the same so miso is my little evening treat!

6. Packing

Endless running, across endless sand, for endless days does funny things to your mind. Simple things become quite difficult. You start counting things wrong and worrying about whether you’ve got enough. I bag all my food in to individual day packs. That way I know that’s all I’ve got and it gives me comfort to have the direction of what to eat on what day. Obviously losing all the packaging, as you need to cut down the weight. Some races have long days, which are a double marathons so its good to fix each pack for each day depending on the distance. You can also count up your calories for each day and make sure you’ve got enough per day. Maybe it’s just me but I feel more comfortable knowing its all sorted. Measuring out your daily portions of Perpetuem powder in the desert aint gonna work. If you look closely you will see each bag has a number of different bags inside. All my powders are measured out and labelled. I even split my Perp in half. In Jordan my crazed mind thought it was a good idea to pour all the Perp bag in to my bladder each day and just let it dilute over the course of the day as I refilled….Clearly what actually happened was I drunk all my Perp in the first 2 hours. It took me 3 days to work out why I was crashing and burning 3/4 hours in to the day – doah! With it split between 2 bags that wont happen again!

Righto, so that’s the fuel blog.

MARCH on – but with full stomachs!!

 

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22 March 2013

An army might march on its stomach but a desert ultra runner really does march on his feet. And you’ve just got to get your system right – from preparing your feet, to clothing your feet, to looking after your feet. This is our approach:

1. Prep = go naked. Or at least, barefoot. Spend as much time as you can, all year round, barefoot. Indoors, outdoors – all doors! In the UK people think you’re odd. In NZ, where we grew up, they don’t even notice. Your feet really harden up and seem to cope much better with the desert thrashing. When you can comfortably jog across gravel barefoot you know you are there.

2. Clothing = shoes are obviously key. It’s a very personal choice. Be prepared to experiment and if it doesn’t feel 100% right it isn’t right. DO NOT TRY AND RUN ACROSS A DESERT IN THEM. Lots of people suggest you go 1 or 2 sizes bigger to allow for swelling. I find that is too much. Your feet slip too much in the shoe and you bruise your toes as they bash on the end of your shoes. I go for .5 of a size bigger. Having tried everything, I find North Face Single Track II shoes great. They have a snake plate in the sole to protect from rocks but they are still light and flexible. They breath well and they have good grip. Decent shock absorption and they seem well made. After smashing them in 6 consecutive desert marathons in Jordan they were still in good shape.

And you MUST keep the sand out. Standard gaiters do not work – trust me! They do not seal properly and keep falling off. Waste of time. As below, I use handmade (Sandbaggers in Scotland) parachute silk. They have drawstrings mid calf and top so no sand penetrates. I get the local cobbler to glue AND stitch them to the shoe. Means you cant take them off but it also means the sand cant get in – and you just roll them down when you are on hard pack (and the silk breathes very well).

Socks? I go crazy. I wear Injinji finger socks AND over the top of that, Hilly Twin Skins. AND I lubricate every toe before putting them on. That’s 3 layers! Sounds excessive and you’d think it would be too hot. Maybe I am lucky and don’t have sweaty feet but I have no problems. With multiple layers of fabric the layers of fabric slide, rather than the layers of skin – bingo! Again, personal choice, but I have run 6 consecutive desert marathons across all the deserts above without barely ever getting a blister.

3. Foot care = the second you feel ANYTHING isn’t right you MUST stop. Do not put it off until the checkpoint or another mile. There’s a crease in your sock that you can feel? Stop, fix it! Hot spot? Yes, its the start of a blister, stop and treat it! Treatment of choice? Old skool! If its blistered, pierce it first (with needle sterilised in a flame), and pour iodine on it, and leave in the air. Stings like hell but kills the bugs and quickly dries it out. Try and go barefoot all evening – taking your shoes and socks off the second the days racing finishes. The heat and dust of the desert actually works really well to harden up the skin and get it ready for the next day. A lot of people tape. I don’t tape anything. I find it traps moisture, softening the skin and creating bigger issues. Better to harden and dry your skin and expose it to the air.

MARCH on!

 

 

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