Running the Connemara ultra - Adrian Ryder-"I belong here!! "

I asked club member Adrian Ryder to write about his recent race in Connemara - the Connemara ultra (39.3 miles). Adrian in his maiden ultra finished in a time of 5hrs48minutes - a cracking time, even more when you consider how, em, relaxed his training schedule was. Read on......

A few people have asked me why I was doing this and I found it difficult to come up with any kind of acceptable answer. I never had the talent, or maybe more so the discipline, to excel at any sport. What I love about distance running is that the farther you go, the less important it is where you finish, as long as you finish. Distance running allows me to enjoy sport without feeling pressure to be any good at it. However, I didn’t think “I’m too lazy to do anything else” would be a viable answer to someone asking why I wanted to run 39.3 miles so most people just got the usual, “Why not”.

Ultra Training 

 Since taking up running 2 years ago I’ve always been a poor trainer. I 
joined Mallow AC last November to try to add some structure to my training and although I  
feel I have made good strides (excuse the pun) since joining the club, I was still only running 
2-3 times per week up to Christmas. I promised myself that come the new-year I would 
up my mileage considerably. While I did increase my mileage, it wasn’t by nearly enough. 
Any training plans I looked at suggested 5-6 day running weeks. I remained stuck on 3. On Tuesdays and Thursdays I trained with the club. This was either speed work or a tempo run and the mileage could range from 5-8 miles. Some days I would add a few miles myself before sessions to bring it up around the 10 or 11 mark. At the weekend I would go for a longer run at whatever pace felt comfortable. Initially I had hoped that I might get up close to 30 miles before the big day. I didn’t get beyond 21.5. Actually, over the course of the 3 months I only went above 20 miles 3 times.

Race Day 

 My wife dropped me to the Galway cathedral to catch the 7am bus to Maam Cross. As I watched my fellow competitors climb onto the bus I started to feel like I really didn’t belong there. Sleek, springy looking specimens surrounded me and all had the air of people who had been there, done that and got the tech tee-shirt. My feelings were compounded as I listened to people discuss the 50 miler they had done here, the 100k they were doing next etc. After arriving in Maam Cross we had a mandatory talk from race director Ray O’Connor. “If there is anyone in the room running the half or full marathon”, he began, “You are at the wrong place. If you want to know how to tell you are at the wrong place, take a look around you”. Everyone laughed and I coughed a nervous chuckle (I don’t belong here). Ray then went on to single out a female runner, Hannah Shields. He explained that Hannah was one of the first Irish women to summit Everest but after she finished her first Connemara Ultra she declared that the run was harder. More laughter. Thankfully.

The start line was a sea of Skins, CamelBak, compression socks and multi-coloured
minimalist running shoes. What really struck me was that virtually nobody was warming up.
This just didn’t seem right but what did I know so I slinked into the crowd and settled for a
little shaking on the spot. Before long, we were off. I settled into a nice slow pace as I waited
for my muscles to warm and loosen up and the first mile passed quickly in 8:47. Grand. The
wind was already starting to pick up and miles 2-5 passed at an average pace of about 8:30.
I wondered if this was too fast for me but decided that with the wind behind me and the level
ground to this point it was ok as long as I felt relaxed. I took my first gel just before the 5 mile  marker. I would take another at 10 and about every 4 miles thereafter. Mile 6 took 8:07 and I gave off to myself for letting the pace creep up. Mile 7, 8:08. Now I was just annoyed with myself.

It was certainly unusual to be angry that I was running too fast and the feeling was new to me but I knew how important pacing would be today. Mile 8, 8:10. God damn it. At this point I had to really take stock. I did a full mental body check. Are you breathing heavy?

No. Are you forcing your pace? No. I decided that I was going to pay less attention to the
watch and more to how I was feeling from then on. Around this time I had caught Caroline,
a young female runner who was looking very relaxed. If I had to guess I’d say she was no
more than early 20’s. She told me it was her first Connemara Ultra. At last! I had spoken to
a few people since leaving Galway and this was the only other first timer I’d met. “Is it your
first Ultra then”, I asked. “No”, she replied. (I don’t belong here). We chatted for a minute
about pacing and the wind behind us and she agreed that there was no point in getting too
caught up about pace as long as I was comfortable. It was good to hear that from someone
else. Then she told me that she had heard this race didn’t really begin until mile 19. That left
me with something to ponder as I eased out ahead of her. 4 of the next 7 miles were run at
a sub-8 minute pace and I knew that there was a real chance that I could pay for this later. I
picked up the first of my drop-bags at mile 16, nearly losing a small bag of Jaffa Cakes to the
Connemara wilds in a gust of wind.

As we joined the full marathon route we started to come upon more people who had
come out to offer their support. I got a good laugh from 2 guys who gave Paolo Di Canio style salutes as they shouted “Come on the Ultras” when we passed. Close to the fullmarathon 5 mile marker I passed my first marathoners. The Ultra runners had been given an ‘Ultra Runner’ sign to wear on our backs and I was amazed at the amount of support and encouragement I received from other runners as I passed them. In later miles there were plenty of runners suffering just as much as I was but they still made the effort to cheer me on and it meant a lot. Miles 16-19 were all over 8 minutes. The wind was now blowing in from my right and it seemed to be getting stronger.

As I turned right to take the road for Leenane I quickly learned that Caroline had been well informed. It was a tough uphill mile, all the tougher because the wind was now blowing hard 
straight into our faces. I averaged a little over 8.5 minute miles to mile 25 at which point the 
pace slowed further. Despite coming downhill into Leenane mile 25 was just under 9 minutes 
and 26 just over. I had a hard job finding my drop bag at the 26 marker. I felt confident that 
I’d be the only one with a tricolour bag from Dealz in Cork but I wasn’t as I learned when I ripped a bag open to find a carton of pasta that I hadn’t packed. Just as I was about to give up on finding my own a kid handed it to me and I scurried off asking the marshals to apologize  for me to the person who’s precious supplies I had spilled all over the table. 
I passed the half-marathon mark, or the full marathon mark for me, in about 3:43. This would 
actually have been a PB for me if it was a regular marathon I was running. Then things  
got tough. Real tough. Immediately after crossing the timing mats we were heading uphill 
again, I forced down a banana, some more Jaffa Cakes, a Bounty and a bottle of Powerade. 
It wasn’t easy but I knew I had to get something inside of me other than gels and water. Miles 27 and 28 uphill into the strong headwind both took me over 10 minutes. At this stage 
everyone around me looked like they were struggling but the support kept coming from other runners and I returned it where I could. 29 to 31 were back closer to 9 minutes again as the 
elevation, but not the wind, eased. By now I was starting to feel a little sick. I had my final bag drop zone coming up at 32 but the thought of it alone was enough to turn my stomach. 
I decided that unless this feeling changed quickly I would skip it. I had been refreshing my 
stock of gels at the previous stations so felt that I had enough left to pull me through the last 
7 miles. In the end I didn’t even have to decide as I ran right by the bags without ever seeing

them. From 32 to 36 my mile times were closer to 10 minutes than 9. My legs were really sore
now from foot to hip but I wasn’t experiencing the energy sap that had plagued me over the 

last few miles of previous marathons so I was grateful for that. I remember at one point the 
wind suddenly seemed to disappear. It felt as though I had been dragging a tyre behind me 
and somebody cut the rope. Then, within seconds it was back, pushing against me again  like a petulant child growing tired of being ignored. A week before I had been doing some hill training with Mallow AC in Doneraile Park. About 45 minutes into the session our trainer, Shane Simcox, had run back to a couple of us that were lagging at the back and explained that we would be going over the largest hill again and then turning around and coming back over it one last time before finishing. One of the girls I was running with had a race coming up 2 days later so told Shane she might go her own way instead. As he ran off ahead of us again he said “Just don’t be too soft on yourself”. Right now, struggling to get up these hills against this maddening wind and seeing dozens of people all around me take the easy way out by walking, those words came back to me. I ploughed on.  

After running over a few of these small but tough hills the road seemed to flatten, even drop. I knew that there was supposed to be one really tough hill before the end but with less than 4 miles to go I wondered if it was possible that we had passed it. Sure, none of the hills seemed that huge by themselves but perhaps we had been gaining elevation bit by bit fora few miles now. No such luck. Almost as soon as I had the thought we turned right for thelast time and as far as I was concerned we were heading up the side of a mountain. The run from miles 35.5 to 37.5 was one of the longest 2 mile runs of my life. The one good thing I will say is that because we were climbing the hill in a winding, corkscrew manner, there was some small relief around most bends. They also offered targets. I’ll go as far as that bend before I start walking. I came this far, I might as well keep moving to the next bend. What wasn’t good, however, was that you could see about 1.5 miles into the distance, small figures dotted all the way along but no sign of the top of the hill. Almost everyone around me was walking. The marathon runners at this point were probably at 4hr 15min pace. I’m sure the more serious runners probably made this look easy. Occasionally I would spot an Ultra runner, invariable running. I felt an obligation to keep running myself because of this.    

If I was going to run with these guys I might as well make the effort to run like them whether I felt out of place or not. Mile 37 was an agonizing 11 minutes and 2 seconds and yet this  didn’t bother me. The way I looked at it, if I was walking it would have taken 16 so I just saved myself 5 minutes. When I thought I was at the top a spectator cried out, “Come on, nearly at the top of the hill”. Nearly? Don’t be too soft on yourself. Before I knew it I was up and over and still running. Mile 38, 9:59. I’ll take it. 

I try to remain focused until crossing the finish line but with 1.5 miles to go I was happy  beyond belief. It was all downhill or flat to the finish and I could actually enjoy this. Another spectator spotted my number. “Come on Ultra, 38 behind you, 1 on front of you”. It felt amazing. Nearly everyone was running again but I continued to pass runner after runner and on mile 39 I dipped back under 9 minutes again for the first time since 25. I came down the home straight with a big smile on my face, high fiving some random woman when she stuck her arm out. Less than 3 minutes after Hannah Shields, I crossed the finish line in 5 hours 48 minutes and 51 seconds, my own mini-Everest conquered. Race director Ray O’Connor was waiting behind the finish line to shake my hand. “Welcome back”, he said as he guided me to an area taped off for Ultra runners only. I marched in with my head held high  

I belong here.