Hillary Allen - Lavaredo North Face Presentation

Some lively weather forced the location of this talk from Hillary Allen and Fernanda Maciel indoors at the last minute which was unfortunate as I think a lot more would have attended and they were more than worth the effort.I wanted to write a post about this because Hillary's story in particular is immensely inspiring.  It's an extraordinary, medical profession-defying return from near death to …

Lavaredo Ultra Trail 119km

Cortina is a town that has redefined itself as a centre for trail running after the national level winter sports moved away and surrounding this picturesque town are some of the world's greatest trails winding through some of the world's most striking landscapes. Lavaredo is a 4-day trail fest with the main event being the Ultra Trail - a 119km race through 5800 metres of climb.I've run it once be…

The Lakeland 50

This year's injury of choice - some sort of plantar fascia/policeman's heel/bruised fat pad sampling platter of frustration hung over this warm-up race for the CCC for a few months. I made a last-minute decision to run, mainly thanks to a cock-up on my part over the last day I could cancel my hotel. I took that as a sign and reasoned even getting part of it done would be useful training.The drive …

Plantar Fasciitis / Policeman's Heel

When Henry Ford was knocking out his Model Ts, he used to patrol the scrapyards for written-off examples, rifle through all the components looking for the bits that hadn't failed so he could reduce the spec of that part and save a few $ next time round.  The tight-fisted old scrote.I'm starting to feel like one of his cars.  At this point everything's broken at least once with the exception of a…

SIS Caffeine / Electrolyte Gels

SiS (Science in Sport) generously sent me some samples of their caffeinated energy gels recently and I've spent the last couple of weeks trying them out.  The original plan was to use them during the comprehensive set of long runs needed to build up for the Lakeland 50 in July and the CCC in August but.. as bad luck would have it, I've gone down with some heel-related niggle which has made a bonf…

Sophie Radcliffe's London to Paris in 24hrs Sportive

I met Sophie at one of Freestak's events last year during which she gave a presentation about her work, lavishly illustrated with spectacular footage from some remote mountain or other. While her itinerary seems to be whatever part of the planet she fancies at any given point in time, this ride to Paris is a regular fixture. I think she's ridden it 9 times now, with this and the previous couple of…

The Boston Marathon

Somehow, despite a lot of years of chasing all over the place to run marathons, I've never run the most famous of the lot, Boston. So I decided that before my interest in road running disappears, I had to get it done and see for myself what all the hype was about.You have to qualify to get in (is there anyone out there didn't know that?!) but fortunately age is kind on this one single aspect of li…

Limassol Marathon

Some races Susie talks me into are ridiculously hard; some relatively 'easy'.  It's the good cop bad cop routine, as used by the Stasi.  But in this case even the good cop is peddling a marathon in the Cyprus sun.Some contrast to Haworth last weekend, this!  The misty moors and trails to the heat (warmth really; it never was to get completely boiling) of the seaside road course of the Limassol …

My top 5 races - based entirely on the food!

The longer you race, the more important food becomes and there are some events out there that put on a spectacular feed! I've known runners, mid-race, kept alive only by a trance-like state induced by thoughts of the free cake lying in wait for them at the finish.So I thought I'd present my top 5 and if you're one of these odd people that thinks the food is some kind of a sideshow, an afterthought…

Haworth Hobble 50km Fell Race

I may as well move to Haworth. I now know the bar staff in the Fleece by name. Thus adding the place to a long list of other pubs with a similar thing in common. In common with last year I'm finding it ridiculously easy to make the effort to get to a race halfway up the country while having far less interest in putting in a similar run in my own patch. Even though my own patch is hardly a scrap…