Stage 4

Where to begin? Where to begin indeed...

I have had tougher days than the day (and night) of stage 4, only a handful but some. However I would have to say that the day of 10th April was the longest of my life...

Before commencing with the write up of stage 4 I should fill an ickle gap in stage 2: I have remembered who the dick of the day was. Me. When looking through my notes from the desert I had a scribble that said that I started to descend the wrong way down the final jebel such that one of the marshals had to peg it after me and show me the correct route. This doesn't sound that bad but I then had to climb back up the hill from hell such that I climbed the top 25% gradient sections twice, once from each side. What a dick...

Also on day three there was a second contender for dick of the day. There's a trend here. Also me. I ran 10k with the youngest UK competitor, Gemma, who had her name on her race number, written on her hat and on her backpack. I still spent over two hours calling her Rachel...

Anyhow, stage 4. Regular readers of this blog will remember that my adopted anthem for the MDS was to be the Stone Roses' classic "This is the one". In reality it was the long day that was the one as it is this, long stage that symbolises the MDS.

Every day comes with a, rather generous cut off, and the long day was no different: 34 hours. However the real target is to do the long stage in one day so you have twenty four hours to cover 44 miles. This equated to finishing by 8:30 am on the 11th April based on the starter gun going off at 8:30am on the 10th.

One of the best bits about the long stage is that they hold back the top 50 runners for an additional three hours so they begin at 11:30. The beauty of that is when the leading runners pass you. Whilst it might sound as if that would be irritating but it was very moving.

The elites were very graceful and humble whilst the rest of us would stop and applaud. It was great seeing the remaining Anshal brother in action. It was great seeing the leading Brit (a guy called Danny Graham) pass as he looked like he was on a fun run around Clapham Common: no sweat, no hat and no sunglasses...

It was mainly great seeing Jo pass as that was the first time I had seen her in action. She was effortless, like a Gazelle galloping passed. Me and Bob saved the biggest cheer for our Jo. Truly moving. You go you little legend we were thinking. We were bursting with pride.

One of big problems with stage 4 was that it was the hottest day to date, topping it at 54 degrees Celsius around 3pm when Rob and I was in the dune section. So them poor elites had to run the whole 44 miles during the hottest part of the day. Legends absolute leg ends every last one of them.

So the gun went off at 8:30 and Bob and I settled I to our pace for the day. We were roughly covering 10k every 2.5 hours. For the first 15-20 miles we were chugging along quite nicely chatting merrily comparing my best Hammers team with his Fulham legends 11. Going through the best England Rugby team of our life and the worst England Football team.

It was probably around 5pm that afternoon that the wheels started to come off. Basically I was starting to get goosed. The last three days of 65 miles was catching up with me. As we were approaching the third Checkpoint around the 20 mile point at dusk I was starting to lag behind Bob. 

At Checkpoint 3 the volunteers were handing out the light sticks that you had to hang from your back and each competitor was getting the head torch to hand ready for nighttime. The reason for the light sticks is the you can guide the person behind and so on. It was a truly magical sight.

Also the race organisers kindly hung a multitude of these glow sticks from any available tree and painted rocks on the route with glow in the dark paint. They also kindly located a laser at the penultimate checkpoint to guide you 'home'.  Supposedly this laser was so humongous that it could be seen from the International Space Station. I bet Blowfeld wish he'd have had such an impressive laser...

It was, I think, at this point that Patrick, the Race Director, was starting to win me over. At the start I thought it was an egotistical dick but gradually I warmed to him. From standing at the bottom of the tough Jebel on day two to being up all night on the long day fretting about the safety of the competitors to kissing every finisher on the finish line when presenting the medals he actually is a nice guy. A rich guy based on 1000 people paying £3.5k to enter his race but a nice one none the less.

As Bob and I left Checkpoint 3 the pace was beginning to fade along with the light and it wasn't long before we were only going at a mile an hour. Quick maths, and yes I did check it with others Phil, and I worked out at this pace I wouldn't get back into camp before the magical 8:30am time. 

As darkness fell we also hit about 10k of dunes that you couldn't see until you were literally climbing up them. When we reached the peek I was so tired that sometimes I would fall down the other side. At one such dune, trying to cheer me up Bob informed me that we only had about 5k of dunes when I classically told him to "do one" or something of similar ilk. You can't help some people...

Whether because of that comment of the fact that he was fairing better than me with regard to pace we got separated for the last 10k. The famous saying is that the darkest hour is the hour before dawn and never a truer word has been uttered.

Separated from my brother in arms I staggered through the desert inching my way closer to the end. My entire goal at that point was to keep going each successive minute safe in the knowledge that if I could keep going for one minute I could keep going for the next. Every minute was dedicated to friends and family. I even think the Milkman had a minute crawled in his honour.

I also had a picture of one of my god sons in one hand and one of my sister's boy in the other to remind me of a better place. Eventually a minute became two minutes, two  minutes became 10. Eventually I reached an hour and then a truly astounding sight behold me; the sun crept over the horizon and I could see that I was around a mile from home.

I zoned in on camp and then sprinted the last 100 metres over the line never more relieved to get to the end. I finished at circa 6:30 in the morning, inside the 24 hour mark. I knew then 100% that I would finish the MDS. I only had a marathon to go...

I worked out that I had spent 5 minutes in each of the six checkpoints so that meant that of the 22 hours I had spent half an hour sitting down with the remaining 21.5 hours ticking off the miles. It was a long day...

Back at the tent I was relieved to find that everyone else was in one piece and still in the race. I knew then that tent 144 would definitely have a 100% record in this years MDS.

I was taking off my shoes noticing that I would probably lose every toe nail on my left foot. Partly due to swelling but mainly as a consequence of me crushing the toe box of my shoes when trying to tape up a hole in my gaiters. It was at this moment that Graham came out with his 'Dossard' moment.

Now I am informed that Dossard means number in French. On the top of each person's email sheets it had your race number so mine was Dossard: 660. Graham saw Dossard on the top of one of the other's sheet and uttered the immortal words, "I didn't realise your name was Dossard". What a dick... ;-)

Anyhow, getting on flight now back to Dubai so these is the last post for the day. I hope to write most of the remaining post whilst in the air and will then post a flurry of posts tomorrow when I land.

I will in my wrap up declare my undying love for the people of tent 144 but as I sit here in the Virgin lounge, supping a Gin and Tonic, depressed to be returning 'home' I miss my friends and family already but I add to that list seven of the dearest people I could ever have met. Tent 144 forever...

TTFN...