Lucy Gossage has done plenty of Ironman triathlon events – won 14 of them in fact – but her colleagues at the hospital where she works as a cancer doctor never seemed that interested. When she did the Montane Winter Spine Race in January, however – the 268-mile triumvirate of running, walking and barely sleeping, along the icy entirety of the Pennine Way – suddenly everyone she knew was gripped by the numbered dots moving agonisingly slowly across their phone screens.
‘They utterly couldn’t relate to it, that they could check the map all day, go to bed, get up, and it would still be going on. They got completely sucked into it,’ she says.
The Nottingham oncologist, 44, spent two-and-a-half years as a professional triathlete, deciding to return to work part-time in 2017. ‘I had three seasons as a full-time athlete, and I loved it, but it is more boring than people realise,’ she says. ‘I struggled a bit with the “why”. It felt quite selfish when everything you’re doing is just to make yourself quicker. I had the most fun when I had more balance.’
Today her “why” is what enabled her to battle extreme exhaustion, cold-induced asthma and a blizzard on Cross Fell, and finish the Spine as the third-placed woman in 106 hours, five minutes and 26 seconds. That’s almost four-and-a-half days, during which she thinks she had ‘one good hour’ of sleep.
‘I had my personal why, which was to do something that scared me, something I might not finish, something that would push my limits in ways I’ve never experienced before. I think if you’re going for a specific time or a place, it’s much harder to carry on if things go wrong. And then I had my why for the charity as well.’
Lucy is a co-founder of the 5k Your Way initiative, part of the charity Move Against Cancer, which encourages physical activity as a benefit for those living with cancer. They meet at a large number of parkrun events across Britain on the last Saturday of the month, participate however they choose – which can mean walking, volunteering or cheering as well as jogging – and meet socially afterwards. At the time of writing, her Spine Race challenge has raised over £26,000 for the organisation.
‘We talk about “movement”, not “exercise”, because the word “exercise” can be a bit off-putting,’ she explains. ‘Movement is something that anyone living with cancer can do to make themselves feel better and also probably improve their outcome. We’re challenging the myth that “rest is best”. It’s intuitive, isn’t it? The fitter you are, the easier your treatment will be. And the psychological benefits are massive as well.’
Lucy needed every psychological tool in the book to train for and then survive the Spine. She maintained her fitness base by running or cycling to and from work every day, as well as doing two gym sessions and a yoga session each week. Her job was flexible enough that she could also add in a large number of big days out in the hills with a heavily laden pack. She did the Dragon’s Back route across Wales (not the actual race) and the Offa’s Dyke Path. She also covered the Pennine Way itself, over 10 days, about 18 months before she did the race.
Immersed in the world of triathlon, she wasn’t even aware that the Spine Race existed until she heard Jasmin Paris discussing her record-breaking outright victory of 2019 on Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour. ‘My first Ironman felt impossible and ridiculous, like I couldn’t get my head around what I was doing,’ Lucy says. ‘This had that same feeling of the unknown – like you were jumping off a cliff and closing your eyes.’
She had done a 100-mile race the summer before, so knew she could cover that distance successfully, but beyond that, she had no idea – and there was no preparing for the lack of sleep. ‘Going into Byrness I had started sleepwalking, which was utterly terrifying. You can see the lines on Strava where I’ve fallen asleep and woken up off the trail or back up the hill. At one point I couldn’t work out whether I was really doing the Spine Race or having a nightmare about doing it.’
What about the physical pain? Does 200 miles hurt twice as much as 100? ‘Probably my biggest tip for anyone who wants to do really long stuff is that yes, of course things hurt, but then they somehow stop hurting again after a few hours. It was my brain that got me in the end.’
In hindsight, she thinks her biggest error was trying to sleep in the Spine’s bustling aid stations instead of a quiet hedgerow somewhere. ‘You have to carry a bivvy bag anyway – you might as well use it. I found it really hard to sleep on demand.’
Overall though, no regrets. Physically, she recovered well and was out on a 5k Your Way parkrun the following Saturday. And as for the experience, it was everything she’d hoped. ‘At times I was really scared, but I did it because I wanted these experiences. I was proud that I could dig these really deep holes. On those last miles across the Cheviots I kept falling asleep, but it was so beautiful.’
