East Hull Harriers 24 hour results 2005

Sharon Gayters personal account at the World and European 24 Hours Worschach, Austria 2005

UK Athletics announced the new criteria for the World 24 Hours to be held in Taiwan in February 2006 just days before the first of two 24-hour track races to be held in this country. The new criteria for individual A standard was to be based on the top 10 rankings in the world for the last three years, the women’s criteria now being 215km, a whopping 25km increase over the previous 190km. The team B standard was increased to 195km from the previous 185km, a standard I had already achieved. At the time I was the only athlete qualified with B standard and there needed to be three women with B standard for a team to be selected.

The first of the races was at Tooting Bec in London and in the week leading up to this I had sickness and stomach problems. I optimistically hoped this would be a 48 hour bug and would allow me to run, unfortunately without even running for an hour in London I was forced to withdraw with stomach pains and unable to drink much fluid. Sandra Brown went on to achieve the B standard with 199km, an outstanding performance and only just a km behind my performance in the World 24 hours in July, I just scraped through to maintain my no 1 status for the year. Chris Finill won the men’s race for his debut with 220km, below the men’s qualifying standard, but at the time the best performance by a British man this year.

Three weeks later was the Hull 24 hour track race. A week after Tooting I was still having problems with my stomach and finally visited the doctor, the verdict was that it was probably a helicobacter infection that was inflaming the lining of the stomach and producing more acid that was causing the pain. I was given a blood test to confirm the diagnosis and temporarily given medication to control the acid problem. This helped with the stomach pain but was never completely relieved of the symptoms. The results of the blood test had still not been received by the time I did the race.

We drove the two hours to Hull in the camper van the night before the race. It had been a long time since I had competed here and in the past was not impressed with the race, however a new organiser, Dave Annandale had taken over the race and spoke to him on arrival. He had gone through a lot of trouble to organise this race as a new track had only just been laid, much later than had been anticipated and the race numbers had suffered as a result of altered dates. There were several tents already on the infield with runners and helpers asleep inside. Dave informed me of all the facilities and help that would be supplied and that champion chips would be in use as well as a back up system of lap recorders. Unlike previous years we were also allowed to park just off the track to use our own facilities during the race, the marquee for the lap recorders was already in place as was the champion chip facilities.

The race started at 10am, a good time for me, so I got up leisurely at 7:30am and had porridge for breakfast. We then put up the tent on the infield opposite the van and chatted to the other competitors I knew. There were around 26 starters and the weather was blustery but mild at 14 degrees. My plan for the race was to run 216km, one km further than selection so I had a couple of laps to play with, I was to run exactly 10km an hour to start with and then drop to 9km, 8km and 7km for the last thee sets of four hours. I decided to start in tights and long sleeve shirt as the wind was making it feel cooler and would avoid a pit stop later in the race to put them on. My plan was to start slightly slower than normal at exactly 10km an hour; this was easy to do on the track, as the clock was easy to see every 400m. My lap recorder for the first 12 hours was Pam Atkins, a runner I had known for many years and was pleased at this as I had great confidence in her ability to lap record and knew there would be no mistakes.

We had a briefing a few minutes before the start and we were away. It took a couple of laps to slow down to exactly 2 minutes 20 seconds pace that was planned and then just settled down to running and ticking the hours away. I was surprised at how fast some of the other runners set off but guessed they would probably not last the race. After the first hour of running I was not surprised to be in eighth place overall and achieved 26 laps, just 400m too fast which was probably gained in the first few laps. After two hours of running I was exactly on target at 25 laps for the hour.

I had settled down in my pace now and stopped clock watching but had not realised my pace was creeping up a little until Bill informed me that I ran 27 laps for the third hour, I immediately watched my pacing again to keep it in check and after the first four hours was just over target and lying in fourth place overall, it was at this point that we turned to change direction for the first time. The sun had come out now and was reading 25 degrees in the sun; I just rolled up my sleeves but was not over heating and was comfortable.

The next four hours passed without incident, it was obvious Stuart Buchan was beginning to suffer and the leading man was also walking now, Jim Rogers was moving up through the field from fourth place in the first hour and was at second place now, he looked the most economical runner in the field and was running sensibly. By the end of eight hours we changed direction again, my total distance was now 202 laps, compared to the 200 laps planned, just over 80km as planned. My stomach was starting to complain a bit and changed my drinks to milkshake (Glycoslim) and completely avoided the coke and orange juice I would normally be drinking now to avoid the acid. The weather had also cooled down again now as the sun had gone in and it was getting dark, the temporary lights were already illuminating the track.

Over the next four hours I had to make a couple of toilet stops and also one to change my champion chip to the opposite leg, I had put it on a little tight and it had bruised my leg, but still reached my planned target for the 12 hour mark. I was now in second place overall behind Jim, just a couple of miles adrift. I took a second dose of tablets for my stomach infection but was only supposed to take one a day so was not sure if this would have any adverse affect. The temperature remained mild between 13-14 degrees overnight with stronger gusts of wind; Bill had to peg out all the ropes on the tent as it nearly blew over.

The next four hours passed comfortably, I was allowed to slow my pace now to allow for more walking to eat my food, mainly custard, potatoes and pasta at this stage. I had the shock of hearing singing at midnight, the laps recorders were singing happy birthday to me, they say you age in these races, I started aged 41 and finished aged 42!! Something connected with Andy Smith I would guess.

By 16 hours I was one lap ahead of my schedule. By 18 hours I still had that one lap ahead and Jim and gone to sleep in his tent which had meant that I was now leading the race but disaster was about to strike. My stomach had been really grumbling and giving my pain but all of a sudden I became very dizzy, I sat down in the tent not aware of what was happening and then had to lay down for 10 minutes. It seemed to pass and got up and tried to run again, I did one lap and the same thing happened again and had to lie down. I lost approximately 90 minutes and didn’t think I would be able to finish the race. I had never experienced this in any race and had never taken time out to rest; the only reason I ever stop is to do something like change my clothes or shoes. I got very cold and Bill had every blanket we had on my and was still shivering. In the end I decided it was best to try again as this would be the best way to keep warm. I put on extra clothes (also Bill’s fleece jacket) and he walked with me for a lap to make sure I was ok. One lap down and didn’t feel dizzy so decided to carry on walking to try and get warm. After 3-4 laps I was beginning to warm up and gave Bill back his fleece.

At the 20-hour mark it revealed just 2 miles achieved for the previous 2 hours, the goal of 215km had gone and felt I had nothing left to achieve. The pacing strategy had gone well and my legs although tired were not that bad, it was my stomach that was aching and gurgling away. I decided it was worth finishing if possible and realised that I still had a 2-mile lead over Jim (who had returned to the track when I rested). He had been lapping me steadily while I was walking and so decided to try to run again. I was pleased the dizziness had not returned but my stomach was very uncomfortable. With three hours left my lead was just one mile and Jim was still stronger than me. For the last two hours I just admitted defeat and walked to finish as the stomach was more comfortable with walking and was eating less and less as my tummy was painful, at least I was not going to get a personal worst and third place person was over 20 miles adrift.

Jim finished with 203km and I finished with 198km. Although I do feel a little disappointed it was always going to be a risk coming into a 24 hour race while still on medication for a stomach problem, it was a risk worth taking and was pleased with my pacing strategy and staying bang on target for 18 hours, it’s a strategy I will use for my next race and know that the distance was within my grasp if I had not had the dizzy spells which I put down to something to do with taking extra medication and the stomach problem as I have never experienced anything like this in the past, it was not to do with lack of food as this was being controlled every hour of the race as Bill records my intake. As for the Hull race, it has improved dramatically since the last time I ran and would have no hesitation in running here again, champion chips give great peace of mind, the leader board was updated every hour and Dave was continually running around the track making sure all our needs were catered for, food, toast, soup, continuous support to make sure we were ok, massage was on hand regularly for those that required it and I thought the lap recorders were closer to the athletes than usual which made communication that much easier. Bill managed to get an exact record of the laps run as opposed to the miles that were displayed on the leader board

The only news to report since this race is the fact that it is now possible the Taiwan race may be postponed as a result of the Asian flu, something I had actually predicted a few weeks ago, it will be decided by next week if the race will go ahead so may actually give the GB athletes another chance to do a 24 hour race to qualify for the event. As for me, I think it needs another visit to the doctor for the stomach problem and see how long it will take to eradicate and recover.