Climb South West, East Devon 8 Trigs

I’ve had my eye on this event for months but the summer hasn’t worked out - I got injured in my last ultra in July, then had covid again in august, then I got breathing difficulties which interfered with my running and meant I couldn’t train and I’ve got increasingly out of shape. It’s only in the last fortnight that I realised those breathing difficulties are anxiety (I had thought it was more likely to be because I’m overweight!) brought on by the above combined with a summer of loneliness and low mental health resulting in feelings of inadequacy, but now I know what it is it’s easier to start to address it and push away the triggers. Due to not having trained (I’ve only run 200 miles in 17 weeks) I left my race entry to the last minute (Tuesday 8th was entry cutoff), only to find it had sold out, so I satisfied myself with 20 miles on Wednesday (which went reasonably well). Then on Thursday I got a last minute race entry!

I’ve not done a Climb South West event before but they seem like a great bunch. The event was back to basics: completely unmarked - 8 trigs and 2 checkpoints as mandatory locations and everything else up to you, but they had shared a gpx of a suggested route you could take if you wanted to. I largely followed this, with two detours, one recommended by other runners and the other on an overheard tip.

It was a staggered start so I set off early, 8:10, as I didn’t expect to move fast. The first 12 miles were pretty smooth and consistent, averaging 16 minute miles over the ups and downs. It was nice to have the trig points to tick off - I’m a trig fanatic anyway, but they came regularly so the miles flew by.

For the middle third the hills got steeper, particularly Beacon Hill and Buckton Hill, but the views were good. Buckton trig was meant to be out of bounds but the landowner was present and was kind enough to let me visit the trig. My pace dropped a bit but I still focussed on that to keep my legs moving. I was really pleased to experience absolutely no anxiety today! The vibe of the event at the start held it off initially, then the other runners started to come pass me so there was that shared mentality. I did feel a bit lonely on the inland section as didn’t see anyone for ages, but my body was feeling good which gave me confidence and kept the triggers at bay.

The second and final checkpoint was at Weston, and I came through just after 2pm, well inside the cutoff of 4pm. The flapjack there was amazing, best flapjack I’ve ever had! The penultimate trig, on West Cliff, brought me back to the coast path and from there it was 10 miles back to the finish on familiar ground, and I was still feeling good. As I came through Sidmouth I was really craving like an ice cream despite having a bag full of food, I think I needed to cool off, and I managed to grab the most delicious Malteser ice cream from the little kiosk, best ice cream I’ve ever had!!

The sweepers caught up with me climbing the final big hill out of Sidmouth. We had a quick chat then they kindly hung back as I explained I was in the zone - I’m not used to running with company on ultras and I’d been on my own all day too, so my head was just in that solitary state. I could still hear them behind me which introduced a little pressure to my brain so I explained the anxiety situation and they said they’d run on ahead as they were happy I knew the route - which was lovely of them and kept the triggers away again. I finished in 9:35, the total distance about 33 miles. The winner did it in 5 hours (unimaginably fast to me!) but I’m happy with my time. I might have been last but apparently in previous years it’s taken people until 8pm to finish and I was back before 6. I absolutely loved it all, I felt like a runner again for the first time in 4 months. What’s more, my body was obviously plenty fit for it as I ran 9 miles the next day to lay a trail I’d already committed to!!