Challenge Stu

Exciting news - you can now donate to the Big Alps Run by text! Just text ALPS70 £5 to 70070 to send a fiver straight to the charity. You can choose any amount - £1, 2, 3, 4, 5 or 10.

This weekend has nearly been a de-ja-vous of one a couple of years ago, when I wrote "This country has been busy achieving in the field of sporting endevour this weekend, with Lewis Hamilton returning to the podium after a disastrous first half of the F1 season, Mark Cavendish destroying the competition to win on the Champs-Elysees and Bradley Wiggins finishing 4th in the Tour de France. The main arena of athletic excellence this weekend however, was of course the Pudsey 10k." The only difference was that after a fall on stage 7 of this years Tour, Bradley Wiggins is at home with a broken collarbone... Hamilton has not had a great start to the F1 season, but managed to win in Germany to put himself back into vague contention, although perhaps only for second place in the championship after Sebastian Vettel's spectacular run of results this year! Cavendish again won on the Champs-Elysees, his fifth stage win this year. This year though, he also finally won the...

I will write this like one of those films where you get the ending first, then we go back to the start to see how we ended up there. So, I didn't finish the Pennine Way. I stopped at Horton-in-Ribblesdale yesterday morning. Since getting home I have made good progress... I can now get up from chairs on my own, and no longer have to crawl down the stairs on my backside! Wednesday 15th: Got the train to Berwick-on-Tweed, then a taxi to Town Yetholm. Set up at the campsite, made some food and settled down for an early night at about 9pm. Forgot that I am actually in Scotland, hence midges! Nice campsite though. The night before Thursday 16th: Set the alarm for 4am, tent packed away and ready to go by about half past (having fought with more midges) then wandered across the river to Kirk Yetholm and the start of the Pennine Way at 4:45. At the start - the "already bedraggled" look is deliberate So off I went, out of Yetholm in some slight drizzle and off on the ...

Ok, it looks like after the disappointment of the SWCP, I will be able to do the Pennine Way. Woohoo! My window for getting in the lab for my project will be from next Tuesday, so the plan is to travel to Kirk Yetholm tomorrow night, start the PW on Thursday morning and finish in Edale on Sunday evening (or Monday?). The last minute-ness has meant it's all a bit dissorganised, so technically I don't actually have a map yet, hence I don't know exactly where I'm planning to stay... The Pennine Way is 268 miles, and goes over more proper hills than I would've done on the SWCP. It's less than half the distance, but the days will be much longer so I'm actually expecting it to be tougher. It will be a good challenge though, and thanks to the people who have donated already. So, the eating begins!   www.justgiving.com/bigalpsrun

Funny how you forget even the really good bits (eg. the zip line on the canyoning!) APEX Race - Sleepmonsters / Likeys: http://www.sleepmonsters.co.uk/racereport.php?race_id=8859&article_id=7145&page_count=1&page_action=rep Lucy's APEX: http://lucyharrisaccelerate.blogspot.com/2011/06/apex-race.html

Well, that was interesting! To save me spending hours and hours on here and you hours and hours reading my babbling, here is what happened... We set off to on 21st May, flew into Zurich, delayed the Swiss travel system by loading and unloading our kit in Bern, and eventually arrived in Interlaken Spent a few days building bikes, shopping, preparing and packing our bags On Tues 24th we got the maps, and on the morning of 25th May the Prologue started... 4 x 90min sections. Our first section was the "Trotti Bikes", basically big scooters! We struggled a little with these, except JC who had used them before. Then, during the hottest part of the 30°C+ day we set off on parts 2 and 3 of the prologue, a 9km then an 11km off road run. We ran well and weren't too far behind the leaders in our group of teams. The final part of the prologue was rafting. This was non-competitive apart from a section in the middle when we were timed. It was my favourite part of the day, main...

South West Coast Path: 11th - 26th June I now have a floor-full of maps, a schedule, and I think some people willing to join in! I'm off to do the APEX adventure race in Switzwerland at the end of this week, then two weeks to recover before I start the SWCP. The schedule is tough but I have done a bit of reccying down there and the views and terrain are spectacular! Very much looking forward to it. Day Start Finish Distance Total Distance 1 Minehead Rockham Bay 45 45 2 Rockham Bay Bucks Mills 50 95 3 Bucks Mills Rocky Valley 53 148 4 Rocky Valley Porth 45 193 5 Porth Botallack 56 249 6 Botallack Pedannack Downs 48 297 7 Pedannack Downs Trewince 43 340 8 Trewince Killigarth 48 388 9 Killigarth Ringmore 52 440 10 Ringmore Stoke Fleming 37 477 11 Stoke Fleming Lad...