Glenmore 24 – RACE REPORT

Glenmore 24 Hour Race 2018

DISTANCE: 118.5 Miles

OVERALL : 8th/120

GENDER: 3rd/40 females

100 miles, what a feeling!

The 100 mile barrier is the obvious next step up from the West Highland Way race, but until this year I hadn’t really seriously thought about doing it in the near future. I’m still quite young in terms of ultra-running and hope to have plenty more years of racing and adventures to come. However, when you meet inspirational likeminded people on your crazy journey, these idea come into play much more quickly that you could imagine. The 1st of April 2018 was when this ridiculous plan was hatched. Jo and I had travelled up to the North section of the West Highland Way for a big training run ahead of my WHW race in June. It had been the farthest both of us had run in quite a while; me coming back from injury and Jo getting her running mojo back after a brief dip having had a phenomenal 2017. We’d got up at ridiculous o’clock, watched the sunrise as we drove through Glen Etive, had perfect weather, a brilliant run and were totally inspired. We decided somewhere along the way that the huge distances in the races we were already doing that year (the WHW for me and the Great Glen for Jo) were not far enough, and we wanted to make it our aim to break the 100 mile barrier that year. That evening we both put out names on the Glenmore waiting list with a backup plan of running part of the Costal route supported by friends if we weren’t successful in getting in. The longer the wait, the more we really, really wanted in. We banked loads of miles, hills and even got in a wee practice run of running loops by going around and around and around Lochore Meadows for 6 hours taking in Harran Hill on each loop, which is a bit steeper than the hill on the Glenmore loop, but elevation is always good!
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Glenmore 12/24 Race Report

Glenmore 12 2016

TIME: 12 hours

OVERALL : 9th/37 finishers

GENDER: 3rd/17 females

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The short version – You turn up at a field just outside Aviemore, decide whether you want to run for 12 hours or 24 hours, pin on your number and run in 4 mile loops for your chosen time. And then party with an awesome bunch of people! There is only one word I can think of to sum up this weekend; Epic.

The slightly longer version began with a panic on Friday night when I realised I had a nail in my tyre and a slow puncture. It was too late to get it sorted and if I waited until garages opened in Alloa on Saturday morning it was highly likely I’d miss the start of the race. Luckily it was still inflated on the Saturday morning and after an early start and Craig telling me to keep my fingers crossed, I arrived in Perth just as the garages were opening and got a super quick tyre change at 8am. By 8:30am I was back on the road and on my way to Glenmore.
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