Ultra Tour Yorkshire Dales 50k

Another 50k under my belt and this one was a goodie. A really nice route with plenty of scenery plus challenge. The weather was pretty good considering and whilst it was a bit chilly I never had any issues with staying warm and no rain!

Kick things off in Grassington, managed to a) get there on time and b) pass kit check both of which were the cause of some last minute anxiety. The first bit out of Grassington until we reach the actual start of the trail around Moor Lane felt good. I tried to focus on keeping it easy, happy to walk bits to begin with. I didn't overly look at my heart rate but got kilometre summaries on my watch and appeared to rapidly enter the "race heart zone" where my heart rate is completely decoupled from my RPE. Things feel like I'm taking it gently at 4/5 RPE and I try to settle into a race for the first stretch down to Winterburn reservoir. This all feels good and on the descent down I feel strong and get a good pace. Next is the first real climb up to Weets top which I walk and tag team with a 100k runner. The climb isn't overly steep but does go and go and I feel like I take it at a measured effort. My mind is always on the Birks fell climb to come and making sure I have enough in the tank for that. Once on the top it's a bobbly track where we walk/run bits until you hit the road to Malham and I used the Malham stop to top up a new SuperCarbs flask. We run around the tarn and start a bit of a climb that is the Monks path to Arncliffe. This I take slightly slower and lose my 100k pal, once on the top the path I get back to a run but isn't a overly flowy path so it's a little bit piece meal working my way along here. I've tried to research this bit with geograph and google maps and am happy I know where I am what is coming. The descent into Arncliffe is gradual until it's sudden! You have to take it carefully and I don't really get to pick up much pace. Pit stop at Arncliffe which I used for a little bit of food, toilet and fill another SuperCarbs. I hit around 25km just over 3h and think this is going reasonably well.

My legs feel OK but I have sort of forgotten the next stint is actually a flattish section to Litton before the climb. This section was a bit meh, didn't feel very flowy and whilst I didn't think I was going too fast on reflection I probably was going a little quick. Maybe I start bonking here but I definitely start to lose some momentum particularly with the looming climb. At Litton the Birks Fell climb starts and boy this was a hill! Unlike Eryri with its unrelenting dry slate this was a proper grassy, boggy in places hill but equally unrelenting. I was slow here and found ascending hard mostly from an output perspective (my legs felt OK) so it was very grindy work, making goals out of fence posts to keep motivated, trying to eat stuff and drink to keep energy levels. I got passed a lot and tried to not let it get it me (which it mostly didn't). At the top I got a strong deja vu of Ilkley moor with heather and big slaps for the path. This helped me get back into a run and start the descent feeling a lot better. I managed to catch up with several of the people who passed me which also helped. Coming down was on a much boggier side than the side we climbed but I was able to run most of it. Descending was tough though and as I approached the track to Buckden I felt depleted. With a little over half my flask of SuperCarbs left I was keen to find the water station to refill.

However at Buckden it turned out this was just a CP for the 100k (who were separating from the 50kers) so no refill for me and my choices in Arncliffe started to look sketchy. I'm still not quite sure what happened here, the race details were a little unclear if there was a 50k CP I could have gone to but anyway. I got myself in trouble here because I had been relying on the liquid calories at this point and now I was likely to run out long before hitting the next water station. The next bit along the Wharfe which was flat became largely a slog because I was low on fluids, eventually topping up my flask in the Wharfe because heck why not. But this meant I didn't eat and got well behind on calories which meant I just slogged things out. This was a mix of running and walking, trying my hardest to find a sustainable pace, whilst I was able to hold it for stints I just couldn't get a comfortable rhythm going until I got passed by two other runners who I was able to run with and have them keep me honest. We eventually made it to Kettlewell (where I thought all my water issues would be solved) but it transpired the water stop wasn't for another a mile. I did take the opportunity to grab some water from the public toilet in Kettlewell but had been without SuperCarbs for about an hour and hadn't eaten a lot either. I couldn't quite run the entire mile along to the water stop so drank some water tried to eat something. Just as the dales way leaves to road to climb up the water station appeared! Here I was finally able to refill my 2 final SuperCarbs flasks with about 10k to go and here I pair up with fellow Team CH Coaching runner! We walk the short but sharp climb and get to the top and make a run/walk of it until there's about 2 miles to go and I can feel my energy coming back and legs feel good. So I turn it up and try and make something of a strong finish. I feel remarkably good and am drinking the SuperCarbs so I'm carried to the finish feeling strong.

I'm dead pleased to have finished and really enjoyed myself out there. Also pleased to not experience any strong urge to just quit when things got tough. Did I succeed in not going out to hot? Difficult to say, I felt like I paced the first half reasonably well and was eating and drinking reasonably well. I clearly should haver better used the Arncliffe aid station to fill up more of my bottles and probably also should have taken the time to eat a bit more of the food they had. Whilst the climb up to Birks Fell was hard (and I clearly could do with working on my power hiking ascending) the bit I'm more disappointed about was my consistency back on the flats. I really struggled to find my rhythm and consistency here.

On nutrition I didn't hit my race goals, I ate 2.3x Veloforte bars, 2.3x Veloforte chews, a packet of crisps from the aid station plus some slices of orange and 4.3x 500mL flasks of SuperCarbs. I relied heavily on SuperCarbs because it was easy to consume and sat well and started out on bars but switched to chews on the big climb and sporadically towards the end. I had a big period from top of Birks Fell down to Kettlewell where I didn't really eat anything and finished less than a full flask of SuperCarbs which almost certainly didn't help things. I lost consistency eating even in the first half largely due to being overly reliant on my watch buzz to tell the time and also from chatting to other runners. Those are two things I can control so definitely areas to work on.

Kit wise very happy with how everything worked. New vest worked well, wore the protium lite fleece the whole way round which was excellent. Made the decision early on Birks Fell to put on my wind proof before things got too cold and was happy with my choice. Particularly as it stayed cold/windy the rest of the day. Shoes were good although had an annoying outbreak of tongue slippage and discomfort on the last 20km. I'll need to investigate what caused this because it's never happened before but was distracting.

I'm not overly wound up by the fact I was quite a bit slower than the three dales trail race. It's something that I'll probably think a little bit more about the further I get from the race. I'd obviously love to be faster or maybe more specifically would love it if I could consistently run most of the runnable bits but I'm also not overly driven by getting a specific time (although I'd be lying if I said I didn't think about it). I'm largely left feeling like I'd definitely like more practice at the 50k distance just to hone my approach to these style of events. Alongside that is also probably just more practice of what it feels like to be 4h+ on my feet which I am still relatively new to.

Overall though happy with this day out, lots of good stuff and lots to learn from. A big thank you as ever for your help and guidance getting me prepared for it!