dartmoor – Packing Our Trunks

The Tavy 13

Published on March 27, 2019 by Kevin Bonfield1 Comment

Fuelled By Banana Cake

It’s been a while since the old trio of Nicky, Martin and myself entered a running event and had a gigglesome road trip.

For new boys and girls to the blog, Nicky is my awesome, inspirational, beautiful, relentless, stunning and quite frankly, hot, lady wife.

Martin? Or, as he’s better known, The Silver Fox. Well he’s as good a mate as you could possibly wish for. He’s also Nicky’s training partner as they limber up for one of those MASSIVE triathlons later in the year.

So, if you look back over the last few years of the blog you’ll find plenty of tales of our little gang’s running adventures.

Kiss your WHAT? (One of us wasn’t camera shy!)

The Tavy 13 half marathon is a community event hosted by Tavistock Athletic Club and this was our third time here. Regular blog readers may remember me taking a tumble here two years ago. (Read about that HERE)

Nervous smiles as we approached the start.

As elite athletes in our prime, all the talk in the car was of fine tuning our nutrition, getting more scientific about running and which particular dynamic stretching routine we should be using as a warm up for a hilly half marathon. Something like that anyway.

The Silver Fox fancies himself a sports commentator!

Just before the scheduled kick off, we discovered that the race needed to be held back for an hour whilst the roads were cleared of an earlier accident.

Having suffered a little for the lack of toilets, we’d had to rush straight to the start line before discovering the delay. We took full advantage of this extra hour to carry out a thorough warm up and dynamic stretching routine….. Oh hang on, no, what we actually did was have a lovely cup of coffee and a great big slab of banana cake.

The cake sat a tad heavy in the first few miles!

We had our usual debate about where to start (my days of elbowing my way to near the front are long gone). Martin opted for the middle somewhere, whilst Nicky stuck to her preferred tactic of starting right at the back.

Starting and finishing on Tavistock’s running track, we felt like proper affereletes.

Live action from one the many welcome water stations on a beautiful day fro running.

This half marathon has 8 solid miles of climbing and descending and climbing again before the flat and downhill charge back to Tavistock.

The crowds lining the route made it feel quite claustrophobic at times.

It is a road event but captures the magic of open moorland and on some of the steep ascents, reminds us ex-smokers what our lungs are for!

With my eyes firmly on future ultra marathons, and Nicky and Martin both in heavy training towards their iron distance triathlons, none of us was predicting we would go as quickly as two years ago.

We were right.

I was more right than them though, adding a full quarter of an hour to my time.

Me and this chap from Launceston blitzing past a guy on his Sunday stroll.

I took my new toy, an action camera, with me and had some fun with (or got on the nerves of) some of the runners around me. I also tried to film the spectacular scenery and some of the dozens of fabulous marshals and volunteers out on the course.

“HI, I’m Kevin from Sky Sports.”

I introduced myself as I filmed runners trotting along with me.

I received, laughter and plenty of self depreciating humour, along with occasional bemusement and grunts. Check out the little video HERE.

A ran my race comfortably hard for those first 8 miles and then upped the effort on the 5 mile flat and downhill run for home. Whilst I may be slower these days, I felt really good throughout the run and am quietly chuffed with how it went.

And I enjoyed every step.

Martin was secretly hoping to run under 2 hours.

Nicky, as she entered the arena to run her final 400 meters shouted something like “Stop feckin’ filming me” as I chased her round the bend. I still managed to capture her sprint finish.

Nicky outsprinted this chap before giving him a playful slap on the back as he caught his breath!

The Tavy 13 is quite a big event with nearly 500 finishers this year, yet once out in the countryside, it never feels busy or crowded. There’s a cross section of the running community here, whatever pace you run at there are always a few people around you.

With marshals at every single junction, crossing, and water stations a-plenty, not to mention rescue and medical teams, the runners are so well cared for. Great signage and a fabulous route, we’d all heartily recommend The Tavy 13.

Oh, and it was £11 to enter.

From BACK off to EFF off

Published on January 28, 2018January 29, 2018 by Kevin Bonfield2 Comments

So, a couple of weeks ago, a very jolly chap delivered our piano. It was a particularly jolly occasion. Alan, the jolly chap, banged out a couple of “We’re forever blowing bubbles” & “My old man said follow the van” type tunes before leaving us to wonder at the magic of the thing.

My father-in-law, Frank, suffering as he does from a progressive dementia, was briefly lit up by the music, clapping along and beaming from ear to ear. If you bump into a (jolly) man called Alan, selling pianos, in the South Devon area, please thank him again for us.

“A piano??” I hear you enquire, “but I thought you had no TIME!?” BUT! I retort, this is THE TIME. Ok, neither of us can play the thing! But it has ticked ALL the boxes from our ‘hobby’ conversation of a couple of months ago. Cheap (ish). Accessible. Pick up and put downable. Fun, involves learning and gives ESCAPISM.

elton john — Elton demonstrating the fastest route from G to Bm

Yes, Nicky is absolutely loving the start of her musical journey. Rumour has it that she has been recruited as back up pianist for the recently announced 3 year long farewell tour for Sir Elton John. Better get practising Nicky……..

Frank, then. Nicky’s father, my father-in-law. We moved in with him about 18 months ago, to support and ‘enable’ him. He’s still maintains a little independence, but, to be honest, heartbreakingly he seems to increasingly need a little prod and reminder about the simple tasks of day to day living.

He has been going to the Memory Café, a weekly pop-up support group provided by The Alzheimer’s Society. For a mere pound sterling, he gets two hours with his peers, in a safe, modern-life free, environment. He gets conversation, coffee and cake and activities. Quite often, these activities include a good old sing song. He absolutely loves these.

Sometimes the three of us can laugh at the situations Frank gets himself into. Sometimes, we can get frustrated, sometimes tearful, sometimes almost desperate. Sometimes, Frank is blissfully unaware that he’s in a ‘situation’ at all. The exploding microwave being one of the more dramatic examples this week!

But mostly we get through life, dealing with each day as a new set of challenges and learning ways to better support, not only Frank, but each other. Sometimes well meant comments about how life works for us can be frustrating. It is consuming, and we find ourselves feeling ridiculous as we get irritated by apparently meaningless and momentary incidents, but when these compound over a day, week, month…… a simple thing can be a tipping point.

If we weren’t here, Frank would certainly be in crisis, we feel we give him the safety to continue with as much of his life as he is able, in a slightly independent fashion.

2018-01-28 12.46.37 — Grandson Callum joining his Nan for a slice of the blues

The piano sits in our dining room, and Frank is really happy to have it here. BUT, his attention span dictates that whilst Nicky is trying to learn the whole concept of the piano, music, phrasing etc etc, from scratch, he is prone to either wander off to an aural sanctuary elsewhere in the house, or sit and call out inappropriate encouragement. Whilst working out the EastEnders theme tunes, both Nicky and I were calling out the notes, prompting a much repeated call of “play the F OFF!” from the ever helpful Frank!!

With so many of us living to grander ages, the prevalence of dementia and related illnesses is only going to increase, and we could all take the time to ensure that we consider that the person next to us could be struggling.

ANYWAY.

I managed a Sunday long(ish) run. After Saturday’s epic (and wet) adventure on the moors (featured in this BLOG) on Saturday, my little legs were aching before I’d finished tying my shoelaces for today’s run. I targeted around 20 miles and hoped those would be at around 8m30s mile pace, on a flattish road route. Whilst I did abandon at 16 miles, I am quite pleased to have ran inside that pace on tired legs. Having to get up in the middle of night to let Frank know it wasn’t time to be microwaving Choco-Hoops and custard (I know!) for a few hours yet prevented us getting anywhere near a night’s sleep. Not ideal preparation. But ’tis what ’tis……..

Check out the run HERE.

I had the absolute pleasure of randomly bumping into a very old friend, Steve, on this morning’s run too. I changed my route slightly and accompanied Steve (Smithy) on his run to work. We studied together for our Sports Science Foundation Degrees a few years ago. It was a hard time for me personally and emotionally and it will be great to catch up with him some more.

2018-01-28 08.05.53 — We’d been running so fast, we were blurred!!

He was a Torquay Athletic front row stalwart in those days, a family man who has got the running bug these days. It will be nice to share my happier times with someone who really was there for me in those rougher days.

So 2018 marches on.

Nicky and I pick up the baton and charge at another daunting week. Determined to enjoy as much training as possible, wondering if we’ll ever truly get ON IT when it comes to our eating and preparing to deal with another round of jabs from the challenges on life.

I don’t mind repeating myself…. Nicky inspires and drives me and I truly am blessed to have fallen in love with the most amazing woman in the world. It would be so easy to get knocked to the sofa and the soap operas by these jabs, but TOGETHER we push on.

This blog would never have happened if we weren’t the A TEAM. I’m sat here typing whilst Lukas Graham’s 7 Years is given the ebony and ivory treatment by my truly amazing wife.

Keep on keeping on people….

Uncle Sam

Published on January 27, 2018 by Kevin Bonfield3 Comments

This blogging thing.

I get such incredible pleasure from writing, I have said it before…….. if just one person were to read any of my scribblings and gain even the tiniest bit of joy from them, then I would be a proud man.

Well, despite me claiming not to be egotistical, the blog host, WordPress, readily throws statistics and ‘performance’ analysis at me. Inevitably, I do get a bit of self-congratulatory pleasure from a ‘like’ or ‘share’. So, a massive THANK YOU to all of you who take the time to have a peruse of, and engage with, the blog.

I’ve noticed this week that quite a few viewers are from the United States of America. Well hello there on the other side of the Atlantic, I humbly thank you for spending your precious leisure time reading my words.

The running scene in America is every bit as fascinating as in the UK. Listening to the Talk Ultra podcast with Ian Corless and Karl Mezler is fascinating, the tales of those iconic US 100 milers and Fastest Known Time (FKT) attempts. This makes it all the more fun for us ultra fans when the quick US runners come to the big European ultras. The likes of Hayden Hawks, Jim Walmsley and Tim Toffleson lighting up the races in Europe’s mountains.

By the way, a podcast giving a UK slant on the ultra running scene is the British Ultra Running Podcast with James Elson (of Centurion Running fame) and top British ultra runner, Dan Lawson.

During the last episode, James revealed that he has a place in this years Barkley Marathons. He was able to reveal that much, but is sworn to secrecy as to the date, as this notoriously gruesome and secretive event had actual spectators turn up last year (which is frowned upon!). The race consists of 5 20 mile loops (which are always plenty more than 20 miles) has a history full of mystery and very few actual finishers. I implore anyone curious as to what this is all about to check out the extraordinary film The Barkley Marathons: The Race That Eats Its Young.

ANYWAY.

Since the last blog, I’ve managed to miss a few planned runs. As readers from the real world will know, sometimes life is just TOO DARNED TIRING! Although I’ve still been getting a sweat on at work…..

2018-01-27 08.54.07 — Very spring like weather up on the moors this morning…..

And today, as ever my beautiful wife inspired me to get out there as we did a proper hilly Dartmoor road run. “Road?” I hear you squeal……. Well, I guess it’s becoming less of a secret that on Easter Saturday we’re going to be having a crack at the Two Oceans Marathon. Gulp. Hopefully avoiding the gun!

So, today, starting in wet darkness and finishing in even wetter daylight, we pretty much did half the distance and half the climbing of Two Oceans. Apparently it won’t be hard driving freezing rain and wind on race day, blimey it was bleak up there today. A quick drive up to Princetown afterwards for our, now traditional, fry up at the Fox Tor Café.

Mud (honey)

Published on January 24, 2018January 24, 2018 by Kevin BonfieldLeave a comment

So it all starts to seem a bit real.

We really have entered some BIG things.

We are sort of keeping the *** ****** under our hats at the moment. 35 miles of epicness at Easter. In another country. So we’ve started dialling in the road miles for the Saturday long runs. Except I didn’t quite master the mapping tool app……. Nicky was ever so pleased as we squelched our way along a few very wet (non) roads.

“Do you mind if we join you on this massive table designed for 6 people, in front of the fire, as there’s only 2 of you?” I enquired whilst hanging our dripping running jackets on the back of 2 of the chairs.

“Er…… I suppose so…”

So our 20 mile road (and non-road) Dartmoor run ended with a hearty breakfast in the Fox Tor café in Princetown. I’m sure it wasn’t the faint aroma of the drying sweaty running kit adorning our bedraggled bodies which put our reluctant neighbour off his SECOND fruit scone….

So with my other eye on the T60 (which I don’t think is a secret now) I set off early on Sunday for a few hours of mud squelching around the glorious Devon countryside. Foul weather, atrocious conditions, bloody loved it……..

I’m writing this on Wednesday. I thought I’d start including my training log in the blog. You lovely people can see how a 50 something year old, time poor, pork pie eating, physical worker with caring commitments is trying to prepare for an overnight 60 mile race.

Erratically but enthusiastically.

So the last week or so has looked like this……

Weds –

Thurs – rest

Fri –

Sat –

Sun –

Mon – rest

Tue – 3 x 1 mile

This morning, running for Nicky for here 3 x 1 mile, really string wind & rain

Oh and a piano update….. we haven’t quite mastered all of All Of Me…… Nicky’s daughter Lou joined us for a plonk too!

Blogging From The Bench

Published on October 17, 2017 by Kevin BonfieldLeave a comment

I stood and watched a hundred or so runners, including my rather wonderful lady wife, Nicky, head off towards the moors.

Jealous? Moi??

2017-10-14 10.00.54 — Nicky ready to follow those ORANGE flags

“Follow the ORANGE flags!!” yelled myself, the race crew and other spectators. A race of 3 halves, as it were. Pure Trail’s Dartmoor 3-in-1. Those who had elected to try and run all three race on the day were to follow the “ORANGE FLAGS” on the first loop. At 9.75miles this was the longest of the day.

Not only the longest (and even longer for those who drifted off course in the mist) race but also the hilliest and the foggiest as it turned out.

In another guise, I did home delivery for Sainsbury’s (You KNEW you recognised me from somewhere!) and for a while we used to cover these west moorland villages. And what a lovely village to base a race, the quirkily named Peter Tavy. Quite a magical air to the village as we optimistically parked the mini on the wet field. (“it’ll be drier by the time we leave!”)

I wonder just WHAT they keep in the shed

The village hall, acting as HQ for this cracking event, is classic fare – the modern era only nodded towards with the addition of a defibulator, not that heart failure is particularly a modern phenomenon.

Anyway, off they all went. Jealous? Moi?

I’d probably have preferred to have been gallivanting across the moors chasing sheep rather than perched amongst the kit bags in the village hall, notepad in hand, trying for all the world to look like “a writer”!

Well, if I DO want to be a writer, then write I must…..

But, my self-diagnosed fooked ankle (did I mention I did The Gower 50 ultra last week?? – read all about it HERE), isn’t in a hurry to get running again, so coat holder and cake eater I was. I also had a wander in the lane and found a Cornish pasty recipe on the village notice board!

2017-10-14 10.01.26 — Steve Skedgell, you know he’s in charge with that hi-viz & air horn

I’m a bit of a Pure Trail fan, trail running events, usually with a twist, created by runners, for runners. We had a great time at their Race The Tide earlier in the year (blogged about, naturally, HERE). They have a regular group runs across the moors and are genuinely good guys to be around.

With a 9.75 mile race, followed by a 7 miler and finally 5 miles (with different coloured flags to follow), some were charging around, then using varied techniques to keep warm before the next race’s start time, the day was definitely one for clever pacing.

Rather dangerously for me, I ended up chatting to Steve, half of the duo who are responsible for Pure Trail’s success, whilst the runners were out on race 1. Dangerous? Well, inevitably talk of ultra challenges, “ooooo 150 miles on a canal…” “oooooo MOUNTAINS!” etc etc……..

2017-10-14 12.04.30 — Jamie after race 1, write your own caption……

So after some quaffing, and scribbling, and chatting, I limped outside to watch the runners arrive back to base. A regular fixture in this blog, Jamie Bullock (see blog about his Stoke Gabriel Carnival 10k HERE) came cruising back, well inside the top 10. In fact he finished 8th overall after all three races.

Nicky meanwhile came back with plenty of time to spare. Despite this, the week’s chaos, tight calves and poor night’s sleep had caught up with her. She opted to partake of the three C’s instead of lining up for race 2 – Coffee, Cake and a Cuddle.

Anyway, a great event and lovely day out on the moors, we took a scenic route home, the mist having cleared, and headed for a chilled evening.

BUT – the real action of the weekend was the pebble skimming at Elberry Cove on Sunday, as four generations of this wonderful and kooky family I’m so proud to belong to took a stroll (or limp in my case) in the warm autumnal breeze.

Head Over Heels (or ar$£ over t!t)

Published on March 19, 2017 by Kevin Bonfield6 Comments

Last time I fell during a run was in the Haytor Heller 2015. Oooo I did graze my knees. I’ve been surprisingly sure footed since then. Until today………..

It sure has been a challenging week chez nous. So we were ready for a lovely adventure today, tired for sure, but looking forward to the Tavy 13. It is a fabulous half marathon, hilly and challenging but with a “ahhhh-weeeeeeeee” 3 mile downhill and flat finish.

2017-03-19 09.05.38 — Other people might want some of that Martin

The same gang of three (the wonderful Mrs Bonfield, the silver fox & yours truly) set off for Tavistock, arriving in good time and ready for our standard pre-match coffee (or multi-sugared tea). We had all, of course, completed the Larmer Tree Marathon 7 days earlier (see last weeks review) and were prepared to be carrying that fatigue in our legs.

This event, fantastically organised by Tavistock Athletic Club Tavistock Athletic Club, also played host to the Primary Schools Challenge, where nearly 500 primary school children would complete a mile after the grown-ups had set off on their 13.1 mile adventure. This was the culmination of 13 weeks of the youngsters running a mile a week.

What with there being nearly 500 in the half marathon, all the supporters, children’s’ parents and supporters it made for a cracking atmosphere at the track and a strain on the toilet facilities!

We were all running our own races, so we wished each other luck and lined up on the lush spongy running track with the buzzing throng of runners.

2017-03-19 09.39.14 — Toileted and Coffeed ready for the off

The hooter sounded and off we went, starting with half a lap of the track through the wonderful tunnel of noise created by all those children cheering us along.

I seemed to settle into what felt like my pace quickly as we went towards Tavistock itself and then straight into a climb out of the town. I don’t climb particularly quickly but I feel I have become quite efficient and so I focus on the rhythm of my foot-strike and try to ignore those that appear to be sprinting past me! They are either faster runners than me, in which case they’ll be gone or maybe they’re pushing too hard and I might catch them later.

Despite this climb, I went through mile 1 in 6m50s, bang on pace for a 1h30m finish, I didn’t really have a target for today, and I knew there was plenty of hilly stuff to come so I stuck with running on feel. We went along a fairly flat tarmac path through some woodland which ended in a sharp little decent followed by a hairpin turn to join a road and head back uphill.

I noticed the 2 mile marker on a post as I started to thank the marshal, there were so many wonderful marshals, skilfully guiding us through any junctions or tricky sections.

“Thank you marsh………..” SLIP, SMASH, SLIDE. Man down! My gangly 6 foot frame spread-eagled on the junction, “you alright mate?” the concerned calls of many of the runners as they hopped over me and headed up the hill. The very concerned marshal encouraged me to take a bit of time to recover, unsightly blood dribbling down my leg.

2017-03-19 09.00.44 — Luckily my fall wasn’t bad enough to require these guys

My watch had actually vibrated to tell me I had completed mile 2 in 6m23s as I fell!

I picked myself up and set off again, sore and with dented pride, wryly chuckling to myself. I seem to remember the next couple of miles being undulating (6.46 & 6.31) before a challenging climb in mile 5 taking us up on to the moors (8.07) before settling in to a couple more undulating miles enjoying the glorious vistas (6.50 & 6.39).

There is a big old hill in mile 8 and I started to trudge a bit. I spurred myself on with a little look at the ribbon I often wear on race day. My sister lost her battle with cancer 8 years ago, and today would have been her 52nd birthday. I try to only use Karen’s memory as a positive thing and I know she was so happy that’d I’d taken up running and started taking better care of myself, so she would have surely have told me to dig in and get to the top.

Through mile 8 in 8m30s, I knew the run in was down to the town and then flat so I started to let my limbs spiral as quickly as I dared, not wishing to repeat my tumbling antics of earlier!

Miles 9 and 10 (6.26 & 6.39) were a battle into the wind and mile 11 had a little climb (6.59) before whizzing back through 12 & 13 (6.18 & 6.47) towards town and the 600 meter finish on the track. My tired bleeding bloody was pleased to see the finish line and there was a brief emotional moment with me and the ribbon.

1 hour 31 minutes 22 seconds. Unofficial.

My rushing about didn’t stop then, though. Knowing Martin and Nicky were also soon to be on their way, I hobbled back to the car to collect jumpers (it certainly was chilly once I’d stopped) and coffee and cake money.

2017-03-19 11.53.01 — Some of the wonderful Tavy Athletics Club Catering Team

The fantastic Tavistock Athletics Club Catering Team were handily trackside with drinks, cakes, hot dogs, bacon sarnies.. The Works. What an enthusiastic, helpful, smiling, congratulating and efficient team they were. The younger staff members falling over themselves to make sure I was laden with recovery refreshments for when my fellow intrepid runners arrived. Which was quite soon as it turned out, Martin blitzing up the home straight in 1h53m and Nicky following soon after also with a sprint to finish in 2h08m.

2017-03-19 12.10.00 — Nicky flying to the finish

Their smiles matched mine as we compared notes and munched and drank through our post race goodies.

£9 this race. With road closures and the facilities and a lovely little medal. Bargain.

Hats off to the Tavy club for another resounding success, wonderful atmosphere and some great memories on a day on memories.

Check out the Tavy 7 too, another lovely race.

Please check out my other blog posts….

Larmer Tree Marathon, Bideford Half, my writing journey, elitism, tired Mo, working & running and have a rummage through my marathons to date.