Kintyre Way Ultra

First race of Summer out of the way and all in all it went not too bad. I arrived at Tayinloan village hall at 8.30am. It was pouring outside but thankfully by the time we started at 9.45am it had calmed down so the first section of the race was rather pleasant.

Getting ready

We headed along the shorefront for a short time and then over the main road and then it was a long climb of 9.5km uphill on a forestry commission road. It was not a steep climb but a climb spread over 9.5km is going to take its toll on your legs and as everyone else was running it then I thought I had better. It was difficult to know placings during the race as some people were doing the Ultra as a relay so it was not wise to try and keep up with those who were obviously going for it. On the climb up to the windfarm I was in 3rd place but no idea if this was 3rd in the Ultra or Relay! After the windfarm it was a long decent that was quite easy going and then some more forestry roads and finally we turned off onto a single track trail as the sun popped out and it was excellent this section , it only lasted about 6km but it was great running on very narrow single track. At this point I was running with a guy from Arbroath(never did get his name) he had also ran the CCC last year so it was good to run with him and have a chat. We ran together for around 10km and then at the 25km checkpoint at Carradale I stopped to refill food and water and he battered on , to be honest he was a stronger runner than me anyway so I couldnt have kept his pace up but it was a good 10k we blasted out together.

Coming into 25k Checkpoint

Refueling

After the checkpoint it was then onto the shorefront , this time the East Coast of Kintyre as we had started the morning running over from the West Coast. It was again a great little section albeit a tad confusing. It was running along the shore but actually sometimes in the water and over the rocks and through the seaweed(which aint that grippy) I overshot my turn off here missing a marker but luckily appeared out on the road just in time to see a direction arrow for the race. Very lucky as if I missed that then I would have got hell of a lost. At the end I did discover I wasnt the only one who made this mistake. After the shorefront it was then another climb and a steep one at that for around 20 mins then it was through a very confusing forest that somehow I got my directions correct.

Trying to watch feet and run and look for marker flags was a bit tricky

Apparently the winner got lost here and did an extra 5kms trying to find his way back and still won the race! It was then a great descent down another awesome single track to the next checkpoint at Ifferdale at 34.5km.

East Coast , just before I almost got terribly lost.

After Ifferdale it was again a long long climb on a crap Forestry road for 5km. Once I topped out on the climb it was a flat section for a 5km (a long 5km) and the weather came in. A strong strong headwind , rain and hail! It was truly horrendous for about 45 mins , sometimes I had to actually turn around and slowly jog backwards to stop the hail smacking me in the face.

Horrendous

Once the flat section was out of the way I hit the Loch , Loch Lussa. It was again  a pretty horrible 4.2km for me alongside the Loch. I was pretty sore at this stage and my hip was really giving me bother. This was around the 48km stage and my head was a bit mince by now so I had to stop and have a good word with myself (Colin stop f***ing moaning and get on with it) Then as soon as I cleard the Loch my adrenaline was buzzing. I stuck on the Ipod and I felt so fresh , I really did. It didnt last too long but I had a great pace going and felt unstoppable. After a few km my friend Rob was waiting to run in the last 8km with me to Campbeltown. This section was hard , I assumed it was all downhill from here for 8km but it was far from it. I was now back on tarmac and the road went on and on and on and I was passed by someone at this stage. Again it was pouring down but once I started to see houses I knew I wasnt far. I still had the guy who passed me in my sights ahead but as I entered the town I only had 2 miles to go. I apologised to Rob as I had to stick my headphones back on and get into Biffy Gear. So Ipod on again and Biffy up full , I then started to crank up my pace and said to Rob "right come on" and I took off. I was gaining on the guy ahead but I just didnt have enough in my legs to pass him , I could push so hard but I could feel my legs cramping and knew they were not far from just giving way. The finish line was a bit disappointing as it was a guy standing at a lampost with a piece of paper taking your number. I finished about 15 seconds behind the guy who passed me.

Rob helping me out

I finished in 5th Place out of the 20 doing the Ultra and also managed to beat some Relay teams but not sure how many yet. My time was 6hrs 42mins. For anyone interested my Forerunner watch was awesome. Not wanting to bore anyone but some of my stats - 36 miles (58km) , Avg Moving time 10 min miles, elevation gain 4117ft , avg HR 157 , max HR 186. My final 2 miles were both 6 min miles.

Best shower ever

Overall I am super happy with that. My pace at the start was way too fast for what I will be doing at Leadville but it was a good race for me. It was a good run and I would recommend it to anyone however there is very little in the way of trails on it. It was mainly forestry roads. The short sections on single track were excellent but just not enough of them and the final 8km road was awful. Some guys did moan at the end about the signage during the race. Apart from almost getting lost once I thought the course was pretty straight forward to follow however the end section once in Campbeltown was a complete joke. If Rob had not been with me to show me the way then I would have had no idea where to go , there were no signs at all directing you through the town and like I said before the finish was a joke aswell. Just a guy in a waterproof jacket standing next to a lampost with a piece of paper and pen taking your time and number. They then had 3 different places for you to go to get a shower , get a coffee and get food! why it could'nt all have been done in the swimming pool near the finish confuses me. Also the checkpoints were ridiculous aswell and apart from a van which was strangely at the 10km point which had bananas and water and oranges the other checkpoints were pretty rubbish and had hardly anything , at Ifferdale I was offered some oranges but then asked for water and was then given a 150ml glass of water! Now this wasnt too bad for me as I like to carry my own stuff but for those doing the full 107km without their own support it was pretty terrible. Still it was a good race and all the runners were super friendly and chatty.

The climb out of Carradale

One final thing though that was quite funny. When I finished I ran into the Leisure Centre on the road opposite to get out of the rain and find out where to go next. I then noticed the race organiser so I went up to say hello and apologise that Laurent couldnt make it and blah blah blah. When I introduced myself he shook my hand and said "Congratulations Colin! Great time. Thats a new mens record , you won and you smashed the old record of 11hrs! Amazing" I looked at him rather confused and said "eh I ran the 57km race NOT the 107km" The plonker thought I had just ran and won the full 107km race in 6hrs 41mins! Now not even Killian could do that. After realising his mistake he then said "oh well you must have won the 57km" to my reply of "ehh no , I know for a fact there were 4 guys infront of me doing my race" Now this was the race organiser and he didnt have a clue what was going on so that kind of sums up how badly some of it was. He was a nice guy but seemed a bit confused.

Yup that lampost was the finish line , the race was still going when I took this.

After enjoying a post race curry it was then bed. The following day me and Rob decided on a little leg stretch and went a hike up the Cobbler in Arrochar. Cant say it was fun for me but my legs kept going and we plodded car to car in 2hr 40mins. Today however is rest day.

Cobbler