Week One: Respecting the Altitude

Tuesday 10 January / Wednesday 11 January

After just two hours sleep in a hotel near Heathrow Airport, I found made my way to meet the rest of the group traveling to Iten, Kenya, for a stint of high altitude training, supported by UKA/London Marathon. This was my third trip to Kenya, so the early wake up call wasn’t as welcomed as the two previous times. The novelty of coming to Kenya is beginning to wear off, but that doesn’t mean to say I don’t appreciate the fantastic support and the impressive facilities and trails out here, I am just well aware of how much harder it is to breath, train and live at altitude. It is well worth the pain though and it makes it that much better with such a great group to train with and miles of positive energy.

I am the first to admit that I hate flying. I get worse every time, and this occasion has to be noted as one of the worst flights. The turbulence was enough to make people feel sick and lasted a few hours, which was enough to make me believe we weren’t going to make it. The second flight from Nairobi to Eldoret however, was much worse. Although it lasted just forty minutes, the entire plane thought the pilot was playing around, as it took a nose dive whilst turning… so not the best couple of flights I have experienced. To top it off, my luggage stayed behind in Nairobi.

When we arrived at Lornah Kiplagat’s training centre, it was a case of finding our rooms, sleeping and eating. Then in the afternoon we went for our first run, which usually feels strangely easy considering we’re now at 2400m above sea level and have had minimal sleep (this feeling doesn’t last)! We were all very happy that evening to go to bed knowing we could settle in and wake up every morning to glorious sunshine.


Thursday 12 January

After what was an awful sleep for my roommate, Beth Potter and I, we woke up for our 7:30am morning run. It is extremely important to ensure that when coming to altitude, you look after your body, this includes many aspects such as hydration, sleep, nutrition, recovery and sticking to your heart rate zones! It is very easy to get carried away in this athlete centered environment, as all you want to do is get out and train as you would normally. The key is to respect the altitude and listen carefully to your body.

I did two runs, followed by glutes and core exercises in the gym today. The great thing about having a gym on site is that it is no effort at all to go, which is great for me, as I find that not doing my glute exercises can cause me many problems in the long run, as I roll in at the knee causing stress on my fibula and in my hamstring. Firing up these muscles helps relieve these symptoms by waking them up and telling them to get working!!

As the evening fell and we’d had our dinner and hot chocolates, all I was craving was sleep. And that, I did.


Friday 13 January

Fridays are usually my rest day, however, the usual weekly pattern had been disturbed earlier in the week due to travel, so it was a day for training. Just the one run today for me though. A nice 45 minutes of trail running followed by some more gym exercises. The day was then open to chilling out, reading and worshipping the sun. Over Christmas I bought a little present for myself... a Kindle! This was something I had wanted for a while but could never justify, as I am not one for reading and also thought that I would miss a good paperback. I couldn’t have been more wrong. I honestly believe this is the best thing I have ever purchased and already feel I have got my use out of it! My current read is Harry Potter. Yes, I know that I am way behind the times but seriously, if you haven’t read them, do it now! I can’t put the thing down and have already got through two books within a week and have had to stop reading it right before bed because it is getting me too excited to sleep. Sad I know. Anyway, enough about HP, and more about the weather. Did I tell you it’s too hot to sit in...

Saturday 14 January

Another 7am alarm and another day of training begins. My personal coach, George Gandy is out here this time, as the Head Coach for UKA, which makes things a little better for me, as I can adjust training easily to fit my needs. Plus he can see how I am responding to the altitude himself so the judgement calls and my training is much more under control. It was decided that I was ready to do something a bit quicker and so I was set a solo run to do with a 3x6min tempo in the middle of it. Not everyone did something quicker as the initial phase is very independent, but for me I already feel that I was ready to pick things up a little because it hadn’t been long since my last stint of altitude.

The tempo went well and it was nice to get the lungs going and legs ticking over. I was even fortunate to get support from some local Kenyan runners who were persistent in their chants, shouting “well done” and “wow, you’re great”. Little did they know, it was just Stevie Stockton from England.


Sunday 15 January

The dreaded long run came around quicker than anticipated. For me, anything longer than 50 minutes at altitude starts to get tough. When you hit it too hard in the first few miles, you will pay for it in the final few. Not a nice feeling. However I had a pleasant surprise on this occasion. It could have been because I had talked myself into believing it was going to be pure hell but whatever it was, it did the trick! I set off at a reasonable pace with a great little group, including, Helen Clitheroe, Charlene Thomas, Hatti Dean, Beth Potter and two other OCWK girls, Hannah England and Stacey Smith. As the run picked up, the latter three girls dropped off to run at a pace comfortable for them, whilst the rest of us ran a stunning route around the Kenyan countryside, villages and lakes. 80 minutes seemed to fly by and we all finished ready for a day of relaxation and not forgetting, a bit of HP!! (I should mention that I am now on book number four, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. I can’t believe who Sirius Black actually is…


Monday 16 January

The Monday morning feeling was with me today. I wake up, supposedly ready for a strong week of training but hardly ever start it feeling ready to go! We woke at 7am, had a quick coffee and off we went for our first run of the day. Just a 50 minute run for me, followed by some chocolate porridge (courtesy of Helen Clitheroe’s hot chocolate powder!) and some Mandazis. You’re asking yourself what they are right? Well, all I can describe them as are DOUGHNUTS!! They are incredible and definitely lighten up breakfast time when they’re served. Everyone gets very excited when they lift up the large silver container to discover them. We think it is strange to be eating doughnuts at breakfast, but it is an East African delicacy… and if it works them, it works for me!

Not long after breakfast, I walked down to the track to meet George and a few others from my group in Loughborough to do a drills session. This came with a surprising gesture, as a local Kenyan man asked me to marry him and then eventually, once I’d told him that I couldn’t, he asked me for 100 Kenyan Shilling. Basically, he wanted my money. What a catch.

The next surprise of the day came from a cute little bird taking a stroll in my room. I could have shown you a picture but, Beth Potter came strolling in and scared the bird to death… literally as I was about to take it. All I heard after the bird started flapping around crazily in our room, then into the bathroom was a huge thud. After a few screams, we were brave enough to go and check the damage to discover the bird lying on its back, in our shower with its feathers everywhere. Luckily, after George was called to take it away, the bird was alive and had basically just knocked itself unconscious. Pretty funny really to watch a bird try and trundle off looking like it had knocked a few glasses of wine down!!

After such an eventful day, we went for our second run and to the gym for some conditioning. Then it was a case of shower, food and bed.