THIS year has a lot to answer for. And not all of it bad. For devoted ultra and hill runners, unable to fulfil their usual racing commitments due to postponements and travel restrictions, an opportunity to tackle other challenges closer to home suddenly became more appetising and manageable than ever before.

Records – or Fastest Known Times (FKTs) to be more accurate – tumbled. Whether it was Donnie Campbell setting a new mark for scaling all 282 Munros (31 days) or Carla Molinaro and Dan Lawson beating the respective women’s and men’s times for legging it from Land’s End to John O’ Groats, this has been a year like no other.

“In 2020 the sport’s best athletes have been giving their undivided attention to rounds and trails and FKTs with spectacular results,” writes Ally Beaven in Broken, a new book that delves into that world with a personal insight that comes from being bang in the middle of much of it.

But Broken is much more than a tale of those achievements. In his engaging, self-deprecating style, Beaven, an accomplished runner himself who tags along on several of his friends’ endurance-sapping efforts, threads together themes of comradeship, integrity and the self-masochism needed to clock up more miles running than most people do in their car in a year.

“The reason I felt there was maybe a book in this came from getting out with a lot of people on their runs and from my own experiences,” explains the 32 year-old.

“There was a perspective there that I hoped would take it beyond simply a series of articles. It wasn’t just a compendium of news.

“But it’s not an almanac. It’s not a definitive list of what’s happened - good luck trying to write one!”

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Given the sheer scale of many of the attempts – both geographically and in terms of time - there can often be a vagueness about what does or doesn’t constitute a FKT. But, as Beaven reveals, an inherent sense of integrity tends to keep the whole thing honest.

“The whole FKT thing is an anarchic world,” he admits. “In normal athletics World Athletics can say definitively what’s a record and what’s not. It’s not like that here so it’s pretty much up to the runners themselves to uphold that integrity.

“If you’ve got an asterisk next to an achievement as someone cut a corner or didn’t do something quite right then you diminish it. The higher the standards you hold yourself to, the higher in values the records become.”

The paradox of endurance running is that it’s a solitary activity only possible with the support of many others. Those, like Beaven, who turn up to offer company, bring food supplies or a change of clothing are vital.

And quite often those most willing to help are those whose records are in danger of being taken away from them.

“Hill running isn’t a vast universe,” explains Beaven who pulls pints for a living when he’s not running up and down the Cairngorms.

“There’s not an obligation to help but it’s quite a nice thing to be involved in. And before the online era if you wanted to attempt to beat a record the best way to find out would be to go and speak to the people who had done it before.

“They would give you pointers on what to do differently or better, even if it meant them losing their own record. And you in turn would do the same for someone else down the line. There’s a karmic element to it.”

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Running for hours, days, even weeks at a time comes at an obvious physical and mental cost. As Ian Stewart, another record-breaker, tells Beaven in the book: ‘I’m glad that I’ve done it but I couldn’t say that I enjoyed it”.

Beaven, though, plays down the agony of it all and points towards a quote from another athlete, Nicki Lygo, in the book as the reason why so many ultra-runners keep going in increasingly adverse circumstances: “The emotional pain of failing just felt like it was going to be a bit worse than the physical pain of carrying on”.

“Some people only write about the misery and it is a necessary part of it,” adds Beaven. “It’s going to happen. If you’re running for days some of it is going to suck. But it’s all worth it eventually. If you didn’t think it was you wouldn’t be doing it. And it’s suffering you choose. There are people with much bigger problems than sore feet.”

And why do it at all? Beaven tries to explain. “It takes you to some unusual places. Like when you’re up a hill somewhere in the middle of the night, it’s not an experience most people get.

“And there’s often not much going through your head at that point which is quite nice. You’re just getting on with things, looking at your map, eating or drinking or making sure you’re warm enough. And everything else you might be usually stressing about just disappears.”

 

- Broken by Ally Beaven, published by Vertebrate Publishing, is out now priced £12.99