Transcript
ukrunchat: Hello, welcome to this episode of the UK Run Chat podcast. Today we're joined by Susie Chan, an absolute icon of endurance running. So it's taken up running at the age of 35. She's completed the Marathon de Sable, more times than any other British woman, set the 12 hour treadmill world record and was one of the first women to finish all the world marathon majors. Thank you for joining us today, Susie. How are you?
susie: I'm good, thank you. How are you doing?
ukrunchat: Yeah, not too bad. So I've just finished reading your new book, which has just been published. It's called Trails and Tribulations, The Running Adventures of Susie Chan.
susie: translate
ukrunchat: I have to say, I really enjoyed it, but I have followed, I've followed you on social media for quite a number of years and I've kind of seen all the snippets of how your runnings kind of progressed over the years. And it was exciting to kind of read all the details of what actually went into training for those races. So tell us a little bit about the book.
susie: Yeah. Oh, thank you. I feel like I've been around for forever running, but I need to remind myself, it's that I haven't been doing it my whole life. So the book basically, it charts my running from when I started, um what made me start running. And my very first race, which was terrifying, I think everybody, well, maybe not everybody, but a lot of people Entering the running scene can be a little bit intimidating. and And you always think, oh, I'm the slowest. No, I don't know what I'm doing. So me just going through all of that and then quite quickly finding myself in some unusual and difficult situations like being in a jungle, um running in my very first 100 miler, where I think I nearly fell in the Thames. um Just all sorts of ah of running running stories that i've I've done over the years. And the book, actually, it's a it's little collection of um
susie: of I think the overall story is my love for the running community and how empowering and uplifting and enabling it is. um Some slightly more difficult stories I touch on as well as some funny stories. And I think anybody that's a runner, obviously you are, if you're listening to this, just knows what it's like to be part of this community and and and you really meet some people along the way. And so stories from other people as well.
ukrunchat: Yeah, that that really came across actually in the book about how much of a community you've built over the years. And there was a particular quote that stood out to me. I think you actually might have actually used it as a chapter title, but you you are the team when you're crossing the finish line of Badwater.
susie: Yes.
ukrunchat: Just tell us about that. like how How important is that? how you know How do other runners help you achieve what you achieve?
susie: ah Oh, so, it's so important. And I didn't actually realise this. When I first started running, I was very much a sort of solo runner. I didn't know what I was doing. I was going out by myself and I was just, you know, running up and down the roads. I didn't really have any, anyone around me. like And it felt like very much a solo activity. And it it was when, I think really the the big changes when I joined my local running club, ah I imagine there's lots of people that are part of a running club and I was really terrified about doing that at first because you know you see them all and everybody's got the matching vests on and they all look super fast and I was really intimidated by finally after one failed attempt at trying to work walk through the door, the second go and managed to walk through the door of the running club.
susie: And of course, you know, it's absolutely fine once you're there and everybody's really, really lovely. And that really helped me that they really encouraged me to come along to some races and have a go at things. And then the thing about running is the more you try these things, the less scary they are basically. And so that was really my first sort of foray into, I was doing sort of half marathons, 10 Ks, and then my first marathon around that time. And then quite quickly, I fell into ultra running. And it's just um um it's something about the community. you can And then, of course, park run, which I think we all know how enabling that is.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: You could go there you know as a walker and then find yourself probably becoming a runner and if you keep on attending. There's something, there's two things I'm going to say about the running community. One, so enabling and welcoming and everybody's interested. You could walk to any race without knowing a single soul and start a conversation with somebody because you're there at a race and you can talk about running. And then the other thing, which has ah been the thing I think, which has really egged me on, especially in the ultra running community, they tend to normalize things which aren't particularly normal.
susie: like going out and running 20 miles on a Saturday, going out and running 30 miles on a Saturday. These are the sort of people I hang around with and I spent a lot of time hanging around with these people sort of in the middle chapters of that book. um And it seems perfectly normal to go and run 50 miles in a treadmill because all your friends are doing it. And and we need I need to sometimes ah take a little step back and think that's not that's not actually that normal. But just just generally, the running community has really, really empowered me. and and it's so um uplifting to be part of it. you can finish Yesterday I did a race, I didn't really know anybody at the race. you You're running along, you're chatting with people, it's helping you get get through the race and at the end you sort of check in with people, for me yesterday, overtaking me, see how they've got on. It's just such a wonderful place to be.
ukrunchat: Yeah it is and I think like you say you can turn up to race not knowing anybody and make friends there can't you particularly in a you know in a long distance event when you're out there for a long time.
susie: yeah
susie: um um of my So my sort of friend's circle when I started running, it very it's there's a lot of people now who and know beforehand will be like, oh, do you want to go to the pub? And now it's like, do you want to meet at 7 .30am for a 10 -mile run? It's kind of shifted as I've got a little bit older.
ukrunchat: Yeah, but all very normal as as an ultra runner, of course.
susie: yeah
ukrunchat: I mean, why do you think you you can't you say that you they they fell into ultra running? How does that happen?
susie: um
ukrunchat: but but
susie: I don't know. I think it's more, it wasn't out of ambition or and anything from from, it just mainly came about because these things sounded interesting and I wanted to to just see what what it was like. And my very first big ultra marathon, which sounds very silly now, I'm saying it out loud, was the Marathon de Saab and I didn't really know what was involved. I signed up to it because I read about it in Runner's World magazine. And I signed up to the waitlist, which I think was think was about 800 people.
susie: It was huge. This waitlist was huge.
ukrunchat: yeah
susie: And I thought, I'll never get in. But i so I was very intrigued by the fact that people ran across the Sahara Desert. I thought, that's ridiculous. And then, of course, what happened is the waitlist is there for a reason. And slowly, but surely, I made my way into the races.
ukrunchat: now
susie: Absolutely. terrified terrified and I'd run a marathon up to that point but one.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: And so I thought, oh my gosh, but then I just had a moment where I thought maybe I could do this.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: And I entered an ultra marathon, where I am now at it on the Isle of Wight just to see if I could do it. And I managed to talk a friend in with me to do it. And and and there is something amazing, it's something very different about ultra running to marathons. If anybody does both, they'll know. Marathons are very governed by time, pace, how do you do? I think the first few times you do it, people are very concerned about you know your time and and and when you finish ultra marathons, you could be like, I just ran 35 miles and people are like, I'm sorry. It's no, they're very different.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: and So it was such a different experience. We were sort of running and walking and hiking our way around the Isle of Wight. And in my head, I thought if I, if I can't run around the Isle of Wight in June, I've got no chance in the marathon, dasar but then what happens is I finished that, hot I finished that first um race around the Isle of Wight. And I thought, or maybe I can do the mountain to solve. And it was more of an exploration than than anything really. And then each time I did a race, I managed to do it. And I met more people that normalize going to run a hundred miles and you just kind of fall into this world and its and it is a lot more doable than it looks like on paper to somebody who doesn't run, I'm going to say.
ukrunchat: Yeah, I mean, in in your book, when you're talking about packing for the marathon, this album, you're talking about packing things like a venom pump and, you know, and tell me you've never had to use it, by the way.
susie: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. didn't know what I was doing. No, I wouldn't know how to. I mean, there's instructions. I'm like, I i think if I got bitten by something venomous, I'll just I wouldn't know what to do.
ukrunchat: No.
susie: I wouldn't know how to. I think it's quite straightforward. But mercifully, I haven't I've been bitten by lots of things and in races over the years, but mainly non mainly always non poisonous things. Thank goodness I did a one race in the in the Amazon rainforest and My back, I looked like I had a rash, an entire body rash, that's how many times I was bitten because I kept falling over and things would just cover you by you and Ants, mainly ants.
ukrunchat: yeah gosh Yeah but that chapter on the jungle was terrifying and I was just, did you honestly hate it as much as you kind of describe it because it sounded horrendous.
susie: i was not having fun I was not having fun and um i was I went into that one completely um unprepared mentally, physically and sort of admin wise like all the kit that I bought and I'd seen it on TV in a documentary and I thought oh that look and I was right in the middle of doing them. I think I'd done two marathon de so by then I was doing all these multi -stays and I was very sort of probably very it's about how easy it was going to be like. I've done the math and the sub. I can like could run through a jungle and um watched it on TV and it actually looked and look fine. It looked fun almost. And what happened was I found out subsequently or realized subsequently that the camera crew couldn't get to the majority of the race because it was so deep in the jungle. We're talking two day treks overnight to get to where parts of this this race is. um And I was
susie: very under trained for it. It was a lot of elevation and my husband nearly died. but just sort of
ukrunchat: Yeah, he had, a was it heat stroke he had?
susie: yeah the
susie: Yeah, he but he was really, really gravely unwell.
ukrunchat: That's very scary.
susie: he He did genuinely nearly died.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: And I didn't realize until we sort of split because he was like, I don't feel good. And then I was like, I need to get this today done. So we sort of split amicably. And then that evening, I realized how seriously ill he was. And we both spent you know quite a bit of money with travel. It was a whole holiday leave allowance, I think, of being burned on this race. And we were in the middle of the Amazon rainforest in Peru. like hundreds of miles from a hospital and I just thought we both just can't come back empty -handed and i I need to finish this race and I i i genuinely, I'm not a crier, I cried every day on that style and thinking I don't want to do this and of course i i did it and I did finish but it was so tough. I remember falling over really hard
susie: and landing on my arm and it being really bruised and I could remember really hoping I'd broken my arm so I'd have a good reason to stop and I hadn't broken my arm. It was so tough and I have no regrets but it was the one that that broke me. I thought I couldn't do it and as people know in a race if you you want to pull out a race you could just pull out of a race but I couldn't because I was in the middle of the Amazon rainforest and the next time I was going to see another human being was at the finish line so I just had to keep going for about another three hours.
ukrunchat: Wow, I was gonna ask how you kept going but there you go, you had no choice.
susie: I couldn't just stop because i um I wanted to, but I was like, well, I'm done with this race now. I've had enough. It's broken me. And you know, just standing there looking around and it's just thick jungle. And I thought and I, ease whatever happens, I still have to get to the finish line tonight, even if I pull out and I'd have to walk it.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: So I just, I just made it. And then I got in and I sat down and the the race director talk to me round and my husband talked to me round because I was only one day left by that point but um oh dearie me yeah it was tough it broke me that race broke me but
ukrunchat: Yeah.
ukrunchat: Yeah. Wow. That's tough. I mean, how, how do you navigate on a race like that?
susie: um
ukrunchat: Did they mark the course for you? How how do you mark a course in the jungle?
susie: a Yeah, so it's actually I in order to do a bit of research for the book, actually, because as runners, we just turn up to races generally, we don't really think about how it's put on or what goes on behind the scenes. And um um for this one, because it isn't such a remote, it's one of the remotest parts parts of the world. And it's so very remote, I phoned him up to ask him how how they put these races on and it is absolutely extraordinary. They head out about a month before and they hire a load of local Peruvians who've been doing this race for a while and they hack the course through through the jungle. There's some bits where there's dirt but roads um and and ah natural trails for the villagers and people that live there but the rest of the time they did they just cut the route through the jungle and so they're doing that for weeks beforehand and then some bits have slightly grown back again so you're just crawling through holes but they mark them with a very bright pink
susie: ribbon about every few hundred yards and you just constantly look out for these pink ribbons and sometimes you know when you're so very tired you miss it and you have to turn around and double back so that is a bit disappointing if you haven't seen one for about maybe 15 minutes you think oh no and so there's a but they are actually because everything's like green or brown it's so thick you can you can sort of spot them
ukrunchat: Okay.
ukrunchat: Yeah. And are they tracking you? I imagine as well. They know where you are.
susie: We had crackers on, thank goodness.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: but There was one moment where I fell in a river and I got washed quite a long way by this ferocious river downstream and um i I thought I could die.
ukrunchat: i'
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: And I thought, well, and I was trying to calculate how long it would take them to find me ah if I... was just So you have yeah you do have trackers, but this sort of extraction, being really realistic, the extraction for that race would be quite a bit difficult.
ukrunchat: yeah
susie: So my husband, who did become very, very ill, you would have to scramble a helicopter from probably Cuzco, and that's hours away. And then they'd have to try and locate you in this jungle, which I think is about the size of Portugal.
ukrunchat: Yeah, one.
susie: and You have got trackers, and then of course, there's all the the the canopies and things. So it's not a... It's not an easy extraction, so your best thing is to try to stick to the race route.
ukrunchat: Yeah, well, yeah, thank goodness you you made it through.
susie: ah but
ukrunchat: Yeah, wow.
susie: it was wild
ukrunchat: You describe another similar hairy moment. It's actually the start of your book, isn't it? Where you're kind of at the top of a mountain in the Sahara.
susie: oh yeah yeah
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: Yeah, I have. So there's a theme. Basically, anybody that has been following me for a little while will will know that I don't really do mountain races because the i i get they give me the heebie -jeebies. I get very scared up mountains. and I have a proper vertigo where I just freeze. I think I got to the first level of the Eiffel Tower, froze, and had to get back down some really
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: ah not good with heights and and I know this but I didn't realise when I signed people said the mountain is generally a flat race and actually with hindsight it really is but there are moments where you're you're climbing up quite loose scree and you're on mountains and it's it's it's like a sheer drop either side and there's one big mountain which they pretty much put in every single edition of the mountain to Saab and it's a very very steep
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: climb or steep drop you can either go up or down it and some races they make you do it both ways and i was just not prepared for this i was just terrified i just i just froze and it was my very first time i did it and i i don't know if anybody's ever had vertigo but you literally can't move and i just couldn't move and i thought oh no i'm just gonna have to stay here then And there have been, of I've gone up and down that thing, I don't know, maybe four or five times. Every time it happens to me, I just freeze with fear and there's somebody has to like push me or bully me up the thing. And and so I just, I tend to avoid mountain races.
susie: The bad water does go over three mountain ranges, but you're on a road.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: So it's a road race. So the road is lots of switchbacks, but it's a lot less perilous.
ukrunchat: Yeah. So we won't be seeing you at UTMB or no.
susie: No, you but ask me about that a lot. And one, I'm not very strong on mountains on elevation anyway, mainly because I don't like it. And two, I think I would just just perish up there with fear. um I might do one of the shorter ones, though, just ah just to see just to see if I like it or not.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: But I don't think I don't think it's in me to do the long one.
ukrunchat: Yeah. well I mean,
ukrunchat: What's your strength then? What's your favourite terrain, would you say? Because you've been back to the desert a lot of times, haven't you?
susie: No, I love, I do love, and I realise a lot of my hundred miles and are are are sort of flat roads, very flat straight roads, so I can run in a straight line for a hundred miles, which I think some people, it's like their idea of hell, but i I don't mind that, I'm pretty tough. um And I do like the warmer environments. i'm I'm drawn to them. I think when I was a little bit younger, I could do a little bit better with the heat. i just It just didn't seem to affect me as much. ah Now I'm at older menopause and it's a bit wilder. But and yeah, I do like hot races. I think, you know, maybe it's because I'm so British and the winter summer years are so awful. I think if I'm going to do a race, I want some of guaranteed good weather. And maybe I've slightly over -rotated on that and I have guaranteed sunshine.
ukrunchat: But you have had to do a lot, you know, you do a lot of work in a heat chamber as well, don't you too, acclimatise for them.
susie: You are. Yes. So the yes, it's that they're really, so yeah they're not to be taken lightly. and And since my husband nearly died that time, I've taken the heat training very, very seriously. um i've I've done races in Costa Rica, which are very hot, the Sahara and obviously Death Valley. um and And sometimes I've gone through Florida and that's been very, very hot too. And so I i work and in a heat chamber and basically that's as miserable as it sounds. ah That's my dog snoring in the background. I hope that's not too loud.
ukrunchat: Got hair in sadly, but no.
susie: and um So a heat chamber is basically a box. like a plastic box with a treadmill in it and and actually a bike in it sometimes. And you you have to acclimatise your body in the weeks leading up to the race. There's really not much use doing it sort of four, three months out. You have to have a programme. Ideally, you want to be in there every 48 hours at at the least to get your body used to running in the heat. And you go in and then they set the temperature and then you you run and a walk or hike or whatever. You just get your body moving and get at core temperature up.
susie: And it's served me very well in in my races, but for my last hot race I did, which was in Death Valley, which is officially the hottest place on earth, and temperatures are over 50 degrees Celsius, and the the the heat chamber doesn't actually go up that high. So they set it to maximum, which was, I think, I don't know, 39 degrees or something. And then I had to put jumpers on, which seemed so counterintuitive, but just to show how it works. The very first time I went in, which was three weeks out, I was absolutely dying.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: I was just in my sports bra sweating. And by the end of it, I had a jumper on, I had a hat on. I was just trying to turn the load up to get as hot as possible. And when I got to Death Valley, the hottest race in the world, the heat didn't bother me. So it really does work, but it's grueling. It really is grueling.
ukrunchat: Yeah. Can we talk a bit about that? Cause you obviously had to go and you have to kind of get to know the team, don't you? Before you, you can apply and, and you know, crew so that you know what to expect.
susie: Yes. So it's, it's, it's been, it's been a, I don't know, maybe 14, 13 year dream for me to do that race.
ukrunchat: Wow.
susie: And as soon as I did the marathon with the Saab and then people and I heard about this race called Badwater, 135. And I only knew three people in the UK that had done it um and I reached out to two of them and said how do I get in this race and they were like you need to you need to go you need to see it first and I didn't really um think much more of that other than you know it's it's have a look and then you'll you'll understand how it works And it's only really when i I got out there the first time I realized that the extent of of how important it is to be there. So it's very difficult to get into. Only 100 people get invited ah every year to to be at the start line of that race. You need quite a robust CV and to be invited. And ideally you need to have crewed it. ah So crewed another runner to finish. So subsequently, obviously hundreds of people want to do the race. And there's actually a bit of a wait list to get on a crew. youre You're trying to find somebody to crew.
susie: And somebody who, I did them out in the sardines and I'm doing bad water, I know you want to do it, do you want to come and crew me? And I went out to help him finish this race and it starts at night, so you miss a night's sleep and then it goes through the heat of the day in the hottest place on earth, then you miss another night's sleep. And by the second night, I was hallucinating. And I was just crewing and I was absolutely delirious and I was exhausted and I i think I'd run maybe, I don't know, 25 miles in this desert.
ukrunchat: No, as gross, yeah.
susie: I nearly passed out crewing him because I hadn't done any heat training. I thought, oh, I'll be all right. I'm in a car, you know, absolutely horrendous. And I sent a text message to my running group, WhatsApp group, and in capital letters saying, never, ever let me enter this race. It's horrific. And then, you know, if he finished, it was glorious. And I just thought that's that ridiculous. It's so ah cat is very hard to articulate how extreme that race is. You are hundreds of miles from anything. There's nothing. There's only ice or water every 50 miles or something. So you need to have you need to have the right stocks in your car. Each of everything kept cool.
susie: You can't really put your air con on in the car in case your car overheats. You see the scars on the road where cars have just overheated and burst into flames, in which case you are in trouble. The average survival time in Death Valley is 14 hours. So it's a very serious place to be.
ukrunchat: Bye.
susie: You really need to know your stuff and that's why you need to go to crew. So I was like, I can't do this race. I've crewed a second time. Same thing happened. I want to do this race, crewed, but I can't do this race. it's It's too extreme. And then the third and final time I crewed it was with um a lady called Debbie Consani -Martin. she's um She's an extraordinary ultra runner. She's i've been at the top of the game ever since I've been ultra running. I say she made it look easy. I mean, she was throwing up for 100 miles, but she's so tough.
susie: she she was sort of very steady. And at some point really near the end, she just looked at me dead in the eyes and said, you need to do this race. You know, you have to. And I was like, yeah, I know. And then I entered and got selected. So, um, but it's, um, it's, it's a tough one to get into, but if you really want to do it and if you're really serious about doing it, then you you can get in. Cause I, I, I did, and I'm not the strongest in, in terms of speed out there. So, um, yeah it was amazing. It was absolutely incredible. It was everything I dreamed of. And I really.
susie: really did enjoy it even the bits that really hurt.
ukrunchat: is Is it all on road that race?
susie: It's 135 miles on the road over three mountain ranges so you go from the lowest point in contiguous USA so that it's 585 feet below sea level and then you go to the the highest point which is a place called Mount Whitney and you go all the way to the top
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: And if you need to go further, you need a climbing license, there's snow. So it's it's um is it's not for the faint hearted.
ukrunchat: No.
susie: If anybody wants to see what that's like, there is a documentary on YouTube. So you can, it's called the 135, just to have a look. And you'll see me falling to pieces and hallucinating quite a bit in the middle and then finishing.
ukrunchat: Yeah, we'll definitely give that a watch.
susie: yeah
ukrunchat: So I mean, backwater seemed to be that that dream of yours to that you wanted to aim for and achieve. I mean, what's what's next for you, Susie?
susie: I don't know now. I mean I do feel like I've sort of done the thing I really wanted to do and I'm giving myself a little bit ah of a rest. I was supposed to do um a 100 mile race but I got like a little bit of a sore foot and it wasn't quite 100 % I could run but I just wasn't sure. and and then you know i had to And then my father died all quite quickly so i couldn't I just didn't have it in me. So I think I would still, I think I still want to do maybe a hundred miler or maybe I'll pop another hundred miler in or 50 miler in here or there. But um for me now that it's shifted from
susie: doing the thing I really wanted to do to to more spending time with my friends and finding the races that I really enjoy um and and just just being there for the experience of it. I i would i would quite like to do one a cold one which I hate the cold and I don't know what I'm saying this but you know when you see people dragging their sledges there is one called the Yukon which
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: you know, if I can talk somebody into doing that with me, then I might be tempted with that one. But right now the focus has has shifted a little bit. I'm just having a little bit of a kinder time to myself and my body.
ukrunchat: Yeah, I mean, can I bring up the subject of perimenopause because you you chat about that in your book briefly, don't you?
susie: yeah
ukrunchat: And I did want to just talk about that.
susie: yeah
ukrunchat: I'm going through it myself at the moment. And it's tough, isn't it?
susie: oh yeah
ukrunchat: You do start to doubt yourself as a runner.
susie: Yeah, yeah, it's so tough. I've all yeah, it's really tough. it Sometimes I feel great. And and but most of the time I feel sluggish. um Everything's a lot harder for me now. It's very a big shout out to anybody that's going to the menopause out there because it's just it just knocks your confidence and knocks the the wind from your sails because one moment you're you're flying long and having a great time and next minute I'm just this sweaty heap having a having a little walk moment in the middle of a race because I can't do anything about it and it's just the way your body isn't and and and some most of the time I'm sort of okay because it's it's where I am and and I do have this philosophy that as long as you're trying your best in your run or in your race then there's literally nothing more you can do and you should be grateful for it but then ever so occasionally I just think oh for god's sake
susie: um Why is this so hard? and And your hormones fluctuate. So I'm on HRT and that does stabilize it, but not all the time. So some days it's really tough. And I think the biggest symptom for me, which is how I get really chronic aches in my joints. So I wake up and I just feel rigid and I'm doing a lot of yoga that really helps cross training. really helps. I'm having to try and lift a bit more. and All these things really do help, but sometimes I think I just want to go for a run and just feel light and free again.
susie: And and maybe one in 10 that happens now rather than, you know, 50 % of the time.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: And it's just, it's just, you know, 50 % of us in the world are going to go through this. So you just have to, I wouldn't say embrace it. I'm not going to be that. keen about it but you just have to roll with the punches and it it and it is it really is what it is. I'm not just i'm not trying to fight it, I'm just just trying to go with it and I'm a lot slower these days and it's a lot harder for me to try and run even slightly faster. I have to really work for it but I do have a couple of friends who have been through it and come out the other side, um one of which is my cousin
susie: she's absolutely incredible and and in the last two years she's got her 5k half marathon 10k and marathon pb and she's been running for about 20 years so i'm holding these people up like i mean she worked for it i'm not going to pretend that she just rolled into it straight from the back of the menopause but she was like right and back
ukrunchat: wow yes
susie: And so I look at these, but you know, at my friends and I think, okay, it's fine. Not that I want to chase down PBs, but there is, it will come to an end and then you'll you'll feel normal again. You'll be able to sort of know where your body is.
ukrunchat: Yeah and I guess you've got to change your philosophy on running haven't you, while you're going through it a bit.
susie: But it is, you have to. Yeah.
ukrunchat: yeah
susie: Yeah. I mean, sometimes I'll go out for a run and I'll just do three miles. I'll be like, okay, that's that. And then I'll just jog back home again. It is what it is. um And it did worry me when I was training for bad water last year. It was very much in the forefront of my mind. Like if I have a bad day when I'm out there, it's going to be horrific. And fortunately, the menopause gods were smiling upon me and I got through that race. Okay.
ukrunchat: Yeah, but I guess you've had it you've had a lot of practice at toughing it out, haven't you? I mean, that that mental fortitude that you need to get through a race is, you know, that's always gonna be there, isn't it?
susie: Yes. Yes.
susie: Yes. Yes, yes. And I think because I'm slightly less wed to paces, and some people, I think if you are very ah keen on and and on getting certain times and hitting certain paces, that that would be soul destroying in the middle of trying to deal with perimenopause. But because for me, it's just a lot of the time it's about finishing and and getting the the medal, then you can tough it out. you know it's It's okay so to to walk. It's absolutely fine Absolutely fine.
ukrunchat: Yeah. Yeah.
ukrunchat: Yeah. And that that's, you know, that's kind of, that's accepted in in the ultra community, isn't it?
susie: Come in, yeah.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: umm I'm talking about evening. and I had a little walk moment.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: and I did a half marathon yesterday. I was like, I'm having a walk up this hill, it's very steep. ah that
ukrunchat: Yeah. Why not? if You know, you just got to keep going, haven't you? Keep moving forward. Yeah. You talk about in your book, actually, how you ran for a lot of time without a smartwatch when you started, didn't you?
susie: yeah No clue.
ukrunchat: Do you still do that sometimes? Or are you kind of wedded to your data now?
susie: No, no, it has to be on Strava now.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: yeah No, I honestly, if I forgot my watch, I'm like, oh, shall I even run? Yeah, I just, I think it's more, I just had to, I like to keep a record of it. I think I'm very, I'm a little bit, yeah, I'm a little bit wedded to it, to the point where, and I know I won't be alone.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: If it's quite near the mile, I'm the one running up and down the road outside the house.
ukrunchat: Oh okay.
susie: round it up I know that's terrible isn't it yes that's I do record everything and it's all there on Strava and I mean you you know all the the the faster ones the slower ones the the ones where I have had to little walk up a hill it's all there you can see it's all um but I do like to keep a record of it yes yes
ukrunchat: I think that's good to see though. I mean, you've obviously got a lot of followers on Strava and I think it's good for people to see that actually even those who go out and run lots of miles, they're still walking lots and they still have slow, easy days.
susie: yeah
ukrunchat: It's okay.
susie: Well, this is it. So when I when I first started to get a little bit, I went through a whole phase, this was even menopause. Well, God is a bit slow. And I remember thinking this is a few years ago now, thinking, oh, God, you know, you know, you see people making the Strava excuses like a recovery run, you know, or I'm running with because the X, Y and Z slow me down. And I remember being quite self -conscious. Oh, God, all these fellows are going to see me. you know, running a little bit slower today. um And being a little bit worried about that and then ah getting over it quite, good you know, it's whatever.
susie: I remember seeing um an ultra runner I follow, she's won, she won mouth in the sub actually. and And I looked at her Strava and she had all sorts of runs on there, like she didn't care at all. And I thought, and it made me feel better. And I thought, what a good example.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: And so that was it. I thought, right, it's all going on there. I'm not going to like not post a ah of 5k because it was slow. It's all on there because, you know, we can't all be running at our PB pace all day long.
ukrunchat: No, no.
susie: It's not at all realistic.
ukrunchat: And it's not setting a good example of what only posting the good stuff is it either?
susie: Not at all. Not at all.
ukrunchat: No.
susie: Not at all.
ukrunchat: Yeah. ah Yeah, so there's there's ah there's a lot packed into your book. I mean, we could we could probably talk for hours about it. But I wanted to ask, because you you talk about your 24 hour track run. That was quite an interesting experience.
susie: Oh yes, that was fun, yes.
ukrunchat: Just you know, how different is that to doing kind of a point to point ultra?
susie: and
ukrunchat: That must be, is it tougher?
susie: I don't mind that that sort of thing. So this was a time, there's a race called, well, it was in Tooting, it's now he's now moved to Battersea, but you run for 24 hours around a 400 meter track. And again, that's one you need to be invited to purely because, and I mean, that's not, not not through they get a real mix of elites and sort of people just wanting to have a go and they just select you. I don't know if it's even done randomly. um And just because you can't have too many people on the track. And so you just run around and around and around and around and round and around 24 hours. um
ukrunchat: We do swap direction, don't hear you.
susie: im quite Every four hours it's absolutely thrilling.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: Every four hours you turn around and you run in the other direction because what happens is one leg usually on the inside track goes rigid because it's quite tight circle. So you turn around every four hours. and I don't mind races like that. I don't mind loop races and I don't know why. I can't, I think then yet they're either your bag or they're not. I like the straight line, perfect straight line or a loop. fine My fastest 100 miles is when you do a sort of you do an out and back um four times. and And to me, I was like, perfect.
ukrunchat: Right.
susie: 12 and a half miles, 12 and a half miles.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: In my head, it's like I'm just running 12 and a half miles, even though I did eight of them. and Yeah, that you have to go into it with the mindset. the right mindset and for me for that race I went into it thinking right 24 hours just as just one day in my life just one day in my life I kept saying um and I just you just I just kept moving for as much as possible and it was probably one of the worst days of weather I've ever had to run through it was it just rained for 22 of the 24 hours and but really English rain so drizzle to heavy back to drizzle it was just um soggy a very soggy race but
susie: Yeah, it it's it's the pure it's very hard to explain, but it's probably the purest race I've done. there' You're not going anywhere. You're not seeing anything. You are literally just running. It's just you in the running and your head.
ukrunchat: What's your mind doing? are you What are you thinking about for those 24 hours?
susie: Oh, God, everything. I got bored with my own internal, I was boring myself. My thoughts were boring me. um Everything, absolutely everything. um I first tried to do it without anything in my ears and then I listened to maybe a podcast and I was phoning people and then I put some music on and then I then i took it out and enjoyed the silence. It was it was ah anything to distract myself from the fact that I was running. yes
ukrunchat: Yeah, wow. Yeah, that's that's tough, but yeah, very different kind of ultra. Would would you do one like that again?
susie: yeah Yeah, I would actually I really enjoyed it.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: I say that but in that way that us runners have the amazing ability to forget to forget tough, tough things and tough moments and races.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: I think we've all had a race where you know, maybe like 5k where we've absolutely been dying 2k in and then you finish and you're like, Oh, that was brilliant. It's I probably would they do a 12 -hour version as well and there's there's a couple of them there's not that many of them obviously but there's a few of them dotted around I think there might be one in Crawley but it's just interesting it's just for me the finish line was the time rather than the distance you think like how far can I go and in 12 hours and and there's a few that there's one local to me where you just do a little tiny loop or two more loop I think of the trails which is quite nice and you know maybe you pick them to say I'm going to do a marathon today I'm going to do it here and then you do your marathon and then then you finish so
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: and It's about setting your own goal mentally in your head and trying to stick to it, that one.
ukrunchat: Yeah. Yeah. Cause you're talking, you're talking a book as well about doing the 12 hours on a treadmill cause you go for the Guinness world record, weren't you?
susie: Oh yeah. Yes, yes.
ukrunchat: And that in a way sounded tougher to me than going around the track.
susie: That was tough. Well, you know, when I'm certain, please tell me the runners that everyone has this, where you just have a day where you get up and you start running, you're like, oh, no. And it's just harder for for no reason.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: You just just have one of those days where you're just not vibing with the running. ah And normally on a day when that happens, you just you know you can you can just not do it, or run shorter, or cut your root short, or walk it in, or whatever. ah And that happened, I just happened to have that feeling on that day where I was supposed to break a world record. I can remember running thinking, oh God. And then my head was slightly not not in the positive mental state and I just had to keep pushing it out of my mind and just keep moving. So that was really tough and I felt quite a lot of pressure on that one because it was very black and white. It wasn't like, oh I'll just get slower and I know I could finish this race.
susie: um It is very black and white. It was DNF or success basically.
ukrunchat: Many.
susie: It's like, it's either I'm going to do it or I'm not.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: an actually And within, when I was running with this treadmill, I felt quite a lot of pressure, which I don't respond that well to. And like, if I try and train for a marathon PB, when it comes to the day of the marathon, I'm i'm a wreck because I don't like the pressure. I prefer to run unpressured. And it was it was bloody tough. And then I got a seasick, which is new. because the it was There was this huge treadmill and it was only a few couple of metres from a wall ah which we couldn't do anything about because this treadmill was absolutely enormous and so I was running and my eyes were sort of very were fixed and and my body was moving but the what I was looking at wasn't moving.
susie: It was a little bit like being in the hull of a ship with it sort bobbing up and down for 12 hours.
ukrunchat: Wow.
susie: and and do anything for 12 hours just sitting down or standing up or you know just painting anything any simple thing for 12 hours straight and it becomes incredibly tedious and tough and it was tough but fortunately I galvanized a bit of support on social media and everybody was really rooting for me in that really caught me through. I had to dig, I had to really dig. I think the video of that's out there somewhere because we had to record the whole thing. Guinness, we're very strict about the rules.
ukrunchat: Yeah, it was on YouTube, wasn't it? I remember watching bits of it.
susie: um do
ukrunchat: I was tuned in, yeah.
susie: so we didn't tune in what was essentially incredibly tedious for you but yeah lots of we there was at one point and they were like oh thousands of people are watching and I was like oh good lord so I think it did you know there's a tiny ego mania could be kept on moving I was like I can' can't look I can't look like I'm struggling so I kept so it did help actually the pressure did actually make it happen in the end thank
ukrunchat: Yeah, brilliant. Well, yes, well, I have to say I really enjoyed your book. So if you're out there listening to do give Susie's new book trails and tribulations and read, I do have one last question for you before we finish up.
susie: you
susie: Thank you. Oh, of course.
ukrunchat: And you you because you you say in your book at the end that you hate people asking why you run. So I'm not going to ask you that.
susie: Thank you. You know what I say? I hate it. It's just because it's such a movable feast, isn't it? It's not the same.
ukrunchat: Yeah.
susie: It's never the same reason. Well, the reasons repeat, but it's not a continuous thing. I mean, I do love running, and I think the bottom line is because I can. I think anybody that's been injured, when it's suddenly taken away from you, it's horrible, isn't it? So I run because I can, and because of what it has bought,
ukrunchat: Thank
susie: to my life and the people I've met and the places it has brought me. I'm just so grateful for running. And I think I describe it a little bit like a religion in my book. like you you read it ah It's sort of part of who you are.
ukrunchat: you.
susie: It doesn't become a hobby. it becomes It's a little is' more than that. It's your community. It's sort of what you what you do on on the regular basis for your own self and just for your own wellbeing and your own peace. and So all of all of those reasons, is just um just we are just so lucky to be able to to move and to run. So I don't ever want that to be lost on me.
ukrunchat: Yeah. So what advice would you give to somebody else who's looking at kind of getting into, not necessarily just ultra running, but running, you know, for the first time if they're out there listening?
susie: Well, it's ultra running, just sign up. it's a lot It's a lot less intimidating than you think.
ukrunchat: yeah
susie: There's so many races out there. The the the first ultra of marathon night I did was open to walkers and runners. And I thought, well, I've done a marathon, I could just walk the rest in. So it's not as intimidating as you think. And if you do want to get to running, the the I would say try but one of the hardest things I have done is actually to try and be consistent at the start because it is difficult it is difficult to to get that consistency at the start. So just twice a week if you can get out, walk running. 15, 20 minutes is all you need, all you need to get going. and But my number one advice I think would be to try and find a friend who wants to do it with you or find your tribe, I call it. you Maybe go to Parkrun for the first time, which can seem quite scary, but you'll realize very quickly that it's not and ah and you'll be able to do it. So head down to Parkrun, that's my advice.
ukrunchat: Yeah, brilliant.
susie: ah
ukrunchat: Yeah, but find your tribe and um do give Susie's new book Trails and Tribulations a read as well for some inspiration.
susie: Yeah.
ukrunchat: So thank you so much for joining us today. Really enjoyed chatting to you and I hope that you all out there listening have enjoyed this episode.
