Average Runner Running 100 Miles in less than 24 hours | Ultra Marathon Running Documentary

[Music] huh [Music] [Music] what are you doing on saturday i i need a favor uh nothing much [Music] i don't really know yet but bring your car on some warm clothes oh lots of coffee all right i'm in beans you do realize the last time you wrapped me up and said that we ended up but i promise you there'll be no police this time all right you're right yeah yeah yeah i've had an idea i'm planning on running 100 miles at the weekend it's the weekend yeah is that all right you've just had time yeah i know i'll well see how we go you're not gonna know that um what are you doing on saturday um [Music] trust me there'll be nobody [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] i mean i had no rights really to even attempt to run a hundred miles i know it's seen as like one of the holy grails of uh of ultra running and and even more so when you try and do it in less than 24 hours and that's exactly what i was attempting to do i'd not done a great deal of training a few weeks before i had covered and been sick there was definitely a few second thoughts as to whether i should even try it whether i was up to it whether i was kind of wasting everybody's time [Music] i put a lot of time and effort into planning the route and also my overall rare strategy i spent a lot of time studying maps studying google earth putting spreadsheets together and just really crunching the numbers creating a rare strategy that i believed in and i think that is is really important i'm not a natural runner i don't really have a runner's build i've done some pretty big events in the past and i wondered if i had enough about me and enough ability to turn myself around to be able to to be able to do this the route itself half of it would be on road and the other half was on the grand shropshire canal and i really did see this as my my secret weapon i knew it'd be relatively straight i knew it'd be relatively flat and you know as long as i've kind of got my head torch and it's pretty decent underfoot then i should be able to maintain a decent pace on there and put a lot of hope and trust in the fact that you know the canal would be a great choice quite a serious amount of water fell in shropshire the night before the event when i woke up it was quite foggy there was not a lot of visibility really and a lot of water on the roads and and on the ground but i kind of hoped that the canal would still be relatively dry and still be able to move pretty quickly along the canal and perhaps just be a few patches of mud that i'd have to tackle [Music] on the actual day of the race i woke up at my usual time quite early in the morning and i spent a bit of time just getting a few final bits together and making sure that everything that i needed was was kind of there joe and andy would kind of where they were set to arrive around midday that would give us time to do a few briefs and go through some of the kit before we get packed up and set off my start time was set to be four o'clock i'd chosen four o'clock because one i didn't want two periods of darkness in the race the dark can be quite a lonely shitty place for an ultra runner and also and i wanted a visual prom that as i'm approaching the finish line it's getting darker and darker hopefully that would help motivate me towards the finish line there were a few hiccups uh before the start somehow judd's dog got into the car without him knowing all right first up uh 30 minutes away realize the freaking dog in the back just dropped it back off setting off now 30 minutes away from my house i did my usual preparation before a race so i taped my feet i made sure my kit and everything was sorted out made sure all the equipment was ready the food nutrition was all sorted out and uh final start briefs and and checks with everybody and then it was a case of moving up to the start point and getting ready to set off [Music] the first four miles not a great deal to write home about really the traffic was good the conditions were good as per usual it was just a case of like holding myself back and and i got to the first checkpoint at costford pretty quickly certainly ahead of time jesus that was a quick that was a quick checkpoint it literally ran in the thing and then ran it was the first real mishap of of the day i'd asked paula and danny to be there at the first couple of checkpoints because they would then be able to head home get some sleep and that means they're not out in the middle of the night but they weren't there i just thought well i'm not i can't hang around too long so i grabbed a bit of food some water and then and then set off again pretty quick the first sort of stage of the of the event was like i said pretty uneventful the the biggest risk was the traffic it was really heavy traffic you know i was on some busy busy roads in the dark get a bike you did and i definitely felt vulnerable when i was on the road i just wanted to get to the canal as quick as i could getting hit by cars is the biggest risk at that moment in time so halfway between checkpoint one costford and checkpoint two paula phoned me and i said oh where were you and she said well i was at the start and i said i wanted you with the first checkpoint and she went oh i thought the first checkpoint was the stats and i was like no you've kind of misunderstood it turned out she went shopping but uh anyway it didn't matter at all you know i said so don't worry about it too much start winding down for the night and and i'll see you early in the morning oh man nailed it when i got to checkpoint two at newport andy was though set up there already added some hot drinks and some food laid out and uh and i felt i felt pretty strong he also told me that paulo was on her way and i thought great you know i'll see you before it gets too late [Music] so i spent a little bit longer at checkpoint two than than i'd anticipated but it was certainly good to see her before it got into the long night and the hearts log drilling down the road with the traffic it was good to have joe protecting me at times all the way i knew my next checkpoint was gonna be the point in which i joined the canal which was to be my my secret weapon in the overall route and at this point i was really you know i was really motoring considering i was going to do 100 miles or i was on for a four hour marathon which was uh which was pretty good look good feel good look good safety and here's how dark it is [Music] truck i've lost so what i'm just like 30 behind now do you need to check your feet roll right five minutes here and then kicking out [Music] sniffing up already 30 minutes ahead use oh 40 minutes ahead you were supposed to be at 1950 now 1912. i got to the canal my rare strategy was train change footwear into some trail running shoes and take a running backpack with some safety gear in there i was i was really exposed down in the canal if something had gone wrong then it would have had to been like a like a helicopter job really because there was just no way to get a car or anything a vehicle near to to the tour path so i took some extra clothing extra food extra water and all that kind of stuff just in case i had any problems awesomeness i'm loving it is it that way is it [Music] as soon as i got to the canal i knew it was going to be a bit of a disaster i just couldn't get any purchase with my feet out for every step i was taking i was slipping around because of the fog my head torch was just pretty much useless and i ended up turning it off and just trying to make my way along the canal bank as best i could in the dark who expected him here maybe 30 minutes ago now uh i became really frustrated because i i think i lost a lot of time i just remember sort of thinking that i'm just gonna have to as long as i'm moving then i've got i've got a chance of getting through this if i stop there's just no way i'm gonna do this i've got to keep moving and although i slowed right down i just kept fighting through and i know i expelled a lot of energy trying to get through the muddy conditions and and also a lot of mental energy because i was really having to focus run along in the dark worrying about falling into the canal and i remember speaking to andy and saying you know i'm really struggling down here very wet and very dark and he said well you know my word of advice if you're wet then you're too far over to the right i just remember thinking thanks andy that's uh that was brilliant advice but that kind of humor exactly why you know it was part of the team to keep me going when i got to the next checkpoint it had really taken its toll i'd slowed right down because the mud and the terrain really technical yeah um what do you want uh i need my water topping up i need some paracetamol and now at that point the whole thing was in was in question i think i was a little bit confused i don't really remember much about that checkpoint i'm telling you you're wrong i just remember that whereas andy and joe's tone before was very positive and i couldn't believe how fast i was going and all this now the tone was very very different it was like you know you've lost a bit of time there you need to keep moving a little bit concerning my brother's voice i i've been looking at it but i didn't know what to what information to give you unbelievably andy had rustled up some some chicken nuggets and chips coffee please yeah that lunch i had a hot drink and some more water i felt ready to leave the checkpoint and ready to get back into the battle yeah okay [Music] all right checkpoint done um it's a bit weird because he seemed a little bit moaned out he seemed you know to be tired um but he just he came to the checkpoint had everybody fistful of nook chicken nuggets some chips and a and a coffee and then just ran off it's just weird weird seeing about this very much the same on the canal for the next leg but i just i just thought i've got to dig in here i know i've got some road coming up and i'll try and make up some time there and this was just a case of just fighting through and i started this this mantra really it was something that i heard from a famous ultra runner called courtney dewalter she said that you know if you want it enough you'll find a way and just thinking i've got to get to the road as soon as i've got some road i'll take that opportunity to run but for now it's just a case of just keep moving it's very dark and wet the next checkpoint in auburn i think i caught the guys by surprise they were still in the car and when they got out the car i was like i'm not going to stop for very long i'm going to keep moving because i'm moving quite well i had and i'd been sick a few times on that leg the food wasn't going down i couldn't really drink a great deal which is it's quite normal and i knew when you're covering 100 mile and you're running for sort of 24 hours you'd have lots of peaks and lots of troughs and i knew this was a temporary trough and and this too like everything at some point it's got to pass and i've just got to kind of get through it so i didn't eat much of the next checkpoint and just cracked straight on all right so tracker's not totally precise uh it's really maybe five ten minutes earlier than i thought it would be but this is surreal because i literally left him at the last checkpoint and i was like kind of fearful for his safety down on the canal but looking at him now he's just blitzed into this into where we're parked and [Music] [Music] there's been a couple of miles of tarmac so i've been able to kind of trap down the top a little bit it was a lot lighter and the mist had lifted so i could move a little bit better and i i started to feel a little bit more positive about what was going on i was thinking you know this is it's on it's it's close but it's it's that was slower you lost 20 minutes of your buffer but you're still good kind of all right with that in your hand no no no i just needed my belly to settle down but i know this one's going to be a little bit short slower so i'm just going to get going yeah yeah yeah hold on see in a bit hello it's me danny and dot dog and it's 12 43 and we can't sleep so we're driving off to i don't know um wherever he's half it's hot an hour and a half away wherever he's half hazel mia is that it heal me hail me or something like that we're off now to meet him because um we can't help him bye-bye yeah thinking of coming off the canal early can you remember where it is um it may be on your map there yeah i'm thinking of coming off there because it's just like this i'll stay on all right if it's like anything down there i'll come off and get on the road i'll meet the maybe point during the recce me and andy had a drive out and we looked at the major checkpoints and we identified a point on the map where i could either stay on the canal and had the benefit of it being relatively flat and straight or i could come off the canal onto the road and it was a bit more distance but it was it would be dry and it'd be well lit and i'd be able to be supported by the crew you know maybe i'll come off the canal maybe i won't so we called it codename maybe not me coming off yeah yeah i decided i was going to come off the canal the canal was just you know it'd become what i thought was gonna be my secret weapon had just become my my greatest fall and it really really battered me so i thought you know get onto the road and let's try and get this time back up on the road i reckon i lost 20 minutes i lost 10 minutes in the checkpoint this time yeah we've got socks on there no no they're the gore-tex socks it's like some thousand miles socks you lost 10 minutes in the checkpoint what do you mean i reckon i didn't account for time in the checkpoint on my my log [Applause] don't change your at all that's where you lost that time then that's where you lost that buffer right yeah but i reckon i lost you when he's on the log he's accounted for the running account for the time in the checkpoint i know that's not trying to make it how we doing now day five you're doing good yeah well obviously the next checkpoint was that telematch wanted it yeah yeah we'll get there we'll still meet you there yeah but i'm not gonna stop long there yeah fine do you wanna know what else come all right it's got a salt tablet and an effervescent thing in there give me the salt tablet to swallow now another one and um and if you can put one of the powders in not the other vessel it's like one minute i need to be going if i can get a hot drink of tolerance that tastes [Music] uh batteries are in one of the big boxes [Music] [Music] [Music] nice one craig i think it was a good decision i think it really was a good decision because um although it was furthering distance it was you know it was just good to get off the road change my shoes dress my feet with a few blisters and a few toenails that would cause me some problems i had to sort them out get them taped up and what have you and then put some fresh socks on you know a refeed hydration and then get going again so it was definitely good to um to get going and i felt a little boost of energy getting onto the road and and mixing it up a little bit there he is he's walking [Music] i was running again everything was pretty plain sailing i mean it wasn't the fastest in the world but i was definitely moving but then when i got through the last checkpoint before the turnaround point the terrain definitely changed you know there was more ups and downs and that was that took its toll as well and there was also a couple of roads that were just so long and straight and boring that it just became a real slog there was one with a light right at the end of the road and it just never seemed to get any closer and but all i could do just keep on moving keep on moving i remember in my mind i was constantly thinking that i had a 10 hour race out and a 14 hour journey back as i was getting to nine hour hours i was kind of thinking that you know this isn't going to plan i'm not going to hit the turnaround point by 10 hours it was going to be much later than that so i thought at this point i would phone andy and tell him that i was going to turn around a little bit earlier to make sure that i got through the 50 instead of doing kind of extra you know i wanted to make sure that i completed the race and it counted more than actually doing more than 100 miles when i spoke to andy kind of just laughed it off and said look just keep going you're doing really well it's going gonna be fine trust me keep moving and we had a little bit of a heated discussion about you know the fact i said you know i don't want to do all this for nothing and he basically said look you need to make a decision craig do you want to guarantee a medal or do you want to break a personal boundary in this event they might not come together and what he meant by that is i can guarantee a medal and maybe not break a hundred but if i wanted to break the hundred now regardless of the time you know regardless of the route i've got to keep going when i put the phone down that was definitely one of the lowest points i didn't know where i was going to find an extra two or three miles with only half an hour to go you know it just didn't seem possible my the way that my mind was and my mindset at that time it just didn't seem practical you know i was really kind of questioning it and i and i was on this long slow slog of a road really questioning everything that i was doing and and a little bit pissed off with andy because i thought you know he was the guy that would speak sense to me when you know when the time came little did i know he was talking sense i just couldn't see it at that moment in time [Music] as i was moving along and i was feeling sorry for myself i heard a car sort of slowing down behind me and i thought oh is this the police is this where i get a bit of a bollocking or whatever and as i turn around i couldn't believe it it was paulie and danny and they brought along little dottie my little dog my best mate dog and that instantly instantly changed everything and all of a sudden i just felt so much better and as they drove slowly next to me i just sort of trotted along and they just kept me going through those real dark times and then at one point said okay we're going to crack on now you keep going with me the turnaround point and it was just the thing that i needed to lift me up and that that disappointment of her not being there in the first checkpoint i would go through that tenfold to have that moment right there where they just lifted my spirits so much that it really really was crucial in the whole race all right so i made my way into the halfway point i was 30 minutes or 40 minutes over the time but it's starting you know i'll um hopefully i'll be able to make it up on the way back and i kind of sat there and we had a bit of a pot noodle a bit of food so everybody took stock that had made it halfway and now the real work had to start in the back [Music] [Applause] [Music] when i set off back i mean i felt i was in a lot of pain you know i was hurting a lot and i was tired and fatigued but i felt like i had you know decent presence of mind and i kind of understood what was going on and obviously not because i went off in completely wrong direction and joe had to kind of pull me back onto the on to the right route [Music] at that point i remember thinking god maybe i'm not as compass mentors as i as i thought i was i want us to follow you a bit closer now because of the roads now it meant that joe could stay pretty close to me and it was it was great to have the noise of his engine and the fact that you know he's watching and he's there if anything goes wrong as i went along we spent a bit of time as well where i was also running alongside the car as he was driving you know and joked about me getting on the bonnet or sitting on the boot or whatever and yeah it was good to have that bit of company it'd been i've been out on my feet a long time and it was good to have someone i could have a bit of a conversation with as we plodded along we got that much into the conversation that actually we took a wrong turn a sense that it weren't right i mean as you're running along sometimes things look different when you're coming at it from a different direction and i start saying to joe you know is this right is this the right doubt it doesn't seem right you know is it left down here and we carried on straight and he was like yeah yeah i'm following your the root of your tracker it turned out that the the tracker hadn't updated and we've done the wrong way it was confirmed when andy phoned us up and said craig you know you're going the wrong way don't you and i was like psych yeah i do now and he said look it's not going to make that much of a difference so just stay with it keep going readjust and crack on so not only now was a bad time i'd gone the wrong way and you know you don't know what the cost of that is until either the fatigue hits your legs or you run out of time and we really didn't know which way it was gonna go [Music] i got into the next checkpoint tarpoli and add a little bit of food there not much and now we just became a game of attrition where i just have to keep moving every step was a step closer and you know really minimize the amount of time that i spent in checkpoints and and keep moving and i knew i had this impending doom of the uh the canal bank coming up good for me jesus that was a quick that was a quick checkpoint if he's really kind of focused on this now i think he's i think he's scared that if he stops you won't get going again [Music] so all the way down the road my feet just really really hurt i've taken a few painkillers throughout the event and they were starting to wear off and i could feel stuff when i got to the point i'm going to get back onto the canal i changed my footwear they didn't seem to fit as well but because my feet were swollen i got my emergency backpack with some extra kit on there that felt much heavier than it did before the one thing i did have was though is much greater visibility compared to the first time that i'd been on the canal and so i thought you know at least at least i've got that and i've gotten to the canal and just focused on and keeping moving and keeping going forward so he's doing well he's going strong hopefully like great daybreak he's getting light out of his heart i think but he's still he is getting lighter but hopefully that's uh he might start picking up when it starts to get brighter at this point i asked andy you know what the fight what the total distance left was to do and he told me he was 31 miles i remember at the time thinking that that doesn't seem right you know it doesn't seem long enough and i carried on running kind of played on my mind for quite a while as things do when you you know you're that tired and you you've been up on your feet for that length of time we got to the next checkpoint i remember saying to him look can you just give me a breakdown of all the distances because i need to i need to get this into my head and i need to know what i'm dealing with so he told me he was staying one mile i'd run another four mile to the next checkpoint and then he sent through all the distances so when i tore them up it was 34 miles so it was more 40 on miles at the last point and i remember thinking like you know i just i can't mentally i just cannot conjure up another 10 miles like where where the hell do i get that from when i'm already no i've gone the wrong way i've already been lost time on the canal you know where the hell do i find another 10 miles now so the canal was again was was really really low i had a couple of phone calls and audio messages through and i knew that two things was happening one graham would be meeting me soon and i just had to get to him and hopefully he would be able to pierce me and pick me up pick me up enough to get me back on track and moving forward and two daylight was coming and with that daylight would become some renewed energy you know get a little bit warmer and hopefully all those two things would combine to propel me forward and get me moving again [Music] surprisingly graham met me early on the canal he wasn't due to meet me until i got to audrey but thankfully he came about five or six miles north of the canal which kind of gives you an indication of how far behind time i was at that time but it was really good to see him and he just kept chipping away talking to me saying the right things at the right time and just constantly keeping me before and the other thing that he did was i was asking him all the time you know what pace are we doing what person we need to do you know how we can do this and he just reassured me all the way just kept me keep moving forward you'd be fine you can do it you're all right massive massive motivating effect and kept me going i do we got to order them i didn't want to stop long but andy had bought as a mcdonald's i wouldn't normally eat it but i did i actually smashed it and it tasted phenomenal perfect pretty sugars what's happening in time in mind you're all right we've got um nine hours to get in and and how far 31 miles tighten it uh [Music] [Music] it definitely gave me a bit of a lift because when we left that checkpoint you know i was moving again and i was moving consistent pace you know which it was all about consistent forward motion and momentum as i was going on the canal i remember seeing mile markers every two miles on the way up i remember it being 18 miles to nantwich when i was crunching the numbers i was thinking it can't have been 18 miles i must have misread the numbers it must have been 16 miles so in my head i was just like okay 16 miles keep going until 8 10 12 14 i thought right this is it we're coming off the we're coming off the canal soon and i was wrong you know it was 18 miles and again i had to find another two mile two extra miles in my mind of of shitty canal now the canal surprisingly had dried out a bit it was definitely easier to move along it during the day time but again it was still relatively slow going [Music] oh yeah this hill is probably too much room [Music] hi boys as i come off the canal ash was there oh gregory holy lads [Music] it was great to see ash it was good to have a fresh pair of legs you know we had a little bit of a turnaround i changed my socks changed my shoes a little bit of food a little bit of drink and then now i was on the road very very close to uh to getting it finished off [Music] my feet was really sore the last thing i wanted to do in the world was run but there was times when i had to run and you know there were times when ashy and graham would arcade come on let's have a little trot and we'd pick out something in the distance like a little threshold okay that sign that tree that junction you know would trot to it and basically just link in behind graham or behind ash and just kind of get in the zone and just just trot along trying to ignore the pain trying to use the pain just trying everything i could to to keep going and with the mantra going in my head still you know if i want this i'll find a way if i want this i'll find a way and every time i thought you know i need to stop i need a break or whatever i'd be like no got to keep going we've got it got to keep moving forward how's it feeling craig just good to have you two here keep me moving my mouth seems to have stopped working i've got loads of haribo going around your legs are still working okay guys just about yeah go that's what you need your head your heart your legs and your lungs and you're laughing at you mate i really didn't want to stop i thought if i stopped now i'm not going to get going again and if more or less run in a little bit of some food something to eat and drink and then was out you know and i pretty much left the two paces there because uh you know i just i just needed to get going in my mind i was thinking that you know if i spend an extra two minutes in the checkpoint and i fail this by two minutes if i miss this by two minutes i'm gonna kick myself so i just did not want to waste any time with the checkpoints at all and and just flew through it ash was telling me now that there's 13 miles to go in my head i was thinking about 30 miles if i do three and a half miles an hour i can do this it's there i've just got to keep going everything became focused on that keep moving although my legs were screaming my feet were just throbbing and aching my back was hurting i was just tired and delirious i think at one point my mouth stopped working i developed like tinnitus in my ears at one point yeah it was just you know it was definitely a place that i'd never really been before in my in fatigue levels for such a period of time as well you know i've obviously been in some states in the past and i've had times when i've kind of collapsed but i've never had such a prolonged period of time in like utter fatigue it was an experience let's say when i got to the final checkpoint at costford there were a few people there and i knew that i had four miles to do and had an hour to do it so 15 minute miles and i could i could i could do this so i set off and and i just remember thinking that you know if this takes me 23 hours and 50 59 minutes i'm happy with that i'm not looking to break a record i'm not looking to like smash two hours off the time i just i've just got to get in there in 24 hours joe andy ash they were all trying to encourage me to run a little bit and to do a little bit extra but i just wanna didn't feel the need and two i just didn't want to you know i'm just happy just getting in there with a few minutes to spare [Music] getting two of the last few hundred meters was special it was really special because i could see a small crowd my family down there i didn't know graeme and his wife was going to be there it was brilliant for them to to be at the finish line as well [Music] what what made it seem like an even crazier thing to do with other people's reaction to it you know like paula said that she set off at home to drive to the turnaround point it took an hour and a half to get there and run and back it's just a phenomenal feeling to to have run 100 miles [Music] good [Music] retiring your eyes at night [Music] all right um a final distance over 104 miles 23 hours 36 it just felt phenomenal and i just cannot thank the crew the pacers everybody for all their for all their help it was an incredible event [Applause] so [Music] i think i've got a few things planned for the future i've got some local runs and races i really enjoyed sort of having my family there part of it and i think they enjoyed it too as well as some stuff in in other countries as well so stay tuned

Channel: Craig Williams Ultra

Views: 44,882

Rating: 4.9463363 out of 5

Keywords: running 100 miles, 100 mile run, ultra running documentary 2020, ultramarathon documentary, ultra marathon running documentary, running 100 miles in 24 hours, ultra running documentary 2021

Id: AVxviDwvhTc

Length: 44min 5sec (2645 seconds)

Published: Tue Feb 16 2021