What I learnt from completing my first Ultra trail race
Change in approach
Rather than the usual race summary I do, I decided I would focus on my learnings following my first Ultra trail race.
"Upgrading" to the Ultra Trail format
You may remember that I did my first DNF last year at the [Grand Trail du Saint Jacques]https://www.ncartron.org/my-first-dnf-at-a-race-grand-trail-du-saint-jacques-by-utmb.html).
I iniitally wanted to run it again, but my buddy Vincent registerer to the Ultra, and somehow convinced me to upgrade my registration :-)
Proper preparation
One big change I introduced this time is taking a coach, which helped me preparing correctly for the race: Expert Sport Coaching. I have a weekly Zoom call with Nico, my coach, where we talk about the past week, discuss the sessions he scheduled for the coming week, all of that taking into account my race goals - which in that case was the Ultra St Jacques.
In addition to GPP (General Physical Preparedness) and slowly increasing my
running volume, one challenge we had to tackle with Nico is: how to get some
uphill/downhill runs, when it's mostly flat where I live?
We solved that in 2 steps:
- "Hamster" repetitions in hills nearby home,
- "shock weekends" where I'd run in the mountains for 2 to 3 days
- I wrote about my trail running camp in Lubéron here,
- and we also did a 2 days weekend at Lac d'Aiguebelette 1 month before the race
So in a nutshell: I arrived well prepared and confident about my ability to finish the race - since this is what I was aiming for, as it was my first Ultra trail race :)
TL;DR
With that introduction done, let me done a quick summary of the race.
As explained in the introduction, I want this article to focus on what I learnt, and will not give a detailed breakdown of the race, but still I want to explain how it went.
The goal really was to finish the race, possibly in less than 26h (cutoff time was 28h).
I ran the race with Vincent - We made some timing predictions and thought the 26h were doable, however barely one hour into the race (around 11pm on Friday), it started raining and it didn't stop before 5am on Saturday. Obviously we lost a lot of time because it was super muddy and slippery, so we had to be extra careful especially in downhill sections.
We ended up having the fight against the cutoff times, which was super stressful, but also a very good experience.
Dawn after the first tought night!
What I learnt / need to improve
- Always come back to the basics: when it started raining, I thought it wouldn't last too long, so I stayed with my running shorts. I had rain pants in my backapck! But instead of stopping for 2 minutes and put them on, I decided to carry on. This was a lack of lucidity, as it meant I consumed more energy to fight against the rain and the cold, but also after 15h running with soaked shorts/boxer, I had groin irritations.
- Fight for lucidity: as we were running as a group of 3 (Vincent, Mickael and myself), my Petzl headlamp struggled to work properly, because it was using the default "reactive lightning" mode, which adjusts the brightness. I switched to what I thought was the 2nd mode, i.e. the "smallest" fixed brightness, but after barely 3 hours, my headlamp blinked for a few seconds, meaning that it was running out of battery. We still had 2 to 3 hours to go before dawn, and I had another battery in my backpack, so what I should have done is just switching batteries. But of course I did not do that... I kept running with the headlamp at minimum brightness, which slowed me down as I had to be very careful. So I lost even more time during that first night...
- Backpack: I had put A LOT of things in my backpack's large pocket, and because I had my rain jacket on top of my backpack, everytime I needed something was painful and I had to ask Vincent to help me. Far from ideal, both in terms of time but also with regards to motivation/mental.
- Quiver and Bonatti rain jacket: I really like the ability to put my rain
jacket on top of my race bag, as it protects it and also means I feel a
lot cooler. But it does not go well with the Salomon's Quiver - sure I can still
put the vest, but taking the poles and putting them away becomes super annoying,
and removing the vest is also a problem as the Quiver can get stuck.
For the CCC in August I will probably try another method: not using the quiver, but instead use a running belt and put my poles on the belt. I can also put my cellphone in the belt, freeing the zipped-front pocket of the race bag. - Talking about the front pockets of the bag: I struggled with the nutritions (bars, gels and purees) as it kept moving and that sometimes prevented me from feeding myself when I needed it. I'll work on that during the training for CCC as I need to improve how I pack - again, using the front-zipped pockets which become available if I use a belt, maybe an option.
- Optimizing time at aid stations: after the race, Vincent noted that I was super static at aid stations - instead of filling my flasks, taking some food and eating while walking away from the station, I was staying and eating at the station. I will try to improve that at the CCC.
- Nutrition: I can't say nutrition was an issue, but I had some moments in the race where I clearly felt that my energy levels were low. I think this is a combination of things: losing energy because of the rain/not having the rain trousers, eating slightly less than planned because of my backpack organization. One way I'm thinking of to fix that is to target slightly more glucids per hour
- instead of 50 grams per hour, aim for 60 or 65.
What went well
Even though I have a lot to improve, there are still things that went well:
- Physical preparation: this was a focus of my ¬5 months training, with a mixture of uphill/downhill sessions, and also a lot of GPP to strengthen my core, my hamstring muscles (which made me suffer in previous races) and improve my proprioception. I can report that this part has been extremely successful, as I didn't have any pain neither during the race, nor after. That's a huge win for me
- Efficiency when going uphill: even though I didn't train a lot with my poles, I found myself quite efficient when going uphill - I wasn't running of course, but my pace was steady and engaged. Probably a consequence of the GPP.
- Ability to resume running after a hill: something I struggled to do in the past, and that I worked on during training - basically, running again after a tough uphill section, so as not to waste time.
- Accelerate at the end of the race and in downhill sections: this one was also a very nice surprise! In my previous races, when I was completely dead, I was amazed to see people still overtaking me at a good pace, and I wished I could do the same. This time, I was the one doing this, and it was even better because every time I passed someone, I felt even better, and I kept "pushing" - granted, I was not super quick, but I was quicker than the folks I was overtaking.
- Fighting against cutoff times: not something I wanted to do, but we had to and surprisingly I found mental energy to do it and manage it.
Few pictures
Finally, here are some pictures of the race!
A well-deserved beer after the race!
From left to right: Julien, me, Vincent, Cristina
Vincent and me before the race, after we picked up our bib
Same folks after the race, notice I feel slightly less fresh ;)
Wrap Up
5 months of focused training with many hours outside (and inside for GPP!) and here we are: I finished my first Ultra trail race.
Sure, it didn't go as planned, but isn't that true for any trail race? :)
Now, there's plenty of things for me to work on, and that's precisely what I like with trail running: when you think you have understood something, then something else happens and you need to figure it out.
With that, thanks for reading!