Training for my last race (for a while)

In a month's time, I will run the Downslink Ultra. The route goes from St Martha's Hill in Surrey 38 miles down to the coast.

I have had a fun time racing racing. It's been two years since my first ultra at the Stort30, and since then I've started 5 ultras, finished three of them, run a dozen other races, spent a fortune on train fares, trained not hard enough, and felt a tremendous sense of achievement (well, three times out of five).

The reason I'm stopping is to help my partner train for the Paris runDisney Half Marathon in a year. I know that if I'm training for races during that time, I'll either fuck up my training by helping her, or fuck up her training by helping myself.

I'm hoping to go out on a high by attempting to finish the 38 miles from Surrey to Sussex in under 6 hours and 45 minutes. It's not an Olympic time by any means, but for me it's positively Herculean. All my training is currently fast and flat, with well placed recovery days and even some strength work. I really want to do this well so that I don't spend the next year regretting not training properly.

Another reason for having a break from races is the fact that I don't want my running to just be for the purpose of racing. It's a lovely thought to just go out for a few hours and run just because it's fun. I visited the Scottish Highlands recently and went out on a few runs just with the aim to run and enjoy myself without thinking about training.

It felt brilliant.

I'm not trying to sound like Anton Krupicka here - I've only been in the sport for two years - but two years is long enough to make me to want to change my approach to running and recapture some of the excitement of just being outside, without constantly thinking about training plans and race splits and all the shit that goes with races.

It has been surprisingly tough forcing myself not to enter any other races. Work colleagues keep asking if I'm entering this race or that race, and watching races sell out feels like being left out. I haven't even signed up for the St Albans Half Marathon, which I've done four years consecutively now. I'm not going to be back at the NDW50, and I'm sure that'll be sad watching it unfold online without being there again. I love the race, and would love to have given it another go to get a sub-10.45 time.

I am looking forward to having nothing to look forward to. I will see how it feels. If I hate it and become depressed, I'll waste no time in signing up for 60 races in a week, but I'm looking forward to running being a cool add-on to my life, instead of racing being a cool add-on of training.