This year Claire and I decided to do the hundred together. We finished the Speyside together having intended to run/walk independently. The Flower of Suffolk didn't go so swimmingly, and I think we both missed the support the other provides.
We started looking ahead at the Hunnypot while we were walking the St Cuthbert's Way a couple of weeks earlier (although I'd sorted out hotel bookings and looked at the kit list etc already).
"Bloody hell, that's a lot more climb than I expected!"
Turns out the North Downs are quite up and down. In reality that plays to our strengths so we were quite happy about it.
We travelled down on the Friday and stayed in Gravesend, then drove to the start Saturday morning. We'd planned kit etc pretty thoroughly and made last minute adjustments for the forecast heatwave. Registration and kit check didn't take long for the 12 o'clock start, so we were sitting around drinking tea for a while. We said hi to Steve Jones, who we know from many Runfurther and Craggrunner events.
It was getting properly hot by the time we set out. Just before 12 we were led out to the start in the housing estate across the road, then on the dot we set off.
Everyone immediately ran off. Not many walkers on the 12 o'clock.
We set off at a steadier pace, but still fairly brisk. We were aiming to stick to around 5-6kph for as long as possible. We know we can sustain that pace comfortably.
It was pretty warm, and I was glad I'd dressed lightly and not overloaded my pack. I was carrying mandatory kit plus a few bits I liked to have or 'needed' (watch charger, some snacks, sun shirt).
The first few miles took us through vineyards on the Weald Way, then up alongside a wood:
"Over a stile, up path to st above. so... what's a 'st'?"
"stream? no. street? obvs no. standpipe? stoat maybe? it's a stile, but it said 'stile to st'. Maybe there's a stoat on the stile".
This only got worse as the weekend wore on.
Just before Addington & CP1 we had the first motorway crossing, under the M20. A quick stop for water. I was carrying a litre for the first leg, and used it all.
We had barely got underway again, climbing up through some woodland, when Claire's GPS beeped a couple of times then switched itself off. This was particularly annoying, because we only had one spare set of batteries.
Then we popped out onto the road and there was a petrol station directly opposite. Winning! Claire popped in for batteries and came back with bonus crisps.
Some suburban bits, some woodland, and we seemed to be at Ightham CP2 quite quickly. It. was. hot. There was an ice cream van outside, and bowls of water to dip hats in had been deployed. We didn't hang around long as we were making good progress.
At Sevenoaks Weald we had one of several level crossings, prompting dark jokes about football boots (for anyone who remembers 1970s Public Information Films).
At Weald Memorial Hall (CP3) we paused for a little while. I ate a few cheese wraps and an egg wrap, some crisps, filled up with water and then bumped into Kieran. Sadly Dianne had already retired after a few weeks of intermittent illness. Kieran had kept going though. Nick Ham was there too, he was also retiring.
We got going again, along the road to the busy dual carriageway.
Over the road bridge and along the lane into the woods. Oldbury Wood was absolutely beautiful, and we encountered the media team here. I was guzzling my now-cool-enough-to-drink tea from Weald as Simon Pipe popped up with his film camera.
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| TEA! (Photo courtesy of Simon Pipe) |
Bitchett Green gave us some childish hilarity.
At Knole Park and the Chestnut Walk we had a couple of km of dead straight parkland avenue, which seemed to go on forever. The local dog walkers must have wondered what was going on as large numbers of walkers passed by. At this point first finisher Lisa Joanne Walbridge came past looking very relaxed.
Under the A20, playing around with the echoes. I expected the tunnel to be cooler, but no.
By Cowden we'd lost the daylight, although it was still warm. We followed the RD but couldn't see the GPS as we hadn't got torches out yet. I'd forgotten my small backup torch, which usually lives in an accessible pocket.
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| Kit check at Cowden. Once we found the CP. (Photo courtesy of Simon Pipe) |
It turned out there was an ambiguous bit in the RD, which assumed you could see the road as you approached through a horse field. We couldn't, because it was dark. We ended up coming in on the wrong path, which meant it then gave completely wrong instructions to the CP. We eventually tracked the CP down and arrived for kit check. I found a few places in the RD where it said "TL" instead of "TR", but this was the most problematic issue we found. It seemed like a few others made the same mistake.
At Crowborough we both felt pretty rough. I had a lie down for a few minutes and that helped. I was feeling a bit out of it. There were quite a few of the West Yorks LDWA group here, and they were finding it hard going too.
"wow, did you see that?"
"no, what was it?"
"it was long with a long tail, brown."
"how big, small or tiny?"
"small."
"Probably a stoat"
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| Pooh sticks |
At the bridge we dropped in the sticks we'd been carrying a couple of miles, then watched them through the bridge.
At the top I could hear nightjars chirring. It was a bit noisy with chatter from the groups of people walking, but we heard the birds in brief lulls.
Down the hill to Eeyore's Gloomy Place and on towards the CP.
I had a couple of muller rice pots at Nutley CP, and just tried not to eat the jam. Think it worked, didn't zonk out. We got going quick before the noisy people left. As we left it was getting light, and we didn't need torches any more. It still felt pretty warm.
Horsted Keynes and pizza, plus some quiche. I was suddenly hungry. We tried not to stay too long though, and got on into the increasingly warm day.
At Fellbridge we picked up drop bags and went to our respective changing rooms. The gents changing room had one sink, but a reasonable supply of cat litter trays. I filled up a tray with hot water, stripped off and had a flannel wash. Reapplied Skinsosoft (with some hooting - it stung quite a bit) on my chafe-y regions, and finally rejoined Claire for some breakfast. Fried egg, veggie sausage, hash browns and some yoghurt and granola, charged up my watch a bit, and I was ready to move on. I considered leaving my sun shirt in my mid bag, but it weighs next to nothing and may come in useful (it did).
Felbridge to Edenbridge was a long long leg with a lot of climb, and tough going.
Edenbridge was hot as the very gates of hell. Volunteers on a well earned break had their feet in a paddling pool. Others were wetting towels to stick on us. I had a crumpet with cheese, and some rice pudding, and tea. Then more tea. And iced water. We stayed here quite a while, just to cool down.
Idle Hill was a nice place, topologically complicated with hills, woodland and small valleys all over the place. I tried to fix my own toe blister while Claire's back chafing was being seen to by first aider Sara. Small world - Sara had been just in front of Claire on the EBB for several hours, and I remember meeting her on the Pendle in 2021. Eventually I gave up and Sara put an incredibly sticky plaster on for me. I resolved to get some of these as they were so effective at staying stuck on - I think they're Dependaplast brand. I swapped my fairly heavy Tea Round t-shirt for my sun shirt to try and keep cooler.
Off we went again, up the hill, between houses, through fields and into woodland. I was so much more comfortable in the sun shirt, definitely a good move. We chatted briefly to a supporter who told us over 200 people had already retired from the event.
Sundridge, and a long long stretch of road past Radnor School and over the M25, then on up the hill. The road kept getting steeper. That's fine, I like a steep hill. It kept being road though, and that I'm less keen on. At the top we doubled back and started dropping, which Claire was even less keen on. We were both having mood issues, so we stopped for a few minutes on a bench at the top and got our brains back under control.
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| Chain gates - shadows of the Speyside |
Round the corner, and Chevening House came into view. We did a bit of a wiggle around the edge of it, and climbed a rather nice grassy valley to some woodland.
Soon after we reached Halstead and the cricket pavilion, which was a pleasant stop. We were getting into the evening now, with seventeen miles left to go, and starting to get tired.
By this point we were thinking checkpoint to checkpoint, but it was only 5 miles to Kemsing so that didn't seem too bad. Climbing up we crossed the M25 again - this time a full ten lanes, with 4 lanes per carriageway plus slip roads. The noise was unbelievable, saturating and disorienting.
We caught up with a large group on the road near the end of this leg and were behind them in the woods, but soon squeezed past as they seemed to be struggling a bit with the navigation. Not surprising to be honest, the RD was extremely sketchy here. We'd been using the RD and GPX together throughout, with Claire using the GPS and me following the RD. The map showed a single coherent route through the woods, but it was a maze of different intersecting paths. Someone had marked out the right route with reflectives, which made it a bit easier although very often at path forks they were in the middle of the fork with no indication which to take!
We dropped down through a largely unmarked field, then down a ginnel and were greeted by some familiar faces - the Irregulars!
We didn't plan to stay too long, I ate some crisps and a biscuit and we had some tea, then got going.
Out of the CP and into the recreation ground, and the RD & GPX conflicted with each other. The RD told us to pass to the left of the copse of trees, the GPX went to the right. We encountered another couple here who'd recced part of it, they took the left and we took the right and both came out onto the road together. Then up a driveway and up through the woods. We were still able to push hard on the climbs and that felt like we were making good progress. Through the virtual self clip, and back down to the valley bottom through a dense rape field with plants up to my chest (they must have been above Claire's head). We stopped at the bottom while I removed something from my shoe, which took a long time as my feet were hard to reach.
At this point I was confused by (I think) multiple big antennae with red lights and was sure we'd just turned back on ourselves. I was cursing the route planner for sending us round in pointless circles (although in reality the whole thing is a pointless circle, isn't it?). I was pretty tired and fighting brain fog. In fact my mind was starting to play tricks on me. Unlike Claire I didn't get visual hallucinations through the second night, but I spent the entire night fighting with the feeling that everything was familiar because we'd done this route before.
A long, long, long gravel track, then up a road and back into the woods. Confusingly straight through a campsite. The shape of the hills ahead didn't make sense and I was trying to work out if we were crossing from one valley to another.
Everyone knows the last CP of the Hundred - Dave, Merrien and friends sadly didn't include Jack Cooper this year - she had other things to do this time. But we had a lovely surprise to find Ken and Jenny Wyles there. They sat us down and fed us tea and rice pudding and we chatted for a while, but needed to get to the finish.
And so to the final leg. 5-ish miles, little climb. Mostly road, not my favourite but it gets the job done.
We got into Knole Park and followed the main park track to the very end. The sky was just starting to lighten a bit. Then finally onto the cycle way that seemed to go on forever. At some point we passed a car park and a supporter called "nearly there, just stick to the path". Claire and I went off on "and beware the moon" for a few minutes. My feet were painful again, and we were just plodding along in a straight line trying to keep up a decent pace. The dawn chorus was absolutely saturating. We could see mist covered fields to our right and no obvious sign of habitation. At last we came out in the village, head torches weren't needed any more and we limped all the way round the school and into the finish. Our final time was 40:39 - rather slower than our estimates, but most of that was spent cooling off in checkpoints.
We were both ravenous which is unusual for the finish of an event (Claire usually gets nauseous), and ate straight away before collapsing into the van for a few hours. Claire got up before me and went for a shower, while I opted to be a stinky git all the way home before lazing in a hot bath.
So that's it for another year. How soon can we enter the Jurassic?
Thank you
Just a final word - the Hunnypot was tough going: the heat was too much for some, and even those of us who were able to keep going struggled. At every CP the volunteers were extraordinary - doing everything possible to keep us safe, keep us going, keep us laughing. Meanwhile managing the almost unprecedented numbers of people retiring, ensuring they got back to HQ safely. The care and support was amazing, and I think we all felt it to our hearts.
That's not to detract for one moment from the work done by everyone else of course - we all know it's a huge undertaking to organise the Hundred and the work that had gone into it was visible. But the care that was shown to us on the day(s) on an individual basis by all the volunteers was quite overwhelming.
Practical bits
My first aid kit wasn't very good. Which is a bit embarrassing for a race first aider. The problem is I tend to focus almost entirely on emergency first aid. I should take the hit on an extra 100g or so and carry a better range of stuff: durapore tape; heavy duty plasters; a more reliable pencil; a few more dressings; hand gel & gloves.
40+ hours was a new one for me. It was actually OK. I struggled at roughly the same time as I usually do - 1am on day 1 - which suggests it's partly sleep deprivation, but much less than I usually would. I didn't seem to struggle at 1am on day 2 in the same way though. I never had stomach or hypo issues, but ate almost zero sweet food.
2nd night sleep deprivation effects were, for me: difficulty focusing my eyes, they tended to wander around; occasionally falling asleep while walking; weird and really strong deja-vu feeling nearly all the time. That faded as the night wore on, and by an hour before daylight I was tired, but my perceptions were fairly normal.
I did wish I'd taken my gluco kit. Not to help with the event, but to learn and baseline.
The Zebralight headlight lasted all the way through both nights and still reported 75% power off a single battery. I ran it on low medium most of the time, with high medium as needed and high-high on fast road crossings. low-med is all the light I need for walking.
Small metal clip to attach my tally to my bottle pocket worked well.
The Columbia legionnaire cap was useful, but a bit hot. It could have done with air vents in the crown.
Gaiters were arguably unnecessary and gave me a horrendous heat rash. Although I might have got that anyway.
Food
I didn't carry much of my own. A few mini cheeses, a few mini malt loaves, a couple of nut bars and a 200g bag of salted nuts.
Things I remember eating: at least 3 muller rices; a cheese toasted sandwich; 4 wraps; fried breakfast; slice of pizza; 3 slices of quiche; crumpet with cheese; 3 packets of crisps; a few savoury flapjack pieces; some bean chilli; couple of mini malt loaves; maybe 3 or 4 mini cheeses; a packet of mini cheddars; most of a bag of salted cashews (between us); half a bag of salted peanuts between us; some tinned rice pudding in a couple of CPs;
Radio Nerdery
I carried my APRS radio the whole way round, but forgot to switch it on for the first couple of hours. Not sure when the battery went flat - it was flat when I thought to look at it on the monday evening.
The south east of England is very populous, but the only igate that picked me up in the whole route was somewhere near Enfield, when I was near the top of River Hill. The very many east-west valleys we travelled through must have blocked propagation. I'll be interested to look at a contour-only map to see the shape of the land.
Kit
- Patagonia thin base layer
- Patagonia shorts
- patagonia terrebonne leggings
- Inov8 primaloft pullover
- Columbia ultra outdry waterproof
- Kalenji waterproof trousers
- UD Fastpack 15
- aprs radio
- ZL H600fw head torch
- spare battery
- route description
- maps
- first aid kit
- survival bag
- gloves - rab powerstretch
- cycling hat
- small powerbank
- watch cable
- water bottles 500ml * 3
- screw top mug
- compass
- hand gel
- whistle
- spare torch
- OR Astroman sun shirt
- Columbia legionnaire hat
- windproof gilet
- antihistamines
- drymax socks (2 pairs in bag)
- altra lone peaks
- altra gaiters
- P20 sunblock (small quantity in bag)
Breakfast bag kit
- spare shorts
- spare underwear
- spare socks * 3
- drybag for washing
- snacks
- towel
- flannel
- skinsosoft
- shower gel
- T shirt (Tea Round one)
- poles
Finish bag
- shorts
- underwear & socks
- t-shirt
- warm hoodie
- towel
- flannel
- shower gel
- washing bag
- bag for shoes & rucksack
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