The Lap Race Report by Angie Parkin
The Lap is a 47 mile ultra marathon around Lake Windemere in the Lake District. It’s held twice a year, clockwise around the lake in May and anticlockwise in September. The anticlockwise version is generally considered to be a bit harder as you’ve got fewer daylight hours to get around and the bigger climbs come in the second half in September when your legs are already well and truly trashed. May 2023 had seen me do the clockwise version, so it seemed only right that September 2024 would see me lining up to do it in the opposite direction.
It’s billed as a low level route and ideal as an introduction to ultra running. Last year I took this description at face value and didn’t worry too much about the hills. That was a mistake, a big mistake. I finished ok, but it took me much longer than I’d expected. This year I changed my training completely and spent a fair bit of time doing hill walks alongside my normal training. As usual I did a weekly long run, with the longest being 32 miles. On all these training runs I did a mixture of running and walking as I knew this is how it would be on race day. I also knew strength and conditioning would be useful, so I slotted in some half hearted sessions and did six weeks or so of very unbendy daily yoga. I quickly got bored with that though and went back to my usual default position of running and walking sessions and feeling vaguely guilty about the other stuff that I wasn’t doing.
I was lucky enough to have my own personal chauffeur and support crew in the form of my boyfriend Chris. He’d done the same last year, so was an expert in dodding about the Lake District to support me. We drove down during the day on the Friday and got settled in to the guesthouse in Ambleside that we’d booked. We were in an annexe, which was perfect. Although I did note the 5 steps up to the front door. I had a feeling they may be tricky post race and I was not wrong!! We headed out for the essential carb loading at a nearby Italian. I was quite careful about what I ate as I didn’t want to feel too heavy on race day. A delicious spinach and ricotta cannelloni hit the spot nicely and I felt very virtuous passing on the sticky toffee pudding that was calling my name loudly. I promised myself that we’d come back another night and I could treat myself.
We then drove to Low Cunsey for registration and kit check. The amount of mud in the car parking field was an ominous sign of things to come. I picked up my number, passed the kit check and collected my race tshirt. I resisted the urge to think that now I had my tshirt I probably didn’t need to actually complete the race. We then headed back to try and get some shut eye. I’m sure there are some people who sleep soundly the night before a race. I am sadly not one of them, but I did manage a few hours of sleep.
The alarm went off at 3.45am and we tucked in to our trusty porridge pots and headed out the door. We arrived at Low Cunsey and the car park marshall was giving driving instructions on how to park up without getting stuck in the mud. Again this wasn’t exactly filling me with confidence. There had been a lot of rain in the preceeding weeks and I was already worried about how grippy my shoes would be. Spoiler alert…….. not grippy enough!
There was the usual pre-race milling about and fairly small toilet queues. There were about 900 toeing the line, so not a huge event, but big enough to have a real buzz about the place. I got chatting to some people and I felt reassured that everyone was as daunted as I was. I think if you’re not a little bit worried before a big event then maybe you should be.
At 6am we were off in a blaze of headtorches. They’d moved the start of the course slightly this time to try and avoid bottlenecks in the first few miles that had happened in previous years. There were still a few pinchpoints, but they were few and far between. The first few miles did not go brilliantly for me. There were quite a few low hanging branches and I got my running vest caught up in one and twisted my neck and shoulders which was quite sore. Then about a minute later I ran right into yet another branch. This had clearly rattled me as a few minutes later I tripped over my
feet and went pitching forward with arms windmilling to try and right myself. I caught myself just in time and managed to stay upright. Just as well as I think that could have been a race ending fall. I had a word with myself and calmed down and settled in to a sustainable pace.
I’d finished at 2.40am last year and was keen to get to my bed a bit sooner this time around. My well thought out plan was to run the flats and the downhills for as long as I could (ideally until the 27 mile aid station at Troutbeck) and crucially not to faff at the check points. I had laminated cards with predicted times for each stage but was pretty confident these timings would go out the window early doors. Sure enough by the first checkpoint six miles in I was already behind schedule. I didn’t panic and just kept on with walking the uphills and plodding the rest. The conditions underfoot were so awful that I don’t think I could have safely gone any faster. It was raining pretty heavily for the first five or six hours and the mud was pretty impressive. I did the best I could with the trail shoes I had and the descending skills I (don’t) have. Something to work on.
Coming out of the second checkpoint eating a most delicious scotch egg I got chatting to Laura. She was eating too, so clearly had the same idea about getting in and out of the aid stations quickly. That was the start of a beautiful racing friendship and we ended up doing the rest of the race together. We encouraged each other to run when we could, and crucially we both knew the running part of our race was done at Troutbeck and we would be walking the rest of the way. Well, we ran over the finish line obviously. It would be rude not to.
Once you leave Troutbeck you have the biggest climbs to do. There’s 2500 metres of elevation in total, and 1306 metres of that comes in the 7 or so miles between Troutbeck and Skelwith Hall. I have to say I was quietly chuffed with how the climbs went in this race. I definitely think the hill walks I’d done in training paid off. They were obviously hard work, but they felt manageable. I mean it still took me nearly five hours to do that hilly section, so we’re not talking super speedy, but they didn’t completely destroy me.
Coming in to the penultimate feed station at Skelwith Hall it was getting dark. I was struggling to eat, which is always a really bad sign. I was managing little bits, but not enough to sustain the calories I was using up. I think this was the most disappointing bit about my race. I’d worked really hard in training to practise my fuelling and thought that I had nailed it. On the day though it just didn’t go to plan. It was absolutely chucking it down again by this time and it didn’t stop for the rest of the race. Maybe being so wet put me off getting food out, but honestly I just felt quite sick and could hardly manage anything. I knew we had Latter Barrow in this section which is the last of the major climbs. I’d climbed it earlier in the summer and knew it wasn’t too bad, but it’s a different story with thirty odd miles in your legs.
Climbing up the mountain in the lashing rain and the pitch black I starting feeling more and more sick. It wasn’t long before I was leaning over my poles throwing up. Really not what you want halfway up a mountain in the middle of the night. What can you do though? I had a few puke and rallies up and down the mountain and then still had a good long trudge to the next aid station. Apparently it’s less than ten miles to that next station but it felt more like a million. I don’t think Laura and I spoke once during that time other than checking that the other one was still alive and hanging in there. I knew once I got there that only 3 miles stood between me and the finish line. There’s no way I was going to let a parkrun distance defeat me. Saying it and doing it are two different things though.
My little laminated card said that there were no climbs between the last aid station and the finish. Well that’s bullshit for a start. We still had to go up and over to the finish. It was still dark, still slippy and I was still rubbish at descending. There were lots of really wet rocks and so it was only a matter of time before I lost my footing. I came down with a clatter and hit my head and elbow on a rock. Not ideal, but I soon picked myself up and got moving again. I was so busy looking at the ground to make sure I didn’t slip on any more rocks that I totally missed the massive tree growing
across the path. It was like in the cartoons where you walk into something and bounce backwards. By this point I’d had enough and just wanted to get it done. Crucially I needed to finish so that I never had to come back and do it again.
Eventually we started to hear some shouts and could see lights in the distance. Could we finally be nearing the finish? Laura and I discussed at what point we would start running. Let’s leave it as late as possible was the consensus. As long as we’re running in the finishing straight that’s all that matters. We crossed the line and got presented with our medals, beautiful wooden ones. I’ve managed to get mine covered in mud by throwing it in a bag with my muddy kit. I think that’s exactly how my medal should look.
I finished in 20 hours 11 minutes and 41 seconds. I’d wanted to go sub 20, and secretly hoped to finish before midnight, so I could have been disappointed, but I’m really not. I knocked 30 minutes off last year’s time and that’s in this harder direction in really tough conditions. There were many times when I thought I was going to have to quit, but I just managed to focus on getting to the next feed station and not thinking too far ahead.
There were hot showers and food on offer, but all I wanted to do was get back to the room. After exchanging contact details with Laura we bid a fond farewell and Chris drove me back to Ambleside. The steps up to the room were as difficult as I’d anticipated. The shower was total and utter agony. My feet were not bad at all, with just a couple of bruised toe nails and a tiny blister. My thighs though where my rain drenched leggings had rubbed were complete and utter agony. I couldn’t understand why I couldn’t get the sudocrem to stick to the chafing. It was then that I realised that I had a massive blister all the way down each leg. No wonder it was sore in the shower!
The next few days passed in a blur of eating, sleeping and hobbling about. Very disappointingly I wasn’t feel well enough for my sticky toffee pudding when we revisited the Italian restaurant post race. I’ll have to leave that for another time. On reflection I’m quite pleased with how the race went. Apart from the falling, puking and walking into things I think I did ok. Around 900 people started and only 800 finished, so I’m really glad to be part of the 800 and not the 100.
I don’t understand how the winner broke the course record and did it in 7 hours something. I’ll never be at the pointy end of the race and I think I’m ok with that. I got the full benefit from my entry fee and took my time to enjoy the stunning scenery (when I remembered to look up), made a friend and enjoyed some delicious food at the checkpoints. The freshly made pizza at Troutbeck was a particular highlight. I didn’t quite get the time I wanted, but I did finish and that’s got to count for something. And as ever when I finish an ultra I feel that I could take on the world. As long as the world doesn’t mind that I’m still walking like John Wayne!