A tough trail race in Correze
I recently ran a trail in Correze (south-west of France) which went a bit less well than I expected.
Selecting the race
Previous trail races
This was not my first trail race, since I already ran the Hivernale des Templiers (see this blog article) in December 2021, and also the Bouffémont Maxicross (nearby Paris) in February 2022.
But the distances were pretty reasonable (35k for l'Hivernale, 28k for the Bouffémont Maxicross) and I finished them without any big issue nor pain.
Running a race with some folks from the running Club!
Since last year, I registered to a local running club, and have a weekly session
with local runners, which is a lot of fun.
Nico (yeah, another one) is very much into trail running, so he convinced a few
runners of the club (including myself) to run a trail together.
We selected September, and the decision was made to go for the "X Trail Correze" (see their website, in French), and went for the 54 kms (with 2500 meters of elevation).
(For those wondering: YES, we had some knights riding their horses, for the first 5 KM :))
In the end, we were 4 runners and rented an Airbnb, so it promised to be a fun weekend!
Sadly, one month before the race, 2 guys got injured, and the third one
preferred not to race, so in the end I had to decide whether I still wanted to
go there.
Since everything was booked and already payed for, I decided to go and run this race by myself - less fun, but hey this is still trail running, so I knew it would be great!
Before the race
Training
Since this was a significant bump in terms of distance compared to what I did before, I decided to be a more cautious than usual when training, and especially I followed a 2 weeks break/slow-down before the race.
Business trip before the race
The week of the race, I had a business trip in London, which I thought would be OK, since I was going there by train (Eurostar) and the time difference is not really huge.
We'll discuss later in this article how it turned out.
Driving to the race and picking up the bib
I had a tight schedule on Friday, the day before the race:
- I had to take an early Eurostar from London to Paris,
- then take another train from Paris to Angers (where I live),
- then a bus back home, where I was to pick up my luggage,
- and then finally drive ~5 hours to Argentat (where the race was taking place) to pick up my bib before 10pm,
- not to forget that I had to check-in at my Airbnb!
In retrospect, I think I've been a bit optimistic: I managed to arrive on time in Argentat, where in the end I first checked-in at my Airbnb, and then picked up my bib.
Once back at my rental, I prepared my running gear for the day after:
I then cooked dinner (pasta!) and went to bed, but quite late: 11pm, knowing that I had to wake up at 5:15am the day after.
D-Day
To the start line
The race started at 8am, but we had to take a shuttle for ~30 minutes. My Airbnb
was about 20 minutes away from the pick-up point, so I woke up early, had
breakfast, and decided to walk rather than taking my car, as I feared that I
couldn't easily park nearby.
It was dark outside (6am), and when about half way, a car stopped - it was
another runner, and seeing me walking with my running gear, he asked whether I
wanted to hop onboard - which I accepted.
We chatted for the 3 minutes that it took to arrive, then when waiting for the
shuttle: Serge was 62, coming from Bordeaux (South-West of France) and was
running trails for a while in many different places.
We were supposed to have 2 options for the shuttle: 6:30am, and 7am. Serge and I were there at 6:20, and no shuttle showed up, so everyone took the 7am ones.
The journey was uneventful really, nothing to report :)
The start line
Once out of the shuttle, we stretched a bit, chatted with other runners, while listening to the speaker.
We didn't have to wait too much time before the start: 15 to 20 minutes maximum I'd say.
First 10k
I knew it since I looked at the elevation: the first ~5k were not too hard, and were even clearly downhill. Only then the first hills would start:
Everything was going OK, I stopped at the first aid station (around 10k) to drink water (it was a drink-only aid station), then carried on, which is where elevation started to appear, with the first steep hills of the race.
10k to 20k
Nothing special to report here (or so I thought): I ran uphill and downhill until the second aid station (~18k) where I ate food - and since we were in Correze, a French department known for its cheeses and delicatessen, I decided to take that as well!
20k to 35k
It was flat then for a few kilometers, after we had to go uphill again.
At KM 21 I had a small pain in my left calf, which although unusual at this distance, I didn't really pay attention to.
At KM 25, a runner was resting on a rock, having issues with his knees - I stopped to ask him whether he was OK, to which he said yes, he just had to rest a bit.
I'm mentioning it here, since I'll meet him again later as you'll see below :)
At KM 30 there was another water aid station, where I drank water and also asked for some Coke - which was unusual (I never drink soda, especially when running) but I felt like it.
The pain in my calf was still there and growing, not helped by the succession of down hill and up hill running/walking.
To the end
Starting at KM 48, it was really painful to run, so I decided to finish the race by walking - even though I didn't like it and that was the first time for me, but hey, you keep learning every day, right?
Fortunately, I was soon joined by Julien, the runner I briefly met at KM 25 - he was feeling better, but his knee was still not great, so going downhill was complicated for him.
We chatted for a while, and since none of us was in a great shape, we decided to finish the race together.
My buddy Eole, who introduced me to trail running, used to tell me how different the mindset is between road runners and trail runners - as in, you can make friends while running a trail for instance.
Julien comes from the Paris area, and started trail running a few years ago. But
what blew my mind, while talking to him, was that he nonchalantly explained that
the week after, he would pack and fly to the Réunion Island, well known from
trailers with its "Diagnole des Fous".
He will run the Trail de Bourbon (109 KM) this year, but his goal is to run the Diagonale des Fous before he's 40 (so within 3 or 4 years), hence he's relocating to Réunion... how crazy is that?? :-)
Finish Line
Oviously, running the last 7K was a lot slower while walking, but we made it in the end.
Upon arriving, we took some food, and of course a beer! :)
I even managed to see Serge again (the runner I met in the morning) - he finished ~20 minutes after me.
There was a "massage booth", so I took a chance to get a mssage, since my left calf and hamstring muscles were super painful - I could barely walk :D
Once done, I had to walk back to my Airbnb, which is when I regretted that I chose not to park the car nearby in the morning, cause of course, this 1.5K took me a lot longer than in the morning... and was also a bit more painful...
The day after, after a restful night, I drove back home, and was thankful that we chose an automatic transmission last time we changed our car :)
So... What Happened?
Alright, so I managed to finish the race, but one question remained: WHAT HAPPENED?
I had been running for 7 years, and run a bunch of races without any issue - true, trail running is still new to me, and is very different from road running, but still, I trained properly. The distance was longer than what I did before, so I knew it wouldn't be easy, but I didn't anticipate such a struggle.
I thought about it a lot since then, exchanging with my buddies Eole and Matthieu (who also run trails a lot), and I think it's a combination of things.
Let's try to break it down in order:
- Training:
- I ran enough in the previous weeks (between 60 to 80k per week),
- I introduced some more frequent uphill/downhill running, but I don't think it was enough.
- I had a small, ramping pain in my left hamstring muscle - nothing really serious, and I could perfectly run, but I should have paid more attention, and should have done a lot more muscle preparation.
- Rest:
- the day before the race, I spent almost 5 hours seating in trains and buses,
- then I drove for 5 hours the same day (which means I was still seated),
- I went to bed at almost midnight, and woke up at 5am, which is clearly way too short before such a long race,
- the previous nights were OK (I slept at least 7h), apart from the day before, where I also woke up early as I had to catch an early Eurostar.
- Food / Beverage:
- I wanted to introduce more salty food, which is why I ate cheese and delicatessen at the aid stations,
- I don't think that was an issue for my body, as I had absolutely no stomach disorder, but in retrospect, I should have tested that during my training,
- Not sure that drinking Coke was a great idea either - again, no issue with it, but it's a lot of sugar and I'm not used to drinking Coke,
- I only had "clear" water, and no additive electrolytes, which didn't help either
Again, that's just me speculating and trying to understand why this race didn't go like I thought it would.
Debrief
Thinking Back
It's been exactly a month since i ran this race (September 24th), and it took me that time to write this (long) blog article, as again my main goal was to understand what happened - not because the race didn't go well, but so that I can avoid doing the same mistake again, and run my next trail without those issues.
Things I'm gonna do
With that in mind, here's what I'm planning to do:
- Training:
- introduce a lot more downhill training,
- increase exercises focusing on legs (hamstring, calf)
- Food/Beverage:
- Eat salty food while training,
- Drink electrolytes to get used to their taste,
- Rest:
- Avoid spending too much time seating the day before the race,
- Sleep well the week before the race.
Toughness of the race
I discussed with one of the organisers once finished, telling him it was a tough trail but still very nice - but not really having "easy" sections (apart from the first 5k maybe), as the rest is just down hills followed by up hills.
The guy laughed and said that the day before, some runners were almost bragging that the route looked easy, to which he told them that it was not the case, and advised them to be careful.
I can now confirm that!!!
Next Race
The next race I'll be running is "SaintéLyon", which is a 78 KM trail running
race between the cities of Saint Etienne and Lyon (France).
I'll be with my buddies Eole and Matthieu, not alone this time, so we'll see how
it goes :-)