Challenge Stu

It's almost the end of September. The days are getting noticably shorter, temperatures have dropped a little, and if like me you live in a University city, the pavements have suddenly got busy again. Although I don't formally teach, working at a University means that summer is the easiest time to take holidays, and also the time when conferences and events tend to be organised. This means that August and September can be busy months! In the last couple of weeks I've been on two notable trips, the first a work trip to Cork and the second a holiday to the Ardeche region of France. I won't bore you with all the details, but I wanted to talk quickly about the major summits of each trip... Carrauntoohil and Mont Ventoux. Carrauntoohil Carrauntoohil is the biggest hill in Ireland. At 1038m it's higher than Scafell Pike, not quite as tall as Snowdon, and 300m or so shorter than Ben Nevis. It is bigger than the two remaining high points in the British Isles (Sli...

As part of the Dig Deep race series at Whirlow Hall Farm last weekend, I gave a talk on Friday night. I was in stellar company, speaking between Sally Fawcett and Nicky Spinks! At our weekly Friday morning strength and conditioning session at Accelerate, I was given a great piece of advice... A talk like this must aim for inspiration, not information ... I can certainly deliver a lack of information, but the first half?! Hmm... Sally spoke first about training for and competing in the World Trail Championships in Tuscany, and then training for the Bob Graham round and the serendipitous week she spent at altitude a couple of weeks before. Sally Fawcett Nicky spoke later about her journey through life and running, culminating in her amazing double Bob Graham round. Nicky Spinks It was great to hear both talks and I left feeling very inspired (and informed!), as well as very proud to be part of Dark Peak Fell Runners, as both Sally and Nicky are too. My talk was titled ...

To borrow the words of a fine sportsman of appropriate nationality... "As they say, sometimes you're the hammer, sometimes you're the nail.  I was a cheapy little Ikea one today. It was terrible." So here, in contrast to 2015 , is a blog about this year's Snowdonia trail marathon. The Scott Snowdonia Trail Marathon is a marathon (obviously, although the distance has in the past not always been exactly marathon distance!), starting from Llanberis and visiting Rhyd Ddu, Beddgelert, Nant Gwynant and Pen y Pass before climbing to nearly the top of Snowdon by the Pyg track, then descending on the Llanberis path. I ran the inaugural race in 2015 but missed the race in 2016. Both previous years have experienced very wet weather, so it was a pleasant surprise to see some sunshine on the start line this year. After a surprisingly comfortable night in the back of the Volvo I had some breakfast, registered and collected my number. then caught up with some...

For once, I took the nice camera with me, so I've decided that my 3 Peaks blog will involve minimal words and lots of photos. I have raced this race a couple of times before, but this time was part of a new team. Wild Spirit is our skipper Paul Jackson's boat, but due to logistics we were racing on a chartered boat from Ireland (Sherkin II), under the team name Wild Spirit. Sailing with Paul we had Tom and John, and Wil Spain and I would be the runners. Thanks to Wil for stepping in at the last minute when Hugh Aggleton's injury became too serious to race. The final member of our team was Judith, who would be our shore support crew and would bring the bikes round to Whitehaven. All the hard work without the fun bits - thank you Judith! Saturday lunchtime - the adoring crowds gather... ...the Wild Spirit crew (l-r John, me, Wil, Tom, Paul) is ready... ...by 1 o'clock everyone else is ready and the race is about to start... So, at 2pm on (a very sun...