Back again

No promises that there will be as much posting in the future but this is all new fangled at present.

Man turned up to do the insulation - it was very noisy in the house and upsetting for the dogs so we went for a walk to the river. Dogs swam for sticks and generally had a great time as usual.Made a couple of calls with regard to arranging this coming weekends run. Plan for Saturday is to run leg 2 of the Bob Graham Round, Threlkeld to Dunmail with my pal Popsy and possibly some others. This will be approximately a 4 hour run over high fells including Englands third highest peak Helvellyn. It is a one way (rather than circular) route necessitating either a vehicle left at the end point prior to beginning running, or an additional 10miles or so to run back to the start point. It is my intention to run the extra 10 miles back but it may prove difficult in the event to watch Popsy get into his car to drive home while I set off for another couple of hours running. We will see.

It's important that I get some very long runs under my belt over the next few weeks as I have entered a 50mile event at the end of July. I have never ran 50 miles before. 26.2 miles plenty of times but never more than 40 (and that 40 included lots of walking as it was over the fells).

My long term goal is to complete the Bob Graham Round or BGR as I will refer to it henceforth.

The BGR is a 65mile route visiting 42 named Cumbrian peaks. There are very few rules to this challenge. You must start in Keswick at the Moot Hall, on foot visit the 42 peaks in any order you like (though there is an optimum route) and get back to Keswick within 24 hours. Anybody can do this anytime they wish, its not an organised event. But to be included on the list of successful BGers (currently less than 2000people) you have to register your attempt with the BG club and have somebody with you on every peak to record the time and verify you were there.

Over the last year or so I have spent a lot of time running the BGR route, either on my own or as a helper for someone attempting the full round. Currently I still consider myself a relative novice BG contender and envisage a lot more time in the hills getting to know the route and improving my endurance/stamina.

Before my interest in Fellrunning was sparked I was a keen roadracer/runner. Living in Carlisle is great for getting to the fells at weekends but is just a bit too far away for regular evening fellruns. This means that most weekdays I train on the pavements, roads and parks of the city. Handily, this also means I still possess a reasonable turn of speed which pure fellrunners tend not to have unless they are top class elite athletes winning events. I will occasionally enter an event on the roads but prefer to race the fells as much as possible, the exception being marathons which I enjoy immensely and which tend to be nearly all road based.

No training planned today. Legs are quite bashed following a race up and down Skiddaw yesterday. Man has gone without finishing job - his machine seems to have blown up.
Tomorrows training will be decided after lunch and will depend on the weather. If it's hot and sunny then an interval based session will be ideal so as to allow drinks to be taken and stashed for in between efforts and afterwards. If it's raining or cool then probably a 13mile circuit at steady pace. Training pal Graham Millican should be with me tomorrow but often has to work late.

Going to hang out washing now as dust has settled and it's nice 'n' sunny