Endure 24

 

24 Hours of running fun

Is it any good?

What a weekend it was!! I’ll not tease you with a literal guessing game of a write up, by hiding my summary towards the end, I’ll simply state that Endure 24 was possibly my favourite running weekend ever, full stop. More fun filled miles than I have ever had before. Would I go again? Hell yes! Would I do things differently? Hell yes! I made every rookie mistake known to the running world. Would I run as a pair? Yes. Would I run in the same pair/ Yes…. But next time I’d love to try going Hans Solo.

Quick tips I wish I’d known

1. Take plenty of running changes of outfit, I changed about every 6 hours as I was dripping with sweat, and putting fresh clothes on really helped
2. Take plenty of trainers for different types of conditions
3. We went to cook all our meals but halfway through the race abandoned the cooking and ate from the event tent
4. Next time I’d run solo or in a big team, running as a pair is tough 

Training

Some 12 months ago I decided to take my running to a different place and signed up for my first couple of Ultras after completing the recent Longhorn Marathon (my 10^th marathon), I trained conventionally as a marathoner up to the Longhorn then started doing back to back weekend long runs. Which finally culminated in Running the 40 mile Dukeries challenge, and then I found myself at Endure 24, the 24 hour running event that took place at Wasing Park (near Reading) in June 2018.

The detail and the boring bits…. The weekend

It’s quite a big event in total there are 250 solo runners (these sell out normally on the first day of the application)

And up to 3300 places for pairs, and teams of 3,4,5, 6. 7 and 8 (except pairs, places are available normally up to the actual event)

I travelled as a group of four: Jane (solo entrant), Nic and myself (running as a pair) and an injured runner Dom who would have been another solo runner (but offered his services to marshal for Endure and crew for the 3 of us)

NOTE: if you do fancy marshalling, it comes in minimum of 6-hour stints, you get a £50 M&S voucher, free hot drink, a free T shirt and a hot meal voucher / or entry into next year’s race

The 3 of us were all Endure virgins… come to think of it we were all 24 hour running event virgins! The longest race between us had been the Dukeries 40 mile up until this race.

We arrived about 4PM on the Friday and headed to the solo / pair camping area, which is right on the start line ( this is a godsend for solo and pair runners as the campsite is enormous and would add many more miles to what was to all ready going to be a long weekend).

After we set up we went for an explore, we had the perfect spot just 50M to the start/finish line and 50M to the rear was perfect for cheering on runners returning out of the forest which helped working out the swap over timings

The runners of the group then went to register (you can also register on the Saturday morning) and we decided to have a walk around the route so the runners had some idea of what they were in for…

 

The course

It’s an 8km / 5 mile loop that starts in the main open field, which in turn changes to tarmac, rough ground, forest fire track, knurled grass, and final trippy woodland narrow technical bits and pot hole-y grass. If it’s dry then road shoes are ok but the flint lined tracks did hurt my feet after hours of pounding, if it rains, you’d have to use trail shoes (so I’d take both).

There is a drink (water) station at about 2.5 miles which has water, electrolyte drinks and this year shot blocks gels

The run starts at 12PM on Saturday and finishes at 12PM on the Sunday. You can run as many loops as you like and if you start a loop just before 12PM on the Sunday you can carry on and finish it. In a pair or a team, you can only have one person on the track at any one time, but you can run multiple loops if you wish before handing over to the rest of your team. The handover area for pairs is great, however it’s really cramped for the team handover areas.

 

 

Course profile Heartbreak hill is at just after mile 3

Camp

It’s bigger than you think, there’s over 3000 runners with their family, kids, friends and non-runners, the camp site is festival sized and is organised just like a typical festival which gives it a unique feel. The portaloos were always kept clean and well stocked, there were only a couple of fresh water taps but that didn’t seem to be a problem, I used the site’s showers once which were clean hot and at 6AM had no queue.

Back at camp we bumped into a few more people we knew and then took it easy whilst we prepared dinner, we had planned to cook all our meals over the weekend, but as the race developed and the more tired we got, we abandoned this. Event food which is served all night, was cheapish and very very heavy on the carbs.

We then headed over to the area of the site where the bars and other stalls are… it was at this point we realised that that this was like no other event we’d been to! The bar had run out of cider and beer (the barman had sold double what he did the year before). It’s more of a festival than running race.

The big marque was pumping out the dance tunes … it was just like being in the middle of a music festival with everyone going for it including a guy dressed as Deadpool trying to have a dance off against a load of kids, he couldn’t get the hang of flossing!!! The music finished at 11pm ( it does this every night) and we headed back to the tent, finally heading to bed around midnight almost forgetting that people had to run as far as they could for 24 hours the following day!!!

Sleep for everyone was rudely interrupted by the sound of a chainsaw by the local farmer in the forest behind us at 5am!!! Sleep deprived already!

Once we had breakfasted and got prepped Dom left to attend the marshal briefing at 10:30am for marshalling from 12PM to 6PM where he dedicated himself in mind and soul to ensuring each and every runner got a cheery smile, word of comfort and even sips of his coffee to keep them going

 

The Race

I’d like to say we had a race plan …. I’d really like to say we did, but to be honest we’d noticed from previous races most folk had just done alternate laps, and in the night a few double ones so that’s what we decided to do. The actual race started at 23C and remained in the 20C’s until late evening with a very high humidity. This affected everyone, in particular our solo runner Jane, after the 3 laps we decided to abandon any pair plans we had and run walk every lap with our solo runner to effectively crew for her.

By 8PM people were running their legs off and I think at this point Jane had done 6 laps which is 30 miles. It was time for runners to have headtorches on… As a trio we were doing really well and going strong, and Dom was helping out with drinks and whatever was needed (you need some crew from this point on)

At about Midnight, my partner was struggling with lack of food, heat, and tiredness and we planned for me to take the night shift to jog / walk a few laps with Jane. The night session was tough at first as I struggled to eat due to the heat, humidity and the miles, once it cooled at midnight I started eating everything in sight, chips and curry, bacon butties you name it and lots of fresh coffee (our meal plan and us cooking went out of the window). However once refuelled the night jog walk was actually quite enjoyable apart from the weird things you think you see running with a head torch in the middle of the forest in the pitch black. At about 5-6AM Nic got ready to change over with me as I was flagging.

Jane and I came in and had a well earned rest knowing her next lap would take her to 104k!! the furthest she had run before this was 50k so she had well and truly smashed that already… I also had a rest as the heat and the night was catching up with me big time.

Nic went out for a lap on her own to try and get herself going again whilst the others had a rest… At this point, Dom sent me to bed as I had lost the plot

Nic finished her lap and Jane went down to meet her to start her lap, when they come through the back bit of the course it got really emotional… Jane had well and truly smashed 100k!!!

The next lap Jane went again with me which brought me up 50 miles and the furthest I’d had ever run and then it was time for Jane and Nic to go out one last time… this would be 120k (75 miles) for Jane and 50 miles for Nic, the furthest they have both run!!

The very best thing at Endure24 is for the last lap section they allow the teams to run the last say 800M together and that’s exactly what we did, Dom walked the course with Jane and Nic and I joined in for the last I’m going to call it a sprint,

Once the dust settled, we came 12^th as a pair, as a provisional result, which we are pretty cuffed about as 24 hour virgins.

Night night, we must get some sleep