The London-to-Brighton 100k Challenge was definitely a challenge. John and I treaded through 100k in 25 hours 17 minutes without a blink of sleep on very undulating and difficult terrains with lots of slanted hills, stony paths, climbing over countless of styles, fighting off tree branches along narrow paths inside the forests.
This was our 2nd time doing this event and we are so pleased that we have improved nearly 3 hours. Last year, due to John’s blister problem, we stayed at the rest stops for a long time to burst his blisters and patch up his feet. We lost many hours and only managed to finish in 28 hours 8 minutes. This year, John taped his feet before developing blisters and neither of us had blister problem or injury.
There were more than 2,500 poor souls doing this event. We’re all nuts but there are far too many of us to be admitted to psychiatric hospitals. LOL. There are 3 categories: (1) Full 100k in one go, (2) do the first half, sleep at the tent overnight, then do the second half, (3) Just do the half distance from London to Crawley in West Sussex or the second half from West Sussex to Brighton. John and I did the 100k in one go category.
I am not really an night owl as I usually go to bed by 10pm. Staying up throughout the night is definitely very challenging for me physically and mentally. By 1am, I struggled to stay awake and keep my eyes open let alone to walk. I couldn’t sleep because we were stuck in the middle of the woods. The most difficult part was after the 67km rest stop, we had to walk 13km to reach the next rest stop at 80km. Under normal circumstances, I could have finished walking 13km in about 2 hours 40 minutes. But due to the darkness (still very dark with the head torch) and undulating terrains in the woods, it took us almost 3 and half hours to reach the 80km rest stop. That 3 and half hours were probably the longest emotional roller coaster in my life. I was so pleased when I saw the 80km rest stop so that I could sit down and eat and more importantly I could rest a bit. I was exhausted. It was just after 3am and I knew in less than 2 hours time, it would get bright and no more head torch. The good news is: the next rest stop was only 8km away at 88km. By the time when we arrived at the 88km rest stop, the sky had already brightened up. Although the last 12km was very tough to climb up along Ditchling Beacon, we knew we would make it. We came so far and there is no way we’d give up. When we finally crossed the finish line at 8:45am, I almost burst into tears. It was my proudest moment ever. We finished almost 3 hours faster than last year – such an incredible experience and totally unforgettable.
This event is so well organised thanks to the effort made by the organiser The Action Challenge. There were plenty of staff, marshals, trek masters and medical personnel. There was a huge variety of food, drinks and snacks to cater for different dietary requirements – meat, vegetarian, vegan, gluten free, nut free etc etc. The signage was fantastic. They are all reflective and night glow. Every 10 metres, there is a signage. It was almost impossible to get lost.
I really want to do it again 
next year !!!