Lakeland 100 Reccies - a view from the back

After several years of running the Lakeland 50/100 events I had decided to give them a miss this year; partly because an active weekend at that date didn't really fit with other things I have on for the year and partly because I didn't fancy getting involved in the inevitable scramble for places when entries opened on 1st September last year. The races filled up in something like 20 minutes, so it seems some sort of ballot is inevitable in future. That's the way of the ultra world now, contrasting with the first time I did the Lakeland 100 when  I put my entry in around Christmas I think.

It's always a good weekend though so I decided to volunteer to help. I guess I'll end up kit checking or suchlike in July, but volunteers were also asked if they could help out at the official "reccie" weekends. The idea of these is to give prospective entrants a chance to explore the course and meet some of their fellow competitors. The organisers also arrange some  talks on the afternoon before the actual outing on the course, covering topics like training, navigation and so on. It's a format that's been run successfully for some years now, and I thought it might be interesting to get involved so I said I was in. I expected I might be manning a checkpoint or something, but I was asked if I could be a "support runner". The idea is to have a few people who know the course spaced throughout the field on each reccie, to help out if anyone needs a hand or gets into trouble. The brief is to avoid doing any actual guiding as one purpose of the reccies is to get prospective competitors finding their own way around the course, but to try and make sure no-one gets too lost and that everyone who starts out shows up at the finish. This seemed like a good deal, a nice day out in the Lakes with a free bus to the start so I said yes straight away. Being still on something of a road to recovery from last year's injuries and not wanting to go too fast anyway, I volunteered to sweep (run behind the field and make sure that no-one gets left behind)  and I've done this for the first two reccies.

Now sweeping in an actual race (so I'm told), particularly in the latter stages of a long one, can be a bit of a tiring affair. You're likely to spend time with the final one or two competitors, and if they start to struggle you have accompany them probably quite slowly to the next checkpoint. Then if they drop out you have to get something of a shift on to catch up with the new tail end of the field before the process repeats itself. But for the reccies you have none of these problems; they're not particularly long days out so unless there's a disaster everyone's going to finish, no-one gets too distressed and you get a good day out with some nice people.

The first reccie was in November from Coniston to Buttermere. A bit of rain, a bit of mist, typical for the time of year, but it's a long, tortuous journey of two hours or more from Buttermere to Coniston by bus so we didn't get away particularly early and it was inevitable that the slower runners would finish in the dark. After a steady afternoon I put my torch on going up Black Sail Pass. The guy that I was with had actually done the course before, so the descent in the dark down to the bridge over the Liza and the Youth Hostel didn't come as a shock  -  as it clearly had done to runners I have been with on at least two Lakeland 100 events who hadn't reccied the course beforehand and who kept asking rather nervously if I was absolutely sure that it goes down here....

The second reccie last weekend was a short affair, 15 miles from Ambleside over to Coniston  -  the "finishing stretch" for both 50 and 100 events. But this one was timed to ensure that everyone got a chance to run (and navigate) in the dark. The talks were earlier in the day this time and the field set off from Ambleside at around 4.30pm. At the start I asked Terry Gilpin, one of the race directors and the course and reccie guru, what time the last runner finished this particular reccie last year  -  just before midnight was his warning. I said we would try to do better.

It was a pleasant evening, not too cold with a gentle breeze, with the odd spatter of snow or rain, difficult to tell which in the dark. It was interesting to watch the navigation techniques of the various people I was with through the evening. Some favoured the map, others the "roadbook" - a fairly detailed written description. I didn't see anyone following a GPS trace, so one up for the traditionalists, in my bit of the field at least! The last three miles from Tilberthwaite up and over to Coniston were a new experience for me in the dark; in the L100 it's always been into Sunday morning by the time I got to here, and on the one occasion I ran the L50 I (just) made it in the fading daylight of Saturday evening. So some learning for all of us. We all made it safely back to Coniston with the last group finishing in fine order just before 9.30pm, in plenty of time for a pint of Coniston Bluebird in the Black Bull before setting off home.

Next up is Buttermere to Dalemain at the end of March. It's the weekend after the Hardmoors 55 for me, but I somehow think it will still be a good day out.

Anglesey Coast Ultra

This was the third year running that I had entered the Anglesey Coast Ultra. In 2013 it was cancelled due to snow and in 2014 I was cancelled due to having a bad leg, so it was time that the race and I got our act together.

The Endurancelife coastal series comprises a number of events all based on scenic coastal locations around the UK. The only one I had run previously was the Exmoor Coast ultra back in 2013 and I had enjoyed it a lot. Each event in the series follows a common format of four races all starting and finishing at the same point. The "marathon" makes a complete loop of somewhere around 26-28 miles, the half marathon cuts the loop short and the 10k cuts the loop even shorter to give a race of 6-7 miles. The ultra completes the the marathon route then repeats the 10k to give a distance of between 32 and 35 miles. It's a format that is easy to organise and marshal (and of course gives competitors whose race doesn't go quite as planned on the day a softer option if required!). The courses are fully marked so no navigational skills are required. This last feature is not really my thing and the entry fees are quite high, but they do provide races in the winter months that are usually less affected by the weather than mountain events, and the "sign up, turn up and go" ambiance makes them easy to enter.

I was looking forward to the run, but was still a bit apprehensive on four counts. The main one was that it is a long time since I've run an ultra. I completed several last year with a combination of a lot of walking and a bit of jogging, but although the coastal series ultras are not long (this one was billed as 32,7 miles with 3550 ft of ascent) you have to maintain a steady 4 miles an hour to beat the cutoffs, and over any normal UK coast path this needs quite a bit of running. Still, I had to start again somewhere. Secondly, I was carrying 12lb or so additional ballast from a fairly lazy year and an indulgent Christmas holiday period, but again this is no real excuse not to go. Thirdly, after careful progress over nearly nine months now of recuperation I had tweaked a hamstring a week earlier and hadn't dared to run since, though I had walked every day. I hoped it would be OK. Finally, when I checked the weather forecast on Thursday it was far from promising  - high onshore winds, 4 degC maximum and periods of sleet and rain. But then I thought of what the Spine racers had been battling through this week and decided that these sort of conditions would seem like a day on the beach to them so I had better just get my plastic mac out and get on with it.

Anglesey's not too far for me so a 6am start from home saw me down there in good time for formalities at the Holyhead Breakwater Country Park. Getting out of the car, the wind made the cold seem even more so and the half mile walk in the dark from car park to the registration tent wasn't too pleasant. Registration was quick and efficient, leaving about 60 ultra candidates being briefed then hanging around in our duvet jackets in the tent until the last possible moment before we were called over to the start line. Thankfully there was only the briefest of holds here, then we were away at just about 8.30 am.

When you get moving things always feel better. At least it was dry and that's the way it stayed all day. It was cold and there was a steady 15-20 miles an hour wind from the West but apart from that we had a quite beautiful day, winter sunshine and great views, ample reward for those who turned up. I ran in a base layer, thin fleece and windproof jacket and was comfortable; taking hat or gloves off was chilly, but of course there were a dozen or so hardy shorts-wearers who didn't seem to feel the cold at all. We seemed to have just hit a lucky gap between two Westerly fronts.

My plan was simple; go fast enough enough to beat the cutoffs but not much faster; cut the route short if anything starts to hurt; have a nice day and get back before dark (I hadn't taken a torch). After a half mile of road and lane we hit the coast then followed the coast path up and around Holyhead mountain, beautiful territory. I was happily placed at the absolute tail of the field, about two hundred yards behind the last runner in front, but going at a pace I thought was about right. On the first climb of a steepish few hundred feet I gradually caught up to the back markers. As we reached the top of the hill the runner immediately ahead of me stopped and bent over a rock, gasping for breath. I asked if he was OK and he said he was, but it didn't bode too well for the rest of his day. Some nice bouldery tracks led down and over to South Stack and the first checkpoint after just over 4 miles.

From here the course followed the coast path all the way down to Rhoscolyn beach at the 15 mile point, with another checkpoint near Trearddur Bay about halfway along. It was great running, mostly along the edges of low cliffs on springy turf with the occasional wet bit, undulations but no real hills and the sun shining on the sea. I trundled along at somewhere around 12 minute mile pace with everything feeling OK. I eventually passed one or two other runners, then an hour and a half or so after the start the first of the marathon runners came past, their race having started half an hour after ours. From then on I was seeing people all day, catching one or two of the slower ultras, being passed by marathon guys and sometimes re-passing them as they slowed, and the whole thing got pretty sociable. 

After the checkpoint at Rhoscolyn, the course turned inland for a loop, coming back to the coast to revisit the checkpoint at Trearddur Bay, then inland again. These sections away from the coast were sometimes on small tracks and lanes, but often across quite boggy heathland, so even away from the mountains and moors, you rarely return from an ultra without your shoes covered in mud. I often wonder by how much all this peaty acidity and animal deposits shorten the life of shoes; still, five minutes under the tap when you get home normally gets most of it off.

The marathon course finished with another visit to Holyhead Mountain, this time climbing right to the top (at all of 750 ft above sea level!). The safety marshals scattered around the top and descent, mostly MR and Coastguard guys, were cheerful but looking a bit chilly now as the sun was getting lower and the wind gaining strength again, but the runners were rewarded with a wonderful and slightly technical descent of 700ft in a mile directly to the finish near sea level.

I had taken stock of how I felt at the duck-out points at 4 and 9 miles in, but they came a bit soon so I was committed to the marathon distance from then. I'd had a suspicion in the preceding days that 26 miles might be far enough for me on a first outing, but as I approached the sign which said "finish" in one direction and "ultra" in the other I felt that I had taken things conservatively enough to gamble on a further 6 miles or so and another 1300ft of ascent. I set off again along the coast for another lap of North Stack, South Stack and Holyhead Mountain.

I managed to pass one or two more runners on the way around, and even some late marathon participants on the last pull up to the summit, and enjoyed once again the swooping descent to (this time) the finish. I finished in just over seven and a half hours, 45th out of the 65 starters. I was pleased enough with that, at least as good and possibly a bit better than I could have hoped for. But to put it in perspective, I completed the slightly longer and very much tougher Exmoor course in 2013 in six and a half hours for an 18th place. Two days later I'm still a bit stiff but OK for a walk yesterday and a first gentle run today. Nothing really hurts. So, fit enough to run ultras? Not yet I'm afraid, but fit enough to start training? I think so, and that's progress.

Training, the Long and the Short of it.

For a few years now I haven't really thought too hard about training. Got into a sort of pleasant rut if you like. Start off in January running more or less on the flat and gently undulating trails. Build up the miles, some tempos and intervals on the local roads, long run gets gradually longer, 30 miles by end of January, 40 by end of Feb then Hardmoors 55 towards the end of March. Start on the hills, drop the speed stuff after the Highland Fling at the end of April, get 1000 miles in the bag before the West Highland Way at the end of June, then on into the long races of the summer. It worked well enough.

But I had a strange year last year. Nothing really went to plan but I still found some surprising learnings. I didn't do any training at all that I would really call "running" until approaching May, and not many miles much faster than a 10 minute mile pace after that, yet at the end of July I got around the Lakeland 100 course less than an hour slower than in 2011, when I would have considered myself pretty fit and well-trained. Last year I did a lot of walking, much of it up and down hills, but the lack of any "hard working" sessions didn't seem to have a huge effect.

I've also been reading quite a lot over the winter about the "less is more" approach to training effort, both the Maffetone stuff and similar ideas, which suggest you get a lot of benefits by doing the majority of your training at a heart rate much lower than that at which you would expect to get any training effect at all.

And finally, I've started to question my long-held faith in the importance of long training outings. When I stumbled into this game about eight years ago now, all the advice you got (and unlike now it was quite difficult to find much at all) stressed the importance of getting used to "time on your feet". Forget everything else, it was "the long run" that was important. Build up until you can stay out all day, so you get used to feeling what it's like. And when the long run causes problems because it takes too long to recover, simply do two shorter, but still long, runs "back to back".

I've been reading John Kynaston's review of last year and his training plan for this year's Lakeland 100. Last year John had only 13 outings longer than 20 miles (8 training runs and 5 races), and plans only 8 this year before the Lakeland at the end of July. I can't really compare with my own last year, but in my last "normal" year 2013, I went further than 20 miles on 24 occasions  -  almost one every two weeks. I've also been interested by Robert Osfield's review of his 2014 running and some of the conclusions that he draws, including

- "training more often is more important than time on feet", and

- "if training with fewer long runs allows you to run more often, then run shorter".

Now both these guys get much better results than me, maybe because they're simply better runners, but they clearly don't suffer from not doing many long runs so they must have something here. I wonder also how much the long run in training is just a psychological crutch when it comes to races. This is the "no big deal" theory. "No big deal" is the length of run you could turn out and happily do tomorrow without any special preparation, knowing that it isn't going to present any problems or do any harm. I always liked to get my "no big deal" distance up to 25 miles or thereabouts, so I did a lot of them. Setting out on say the Hardmoors 55 with only one 20-25 miler done in preparation would seem to me to require a lot of self confidence  -  but it works for other people so why not?

I'm buying into the idea of doing more, shorter runs. For the past two or three years I have struggled to enjoy more than three or at best four outings a week. Too stiff and tired after the one before; I had put this down to approaching middle age (!) but now I'm prepared to believe that I got the balance of effort/recovery time wrong.

So where am I now?

Putting all the above together, I think that to get the best out of the kind of events that I enjoy my training for this year should consist of:

- Walking up hills. I'm aiming to hit 5000ft a week by March and 10000 by May. I'm getting more and more convinced that a day's hillwalking at a fairly brisk pace once a week is far more beneficial to me than a "long run"

- Getting out every day. The minimum is a 3 mile brisk walk, otherwise I'll go with how I feel

- Only doing a "raised heart rate" session once a week - a bit of 8 minute miling or some uphill running

- Planning the individual weeks on the basis of how I feel

- Keeping any "proper" runs (say 10 minute miles and faster)  to a 15 mile maximum. I've got enough events planned in through the spring to get in practice at longer runs.

- Not fretting about the miles logged. I think for me that hours spent, feet of ascent and getting out every day are more important. I'll log the miles but not plan them.

That's it then. Some new tricks for an old dog. Only time will tell whether this approach is completely misguided or a reasonable fit with my (I hope) realistic targets, which are:

Main Target: The Dragon's Back Race  -  "just" to finish (this is a stretching target!)

All other races (likely to be around 8-10 events from 26 to 55 miles, and maybe a 100 miler...): Enjoy the day, finish in good shape, don't worry too much about the time taken.

Last year I didn't put my programme of events in the side panel as I have for previous years because I just couldn't tell from month to month whether I would make the start line or not (I intended to do 9, pulled out of 7 and eventually completed 8  -  work that one out!). This year (fingers crossed) looks more plannable and the details should shake down in the next week or two, so I'll nail the colours up then.

Review of 2014

A game of two halves, 2014, but still with a bit of a surprise in the dying minutes.

I won't dwell too much on the first part of the year, I've documented it well enough already. Sufficient to say that injuries and cures took up a lot of time and precluded participation in many planned events. I managed to keep walking around the hills (almost) throughout, but didn't start running again until the middle of April, a gap of 7 months since things went wrong the previous October.

By the 7th June I felt I could jog far enough to join in my nearest ultra, the Cheshire Sandstone Trail race (34 miles, 2500ft ascent). The time of 7:28:00 was far slower than I would normally cover the route in training, but at least we were (sort of) back in business.

I had reasoned that with the winter and spring walking, speed rather than distance was likely to be my nemesis over the year, so I was not put off by the length of events but was determined to do them slowly. Smell the flowers, skim the cut-offs and generally have an enjoyable and recuperative summer. The plan went into action  on 21st June with the West Highland Way race (95 miles, 14,700ft). I was nervous about having to average nearly 4 miles an hour for the first 20 miles including the first real climb over Conic Hill, but it went OK and from there to the finish I took my time, getting home in 29:37:33. Over seven hours slower than the previous year, but it was nonetheless a very satisfying experience and an eye-opener on what can be done with virtually no training, so long as one is prepared to cut one's suit according to the cloth available.

The plus side of such a slow journey was that I felt recovered and ready to go again within a couple of days, so I had no hesitation in fetching up at Keswick the following weekend for the Lakes 10 Peaks race (46 miles, 18,400ft). A proper mountain course, this one, plenty of climbing, technical tracks, no tracks, and scrambling. I enjoyed it hugely and finished in 21:24:18. 

I had wondered about my long-standing entry in the Lakeland 100 (105 miles, 22,500ft) as this was a course I had found quite challenging enough even when fully fit, but the combination of the West Highland Way and Lakes 10 Peaks experiences gave me enough confidence to turn up at Coniston for the start on 25th July. I'd formulated a scheme of walking all the uphill and flat bits and jogging only the comfortable downhills, and this was good enough to see me to a finish in 38:34:26.

I'd gradually got back into a bit of running by then, covering up to five or six miles at around nine minute mile pace, but longer sessions were still uncomfortable so I didn't push too hard. But at least when the Grand Tour of Skiddaw (46 miles, 7,000ft) came round on 23rd August I was up for jogging reasonable stretches of flat ground. This upped the overall pace a bit to get a finish in 11:10:47 on a beautiful August day.

I'd been so impressed with the laid-back yet well-organised Lakes 10 Peaks that almost immediately after finishing I entered the sister event, the Brecon Beacons 10 Peaks (56 miles, 15,700ft) on 6th September. With the Skiddaw run under my belt and assuming that the Beacons would be easier going than the Lakes (I'd never really been there before), this was the first event of the year that I set myself a time target for, I hoped to get round in under 20 hours. A mistake on three counts: I wasn't yet ready for running long periods, a couple of bad navigational decisions led to my extending the course to over 58 miles, and as I found out on the day, a lot of the territory in the Beacons is far from easy! Still, I finished in 20:51:42 with no real harm done, but resolved to go back to "just complete with enjoyment" for the remainder of the year.

Way back in the year two events in the Lakes had caught my imagination. They were only a fortnight apart and I couldn't decide which one to go for, so after months of procrastination I finally did both. The Lakes 3 x 3000 (47 miles, 12,500ft) came up first on 4th October. The attraction of covering the three classic 3000ft peaks (Scafell Pike, Helvellyn and Skiddaw) in a circular entirely off-road trail run was too good to miss. In the event, the top bit of Scafell Pike was missed (officially!) due to appalling morning conditions on the day, but it was still a nice event, marred a bit for me by the blanket route marking which took away the navigational element which I think is so appealing in mountain events. For this reason alone I may not do it again, but you never know. I finished wet but in good shape in 15:10:02.  The other event, the Lakes-in-a-Day (50 miles, 13,100ft) I will definitely go back to. For great organisation and variety of ground covered, with a bit of everything the Lakes has to offer, I thought it was one of the best events of my year.  I finished in 16:34:53.

I had nothing planned in November but was looking forward to the Tour de Helvellyn in December.  But a bad cold took a grip the last week in November and left me unable to get out at all until just before Christmas, so for the second year running I had to pull out of this classic event before starting.

Earlier in the year I had joined an on-line "2014 miles in 2014" group. With the early injuries, this had seemed an impossibility for me in the late spring, but by November I had just got my head back above the "average" line and it looked like a reasonable December would finish it off. But of course that has gone too now, no big deal but a bit of a sad end to one of these little games we play.

A couple more gentle jogs around the block (or the forest, if the weather looks up a bit) should see me complete around 1950 miles for the year. More important I think is that I have amassed just over 266,000ft of ascent, and I think it is this rather than the miles that has seen me through the majority of the events mentioned earlier. I've now started running again, and it's going to be a fairy long but enjoyable process to get back to somewhere near the fitness I had in 2013; if I can add that to the knowledge I've gained this year on how to complete events when far from in best shape, then I might actually start achieving something again.

So all things considered, not a bad year, much better than I at some times feared. And now, going into 2015 with (touch wood) no injuries, hopes of a better one to come.  2015 will be different in some ways. I may not enter any "100 mile" events. With the Dragon's Back coming up in June, preparation for at least the first half of the year will be about getting used to 30-40 mile days with lots of climbing, navigation and rough ground (and finishing with enough in the tank to set out again the next day!). But I like events, so I will probably do a number of shorter ultras through the Spring; something of a plan is coming together.

Happy New Year!

My Waterproof Jacket Leaks!

You'll have seen the discussions of course. Runner A recommends a jacket as the best he's ever used, then five minutes later Runner B says he had one of those but it leaked like a sieve. They can't both be right............can they? And nowadays we get instructions that we must have hoods, taped seams, this, that, whatever; Joe says how can he find the lightest job that will still satisfy the kit inspectors while Bill says take the heaviest you can carry or you'll die. What's it all about?

Well, for what it's worth, here's my take on the subject. The usual health warnings, my views come from a combination of experience in the hills and training as an engineer; I hope they make sense, I'm sure not everyone will agree, but if they prompt a bit of thought that's enough and OK. Also this is an area where it's easy to get bogged down in the science; I'm hoping to get by with only the most  important bits and I might take some shortcuts which will offend the purists, but I'm sure I'm like most runners in just wanting to understand why things that affect us happen and what we can do to try and control them. And if you've read my blog before you'll know that these odysseys of mine can go on for a while, so be prepared if you're going to stay the course.

First the briefest of histories. When I was a lad, if it rained in the hills we donned our "anoraks" (pullover smocks with a hood and regulation front pocket for OS map) made from cotton with some sort of proofing involved. They were OK in showers and a bit of rain but not great when it got heavy. We got wet. Then nylon appeared with Peter Storm, Henri Lloyd and so on, fully waterproof and it kept all the rain out. The problem was that it kept all the sweat in as well so you got pretty much as wet on the inside as it was on the outside. Then Gortex came along with the first "breathable" fabric and solved the problem. Sort of.

At this point we have to be clear about what a few of the key terms mean:-

1. "Sweating". This is your body's way of dumping unwanted internal heat generated by physical exercise. A fluid that is mainly water is pushed out through small holes in your skin (pores), carrying some heat with it. What happens next depends on external conditions.  If you're wearing no clothes and the air humidity is low, the water (sweat) will evaporate, gaining latent heat from your skin as it goes and so cooling you down. That's the way it's designed to work. But when your body gets hot and generates sweat, it can't control what's happening on the outside. If you wear a technical "wicking" shirt, the sweat gets drawn through to evaporate on the outside, almost as well as without a shirt. A cotton shirt will absorb the sweat, but it will eventually start evaporating from the outer surface, although you won't feel so comfortable. A rucksack tight against your back will prevent any evaporation at all in that area. And if the air outside is already saturated  -  ie it has already absorbed all the water vapour it can hold, a condition known as 100% Relative Humidity (RH)  - then sweat won't evaporate whatever you're wearing.  But we should say here that the air won't have reached 100% RH until you see visible signs of it; the water vapour starts to condense in the air, and you're walking in mist, fog, a cloud (or the bathroom). The fact that it's raining alone does not mean that the air is saturated (but for sure if there is rain about the air will be already holding more moisture that it would have under a cloudless blue sky).

2. "Breathable".  This is generally accepted to be a material which has "holes" small enough to prevent water droplets passing through while big enough to allow the passage of water vapour. This isn't the precise truth, but it's good enough for us here. It doesn't matter what the material is, or how the "holes" are created, these details might affect the overall robustness of the material but not the explanation of how it might work. The theory is that you can wear such a material when it's raining; sweat then evaporates on the inside of the jacket and so can pass out through the holes, which at the same time are not letting the rain in.

3. "Waterproof". A string vest is not waterproof. Wear one in the rain and you'll get wet. A plastic material can be made completely waterproof - think of the bladder in a Camelback - and if you make a jacket out of it, it won't let the rain in, but it won't let any vapour out either, under any conditions. What we think of as modern "waterproof-breathable" materials are a compromise between these two. The smaller the "holes" the more they lean towards waterproof, bigger holes mean more breathable. Maybe they should more correctly be referred to as "water resistant".  A material that is resistant to a steady rain may not be so resistant if the pressure of the water goes up  -  a tropical downpour maybe, or if you sit in a puddle. That's why modern jackets have some sort of hydrostatic rating on the label  -  a measure of their actual degree of waterproofing. In a practical garment, the resistance given by its basic degree of waterproofing can be enhanced (for example by putting a shiny coating on the fibres so that they "shed" water droplets better - this is what has worn off when you are told you need to have the garment "re-proofed"), or compromised (for example by making holes in the seams when they are stitched  - which is why manufacturers claim the improvement of "taped seams" when they have covered up the holes with some glued-on tape).

So far, I would assume that anyone more expert than me might tick me off for over-simplifying things, but would hopefully concede that I haven't said anything outrageously wrong. But it seems to me there are some elephants in the room even up to here. You may already have spotted them, but let's move on now to some propositions on what might actually be happening when you wear your jacket for running out in real weather.

Let's say you are out running on a coolish but not cold day, wearing a long-sleeved technical teeshirt, and it feels pretty comfortable, not too hot, not too cold. The heat you're generating is being dissipated by your sweat into the air. Then it starts to rain steadily. It's not unpleasant to start with, but after a while you start to feel cold. What's happening here is that the raindrops hitting you and then eventually dripping away are more efficient at conducting the heat away than the air was  (you put air gaps into things to improve insulation, remember?), so now you are losing more heat than you're producing and you start to cool down.

There are three options from here. (i) You run faster to create more heat to warm up, (ii) you increase the insulation by putting on a thicker layer, say a fleece, or (iii) you pull on a waterproof. Intuitively, the best option is (iii) so on goes your lightweight waterproof but breathable jacket. This sheds the raindrops much more quickly and efficiently than your teeshirt so it cuts down the heat transfer, and this enables you to warm up. But as you warm up, you start to sweat again, and now the sweat has a much harder route to escape and evaporate. First of all, it now has to evaporate not into unrestricted air, but into the small space between your jacket and the layer inside it. And when it reaches the shell it (a) has to find its way through the restricted holes in the surface, and (b) even if it gets out it will be faced with air more humid than before you put your jacket on. Sorry, but a lot of your sweat is either not going to evaporate, or evaporate then re-condense as it hits the inside of the shell. You probably still feel quite comfortable, because the heat being taken away now matches again that which you are producing by the running effort, but inside your jacket you are unlikely to be dry.

Most outings in the rain start and end like this. When you stop running you get into a warmer place, change your clothes, and think nothing of it. Your jacket did a good job. But on a longish run, there may be the opportunity for a few other things to happen to affect the balance again, such as:

- you get tired, so you slow down to a jog or maybe even a walk, so you're putting less energy (and therefore less heat) into the system, but the outside conditions are still taking out what they did before.

- the weather gets significantly worse, heavier rain, lower temperature, higher wind, so that although you're still putting in the same energy (heat), the outside conditions are taking it away faster.

- it's a long time since you last ate anything, so more of the work you're doing gets used internally and less goes to warm the surface.

The first thing you realise in any of these scenarios is that you're getting cold. Then comes the realisation that your clothes are wet, because instead of being warm and wet which was comfortable, they are now cold and wet which isn't  -  "my waterproof jacket leaks!" Yes, I'm prepared to stick my neck out and say that so long as you're wearing a jacket that claims to be waterproof, then 99% of the moisture on the inside will have come from you, not the sky. OK, nice to know, but once you get into the "I'm cold and wet" scenario experience shows that you're on a downward spiral to ending your participation in the race (and in anything else if you're really unlucky), so what can we do about it? Before we go on to that, let's just home in on a couple of points that are key to the situation.

1. Breathable clothing was originally developed for activities less intense than running, such as walking, climbing and the like, and was found to work well. But these pastimes are less energetic than running and less sweat is necessary. Walkers and climbers would also not normally use a waterproof shell unless it was part of a three (at least) layer system - base layer wicking, to keep sweat away from skin, middle layer insulation (fleece, etc), then outer shell to keep rain or wind out. The whole system is under far less stress than in running, and the wicking/insulation layers hide any deficiencies better - they keep you feeling warm. Further, these activities are often intermittent, where bursts of energy are interspersed with easier or inactive periods allowing any accumulated moisture to evaporate while none is being produced. Finally, walkers and climbers (sensible ones at least) layer up and down frequently to keep in balance with changing conditions, whereas a runner will begrudge the time spent in doing this.

2. There is nothing wrong with being wet. Hot showers and warm swimming pools are not unpleasant, and certainly won't do you any harm. It's being COLD that gets you, and the problem with water is that, as we've seen above, it accelerates the heat transfer away from your body in a big way. The challenge is, if you can't avoid getting wet, how do you minimise the heat transfer?

So where has all this got us so far? You know now that I'm sceptical that you'll stay dry inside any waterproof jacket, whatever it claims, when you run in it. You know that being wet isn't in itself bad, but being wet (especially if it's raining) promotes heat loss, and if you can't manage that heat loss you can get into big trouble. So is there a strategy that we can adopt that might keep us out of jail? Well, for what it's worth, here's mine.

1. Choosing and maintaining a waterproof jacket

I personally don't think there's an overall winning brand; after all they're all using the same science and mainly similar materials. I've tried a lot of the reputable guys, North Face, Salomon, Montane, OMM and can't really detect any difference in performance. Better to go with what fits you best I think. I'm not sure that I buy into the taped seams thing but a lot of Race Directors require it and all of the reasonable makers do it anyway. More important for me is the state of the surface. You want it to shed water drops fast. You can't stop it raining but you want the drops that hit you to bounce off as fast as possible before they pick up any heat on the way. Pour water on your jacket and it should form globules and run off. If it doesn't, time for reproofing (or a shinier material).

2. Don't put on a waterproof unless you really need to

It doesn't matter how brilliantly technical your jacket is, it will be nowhere near as breathable as if you don't wear it. The sweat inside starts building from the moment you put it on. I'm quite happy to carry on in a baselayer in gentle rain, or even a light fleece if it's chilly. In the Lakeland 50 one year we had intermittent showers, some of them quite heavy. I passed numerous runners wearing waterproofs. But each time, often just at the point where I would be thinking "this rain has gone on long enough, I need to put a jacket on", the rain stopped. I ran from start to finish in a long-sleeved Helly-Hansen vest and was comfortable throughout and dry at the end. If it's windy I prefer a very light windproof, much more breathable than a waterproof, and I often carry both for this reason. The moment you put your waterproof jacket on is the moment you've decided to transfer from "cool and wet" to "warm and wet".

3. Once you've got a waterproof on, manage the layers

This won't be popular with the faster runners, but less necessary for them either as they continue to generate plenty of heat energy throughout the race. But if your pace drops to a jog/walk or the conditions worsen, be prepared to play with light teeshirt, long-sleeved teeshirt and light fleece under the waterproof to keep you warm enough but not too warm as the race goes on. Once you're really cold you'll probably have to stop somewhere dry to warm up and regroup before you can carry on. In the 2012 West Highland Way Race it rained pretty well from start to finish, well over 24 hours at my end of the field. After the first few miles I put on a long-sleeved teeshirt and a light fleece under my waterproof and was comfortable to the end. A lot of people that day pulled out with near hypothermia  -  my contention would be that they simply were not wearing enough layers. Remember, when you can't generate enough heat to balance what's going on outside when in your normal running gear, you need insulation to slow down the heat loss - you have to take away the sensation of touching the inside of a cold wet outer layer. In fact, I suspect that's why we often believe a heavier weight "mountain jacket" with a light mesh lining is more waterproof than a lightweight running top - it isn't actually more waterproof but it offers more insulation and a cosier inside feel, it doesn't feel so "wet" inside so we think it's more waterproof.

4. Don't stop

I don't mean don't stop for the odd cup of tea or jam sandwich, but you have to realise that unless you can stop in a warm place, you really change the heat balance dramatically by stopping. You'll lose a lot of heat and start shivering fairly quickly, so get going again and get the balance back before you lose it completely. In the re-routed 2010 UTMB conditions were fairly wet and I was with two other UK guys most of the way through the Swiss section. We were all feeling pretty comfortable until one of the others stopped for a comfort break at the Bovine Alp checkpoint. Although it was no more than five minutes, the two of us left waiting were reduced to shivering and jumping on the spot to keep warm, and it took us several miles to get back to feeling comfortable again. I'm sure we've all had the experience where we finish a fairly damp event, spend a half hour or so at the finish if it's inside, chatting, drinking, lazing around, then find that after the hundred yard walk back to the car we're shivering almost too much to get the door open. And if you have no choice but to stop during an event in these conditions, because of an accident or similar, well that's the time to get out the spare DRY top that you've been carrying in the bottom of your bag to put on underneath everything else on just such an occasion!

Wet outings where you get cold can turn into varying degrees of misery. Wet events where you manage your temperature and are comfortable can be strangely satisfying, maybe even enjoyable. As Brits, we ought to be able to manage a bit of rain  -  we get plenty of practice.

No, your jacket doesn't leak.

Milestones

A few days ago this sometimes stuttering blog recorded its 50,000th view. Now if you're in a bigger league, this is the sort of interest you can no doubt generate in a week or so but it's taken me just over 5 years. But from quieter beginnings it's built up to around a thousand hits a month these days, and that's more than enough to encourage me to keep rambling on.

Readers have to be quite persistent as I'm not a prolific blogger. An average of a post about every two weeks is all you get. I've often thought of putting up the frequency but never really got around to it because I always try to wait until I think I have something to say that may be of some interest. I'm no good at writing about training, so I tend to wait until I've done an event, or have a view on some general topic to do with running. What does surprise me is how long-lived some of the posts have become. I'd thought that the whole thing was a bit transitory  - publish a post, a few people read it, then you move on and it gets forgotten, but every so often I look at the statistics and discover a post from maybe two or three years back is still getting new views.

Here is a list of the "top ten" posts since I started, in order of popularity:

1. "Well, I think I'd better stop now......" (Oct 2013).  Views on what causes DNF's.

2. "The toughest race in the world" (Mar 2012). An attempt to compare the difficulty of a number of well-known races.

3. "Bad news and blisters" (Nov 2013). What causes blisters and how to prevent them

4. "The other Lakeland 100" (May 2013). A recce of the Ultimate Trails Lakeland 100k.

5. "Views on shoes" (Oct 2012). Comparing different shoe types and how to make choices.

6. "West Highland Way Race 2013" (June 2013). Race Tale.

7. "Pacing and the Lakeland 100" (Jul 2013) Pace strategies for the Lakeland 100 mile race.

8. "At the Lakeland 50 and 100" (Jul 2012). Running the Lakeland 50.

9. "A tourist's guide to the Lakeland 100" (Jul 2014) Running the Lakeland 100 "just to finish"

10."So why does my Garmin tell lies" (April 2012) How Garmins acquire cumulative errors when recording ascent and descent.

Some of these are getting out of date now as technology moves on (for example the shoes and Garmin posts), and I've learned a bit more about other things; they're still interesting for me to look back on occasionally, but I'm often puzzled why these particular posts have proved the most popular. I think I've done better than these, but of course it's up to the reader to judge!

Anyway, I'll keep going so long as I still find things that interest me to write about.

Another little milestone for me this year. It's November, the month when the entries go in for the West Highland Way Race. I've become very attached to this event over the years and I've completed eight in a row. I had every intention of making it a nice round ten and was determined not to let anything stand in the way of that. But since I began this series the Dragon's Back Race, first run in 1992, has been resurrected and 2015 will be the third running, after the second in 2012. Two hundred miles down the length of Wales visiting summits in all the main Welsh mountain groups. Home ground if you like, for though I'm not Welsh these hills are where I spent a lot of my formative years. Has to be done, and going by the history to date the next Dragon's Back won't be until the summer of 2018, when I shall be 70. Next year may be my only realistic chance, so the West Highland Way will have to wait a year. I'll be back.

"Ultra Running overtakes Angling as Britain's most popular participation sport"

Well, probably not just yet, but you'd have to agree there has been a real explosion in participation over the past few years in what we used to think was a bit of a fringe activity. And there have been consequences, both good and bad.

1. First, choose your race....

The first time I tried the UTMB in 2006, entries opened while I was on holiday. I entered when I got back home a couple of weeks later; no problem, I think there were still about half the places still available (and no qualifying points required in those days!). Nowadays you might be lucky in the draw, but you can only guarantee that you'll get a start within three years of your first application, and this is surely going to get worse. It's getting the same for all the well-known international events. For the Tor des Geants I think you have a less than 50% chance of success in the draw, for the Western States less than 20%, and so on.

A similar situation is either starting or likely with the popular UK races. This autumn, entries for the Lakeland 50 and 100 races closed out under an hour after opening, with over 1000 runners struggling to get their entry finally confirmed. I entered the Highland Fling a day or two after entries opened and was number 800 or so to register. It  seems inevitable that ballots will be needed for these events next year. A ballot has been necessary for the West Highland Way race for some years now.

It's great to see these races become so successful, and it must be easier for Race Directors to manage their budgets if they know early on that their target entry levels will be met, but I'm rather coming to the conclusion that this isn't a game I want to play. I'll probably keep my hat in the ring for the Chamonix events because for a number of reasons they're quite special for me in spite of their downsides, but other than that I think I'll not bother with races that are likely to be over subscribed in future. The flip side of the increase in interest in the sport is that many new and very worthwhile events are springing up which you can plan to run then enter in the knowledge that you'll get a place. Some of these are every bit as good if not better than the established "classics", so you can get your day out without any of the of the "will I, won't I" entry hassles.

2. There are a lot of people around.....

I guess the UTMB is the event that I have run in regularly that has the biggest field. It's a beautiful course, but with 2300 people on it you're not going to get a wilderness experience, you're rarely if ever out of sight of other runners. If you're happy with that and the organisers continue to manage it as well as they have so far, I don't think it's going to do Mont Blanc too much harm. It's mostly a hard surfaced track that sees thousands of feet a year anyway and the Alpine climate makes the mountains reasonably resilient.

I'm not sure that the same can be said of some of our local hills. Runners have been tackling the Bob Graham Round for decades but it's a tough trip and only a relative few are capable of a serious attempt, let alone a completion. "Bob Graham Trods" have appeared over the years where the best line covers previously trackless ground, but they are in general pretty unobtrusive. Compare that to the Lakeland 50 and 100 races; when I first got interested in these barely five years ago you had to navigate quite carefully to find your way over the less well trodden bits of the route. Now, after 300+ runners a year on the 100, three times that number over the 50 section and countless reccies by prospective competitors, there is an easy to follow track all the way round  -  the only parts you can get lost on are the bits that have always been rocky so the runners leave no trace of their passing. I'm not recording this as a criticism, just an observation of the effect that the events have had on the landscape over a very short period of time. The saving grace for the Lakeland events (which I have used only as an example) is that the formerly less well trodden areas (Seathwaite to Eskdale, High Kop, Blea Moss and so on) are not in particularly popular walking areas so the "damage" is less visible to the fell-using population at large.

We also have an impact on other users of the countryside. On the open fells and wider tracks exchanges between runners and walkers are likely to be pleasant and mutually encouraging, but it's clear that a stream of runners hammering down a narrow track on a rocky hillside is likely to make those coming up feel nervous and possibly less than pleased. And I wouldn't want to be walking the narrow and often tortuous path alongside Loch Lomond on the day that 1000 Highland Fling runners come past. In the early days of its similarly explosive growth mountain biking caused a lot of antagonism which has taken quite a few years and a lot of goodwill to ameliorate.

3. Let's stay safe out there.......

Although there is the odd news item about someone dying from a heart attack on a hot day in a city half marathon or suchlike, running is generally felt to be a healthy activity.  But in spite of the common view, statistics normally don't lie. The higher the population you have in any activity, the more accidents you get. Runners have died on mountain races, just not many so far. I don't want to appear elitist in any way here, but I'm often surprised by the rudimentary knowledge of navigation that I sometimes see in some runners I have met on events, and who clearly have to rely on others around them. Mountains, even our little ones, are not very forgiving of incompetence and a few bad incidents could have a huge effect on the public view of our sport unless organisers continue to be vigilant. I'm rather nervous of the emerging trend to mark courses with flags so that navigational ability is not required.............not until, of course, you lose the flags.

4. And then there's the money.....

When I started this game only a very few years ago, there was no such thing as kit specially for ultra running. One or two small companies made odd bits of lightweight gear for mountain marathons, but in general folk used kit from road running, fell running, climbing and whatever seemed to work. I ran all my early ultras in road shoes (well, rock climbers have always used "trainers" as they were generically called to walk up to pretty remote crags, so why not?). Helly Hansen vests with shorts or Ron Hill "tracksters" seemed to be the name of the clothing game.

Then as ultra running started to become more popular, more "establishment", the outdoor companies saw another potential market; one with a relatively cheap entry level. You didn't need to buy skis, climbing gear, or a bike, so you could afford to spend money on shoes and clothing. North Face started sponsoring the UTMB and we were on our way. Markets need to expand so we need more consumers, so we need to sponsor and create more races, to create more runners, to sell more gear, ever better and more specialised. Again, I'm not criticising, just observing what happens.

5, And the answer is.....

There is no answer. Because there is no question, just a natural progression. Over 30 or 40 years I saw climbing move from a lunatic fringe activity to establishment and on to big business. The same happened with mountain biking (yes, it did start that way, I can remember trips like High Street or the Walna Scar Road on a bike with no suspension whatever (and no helmet!)) but the evolution happened in maybe 20 years. And in ultra running, barely 10. That's the way of the world.

But the beauty is, that if you hunt around a bit, there are still enough crags, bike trails, and yes, even ultra races, to suit whatever your taste is for at least a lifetime.