Tyndrum-Kingshouse Hotel

What a great run I had today on the WHW - and as a surprise even company!
I had planned to run just from Tyndrum to KHH by myself instead of like the main group from the Drover's. That would give me a distance of 30K, plenty for my training calendar.

So Thomas and I dropped the car off at KHH and thanks to John and him taking care of the important transport issue got a lift down to the start. That way I could access all my dry clothes after my return as I was going to have to wait for a couple of hours until everyone else would arrive. I found out that I would have company in the van as George - Ian's friend and support runner - wanted to do a shorter distance as well. I was a bit worried that I would keep him back or be out of my depth to keep up with him, but it turned out to be a great run in great company and the time flew by.

He started to run up the hill behind Tyndrum and I tried to keep up but then remembered that Thomas had told me to walk it and I just admitted there and then that I would have to walk the uphills. And that was fine. So from then on we walked the uphills and occasionally when it wasn't as steep George would encourage me to run slowly. That way I did run a few bits that I would have walked. We kept quite a good pace going on the straights and downhills, again slightly faster than I would have run, but I felt comfortable with it. As George knows the route very well he kept telling me about the bits that were due to come and how we would run or walk them and that was helpful.

He has so much experience in running and supporting and kept telling me all these interesting stories that before I knew it we had reached Bridge of Orchy in 1h10min, much faster than I had expected. I even forgot to take on my first gel after 30min and took it eventually in BoO after a short toilet stop.
I kept sipping away at my Lucozade and thought that I was drinking quite well, but it turned out later that I had only taken on just over 500mls the whole time! Ups, I need to watch my fluid intake I guess. I had a few jelly babies and "Vital" biscuits going uphill behind BoO and took another gel near the Forrest Lodge and that was me. Probably not quite enough if I had to keep going after KHH, but it was o.k. today. We reached the top of Rannoch Mor and started our downhill. This felt really good and we came to just above Blackrock Cottage at 3h31min and we thought, well can we make it under 3h45min? We then started to charge down the hill but the hotel looked closer than it actually was. But George kept the pace going and I felt good and just kept sprinting along and we arrived at the KHH carpark after 3h42min! Great!

We got ourselves dried off and warmed up in the Lounge looking out for other runners. The first runner home from the main group was Marco. I then met little Cairn for the 1st time who was out for his 1st support drive with Debbie and we all headed into the bar. The pea soup and chips were good!
Thomas had a good run as well so all in all a great day out for both of us.