Falkirk 8 hour Ultra

While many other harriers competed in Fife and at Strathclyde Park last weekend Ian Rae and I were up with the larks on Sunday morning and heading to the familiar surroundings of Callendar Park in Falkirk for the inaugural running of their trail ultra. As the name suggests this was an eight hour race consisting of as many laps as you could run of of an undulating 3.8 mile circuit situated entirely within the confines of the park.

I had run a lap race before, at the North Inch in Perth in 2016, but that was over a set distance of 50k, all on tarmac and on a pan-flat 2.1k circuit. This was a very different proposition being longer, hillier and over a variety of surfaces – mud, trail, tarmac, mud, grass, gravel paths and, did I mention it before, mud?

Callendar House in the January dawn

The tented village near the start/finish line

Ex-club colleague Ivan Field was there too although as he had run a marathon in Ireland the day before he ‘only’ intended to run another one to add to his total in the 100 marathon club records. 

104 solo runners and 15 relay team members belatedly crossed the start line at 08:07 with the relay runners very quickly disappearing into the distance. After Ian left us behind early on Ivan and I had a very pleasant and chatty first circuit of the park, please note this was the only lap where I ran all the hills!

Ivan resisting the temptation of the coffee van (I didn't, three times!)

The route was very runnable (to begin with) and with a huge chunk of it under the trees we were sheltered from the worst of the weather although, from what I hear, we had it easy compared with the the harriers at Strathclyde Park. 

It was fairly wet to begin with

There's not much else to tell really as it became a bit more of a grind with each passing lap but the company of friends old and new made it most agreeable. My only real moment of excitement came when I high-fived the most exuberant marshall on the course, lost concentration and went down like a ton of bricks - onto soft and grassy mud fortunately and, even better, no photos! She was most apologetic.

Mark Wheeler of Hamilton Harriers (better known to some of us as Kai's dad!) looked steadily impressive all day and came home seventh having run 48.2 miles. 

Mark negotiating some of that mud

I had been dreading the mental effort when setting out on the last lap but was very fortunate to be almost immediately caught by Lorna, a friend of a few years and a vastly experienced ultra runner. We ended up chatting for the entire lap which helped both of us no end. I'm sure she could have left me at anytime but chose not, for which I was grateful. She finished 16th overall with a total of 44 miles under her belt. I, meanwhile, came home in 33rd place, just exceeding my self-imposed target of 40 miles by 0.2.

The weather improved so much I ran the latter half of the race sans jacket

While Ian out-performed his own expectations by totalling 38.9 for 43rd position. 

Ian, smiling as ever (it masks the pain, I do it too!)

Ivan ran 26.6 miles before dropping out, finishing in 91st place.  

Race winner was Neal Gibson with 51.99 miles while the female winner, and fifth overall, was Egle Laurinaityte with 49.08 (who had also run leg 3 for Carnegie Harriers the day before at the Devil's Burden!). The relay race winners (teams of four) ran a total of 62.09 miles. 

A well organised race over a superb course (I'll take undulating over flat any day of the week) if a tad early in the season - I think I might just run this one again. 

Some stats from the organisers;

Total number of runners 161, total mileage for 14 relay teams 721.99 miles, total mileage for solo runners 3656.26 giving a overall mileage of 4378.25 which is the equivalent of running from Falkirk to Jamaica with a combined calorific output of 777,800. 

Photographs are all courtesy of Sandra Hunter who stood out in the wind and rain all day - it's definitely easier running!