FOR WOMEN, BY WOMEN - BUT WHY?
Every October, Girls on Hills hosts a popular Trail Skills for Ultrarunners weekend in Glencoe. Despite its northerly location, it’s the biggest all-female ultrarunning course of its kind in the UK and has one simple goal: to bring together elite athletes, specialists and female ultrarunners with a range of experience.
This last part is important, because it means that women at all stages of their ultrarunning journey can benefit from the course. It’s an event specifically for women, by women and we think is why it presents a uniquely supportive learning environment for female ultrarunners.
The course programme is structured around skills workshops and talks, with two short outdoor sessions a day –we DON’T actually go ultrarunning! Some attendees are very experienced, racing multiple long-distance events each year, while others haven’t yet run their first ultra.
Each year we try to involve elite runners who have excelled in a range of disciplines e.g., from ultra trail, to fell to sky. This year was the event’s 4th year and we had some well-known names on the list…
OUR PROGRAMME
As usual, we were joined by Girls on Hills team-mate and inov-8 ambassador Nicky Spinks. Nicky delivers a Running with Poles session, supported by Mountain King, as well as a Training for Ultra’s talk, which is always really insightful.
“My ultra-preparation talk covers the whole process, from choosing your ultra though to training, as well as thing things you can do outside of training to prepare yourself 100% for the race and reach your goals successfully” – Nicky Spinks
We were also joined for the first time this year by Georgia Tindley, who joined our staff this Spring as Skyrunning Specialist and Content Creator – curating our new blog! Georgia really got the ball-rolling by describing her positive experiences of racing as a woman on the international Skyrunning circuit, as well as sharing some of her own experiences and those of fellow female competitors, on the subject of barriers that women face when competing in ultrarunning events.
As a ‘champion’ for the sheRACES network, spearheaded by Sophie Power, we encouraged all our attendees to share their own experiences and ideas with us, with each person entered into a prize-draw to win a year’s free subscription from ULTRA magazine (what a prize!) We’re grateful to all those who contributed and look forward to feeding back our comments to sheRACES.
“What I loved about the weekend, and about my talk specifically, was the way we created a space for women to talk openly about their love of trail running without any external pressures” – Georgia Tindley, Skyrunner
It was also great pleasure to welcome 2022 European Masters Trail Running Champion, Jill Stephen to our programme this year. Jill is enthusiastic and inspiring, and delighted our attendees with an accessible strength and conditioning routine that could be done at home with minimal equipment, to support sustainable ultrarunning.
My favourite session to deliver this year was our night run on the West Highland Way, sponsored by Petzl. It always feels exciting and invigorating to run in the dark, but add in a little wind, rain and wide-open space, and it's a thrilling mix. Sharing the trail with other women at night helps prompt some useful discussion about risk and personal safety - a topic of real concern for many (or even most) women who train alone in darkness.
Girls on Hills has a number of core providers who lay the foundation of what we do year on year. Whilst the Girls on Hills team teach navigation skills and ascending/descending skills, we rely on the expertise of Mariam Kilpatrick, an ultrarunner and chartered women’s health physio (at Physio Effect), to help us with approaches to injury prevention.
We also include Yoga for Runners and Nutrition for Ultrarunners, this year presented by Becki Yoga and High Performance Nutrition, Chamonix. We were lucky enough to have Rebecca Dent joining us remotely from France, and if you’re looking for an online programme to support your nutrition as an ultrarunner, then you should definitely check this out!
SUPPORTERS
Girls on Hills is very lucky that ULTRA magazine continues to support our event, and though great content, continues to showcase the inspiring performances and contribution of women to our sport. When brands back our courses, they help us raise our profile and tackle the participation gap that exists for women in ultrarunning.
In 2022 our event was supported by Harrier UK, Harvey Maps, FATMAP, SILVA, Goodr, Coros and Mountain Fuel.
THE VIBE
The Trail Skills for Ultrarunners weekend is about so much more than just workshops. The real pleasure comes from creating an atmosphere where everyone feels at home, comfortable and happy to ask questions and contribute. This is helped by our ‘fireside chats’ where we share a wee dram of whiskey and some Scottish tablet while we discuss races, training and more. On the Saturday evening we are joined by Nicky, and there is an informal Q&A in the lounge.
“I’ve been involved with this event for 4 years now, and I love the way so much is fitted into a single weekend. The atmosphere is very relaxed and by the end we feel more like a group of friends” – Nicky Spinks
There is a lot of pertinent physiology, psychology and even clothing/equipment which benefits from a women-specific approach, but that’s not all. Throughout the weekend we enjoy being able to openly discuss bras, periods, the menopause, post-partum recovery, pregnancy, ageing and a load more topics that somehow still feel taboo in some circles (though they are becoming less so, thankfully!)
Women-only courses are not about excluding or alienating men. More than ever before, they are about achieving equity; about stepping-up to fill that gap where data, manufacture and support has been lacking. It is about finding-out what women want from ultrarunning and recognising women’s unique needs in this sport.
WHAT NEXT?
Girls on Hills has just released a new schedule of events for 2023 which include some exciting new fell running, trail running and skyrunning adventures across the UK. We hope to run with even more of you next year!
By Nancy Kennedy and Keri Wallace