The West Highland Way ultra – A Training Journey (part 5)

I am a little behind writing blog posts for my training journey, compared to my actual training! This post relates to week 4 of training which ran (pun intended) from 30th December - 5th January! I'll get caught up soon...😅

It’s recovery week! I have made it through the first 3 weeks of increasing my weekly running mileage. My body is getting used to being back to ultra training mode and is sharpening up for what lies ahead! This week, I reward it by taking the intensity down and letting the work done so far settle in. Recovery week has not quite gone to plan though. Read on to find out why…

Time on feet (running!)

Compared to previous weeks, recovery week was always going to be a smaller percentage of running time on feet relative to overall time. My step count for recovery week had me cover 50.4 miles/81.1km on foot. Of this, I spent a mere 18.1 miles/29.1km running, which accounts for 36% of time time on feet. I forgot to screengrab these stats for pictorial evidence so you’ll just have to take my word for it 🫠.

Instead I’m sharing a couple of photos of my New Years Day hike in the snowy Ochil Hills with partner in crime and head of my West Highland Way support crew, Susan! Ultra training can be a very solitary experience. Being a hardcore introvert, this is actually part of the appeal for me. Nevertheless, to balance this, I like to allocate time in my recovery week for doing something with those close to me. That we were outside replenishing the soul is even better!

Runs (and tight hamstrings) for week 4

My percentage of time spent running is within the realms of what I’d expect in a recovery week. However, I only ran twice – an easy 5 miler/8km, and a half marathon/21km that landed somewhere between steady and easy…steasy?

My plan, however, entailed four runs for around 28 miles/45km. So, why the shortfall? Good Mornings! Good Mornings is an exercise that loads the hamstrings and is my favourite lower body strength and conditioning move. To this point in my training I had completed strength and conditioning sessions that included the legs, but I had not loaded the legs exclusively for the full session. Suffice to say, the hamstrings got a shock and responded by retracting to about 2 inches shorter than they actually are 😂.

Although I ran my half marathon training session straight after this leg session, I can confidently say this run didn’t impair the hamstrings. I could sense my hamstrings were ‘off’ when doing the Good Mornings. Previous experience of this issue told me that tightening was likely – regardless of whether I ran afterwards or not!

Healing the hamstrings

My hamstrings were not injured, per se. They were simply tightened to the point that they needed light activity and a lot of rehab to release them again. I ditched the running, kept to gentle walks, and stretched for longer. I also dug out the acupressure kit, the foam roller, and the massage gun (shown below, in order).

The acupressure mat

The acupressure mat and pillow have several white discs, each with numerous plastic spikes on it. It mimics the ancient east Asian ‘bed of nails’, designed to stimulate the nervous system and blood flow to the parts of the body that are resting on it. I used the mat mainly by sitting straight legged on it so that the glutes and hamstrings were in contact with the mat in a rested position. I would alternate that with having just the pillow under my hamstrings too, so that my knees were bent more, allowing my hamstrings a different angle of release.

The foam roller

A runners essential! I used the foam roller for releasing the fascia around my hamstrings. I’ll go into depth on what the fascia is and how it affects us runners’ muscles in another post, but for now you can think of it as a sheet that layers over muscle groups, holding things in place. The fascia can become sticky and tight, limiting the capacity for my hamstrings (sitting underneath) to flex and move. Using the foam roller to release the fascia, meant that I could free up the hamstring muscle group and give them the best chance of benefiting from stretching and the massage gun work.

Massage gun

This is a well used versatile piece of kit in my house. For my hamstrings I primarily used the ‘scraper’ (I know, sounds appealing 😂). In the picture above, the scraper is the head that looks like a curved squeegee. The vibrations from the gun was helpful in stimulating blood flow, and the accompanying oxygen and nutrients, to my hamstrings to help the repair process. Using the massage gun also allowed me to get deep into the muscles to relieve tension.

At times I would switch to the trigger point head (bottom left in the massage gun picture) if I hit a small pocket of higher resistance anywhere in my hamstrings. I would hold the trigger point head in position and push deeper into the muscle for a more focused release.

My order of rehab

I started with the massage gun the same night my hamstrings started to tighten. TOO SOON 🫨! I think this made my hamstrings a bit worse because the intensity, even on the lowest setting, was too great. I knew the foam roller would also be too intense to start with. So, alongside stretching and staying mobile for the full duration of rehab, the order of physical kit that worked best for me was this:

First few days – acupressure mat/pillow only
Middle few days – acupressure mat/pillow PLUS foam roller
‘Last’ few days – acupressure mat/pillow, foam roller, PLUS massage gun (lowest setting – normal for me anyway since I’m a delicate wee flower 😂)

I have placed last in inverted commas as whilst I was forced to include it at this point, it was to feature (as prehab) in my programme soon anyway. Of course, the smartest plan would always be to have it in my programme from the outset. Even better if I have it all year round…then maybe issues like hamstring tightness wouldn’t occur 👀. But I had been a bit neglectful in that area recently, so this was a timely reminder. Thankfully, I have plenty of training left to get this side of things up to speed.

Week 5 West Highland Way ultra training

Hamstring issues aside, my body, fatigued from the first 3 weeks of training, has recovered well in week 4. I am raring to crack on with block 2 of training, but the hamstrings are not quite ready. Week 5 of running is likely to start later than it normally would, and my hamstrings will be k-taped up as an insurance policy!

My overall target distance in week 5 should be in the realm of 55-60 miles/ 88.5-96.5km, but we’ll see how things pan out. I’d much rather scale back and heal properly than push on for the sake of a distance marker. That’s not to say I won’t be testing the hamstring capability; I most certainly will! Wish me luck…

Follow along with my West Highland Way ultra training!

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I’d love to have you share my West Highland Way Ultra 2025 training journey! Curious about something I’ve said (or not said) or want me to dive into certain training areas in future West Highland Way ultra training blog posts? Let me know in the comments!

Shari 💚