Here is my race report of the Dragon's Back Race in Wales.
The Course : The course is brutal - take some of the toughest traverses (say the Ptarmigan) in Washington and remove the ice and snow and replace it with rocks, bog and grass. Large massive landscapes with big mountains, steep ascents, technical ascents, technical ridge crossing and technical descents. Probably the worst were the steep grassy descents, where there was no path (sheep don’t go downhill, they just make big contours around and around), no switch backs, just a steep slippery descent and where the easiest way down was to slide on your butt as it was too steep to gain purchase and you’d likely fall anyway. Large tracts of open grass land with chest high bracken ferns, tufts of grass hillocks under foot (baby heads), sheep paths and bogs where moss, grass, mud and water waited ahead and it was unclear if your foot would sink 2 inches or 2 feet until you stepped in it. That terrain is energy sucking slogging with very little running. There was occasional trail - but it was by far the exception rather than the rule.
Finishing : - I did not finish, but I also did not not finish. The race is 6 days long; each day is a point to point continuation of the race, from start to camp, and then camp to camp until you finish in Cardiff. Each day has two cut off times; none of the days are easy, except maybe the last day. The entire race is a war of attrition of your body : can you cover the course with enough time to rest and recover and to do it again. I made it through day one (32.65 miles and 13,097vertical feet) in 14 hours and 45 minutes, about an hour and 15 minutes before the 10 pm cut off. On day 2 - I mistakenly thought I had time - and to save energy just power walked the flats - vs. running and by the mid day I was the last chasing cut off - though I made it with 10 minutes to spare - I burnt all my matches, and didn’t have enough energy or gas or speed in the tank to get over the Rhinog’s and to camp before the 10 pm cut off and so I after a couple of miles, when I met Paul - I turned back to the support check point and rode back to camp. From there I did the half day course (inserted at the support point each day) and did 15-20 mile days to camp instead of the full 35-40 miles. So while I didn't “finish” - I didn’t fail and I didn't quit or withdraw and I had a great time and saw a lot of the Welsh countryside and mountains. In this year and in years past the race has been kind of an all or nothing event, and the event itself as much a logistical expedition and an opportunity for adventure - as much as it is a race. While tacitly but not explicitly recognizing ½ days as fully but differently participating - it sets up anything less than full as failure. I think a welcome addition to this race will be next year officially acknowledging that the race is the 6 day event and you can chose to complete the full or partial course and still get “credit” - and you’ll compete against and in the level at which you compete. Either way what I experienced and took away from the event is forever mine - regardless of what trophy or status I have on the results page. And best of all was all the people I met along the way.
Comparison is the Thief of Joy : When you train alone - its easy to use your self as a baseline and as a comparison to the rest of the world. Especially when most of the people you encounter on the weekends are hikers and you’re faster than them all. I’ve have gotten stronger and fitter compared to myself as a result of my coaching plan and training, I know that I am faster and stronger. However at times inside my own head I entertained fantasies of maybe I’ll really crush it on the hills and show everyone else how fit I am. Things get disconcerting and discouraging when as the race progresses it feels like literally everyone you see passes you. This is a bit of a self fulfilling prophecy since invariably everyone that you see is generally someone passing you; sometimes you come upon others that you pass but in my case it seemed the opposite, I was always the one getting passed. I was neither as fit, as fast or as tough as I thought I was.That got me down. I didn’t fare any better on the hills by comparison to others, though I didn’t fall behind I wasn’t ascending faster per se. The only place I made up time and was faster was on the technical scrambling sections where things felt easy and straightforward and others slowed down due to the terrain. But I felt good; I wasn’t tired, I was just a ½ a gear slower than those that passed me (in some cases with the front of the pack I was many gears slower). Comparison is the thief of joy and toward the end of day 2 - I was ready to quit running and give up on everything ;)
Gear : I was generally happy with the gear I chose to bring. A couple of notes : first my pack : Ultimate Direction Ultra Vest 6.0 - which is 10.3 liter pack - I was generally pretty happy with this, but it was a little tight fitting in all the mandatory gear and a GoPro and a SonyRX100 (if you don’t have the later two probably fine) and it would have been nice to have a teeny bit more space - AND the stupid upper side pocket zippers that are impossible to open and close with one hand while your pack is still on. You literally have to reach one hand entirely behind your back, grab the bottom of the pack and zip with the other hand, a little awkward. Secondly my shoe choice, I brought the Altra Timp 4’s and the Olympus 5’s. The Timp’s I wore on day 1 and 2 - they were plenty grippy enough on the rock, but on steep grass (mostly found on day 1 coming off Snowden and day 2 off of Cnicht) they were no use at all. A shoe with a more aggressive tread may have helped here. The Olympus held up fine on the other 4 days - plenty of cush, plenty of stability and just general go go go. Rain gear : at singular moments - I debated whether or not I should have brought a heavier water proof layer than the Outdoor Research Helium 2 - this was when it was really raining hard, but that never lasted longer then 45 minutes or so and in the end the Helium was just fine. I could have always put on another layer underneath; though I never did. Otherwise everything else worked super well.
Nutrition : I have SO MUCH left over food! I planned for 12 hour days and 200 calories an hour - and I had lunch snacks - the only ones of those I ate were the little 55 calorie bags of Trader Joe olives. Since I only did 1 full and 5 half days that meant a lot of left over food, BUT I also didn’t feel like I ever got behind on calories - I generally set an hour alarm after start and then an alarm every 35 minutes to eat some food. Some things I really started to hate : Skratch Lab - Chews - stuff that I had to try to masticate while breathing heavy. I ate a ton of food at camp in the evening and morning meals and we were lucky on the ½ days to generally have a cafe to get a second breakfast at.
Water : I got worried on Day 1 about the reports of no-water on the route. This is generally true, but it had rained off and on the prior couple of days so there was in fact water. I carried an extra liter and a half all the way to the support point - all because I hate taking off my pack to get water. So my water strategy was to drink from the streams. I had a filter, but that was on my 1 liter bottle in my pack (remember I don't like taking off my pack) and so I never filtered any water and I refilled quite a bit from streams every day - as well as the water and support check points. So far no sickness, pretty sure my drinking from the Washington streams made me more resilient. ;) I am sure there was a lot of sheep sh*# in there.
Body : things went pretty well, other than the feeling slow and in the end not being fast enough on Day 2. My ankle (3 torn ligaments and broken bone in Jan 2021 - surgery Feb 2022) did fine; it was stiff in the mornings but warmed up as it always does with motion. On technical descents that required big step downs with confidence, I didn’t feel strong; my ankle and general knee/leg stability wasn’t there : mostly the strength to step down confidently with speed. My feet did great, no blisters really at all. A couple of minor hot spot areas from rubbing around the cuff of my left shoe that I only really noticed when I took my shoes off at night, applying a bit of KT tape to one on day 3 and one on day 4 fixed everything up nicely. I did get some chaffing under my right arm pit on day 2 - that I put Butte Paste on - and finally had medical tape it over on day 4. I was getting some chaffing the last couple of hours on the last day on the left side from my pack, but I could easily shift my pack to the right and ease that. My IT band felt “slightly” tight/achey off and on - but nothing like it felt back home and it never bothered me throughout the trip at all. On day 1 - my abductors (inside of your upper leg/quad) almost cramped on me several times when I was ascending Tryfan. I had to step carefully and stopping to rest for a minute relieved them. The only part of my legs that really ached a couple of times at night were my glutes and hip flexors - one nice I woke ever hour with them aching, but it wasn’t extreme pain.
People : This is for sure one of the best parts of doing these events is meeting everyone. From the support staff to the other runners. I love how friendly, welcoming and easy going everyone is in the trail community. Chris Cope, who led the first three days was especially engaging. We chatted about his diabetes while bathing in the creek on day 3. He got a special message from my diabetic grandson cheering him on. Despite all the people along the way, you spend about 90% of the race on your own; you and your pace are your own and its not super often that you mesh with someone for too long. But I did enjoy the times when I got a chance to get in the groove with someone else and to chat with them. The fact that everyone’s first names are on the bibs on the back of everyone’s pack helped. I was asked so many times : “We are guessing your not from here.” Another thing that I always find interesting is how many people love talking about themselves - ask them 4-5 questions and they can talk non-stop for an hour - and many of them (not all!) never ask you a single question about you - or if they do - its a simple answer and they never ask a follow up and go right on talking. I hope I’m not one of those people, if I am please figure out a nice way of telling me :)
Race logistics :
When you registered. They put a small 2 inch “stick” or “booper” tied to your wrist that you dipped into electronic checkpoint boxes at start and stop and each checkpoint along the way. They also had a band on your wrist with a bar code tied to your bib number and attached to your pack by tape was a tracker, that had a GPS signal and mobile sim card. GPS way points were tracked and then transmitted via them sim card when there was cell service. When there was no cell service the device buffered the way points until service was restored. People could follow along on the website to see where your last waypoint had been uploaded. You had all your gear in two Ortlieb dry bags, one large 59 liter bag with a max weight of 33 lbs (15 kg) that held all your overnight gear and a small 10L bag for support points with a max weight of 5.5 lbs (2.5 kg).
Camp was a consistent routine of :
Run through the gate
Dip in at the stop to end your day
Dip in to get your splits for the day between checkpoints
Someone would hand you your support bag (based on your bib number) and tell you your tent number. Tent numbers would change each night as people dropped out of the race. I was in the same tent each day as I bunked with 2 guys (Robert Henderson and Mike Prince) that made it all 6 days - full course
Wander to your tent - where your overnight bag was waiting inside. Each tent was a large tent - with 2 pods on each end that could hold 2 people with a large central area for gear and changing. Tents were very big, never felt cramped, tall enough to stand up in and nice and dry. Each day the tents were packed up and moved to the next camp.
Depending on how late it was; how tired you were and how hungry you were :
Change out of your wet clothing - and leave your wet shoes outside the tent. I was always wet - either from the rain or sweat. Shoes were never dry. I had a dry bag that I just stuffed my wet clothes into. And I had a set of clean clothes for camp. Grab your day camp bag (I had a Cotapaxi bag that I hauled stuff around in)
Maybe go find the river and sponge off or sit and wash off. I only managed to get down to the river 3 times - always nice and refreshing and cool.
Change into your dry camp clothes and put on your camp shoes - mine were my fav pair of green crocs.
Go to the food tent - get your chips - always always always chips (fries) - hope that there was ketchup (they ran out 2 days and I had to use brown sauce) - maybe get some soup, maybe get the main course : the food was vegetarian and vegan - generally a bit on the blander side to accommodate everyone’s taste buds - there was salt and sauces to add some flavor - the thing I missed the most was fat.
Go the main tent - to sit in tables, comfy lay back chairs or beanbags to eat your food. Usually go back for more chips; get your dragon mail, ask questions about the next day
Go wash your dishes, brush your teeth, maybe drop off some wet things at the drying tent.
Maybe go to medical tent - I only went twice, once on day 1 due to chaffing developing under my right arm from pack and swinging my arms all day - and once on day 4 to get the chaffing tapped over.
Visit the port-a-potty - if you were lucky and regular this would be your solid waste disposal opportunity - versus out on the trail - I was lucky I was regular in the am and at night and never had to go out on the trail.
Go back to your tent - maybe organize your gear a bit - I tended to just throw my stuff in a pile and organize in the morning.
Get out your pad, your sleeping bag and pillow and crawl into bed and fall asleep.
For sleep - I took 2 melatonin gummies every night and I would either sleep like a rock - (except for the old man pee) - or I’d wake up by the ache in my legs. Once night I woke every hour with my glutes throbbing - that was from the day we had a lot of road running.
Next morning - wake up early - sort gear, pack your bag, change into a dry set of running gear, lube feet and body, put on a dry pair of socks, wet shoes and haul all your bags to the common tent and go eat food
Breakfast always had hashbrown triangles - which I ate every morning, there was also porridge with golden sauce or jam or compote - I never got the rolls or the waffles. They also had breakfast cereal. I generally had hashbrowns and porridge.
Then finishing packing the last stuff in your overnight bag, take your packs and your overnight bag and support bag to bag drop off and gear check - here they would always ask for a different set of 3 of your required gear - biivy support bag, synthetic 300 gram outer puffy layer, compass, or mobile or map or headlamp or wet gear etc
Then if you were still in the race - start as early as you needed to finish (6 am) - if you were an elite you’d start around 8:30 am. Because you’d run so fast you’d risk finishing before the evening camp was set up and ready for you.
If you have missed a cut off or failed to complete a day - you could after a ½ day completion - do the full day or you could do a ½ day of the course - either by starting at 6 and finishing at the support point - or by getting a ride to the support point and then waiting to start for a bit and finishing the day at camp. I preferred the later - as you’d leave camp at like 8:30 am - giving you a bit more time in the morning, then get to the support point, if you were lucky there was a cafe to go to, and then generally start the day between 11:30 and 12:30 pm.
Day by Day Reports
Day 1 :
The excitement of the race starting! Lining up in the castle and listening to the Welsh choir sing songs in Welsh and odd to hear them sing Dixie Land. The start and you're off - along the castle walls - up the city streets of Conwy and across a field to gain the ridge that starts you up to the first checkpoint. I’d run this section of the course before and knew what to expect. I felt good but just noticed how everyone else was a ½ a gear faster than me. Including Mike Dougherty who I’d signed up with and come to run the race with. We hadn’t talked 100% explicitly about sticking together or not, but we’d kept an eye on each other, MIke glanced back and gave me a head nod and he slowly pulled away and ahead of me. I loved the big open hills as we made our way toward the first checkpoint. The descent down to the support checkpoint (where your support bag waited), was steep and rocky and technical and required a bit of scrambling. My ankle and just general “down” knee stability made me a bit slower than the folks that had those legs but I was faster than others even with my stilted stepping down and scrambling. At the check point I got some water and ate my PB&J - and then started up the VERY steep technical ascent up Tryfan - some scrambling for sure, lots of stepping up rocks and I passed a bunch of people who were less comfortable and lots of folks that just seemed to want to take huge big steps vs. many small ones or were just slow. The descent down Tryfan to Peny Pass wasn’t as bad as the descent to the checkpoint. I was 100% surprised to see Mike Dougherty along the trail near the bottom as I thought he was long gone. He said that he’d thrown up and was feeling weak with no energy. I bought him and myself an ice cream bar at the cafe at Peny Pass and we started up the Pyg trail toward Crib Goch. I’d done this entire ridge before from Crib Goch and around, so this was all familiar territory. As we started up Crib Goch - I took the same dumb side trail to the left that overlooked the lakes, the main trail was to the right. Mike went right and I just scrambled straight up to the top of the visible ridge where I knew I’d re-join the trail. As I ascended and actually got on the Crib Goch ridge - I kept looking back for Mike but I didn’t see him - he’d disappeared. I carried on. I loved the section climbing through the ridge and over to Garnedd Ugain; it was fun traversing through big gendarme’s on the ridge, scrambling through the rocks that were like the scales on dragon’s back. Then down to gain the trail to Snowden, not that long and we were at the top of Wale’s highest point and then down and around to carry on the ridge to the top of Y Lliwedd- and then steep descents along the ridge ridge to the last checkpoint and the rain started to fall. A rain jacket was necessary to stay a bit dryer and warmer. I ran into Adam and I followed him as he led the way; the light of the day started to fade and we had a very steep descent off of Snowden ridge to camp. This was all grass and mud that had been wetted by an hour of rain. There was no real trail, and what there was was slick mud. In between was grass, just simple grass, normally something you’d associate with easy travel, but this grassy slope so steep that it was one of the worst descents of my life; there was no way to really gain purchase with your feet. Crampons would have worked best; instead we either fell or slid and when you fell the best thing to do was use your poles to slow yourself in a grass ass glissade and make sure you avoided any rocks. I must have fallen over a dozen times. Eventually the light was gone and I pulled my headlamp out of my pocket where I had stashed it early anticipating this moment and the light lit up the last few 100 feet of descent well enough that I could find my feet. A bit of road and we crossed into camp at around 8:45 pm. I was exhausted and went into evening camp routine. I was 100% sure that MIke was going to time out and felt awful for him. I was surprised 30 minutes later when I ran into him in the communal tent and he said that he’d had a puke and rally on Crib Goch and made it in about 20 minutes after me.
Day 2 :
Day 3 :
Day 4 :
Started off the day being driven to Elan Valley - we walked down the street to the cafe and I got a cake, Twix and some salt and vinegar potato chips. I chatted with cace director Shane for a bit about the race. We started around noon, off up a road and then started climbing the hills toward the summit of Drygarn Fawr with its huge beehive cairns. The rain fell and wind blew again (a daily occurrence) and I put on my rain jacket. Then we crossed some lovely bog, I ended up knee deep one step and Julie lost her shoe. We descended to a road that wound through a beautiful valley. As we ascended through road the rain stopped and the sun came out and a beautiful rainbow appeared on the hills behind me. I ended the day at camp and went down to the swift river to bathe and clean off. I found Adam and Mike and we crossed the Rhandirmwyn Bridge to the Towy Bridge Inn; they got a pint, and I got two bottles of sparkling water, another bag of salt and vinegar potato chips and two rolls with sage stuffing and roast pork - they were delicious. Back at camp I had a plate of chips and then settled in to sleep for the night. This night’s sleep was fitful, every hour I woke up with my glutes aching or my IT band on my left knee.
Day 5 :
Day 6 :
The final day. This perhaps the most "contrived" section of the course, to run mostly on tarmac to Cardiff and end in the Castle. A fitting end to starting in Conwy Castle to end in Cardiff Castle at the other end of Wales. While on our race the Queen had passed away and as Cardiff is the capital of Wales and the Castle the main place of remembrance and celebration - the castle was closed so we were to finish just outside the castle in the park. This was a fast day with little elevation and we started at the support point at around 9:30 am. I once again mostly ran alone to the pub, 10 miles in, where I grabbed a ham and cheese roll. When we finally rolled into the park I caught up with Pete and were shared the last few miles together, just walking along at a very brisk pace. We finally rounded the corner and ran in the last 100 yards to finish. Stac and Miles were waiting for me; I was so excited to see them. I grabbed my gear bags and an orange and then we slowly hobbled back to our AirBnb where I took a shower and then we went for a nice celebratory meal of pizza!People
Stats for the Week
