In search of inner greatness.

On Sunday, September 1st 2019, at exactly 11:08 am, I received email confirmation that I'd been registered for the 2020 Ridgeway 86 ultramarathon, a race from Ivinghoe Beacon to the Avebury Stones in Wiltshire, to be completed in under 28 hours.

Me being me, I had loftier goals from the off, and so I thought as long as I'd be doing 86 miles, why not map out 100 and get it done? After all, I may never want to try this kind of distance again.

As it happens, the original plan was scuppered by the pandemic and I didn't get my first bash at it until August 2021, where I got through to the Foxhill checkpoint at c. 69 miles, wandered round for a bit to hit 70 and gave up the ghost. My heels were chewed up at the start from the postponed Shropshire Way 80k three weeks prior and I didn't have the mental stuff on the day to keep going, because reasons. Still, I'll never not regret that decision to stop.

Me being me, I recced the hell out of the route, returning again and again over the course of that five years since first registering, studying, learning what to do and what not to do. Learning what made me tick and more importantly what made me sick.

Twice more I tried, and twice more I failed to complete the race. And on the cusp of timing out in 2023, I fully realised that I no longer wanted to race this route at all, but I wanted to complete it on my own terms.

On Easter Sunday at 11am, I set off from Ivinghoe Beacon for a fourth time, prepared to go through as many days and nights as it took to reach trail's end. I fought through a difficult wet and cold first night and waded through the flooded Thames to reach my mid-point in Streatley, stopping right at the last minute to wring out my waterproof socks and remove the tape I’d so carefully placed, now sodden and balled up. I had plenty of time after all.

And maybe it was time that was missing…all that time.

A few hours later, for the first time in three years, I left Streatley unaided to take on the second half. I’d had a rest, a shower, and a re-set, and I was bound and determined to reach the end of that trail whatever it took.

The race had become a quest, but I think I already knew that.

2-1/2 days after I'd begun, at just past 9pm as a third ridiculously sodden and challenging night was setting in, I staggered into Avebury, greeted in the dark by a single headlamp - another friend who decided to completely drop what he was doing in order to help me achieve my dream. I’ve some FRIENDS, man alive.

After finally achieving victory to reach the end of the Ridgeway, I decided to stop as I wasn’t kitted out well enough for the conditions and it was just too dangerous. I’d every intention of calling it a day.

But that dream had three numbers.

Prodded on by a total stranger who somehow found a way into my skull in seconds (thanks Pop!) after a two day break, I left Streatley for the last time to complete those final miles. At 3:30 pm on Friday 5 April, 2024, my watch turned over the remaining mileage.

And it was done. 100 miles on the Ridgeway.

I've a whole lot to say about the conclusion of this journey that’s largely both consumed me and equally been my kryptonite so it'll take a while to write it up in the way it truly deserves. What I do know already is it has so much to do with 'to thine own self be true' and careful consideration of how little pace really matters in the grand scheme of things. Greatness is within you, whomever you are, no matter how fast you move.

It's ok to go slow, as long as you go.

In the meantime, enjoy a few pictures - worth a thousand words, a million steps, and a lifetime of dreaming.

Never give up. Never ever ever.

#relentlessforwardprogress #ridgewaynationaltrail #ridgeway86 #plusafew