Marathon Man Read online

  At the top, we continued onto some Land Rover tracks and soon I could hear cheering up ahead. Were women mud wrestling? Was there a shot-drinking competition in full swing? Not quite. There were a couple of old dames and an elderly gentleman, each sitting in their own metal bath, drinking cider. The ladies weren’t naked but the gentleman, who everyone told me later was a farmer, certainly was. Not something you see every day, I thought, and definitely worth a cheer.

  At about mile 8, a marshal kindly pointed out the Cerne Abbas Giant himself – a huge chalk figure, 55m high and almost the same size across, etched into a grassy field. He’s been there since the 17th century, apparently, though no one knows quite how or why he got there. He’s most famous for his giant erection. At 10m long and pointing straight up it’s the kind of thing that sticks in the memory – naked farmers in bath tubs and giant pornographic art. This was my kind of marathon!

  The race continued with amazing aid stations serving up home-made cakes and snacks, and super-friendly marshals, too. This event was clearly a labour of love and White Star Running, the organisers, need to be given all the credit, as well as the Women’s Institute they’d roped in to feed us so well.

  The race continued with uphills and downhills, about nine in total. It was tough going. At mile 20 there was an aid station they had dubbed the ‘Love Station’. They were offering cider, cakes, fruit vodka and big slabs of melon – as well as hugs for all runners. I love a good hug, but someone got a bit carried away and gave me a big smacker on the lips. Sorry about that, Joanna. I blame the Cerne Abbas Giant, who had clearly got everyone’s juices flowing.

  Soon I was coming along the final stretch, a steep downhill to the finish. It had been very tough, but I finished in 4 hours 34 minutes and felt good for it. There was an ice-cream van at the finish line and everyone was standing around in the sunshine eating enormous cones of ice cream and swapping stories. It was a good moment and a nice memory from the year.

  Dustin and William turned up in the car and they were keen to get going. It was a shame to be missing the barn dance they had on for that evening, and I was sure that someday I would come back and take my time down here. But today we had to be up in the Brecon Beacons for a 5.30pm start, so we had motorway time ahead of us. Everyone wished me luck as I climbed into the car and we headed off.

  I snacked on a bag of Tesco’s chicken and bits that I’d bought the day before. I drank a coke and tried to get comfortable in the back of Dustin’s estate car. Resting or sleeping in cars is not my favourite thing, and I’d have plenty of opportunities to get better at it throughout the year but never did. We played I-Spy and ate plenty of chicken and a giant bag of Doritos. I think we might have stopped for pizza by the side of the road at some point, too.

  You need to get calories on board when you’re doing more than one marathon. Healthy, nutritious food won’t replace the amount of calories you’re burning up, so chocolate energy drinks or thick fast-food milkshakes are good, as are burgers and pizzas. I’ve learnt to mix this with nutritious food before and after, but during weekends like this I eat what I want and as much as I want. For some reason I tend to lose my appetite at times, so I have to force myself to eat enough.

  We entered the Brecon Beacons where everything turns deep green and the hills are spectacular. There aren’t many places in the UK you could get lost and it be a problem, but this is one of them. It’s where the British Army and the SAS do their training, pushing would-be soldiers beyond their limits to find out if they’re made of the right stuff.

  We arrived on time for the race briefing, in Talybont-on-Usk, a tiny little village which seemed to consist of a few houses and two pubs. Plenty of tough-looking guys milled around the village hall, which functioned as the race HQ. They were military types, I was convinced of it. I’d heard a lot of SAS guys did this run, and I’d later learn the course covered much of the same ground as the infamous Fan Dance, an SAS training run over Pen y Fan, the highest mountain in the Brecon Beacons.

  The atmosphere even in the car park was unnaturally serious, tense. It felt like a pre-battle gathering (not that I’ve ever actually been to one, but I’ve seen a few movies). This was just a marathon wasn’t it? Or had they dotted the route with Taliban soldiers? I didn’t like it already. Give me naked farmers in bath tubs over this any day of the week.

  Dustin lent me his mobile phone for the race briefing in case they wanted to check my kit list; I had the head torch but most of the other items were missing. The organisers were fantastic and were good enough to lend me the items I didn’t have. The race briefing got underway. It was the most intense of my entire year. I felt like I had to spend a good deal of time that year overcoming other people’s nerves, but this was too much. The race director, who was also wearing a kilt, seemed convinced many of us wouldn’t make it around and would die on the mountain that night. I only listened to part of it, but at the first chance I got I slipped out the back into the car park.

  It’s just a bit of running, I reminded myself. I spent the next ten minutes before the race playing football with William in the car park. Messing around, playing games, and being around children really helps keep me relaxed and light. People are always making the mistake of being too serious for races. I’ve been at countless events and seen runners doing all the right stretches with a look of grim determination on their faces. They’re usually the ones unable to finish the race.

  You really need to let your mind know ‘it’s just a bit of running’. Once you become convinced you are entering the toughest thing you will ever do, you’re almost finished before you’ve started. Don’t believe the hype. Make a joke with someone, imagine everyone naked, sit on a whoopee cushion – whatever chills you out. Don’t get end-of-the-world serious about it or you’ll end up taking the ambulance home.

  By the time the race started, I sensed the race organisers were barely tolerating my relaxed attitude. By the look on their faces, they didn’t expect me to finish so it was good of them to give me the benefit of the doubt, I guess.

  When the race got underway the small field of about 100 runners ran through the village towards the mountains in the distance. Then we turned sharply and started heading up a steep hill. At the top you could see the enormous Talybont reservoir, which we ran alongside, a giant sea of water surrounded by hills. It was quite a sight. The views in the Brecon Beacons are something else and I felt fresh enough to really enjoy them that day.

  The next few miles were generally uphill, but with some downhills thrown in for good measure on the way. The run had over 4000 feet in overall elevation, some of which you could tackle only on your hands and knees. It was tough going, but there was some respite at the first-aid station, about 7 miles into the race. Shot Bloks were on offer but I’d never tried them before so I had a banana instead and the few jelly babies from my pack.

  The views in every direction were stunning. Green, treeless mountainsides, with nothing to obscure your view in all directions, were topped off by moody, gathering clouds. Rain looked imminent and I worried that if those clouds had as much water in them as it appeared, then we might all get washed off the mountain.

  The race continued up to the first peak, Fan-y-Big (curiously named when you consider it’s the smallest of the Pen y Fan set of peaks). Past that we came steeply down the other side before we started climbing again. All these ups and downs were what made this race ‘brutal’. It was relentless and seemed to have been designed by a sadist – or an SAS squadron leader, which is probably much the same thing. My legs were really hurting now, my muscles screaming at me to stop.

  Push on, Rob, I said, push on. It’s just a bit of running.

  It was then I went the wrong way and got lost. It could have been a disaster, but I figured out quite quickly that I’d gone wrong and doubled back on myself. Fortunately, I’d gone only about 500m in the wrong direction, so it wasn’t the end of the world and wouldn’t be the last time I’d end up on a detour during a marathon.

 
After climbing another peak, Cribyn, we started up the highest peak of the lot, Pen y Fan. We were totally exposed to the elements and, though it was mild that day, the wind was all over us. I had to use my hands at some point and walk for quite a bit of the ascents, but I was making progress and it never felt desperate. When I reached the peak of Pen y Fan, it signalled the halfway stage of the race and a medical check point. I was good to go and didn’t linger up there for too long.

  The rest of the race was more of the same, running up and down steep hills, walking for much of it but making progress. It started to get cold and dark, and by mile 20 I was ready for my tent floor until one of the race directors offered me a Shot Blok, which perked me up right away. Then it started to rain, as though the dark and the fatigue and the steep mountain descents didn’t make it dangerous enough. Not long to go now, though, keep pushing on.

  Soon enough I was on the Taff trail running along the reservoir again and down into the village. I was soaking wet and stumbling occasionally on the uneven ground, but in no doubt that I would finish. I got to the start/finish just before 11.30pm, with one more marathon still to run that weekend. Most of the field had finished already, but I hung about to cheer in the remaining runners and to swap stories with some of the guys. I really loved this event, despite the tension at the start. The organisers are some of the best around and the course was well marked and marshalled, with good aid stations. I’d encourage anyone looking for a tough run to give this marathon a go. You won’t regret it.

  Eventually, I left to find our tents in the field behind the race HQ. Dustin and William were already fast asleep in their tent, so I got out of my wet clothes and into some dry ones before zonking out in my tent for a few hours.

  At 5am Dustin woke me up: ‘Rob, Rob! We’ve got to get moving.’

  ‘In a minute,’ I replied.

  ‘But we have to go now. How was the race anyway? Did you finish?’

  We got up and threw the tents into the back of the car any which way. By now the car was a jumble of carrier bags, wet clothes, sleeping bags and tent poles. Finding what you wanted was a case of endless rummaging by now. I got in the back seat with the intention of sleeping some more, but we were on the move and there was I-Spy to play and sunrises to watch so that never happened. I was tired, but I was used to that so my body didn’t go looking for those missing hours’ sleep like it once did.

  At about 7am Dustin, to his credit, pulled over at a mini-market and said we needed to get some food inside me. I don’t know why but I wasn’t hungry. Perhaps my body gets confused with all that it goes through, but I had no desire to replace the countless calories I’d burnt up in the last 24 hours. I should have eaten anyway, forced the food down. In the end calories-in have got to try to measure up to calories-out or you’re going to get exhausted and slump. So I nibbled on some chorizo slices as we went along on another beautiful, summer’s day. And we were off to the beach, too, in Rhyl on the north coast of Wales. How I would have liked to have laid down on that beach for the day.

  I say that now, but at the time I wouldn’t have allowed such thoughts to enter my mind; I was focused on the mission at hand. This was my dream and everything was riding on it. Though it was tough much of the time, having a clearly defined and challenging objective each day makes for a very peaceful life. Run a marathon, eat, rest, survive, negotiate people and repeat. That was all I had to do. It was taking all I had, but maybe that was the secret. By giving my all there was nothing left: no worries, doubts, thoughts of more or less, or what if. There was nothing missing. I was happy like never before.

  Fortunately grace was on my side, too, or so it seemed. I said earlier that it would take a few miracles to achieve my goal, and I would need things that were out of my hands to go my way. Though I’d fail to get at least one of the world records I was after (and fail to raise the kind of money I’d hoped to), enough things went my way for me to feel like someone was watching over me.

  That morning was an example of this. Waking at 5am looked enough time for us to reach Rhyl in three hours. It was 150 miles and some of it was on the motorway, but even without getting lost we still got to the HQ with only minutes to spare. I hurried to get my race number and join the other runners at the start on the beach front. It was all fine margins, but I was always on the right side of them.

  The Runfest Wales marathon was, on paper at least, a straightforward one. We were to run along the beach front on a flat, half-marathon course, and then repeat. It should have been the easiest marathon of my entire year. I’d just run up and down the SAS training routes at night in the pouring rain, so what threat could this beachfront run possibly pose?

  In a word, plenty.

  I can’t tell you much about the route or the occasion because about ten minutes in I was in trouble: I needed food. The aid stations on the route had plenty of drinks, but no food on offer, and I needed a couple of buckets of fried chicken and rice. I hit the wall at about mile 2 – there was nothing left. I think having my legs bent up in the car hadn’t helped. Where was Dominika when I needed her to massage me? Where was a burger van? And where was my wallet to pay for those burgers?

  Nowhere to be found, that’s where.

  I just had to drag myself around, as I had no idea where Dustin and William were. I wanted them to get me some food, but I was running away from them now. I felt like I’d just set sail for America but forgotten to pack the sails. This would be a whole new experience for me – a slow and painful one.

  When I finally returned to the start point 13 miles later, I couldn’t see Dustin anywhere. I had no cash on me or I would have jogged into town to buy a burger. I thought about asking someone for some money, I was so desperate to eat something. The aid stations didn’t have what I wanted in terms of food, so I was stuffed, and not with food, unfortunately. To make matters worse, my kilt was wet from the night before and weighed a ton. I stopped and changed into some shorts, laying out the kilt in the sun by the beach; Marathon Man would have to run without his kilt today. It was an emergency situation and even superheroes have to adapt.

  I’d pinned my hopes on finding Dustin and getting some food, so for the sake of politeness let’s just say I was ‘extremely disappointed’ to be starting my second lap of the course on an empty stomach. It was a case of grin and bear it now. The second lap was a never-ending torture, so by the time the finish line loomed up I was dead on my feet. This time Dustin and William were both there and looked relieved to see me.

  ‘Are you all right, Rob? We thought you’d failed to finish. I’ve been calling around all the check points to see if you’d retired from the race.’

  ‘Where were you at the halfway point? I was looking for you everywhere,’ I said.

  ‘Shit! Sorry, man. We were on the beach.’

  It turns out one man’s journey through hell is another man’s beach holiday.

  The race had taken me more than five hours. A simple flat road marathon, one where runners come to record a personal best, had become for me a hugely unpleasant ordeal, my toughest marathon to date when I finished 108th out of 118 who completed the race. After the other two epic marathons that weekend, I’d made the mistake of thinking the worst was behind me. How wrong could I be.

  It shouldn’t need saying, but I’ll say it anyway: if you’re going to run multiple marathons then EAT PLENTY OF FOOD. Still, I had finished. I had gone through hell and kept going, and this is part of why we run marathons.

  There are many reasons not to do a marathon or an ultra marathon. There are risks of injury and pain, a loss of your spare time in order to train and the expense of getting all the kit. But if you want to do one, then decide to do it and don’t look back, that would be my advice. Decide to go through whatever it takes to get to your goal. It will hurt up to a point, but then it will go numb and it won’t get any worse after that. When you eventually cross the finish line, the feeling of success will overshadow all that you’ve been through to get there. And that was my emotion w
hen I finally completed my third race of the weekend.

  But before I could get something to eat, I had to find my kilt. I returned to the spot I had left it, drying in the sun, but it was nowhere to be seen. I asked at the race HQ, but no tartan of any kind had been handed in that day.

  ‘Someone’s nicked my kilt,’ I said to Dustin. ‘What kind of a person steals someone else’s kilt?’ I was tired and hungry and in no mood for being philosophical. We headed off to the nearest fried chicken restaurant and got some takeaway.

  It had been a triumphant weekend, or so everyone kept telling me. We’d managed to get to every race in time for the start and I’d handled the running well until the end. My decision not to eat much on the Sunday morning had been a big mistake and had made things a lot harder than they’d needed to be, but at least I had got round and in one piece.

  I was pissed off about that kilt, though.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Solving the Enigma

  29 June–6 July 2014

  The drive back from Wales was a long one and I had time to think about things. I loved these weekends away: they were an adventure and I was thriving on how much they tested me, but I missed Joanna and Buddy. I wasn’t seeing them enough and I didn’t know when I could change that. I also missed my daughter Olivia, and wasn’t sure when I’d get to see her next. Dustin dropped me off at the flat and I went in to find Joanna and Buddy. I had called them from his phone earlier in the day, so they knew I was OK and still in one piece. I gave Joanna a big hug and scooped up Alexander, who was smiling with everything he had.

  ‘I’m exhausted,’ I told Joanna.

  ‘Let me get you some food,’ she said. ‘You lie down here with Buddy.’

  I did as I was told. I felt my left leg, which was badly swollen and needed Pippa to get onto that. Alexander didn’t want to lie around; he wanted me to play Lego with him on the floor. So, by the time Jo came back with my dinner, Buddy and I were playfighting on the living-room floor. She looked at me like I was being naughty.