0700 And they’re off!
Pascal and Sim (being highly trained Ultra athletes) spent The Night Before loading their bodies with carbs and trying to get a good night’s sleep.
They’ve arrived at Carlisle Castle with hundreds of others and now have 69 miles “to work out whose stupid idea this was”!
If you want to follow them on the Rat Race live tracking, the link is here:
I’ll post updates as and when I hear from the athletes so please keep checking back until he finishes sometime overnight. the cut off times are very generous so as long as they keep moving at slightly more than 2.8mph then they’ll be allowed to go the entire crazy distance.
Fingers crossed that the weather doesn’t repeat the Ride24 journey from Newcastle 3 years ago when he had to pay to have his bike frame drained off water after he’d finished!
Remember to shout out “Keep going Pascal and Sim!” at random intervals throughout the day. If you shout it loudly enough, they might even hear you (especially if you live near Hadrian’s Wall).
0904 10 miles complete
They’re whizzing along (relatively – I’m sure it’ll slow soon enough) and averaging 5mph. Sim is an experienced half marathon and marathon runner so I suspect they’re treating this as “how far can we go with it feeling hard but like a normal run”. I don’t know how it’ll feel later on when they’ve got nearly 3 back-to-back marathons to complete. *gulp*
Looking forward to an update when they get to Lanercost Priory for the first proper pitstop.
1013 Pitstop 1: Lanercost Priory (15.2 miles)
They’ve reached the first pit stop and the first loo queue. Pascal’s old bones are struggling already (right hip in case you’re wondering) but they’ve had hot sausage and are off and running again.
Sim is full of beans despite both of them being told that the stop was at 12 miles. They’ve done 15.2 miles to get here and Pascal wants me to understand that “the point two counts”.
1144 Lone runner
He’s running on his own now. Well, when I say on his own, there are still 800 other runners out there who just happen not to be Sim. The views are spectacular. He thinks Sim is miles ahead but he’s ready to be surprised.
1249 Pitstop 2: Walltown (23.9 miles)
Pascal has now run nearly a full marathon but is far from half way there. He still hurts but is carrying on.
1547 Pitstop 3: Barton Mill (32.4 miles)
So much for Sim being 4 miles ahead. It looks as though when Pascal arrived at the stop, Sim was just heading out. Of course they missed each other but there isn’t much in it. Pascal managed to wolf down 4 ham sandwiches to keep him going which was all washed down with some very sweet tea.
Pascal feels pretty broken but there are lots of lovely runners all helping each other to carry on. The lovely Helen gave him a salt tablet to help him out too. Her husband is running as well but apparently has decided to quit at this stop when he gets there. Here she is. “Thank you Helen!”. Personally, I think her husband is showing more common sense than mine but these are the differences that make life interesting.
Living in a home counties vale doesn’t train you brilliantly for hills and it is seriously hilly out there. The next leg is apparently very, very steep and the next pitstop is 13 miles away (just a little half marathon). It’s not going to be easy. Did I mention he thinks he’s broken already? Clearly, being Pascal, he’s just going to carry on until he actually collapses under the weight of his water, survival kit and his delicious homemade flapjacks.
At the moment, he is really looking forward to going to bed. He’s hoping to finish around 4am tomorrow. I can see his pace is dropping fast so I hope he can keep going until then but, boy, that is tough.
1857 The bus beckoned
For anyone following Pascal on the live tracker, you’re probably wondering what I was wondering – has he been helicoptered to emergency first aid? That isn’t running pace and why when I send a message does it tell me that he’s driving?
After 42 miles and a lot of hip pain and foot pain, Pascal spotted a local bus outside The Red Lion pub and “had a massive case of the f*** its”. He hopped on the bus (“Are you going to Hexham?” “Why-aye!”) and sped past Sim to get to the town centre and walk to the next pit stop.
At the moment, he’s having a massive wobble and isn’t sure whether he’ll finish. His plan is to have lots of hot food, change his socks and then see how he feels. Apparently Sim is Action Man. You decide.
Hopefully Pascal has rejoined the runners entering the pit stop by now and is about to refuel and refresh and then make the decision whether or not to go on.
I’m sure the lack of sleep last night hasn’t helped. There were hotel drunks banging on the door at 4am when they were both up at 5:45. All the way to Carlisle they had joked about having to share a double bed and when they got there… yes, you’ve guessed it. They were told on check-in that the hotel was full, despite having pre-booked. Pascal said the bed was so uncomfortable that he chose to sleep on the floor for preference and leave the bed to Sim. He cannot recommend an Ibis.
So, maybe it’s that. Then again, 42 miles is further than his feet have ever had to carry him in any 12 hour period so he could also recognise that this is a phenomenal achievement and anything from here on is just a bonus achievement. He’s got a local 10k in 2 weeks and the next of three more RatRace event is 3 weeks today so a broken Pascal on the first event is going to make the next four very uncomfortable.
2012 They say it’s all over…
Pascal has made the very difficult decision to stop. He’s feeling like a fraud despite having achieved an enormous physical challenge. I’ll put it down to the sheer exhaustion and the desperate need for some “fresh, clear, well-seasoned perspective” as his favourite restaurant critic would say.
42 miles. 42. It’s the answer, of course.
And now we’ve answered that question (again) it’s time to look forward to the next post in the Stupid Stunts category – Man vs Coast. This time he’ll be running along the Cornish Coast from St Michael’s Mount up to the North coast and all the way round to Sennen. It’s about 23 miles in total. Sim will be with him again (they’re making sure they get good value from their RatRace annual race passes!).
Three weeks to recover/get fitter depending on your own perspective and hopefully this will feel much more achievable from the off, knowing that they easily covered that distance in about 6 hours today.
Sim still has 24 miles to go but that’s less than a marathon and he definitely wants to finish Go Sim!!
Please post words of encouragement or otherwise in the comments. I’ll pass them on during the race and Pascal loves to read it all when he’s finished.