It would appear that the weather is broken, this is the second weekend on the trot that it's not been raining when I woke up on Saturday morning and that's not normal! I'm confused, unsure of what to do with myself and strangely dry. Whats going on? With the predicted forecast for Saturday being hot and humid I thought about spending the day laying on the beach or sat in a pub beer garden. Well OK, I thought about it and then remembered that there's a million better things to be doing and as I've got no ability what so ever to sit still and the boredom threshold of a thing that gets bored really easily, I decided I'd better do something else instead. What to do though? A bit of cycling would be OK in the sun, as would a bit of walking, or I could go and run my "Marathon a Month" effort. Let's see then, which is the most stupid idea? Ah, yes, "Marathon a Month" it is then. And where should this stupidity take me? Well the canals nice and flat and mostly shaded, that could be OK. The coast will have a nice breeze. Maybe I could go that way? Or no, because I'm an idiot let's go and have a go at the Punch Bowl Marathon route. I've now had 2 attempts at this and still not got to the start line. Yep, that will be ideal, it's inland, hilly and when it's not hilly crosses open, sandy heath-land. Ideal! Oh, and it's 30 Miles, so I get a bonus 4 miles on top of a normal marathon, even better! Not being a complete lunatic, I thought that I'd better get an early start and try to miss the worst of the heat, so had the alarm set nice and early and was up before the birds had the chance to start singing in the new day. A quick bit of breakfast and off for the short journey down to the start line. In an unusual touch of sense on my part I realised that the route actually came towards home from the original start point, so planned on picking it up at the furthest North point to save a bit of driving. Unusually for my planning, this worked a treat and I was parked up and ready to go by 07:30. With the van temperature gauge showing nearly 20°C and the sun breaking through the light cloud cover it looked like the forecast was correct and it was going to be a warm one. Having actually remembered to bring the GPS this time, it was a simple matter of following the line and as I set off Southwards from my start point, I quickly settled into a steady rhythm. Conscious of the rising temperature I was trying to keep the pace slow and steady, knowing full well that the day was going to get hotter and going out too fast early on was likely to cause big problems later on. Just how big those problems were going to be I had no idea, but as we will see later things didn't turn out quite as planned. It wasn't until I'd got a couple of miles in and paused to have a look into the River Wey that I got the full picture of how warm it actually was. The second I stopped the sweat started running down my face and dripping into the river below, not a good sign when it's only 08:00 and your already going about as slowly as you can! From the River Wey it's a long slow climb up to the Devils Punch Bowl itself, crossing through the outstandingly picturesque heath-land of Hankley Common on the way. Whilst it's a beautiful area, made even more so by it still being early and totally deserted, its not ideal for long distance running, as, like much of this area its very sandy. Personally I think that loose sand is about the worst thing in the world to run on. It looks so inviting, yet is just so energy sapping, a few hundred yards plowing through loose sand feels like miles of running on a firmer surface. 10 Miles in saw the high point of the Devils Punch Bowl and some glorious views back to where I had just come from, looking back you can clearly see the height gained and get an appreciation of the work it's taken to get up there. It's worth it for the view though and I paused for a moment to take it in. It's days like these that hopefully I will remember when I'm to old to do these stupid things anymore and it's always worth pausing to make sure the feelings and thoughts are lodged away into the depths of your memory to be pulled out again some time in the future. I can't stop for long though, there's still 20 miles to go! On around the top of the punch bowl and then drop off the other side to cross the notorious A3 and pick up the Greensand Way towards Wormley. Looking at the twists and turns on the GPS it's not surprising that I couldn't follow the Greensand Way when I tried a couple of weeks back. No such problems today though and It's through Wormley and back towards the A3 to cross back over again and into Thursley Common nature reserve. By Thursley Common I was 20 miles in and the heat was starting to really build. A quick stop for a sandwich (I'm not sure if sandwiches are supposed to feature in Marathons, but conventional is so last season, so I'm going with it) and push on. By the time I'd worked my way across the common and reached Elstead I was really starting to suffer. Whilst my legs felt fine, the heat was starting to get to me. Despite starting off with nearly 2 Litres of water I'd got through most of it and the sun was now burning down. Crossing the River Wey for a second time, I paused at the river edge and threw some of the cool, fast flowing water onto my face and head, absolute bliss, it really looked good enough to jump straight into. I can't afford wet feet today though so push on I must. Not long after Elstead as I worked through the 25 mile mark things started to go a bit wrong. I'd started getting a few twinges of Cramp in my calves, a sure sign of dehydration and the heat was really getting to me. I'd not long finished that last of my water, when somehow I missed a turning and got a bit lost. That's a bit weird, all I've got to do is follow the line on the GPS, how have I got off track? Not to worry, get back on track and carry on. By the time mile 27 came along I'd got off track a couple more times, and on the last occasion struggled to get back on the right route, finding it all a bit confusing and difficult. OK, stop and take stock of the situation me. What's going on? Why am I struggling and getting lost? I realised pretty quickly once I'd stopped that the heat was really starting to cause me some serious problems and I needed to do something about it! Confusion, Dehydration, Fatigue, Headache, all early indicators of heat stress and pretty good indicators that things aren't too far from going seriously wrong. Time to make a sensible decision then and stop, except I can't stop as I've still got to get back to the van! What I can do though is stop and cool down for a few minutes and then walk the last couple of miles, which should be a bit easier. There's nothing at stake except pride and there's nothing to be gained from continuing to run. It probably took 30 or 40 minutes to cover those last couple of miles at not much more than walking pace. I could have pushed on and maybe I'd have been fine but maybe not. I'm more than happy to say that I think I made a sensible decision and lived to fight another day. Despite knowing that it was going to be a hot day, setting off early to try and avoid the worst of the heat and running at, what is for me a slow, leisurely pace to try and stay cool, I still nearly messed this one up. I got back to the van in just under 5:30 having covered 30.5 miles. A distance I should be able to easily do in around an hour less without any real problems. Thankfully I was able to spot when things started to go wrong and do something about it, but it just goes to show how easily these things can come out to bite you and how careful we all need to be in the heat. Within 5 minutes of getting back to the van I'd downed a Litre of water and felt a lot more human, by the time I got home I'd probably had another 1/2 Litre and I would think that by the time I started to feel fully hydrated again I must have taken on at least 3 Litres of fluids. Knowing how the sweat was pouring off me in the early stages and the duration of my run in the temperature I can quite believe that I had lost that amount of fluids, and despite setting off with nearly 2 Litres with me, there is no way that I could have carried enough water to keep on top of that fluid loss. So, have I learned anything from my close shave? Of course I have, I've learned that this is a great route and one I'll definitely do again, but I might wait until it's a bit cooler. No, seriously and in all honesty I think that the important lesson is to take adequate precautions whatever the weather, whether that be stupidly hot or cold wet and windy and make sure your listening to your body. There are always warning signs when things start to go a bit wrong, take notice of those signs and most importantly act on them. If your body's saying stop, then stop or it's not going to be long before it goes really wrong. Sunday morning didn't look to promising when I got up, it was grey and dull first thing with the wind steadily increasing whilst I sat eating Breakfast and trying to summon up the enthusiasm to tackle the day. I considered getting my bike out and doing a few miles, but my legs felt a bit tired after yesterdays efforts, and did I really want to slog along into the wind just for the fun of it? Eventually I decided to wander up to the allotment and have a couple of hours pottering around and decide what to do from there. I managed a bit of weeding, pulled out the Sweet Peas and French beans that have finished and lightly dug over where they had been and cut back the Loganberries to leave space for the new growth which will bear next years fruit. By the time I'd got through that little lot and spent some time watering the sun had come out and it looked like it was going to be a nice day. Casting my eye around the plot I looked at the little shed and decided enough was enough, it was time to do something about the state of it. As a bit of back history the little shed was on the plot when I got it. It was missing half of one wall, was full of spiders and rubbish and looked pretty sorry for itself. So I could get it usable and have somewhere to hide the wheelbarrow and few tools that I leave up there, I fitted a bit of spare wood over the big hole, and bodged up the door, with the plan being to replace it ASAP. A couple of years later the roofing felt blew off so I fitted a bit of spare tarpaulin that I had laying around and got a new shed for all the good stuff to live in, relegating this one to seed tray and plant pot storage, the plan being to get a new one ASAP. Can you guess whats coming next? At the start of this year the Tarpaulin blew off and ever since the seed trays have been getting wet, the door won't shut and now 7 years since I first said it was going, the time had definitely come to replace it. So, I had a look on the internet of stuff and discovered 2 things 1) A new shed was going to be £200+ and 2) The quickest I could get a £200 shed was 8-10 weeks. As far as I'm concerned there's 2 problems there A) I'm not spending £200 on somewhere to keep my plant pots and B) in 10 weeks time I'll have lost interest and moved onto something else. Que, plan B: Fix the shed that's there and see if we can get another 7 years out of it. First things first then and a bit of brute force and ignorance to pull it away from the fence. Half the problem is it isn't sat flat and level, which considering that it's only made of rotten tissue paper isn't doing it any favours and getting it level will at least give me somewhere to start. So a quick bit of bad carpentry for beginners followed by slopping some of Paul's special wood preservative around should give us somewhere firm and flat to sit it on and at least give us a fighting chance. The next problems going to be getting the shed onto the plinth on my own. Not to worry though, good old Archimedes had the solution to this little problem. There's not many things that can't be solved by either the application of brute force or if that fails leverage! Handily there's a few bits of wood knocking around and a couple of poles left over from the net building project (I knew I'd not taken them home for a reason). With it now sat nice and level it's quite amazing the difference it's made. For the first time ever the door actually opens and closes and the whole thing feels a lot more solid.
Next step, slop on a coat of preservative and strip off all the really rotten bits, including the roof and that was about as far as I got for today. I'll grab a sheet of OSB next weekend and make a new roof which will give it a bit more rigidity and square things up a bit better. Then a couple more coats of magic mixture and we should be good for another couple of years and all for the cost of a box of screws, a bit of wood that was left over from building the other shed and a bit of roofing material. Even at the worst case that's £150 odd, I'm better off by! Now why didn't I just do that a few years ago and save myself a whole load of agro!
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Paul PerrattOld enough to know better, young enough to still feel invincible, stupid enough to keep on trying the same thing again and again. Cyclist, Gardener, Runner, Hiker, Cook, Woodworker, Engineer, Jack of all trades and master of none, Anti social old git and all round miserable bugger. Archives
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