So, the day had arrived, it was the morning of my first 50 mile run. I say first, I do believe, I might go again, because the experience was fantastic. It left me wanting more.
My dad picked me up at four o’clock in the morning. I had been up and had my breakfast, which was a cereal, and a cup of coffee. Had the obligatory toilet stop and then we were off.
We drove to Forres. Stopping off at Findhorn Bay so I could see where the turnoff was for later on that day. It was surprisingly calm, the sun just came up yet and the bay was looking beautiful.
There was a little spot of rain in the air. The temperature was nice and cool (Perfect for running, with a west to east breeze). We drove on through to Forres and arrived at Grant Park, it was nice to see the volunteers all waiting to welcome us.
I had, I must admit, over packed of my drop bag. Seeing other people with sandwich bags with a banana and a couple gels. My full wardrobe change and new pair of trainers with millions of other gels was slightly over the top. This would be my first learning.
It wasn’t long until the numbers were dished out, and we were on the start line. Waiting for the race to start. There was a sense of excitement. This would be the first race I would have completed, since the COVID pandemic started. The interesting thing was that although everyone was excited to start. Everyone had their own race plan. When speaking to people at the start, It was quite refreshing to hear how other people think. Their thoughts varied on how they were going to tactically manage their way around the course.
After the race briefing by Kyle. (interestingly, half past 10 the night before, his wife Debbie gave birth to wee boy). He looking fresh as a daisy, as he welcomed us to his hometown of Forres. It was the first race in his new series of The Moray Races. If you have a spare second check the website out. Sign up to a race if you can, it was such a great experience for me, I thoroughly recommend.
Before we knew it a piper started playing. The words three two one go were shouted. My first adventure on my 50 miler was off. My plan was to try and run, roughly 10k an hour, so six minute kilometres would be roughly the pace. This felt quite slow at the start, where the running was good. I knew the future James would benefit and decided to keep the pace in check.
The first part of the run was from Forres to Kinloss. We left Grant Park, headed across the A96, and some back roads, which then brought us around to Findhorn Bay. We were running parallel to the airport at Kinloss. It was nice but although there was no activity, and it was quite nice to run through that area.
I ran with a girl who travelled down from Shetland to run the race itself. This so it was quite nice, keeping time with her. Discussing what her tactics were – mainly around feeding and how often we would eat.
We then went through Findhorn eco Village and this is where we first met, the coastal path itself. Here is where I think I missed the turn. We stayed on the beach for a lot longer than what we should have. We missed the path that ran in parallel to the beach itself. It was early in the race, it felt easy and felt good so continued. The views were just stunning over the beach itself as the sun was coming up.
We took the path, right through to the first aid station. This was at Roseisle in the middle of the forest. This was by far my favourite part of the race. We ran through a forest with the beach on the left just a stones throw away. At this point you can see the coast and how far there was to go to the next check point. The body was feeling good and the pace/nutrition were on point.
The sun started to come up and it was beginning to heat up. I noticed that I was drinking my water a lot lot quicker than I had anticipated. The water stations were roughly 10 miles apart so it was important to strategically monitor calorie intake and fluid replenishment.
The next stop, we went through to was Burghead a good place to see coastal views. A lot of nice running around the coast here. The terrain varying from coastal path narrow to tarmac sections, to sandy beaches. The majority was however tarmac, and the pace was kept consistent to the plan.
The path meandered towards Hopeman and around the edge of Hopeman golf course. We meandered down and on to the beach, which took us closer to Lossiemouth itself. Now this was the first time I felt the benefit of the tailwind. It really benefited us as we came around the beach, towards the big lighthouse. The sun was behind us, and the wind buffeted us along nice there. It was pretty cool.
As a lot of the runners had spread out as far as you could see along the beach. There were just small dots of runners everywhere. We continued down the beach, coming off in the town. We ran through the streets to the first bag drop zone.
I had, as previously mentioned, a large drop bag. I ended up not having to change any clothes. I kept with the trainers I started with because they were feeling very comfortable. If it has not broke don’t try and fix it.
This is when it started to get a little bit tougher for myself. Making my way through a forest,I took a few wrong turns and had to double back on myself. Reaching a bridge, before running directly down to the beach and on to the shale.
On this section towards Kingston. I had to make the decision whether to run, or whether to walk as it was very hot. The effort going into running on the shale was more than I wanted to use at this time in the race.
So I made the conscious effort to walk. What I thought was an eternity, but was only three miles, towards the first bay of Kingston itself. On arriving at Kingston. It was great to see fellows zoom runner there, Mike Munro. When I asked him, What do I need to do to get out of this funk? He said, have some watermelon. I looked at him a bit oddly. Took down the watermelon before asking for a second piece, because it made such a huge difference.
It’s small things like this, and the small motivational chats on the way that made a huge, huge difference. On leaving Kingston, I caught up again with the runner from Shetland. We made our way out across the the river, and we headed into Spey Bay. Before working through the forest, before getting in to Portgordon.
It was lovely running, but the heat of the day had really picked up now. Water was becoming a bit of an issue, because I had ran out quite quickly. I had drunk most of my tailwind. I had been on target for my 300 calories an hour through eating pretzels and smaller bites. I was now struggling to get harder food on board now. I was really lucky to see my dad there, and he was able to offer me some Lucozade and a Trebor extra strong mint.
We then headed through the streets of Buckie, a wee bit more of an elevation here. Portknockie, PortGordon and Buckie all seem a blur and all i seem to remember was that the sea was always on the left hand side, but it was a great views all the same.
At this stage, from Portessie we headed towards Findochty with a lovely piece of running around the coastal path, and quite a steep incline up into Findochty, but the views of Bow Fiddle rock, which were coming up, really spurred me to keep going there.
I must admit I did use the GPS, and it was a lifesaver, as it kept me on the right path, at the right time. I knew that the end was in sight and having my iTunes on at this point, was a great asset to myself. There was one song they played on loop, which had got me through to the end. The part around Port Knockie, was very rocky and very jaggy but very very nice to run on. At the same time, at the end of 50 Miles was quite tricky so full concentration was needed. I then dropped down onto the beach. Tapping the bollard and the 50 Miles was over.
The enjoyment was written all over my face. I enjoyed, not just the day, but the journey to get to the start line. The training for my coach Ginie Barrand was fantastic and really set me in good stead for the event that not only kept me physically fit, but mentally fit during one of the hardest 18 months of my life. It was interesting to have all my friends and family there, and to have that motivation to keep me going. I didn’t really have that prior, and that’s the first time I’ve experienced that and it was fantastic.
I was able to raise 1173 pounds for brains Trust, which does a lot of research into brain cancer and brain tumour awareness, which unfortunately is very very close to my heart now in the last 18 months with one of my close friends, been diagnosed with brain tumour.
Thanks very much for reading, listening, and if you have any questions about the race itself, or if the race is for you, please don’t hesitate to get in contact and ask any questions you wish. And if you ask me if it’s for you. I will see yes. No human is limited. We train for what we want to do, and we shouldn’t be restricted.
Thanks very much, yours in running, James.