Race review: Belper Rugby Rover 30k trail race

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2 weeks ago I was planning on embarking on a long run. It was going to end up being a relatively boring street-pounder from my front door, until I heard about the Belper Rugby Rover; a race organised by the Belper Rugby Union club. 30km (18.5m) entirely off-road around Derbyshire and a 1.5 hours drive from me. It seemed perfect. Why not?! Oh yeah, maybe because the furthest trail run I've ever done is 6 miles and the furthest I've run recently is 13.5 miles. Ah well, what could possibly go wrong? Storm, plague and death knowing my luck.

If you haven't worked out that this is the route, then stop reading my blog and go away

I contacted Dom to see if he would be up for this at very short notice. To my surprise, he was. Plans were made for me to stay at his in Hull on Saturday, then travel from there to Belper the following morning.

On Saturday night, after a too-speedy 8km around Hull (it's impossible to get Dom to do our "warm up" runs slowly), we popped in to the Rugby Tavern for a couple of pints. Wonderfully it's a Samuel Smith's pub, which is some of my favourite beer. And it was in the pub, whilst playing pool that I had my oddest injury ever.
Suddenly, with no warning, my left knee began to hurt. A lot. A small spot on the inner aspect of my knee, just above the knee cap began to hurt. I hadn't twisted it or walked in to anything. It just started hurting, apropos of nothing. I did a deep squat to try to stretch it out thinking it might just be an odd muscle spasm, but that just made it hurt even more. 5 minutes later it began to ease off. I could put full weight through it without any problems but the actually site of it was very, very tender to the touch. I have suffered no knee pain since my chronic (2 decade-old) knee pain disappeared 2 years ago when I received some decent physio.

That night in bed the knee pain woke me up at about 3am. I began to wonder if I would actually be able to run.

In the morning the tenderness was still there. I decided not to think about it and set off. The drive went smoothly, (Although pressing the clutch was interesting) until we arrived at Belper. We had looked up the postcode of the rugby club where the run finished and started. Somehow, however, we had managed to get the post code for the address for postal entries and arrived at someone's house. Cue quick googling whilst Dom's stress levels began to rise rapidly. Luckily we were close to the rugby club as Belper is pretty small and arrived in good time whereupon we parked next door in a hospital car park where we were directed.

We quickly sussed out our "competition" also known as, "checking out what everyone else is carrying and wearing"
Most people seemed not to be carrying water or wearing too much. A lot of people wore road trainers.
I selected a vest, my Salomon trail shoes and my shades from the pile of "everything-from-Arctic-to-tropical wear". I reasoned that my trainers were good on the road too, so they should be fine. It was a mistake, but more of that later.

 The race director gave us a pre-race briefing and the police escorted us around to the road where the race was due to start. I spotted Dom on the line after losing him between signing up and getting my race number and listening to the briefing.

Off we went and the field set off at a sprint. I wondered why? Did they know something we didn't? The answer was a resounding yes. During the first mile there are lots of bottle necks, mainly in the form of stiles.
Dom and I ended up queueing on more than one occasion. The sprinters had avoided most of the queueing.

You can just see me looking down starting the GPS watch

The usual discussion had taken between Dom and I about race pacing the night before and continued on the drive there. It went as it always does. I talk about taking it easy because of the previously mentioned reasons. Dom agrees. Then over the next few hours Dom talks himself from taking it easy, to running it fairly hard, to naming a very tough time that he would like to beat and finishes off by wanting to beat everyone.
I reiterate that I will be taking it easy.

After a few fields and queuing at the stiles the race took a dramatic turn up an extremely steep hill section, which turned out to be the steepest of the day. At this point my recent fell running experience took over and I passed Dom for the 1st time, who squeaked, "I thought we were taking it easy?!?!"
"This is easy Dom..."
I had heard genuine terror in Dom's voice. He was obviously worrying that my fell running and his doing all his training in entirely flat Hull,  might mean that I would beat him for the first time ever, bearing in mind his 10k PB is 3 minutes faster than mine, and his marathon PB 22 minutes faster.
He needn't have worried.

As soon as the track levelled out again, Dom passed me with ease. At about 5k the track began to descend and I sped up. I find that I can descend a fair bit quicker than the majority of people who finish races around me.

I passed Dom again. I didn't see his face, but I bet it was a picture. But of course, when the track flattened out again, Dom cruised back in front of me with consummate ease.

Not long before the first water stop at about 7k I heard two people catching me. They were busy chatting and one voice was a woman's. I was going to be chicked... At the water stop I paused and drank 2 full cups of water; it was a hot day and I had decided not to carry any water. I grabbed 2 of the proffered jelly babies and ate them as the couple passed me. I saw them many times throughout the run as they caught me each time I paused to drink and eat jelly babies at the water stations. The lady was in her mid 40s I would say, the guy around 30 in a Kirkstall Harriers vest, and he seemed to be pacing her.

Dom had now long disappeared and I was thoroughly the meandering route through beautiful countryside.
My GPS watched bleeped off the kilometres and the sun shone away with few clouds in the sky. The field had spread out and I saw few people.
At the third water stop, another couple caught me, this time a pair who were probably late 20s. There was something like 10k to go, but don't quote me on that because as usual, my post-race memory is pretty poor.
The soles of my feet had now started to get pretty sore and I was regretting my choice of footwear. This new couple passed me with jelly babies stuffed in my mouth. I trotted behind them on one of the few sections of road and started to catch them with the help of the jelly baby-buzz.

We followed another large red arrow in to a field which was steeply down hill and I rapidly caught and over took the couple, a de-chicking! I then realised the couple had been heading in to the wrong corner of the field, the tell-tale red and white striped tape was in the other corner. I quickly changed direction and called out, "I blame you!" at the couple.
"I blame me too!" the female half said.
"Who let the woman navigate?" I said.
"Just for that I am going to beat you!" she announced.
I should point out that this exchange was all in good humour!
In to the next field and the descent continued with me pulling away with each step. By the time we entered a forest section I was flying and sore feet aside, felt great. Thankfully, I didn't see the couple again so she was unable to make good on her promise to beat me.

This was taken earlier in the race, but I thought I'd best break up all this waffle

As the last 10k wore on my feet were starting to be a real problem. I had to face it, there were almost certainly blisters in there. With about 5k to go, I could feel warm liquid in my left shoe and I really wondered what I would find in there at the end...

Now I was really ready for the end, if not ready to stop "racing". I pushed on harder. Despite this I was passed by a man at least 10 years my senior, "Is there anyone else to catch?" he asked.
"Don't think so, the guy in front of me was moving pretty quickly"
I was wrong, 5 minutes later I went past a runner who was clearly examining grout.

With 3k to go, I was amazed to hear the Kirkstall harrier and his friend catching me. Something awoke in me.....

"Oh hell, No!"

I put down the hammer (ok, I put down the mini screw driver) If I was to keep in front of Kirkstall harrier's mate and avoid a late chicking, I would have to work hard.
I recognised the trail we were on as being back on the start of the route. I paused at a bridge to contemplate the route and Kirkstall Harrier and I decided we needed to go over the bridge, thankfully, we were right. Now I knew exactly how far I had to go. A quick run through an industrial estate, along the main road, down the drive to the club house and in to the field to finish.
The pause at the bridge had given my nemesis the chance to catch me up again but I found enough energy to speed up down the main road with her following close behind me. The drive appeared and I started to sprint, such as I could manage anyway, and I heard her fall away. Triumph! (which is exactly the same as disaster, Mr Kipling) I rounded the corner in to the field and crossed the line. As always, I was way happier than I should have been to finish in 73rd place out of close to 300 runners, one place in front of a woman probably 10 years my senior, but hey ho, I'd won another tiny, tiny, insignificant battle.
My legs which had felt ok(ish) suddenly announced that they had actually just been keeping quiet and uncomplaining (which is very unlike them) and quickly deposited me on to the floor, refusing to pick me up again without a struggle.
The orange segments provided by the rugby club were extremely welcome and the outside taps provided tasty cold water.
I found Dom who had finished around 9 minutes in front of me, a phenomenal performance for someone who has never run off-road and rarely on hills. Predictably, he had crippled himself and was walking much worse than me. Good job he doesn't drive really!

The race had been great fun. Really relaxed and friendly with a beautiful, fun route. It was anything but flat of course, but that was part of the challenge and one of the reasons I wanted to do it.
When I eased off my shoes to check the damage to my feet, I was amazed to find there was none. There was only reddened sore sections and none of them too bad. I had been convinced there would be blood and blisters in there!

The pint in the club afterwards was incredibly cheap of course, as was the burger and huge portion of chips, all of which tasted brilliant after 18.5 miles.

All in all the Belper rugby Rover turned out to be perfect training for both my upcoming Oslo marathon in September and my desire to run ultras which are usually off road. A highly recommended race.