Otmoor Challenge and Ridgeway Relay Reports by Benedict Pollard
THE OTMOOR CHALLENGE (Saturday June 1 st )
– a training race for THE RIDGEWAY RELAY (Sunday June 23 rd )
Benedict Pollard
Having been a club member since around 2010, I think this might be the first time I’ve won the club wine draw, so that was a nice surprise to be able to stock my cabinet for guests.
I’d always heard of the Otmoor Challenge, kind of a bit like a distant cousin, who may or may not actually exist. And then one day you meet them at a wedding, or Christmas, or maybe even a funeral … I’ve been trying to work out which. Then I decided it was probably more like a fitful night’s sleep where you have a horrible nightmare only to wake up and realise it
was just a dream.
Anyway, whatever it really is, my point is that since tripping on a tree root last July in the Abbey fish pond area (be careful) and badly cracking my ribs, I spent two months recovering, but then several more months with a total mental block around running, and had kind of given up until around February this year. In 2023 I’d put in so much effort to get closer to where I wanted to be in terms of fitness, commitment and pace, another sucker
punch to the gut was too much for my mind to work around. Fast forward to early March 2024, and I realised that if I was to have any chance of being fit and available for selection for my favourite race of the year, the Ridgeway Relay, then I’d better get my act together, and stop being so evasive … sharpish.
Rule #1: speedwork every week – and despite regularly being last on every lap on the multi-club sessions held around Albert Park in winter, and at the Radley track in the summer, I kept on pressing on, undaunted by the recent arrival of a new trainee who had just posted a 5k time of 15:04!
Rule #2: work towards 20 miles a week minimum.
Rule #3: get some longer runs in.
Thus my attention turned to the Otmoor Challenge at the very last minute. Things weren’t helped by my work involving regularly doing 20,000 or more steps a day just from physical labour – great cross-training – but exhausting. So, as race day arrived, I was already kind of ‘out on my feet’, not least because I also set myself some gruelling weights/circuits targets,
including many dozens of pull-ups, push-ups and so on, which the body seemed to be rather committedly rebelling at by way of feeling utterly exhausted.
The race: The whole setup of the race venue was jovial, upbeat and slightly carnival-like, albeit there had been a major car crash opposite the entrance to the field, which was being cleared by a mix of army cadets and firemen. After eventually getting into the car park, I found a really good number of ERRs milling about in chitchat and general bonhomie, it being a club champs event, which felt a bit like a home from home.
A few of us then opted for a warm-up, but I quit after the magnificent achievement of about 80 yards with legs resembling extra-heavy fortified lead, as if one had gone fishing for The Kraken. I felt like I might trip over a clump of long grass, let alone tree roots.
Feeling rather dismayed, bewildered even, at the fatigue, the starting claxon went and off I went imagining I’d be able to keep up with the first 30 or so runners, but it soon became abundantly clear that I was simply unable to run at any kind of pace I would usually be able to muster. I got slower and slower, and dozens of people overtook me, until after about 2 miles, I thought, well it doesn’t really matter, I might as well just plod round at a jog. A rather strange experience. Admittedly, I hadn’t run this far for a very long time, and after all, I was only actually running it to get some training miles in for the Ridgeway Relay, but then again ‘a race is a race’. My pace of around 8:30 to 8:40 minutes per miles, is what for me would usually be classed as ‘very easy’, but I literally couldn’t go any faster – it was so weird – I don’t ever recall feeling like that. It was becoming rather disconcerting.
Then the mental games began. “Am I over-the-hill?” “Maybe it’s time to pack all this running malarkey in – clearly I’ve lost [insert word here …motivation, commitment, pace, fitness, stamina] …” “I can’t believe I can’t go any quicker”, “I mean I am over 50 now” … Then I had the old classic chat with someone else, reminiscing about the good old days when I used to
be able to do low 6 min miling for a half marathon … as did he, as it turns out. Two overweight ‘has-beens’ reliving old glories. It was all rather depressing really, and it just served to slow me down even further as he ambled on ahead, and my mental state deteriorated further into frustration.
And so I pootled on, just figuring well I’ll at least finish it, and that will be some kind of achievement.
But then something rather odd happened, at about the 6 mile mark, the course went off-road, over a little stile and then onto some rather lush springy turf, which immediately unearthed a hidden bounce in my step: my pace rocketed from almost 9 minute-miling to a sprightly 7-minute-mile, and a couple of chaps ahead of me commented in surprise as I whooshed past them in a dazzling blue and white chevronic blur. And it got me thinking:
“maybe it’s my body telling me that I really don’t like running on roads/tarmac/hard surfaces”.
And that kind of makes sense when I think about it. Cross Country and track were always my thing, and that was back in the day when the track at Radley College was cinder. Long before tartan arrived. I loved it. A bit like running on solid sand, with enough give in the surface to make it soft, but enough traction to power forward. This sudden change in terrain to a natural off-road substrate gave me a much-needed mental boost, as I suddenly found that the body had quite being a rebellious punk, and that it did secretly have some pace after all, locked away somewhere previously unknown. Some core strength also emerged and I started picking runners off. From around mile 7 onwards I just seemed to accelerate away at pace, and reeled in many of the people who had vanished on ahead earlier in the race.
The sound of machine guns rattling away at around mile 8 or 9 was a little disconcerting, but I figured that if war had come to Otmoor, presumably a few people would be running back the other way. Apparently there’s some sort of army base nearby and they must have been doing their morning drills! Good to keep us on our toes at least.
I had been warned pre-race about a stiff hill near the end (about 200ft of ascent in a mile), and when it arrived I felt warmed up, strong, ready and willing to take it on, and overtook quite a lot of people on the way up through gritted teeth. That was followed by a storming sprint down the other side, a rather lengthy delay at a stile, where a child was being lifted
over by a patient parent, holding up rather a crowd of runners, then a tough last mile that I managed as the quickest of my race, a little under 7 minutes per mile on a gradual uphill. By this point I wasn’t bothered by the tarmac – as I seemed to be running into an altogether different gear.
I crossed the line in 1:44:24.4 which I think was comfortably a PW (Personal Worst) being almost 25 mins slower than my best, and yet somehow it felt very satisfying. I had maintained the discipline to go slow when I needed to (or had to!) but then sped up when conditions were right, and as is my general preference, executed a progression run (speeding up gradually as time goes on). More than that though, it was the first of 4 long (10 miles+) training runs that I delivered in the space of 3 weeks before the Ridgeway Relay on June 23rd.
Here’s the Otmoor analysis:
https://www.strava.com/activities/11546764882/overview
After the race it was good to chat to old friends, meet new club members, clap rather a lot as Eynsham swept the board with many prize category wins, and reacquaint myself with racing. All in all, I’d do the race again, and probably even add it to one of my favourite courses, a really good mix of terrain, undulation and upbeat fun. I look forward to doing it when fit, rested and strong.
Writing this report the day after the Ridgeway Relay seems apt, as Otmoor was one of the stepping stones to yesterday’s exertions … and I am delighted with how my leg went. I took on the 10.1 miles of Leg 5 without fear, as I knew I had at least done a modicum of longer runs, in addition to three months of solid interval work on the track, every Tuesday. My Ridgeway time was a minute quicker than last year, and I placed 5th on the leg, up against some very decent runners. More than anything I was delighted with the mental discipline I showed by not overdoing it on the first two miles, which includes a beastly uphill, but also tactically easing off twice during mid-race, to keep a bit back for the last few miles. They are perhaps the most challenging miles as the terrain is generally long vegetation – in
yesterday’s case, the farmer had cut it for hay, so we were running on top of these big floaty piles of grass, without being able to see the ground below. That’s not to mention the densest cluster of the 22 gates and stiles that punctuate this deceptively tricky leg. It’s so hard to keep any sort of rhythm or pace when it’s irregularly stop-start, stop-start, going through or over these obstacles, so I was delighted that I ran them the quickest that I’ve managed in my three Leg 5 race outings (2016, 2023, 2024).
Conclusion: as we all know, running is a mental game as much as a physical one. These recent two races have been great mental successes. So, I’ll keep pushing on.
As is no secret, I enjoy the team events, so next up is the away leg of the Witney Challenge – hope to see you there, as we aim to defend our hard-won trophy from 2023.
