Training Update - 24/11/07

A couple of weeks back I travelled up to Snowden with Roger from work to have a look at the track I’ll be taking up for the main 3 peaks challenge. For anyone else planning to park at Pen-y-Pass, get there early as the car park was jam packed when we arrived at just before 10:00. I’m not quite sure how to take this but the attendant was kind enough to let us park in the disabled space. Roger was pretty certain the attendant thought there was something wrong with me! Comments I’m getting from mates about these challenges at the moment makes me wonder whether he wasn’t far wrong.

The track we followed up to Snowden summit is called the Pyg track. At the bottom of Snowden I was under the impression it would be a nice fairly smooth track with a few stones here and there, maybe like a canal towpath or something but up hill. How I could have been so wrong (and if we’re being honest, STUPID) is beyond me. The track is more a mountain path (as you’d expect going up a mountain). By mountain path I mean a track strewn with boulders which involve using hands and feet to climb and falls of 6 – 8 feet in some places back down to the path. In some areas the track is not so easy to make out and due to our lack of navigation skills ended up having to climb a 13 foot rock face. Had we fallen from this point and missed the path the drop below us was about 40 – 50 foot.

The first hour was fairly easy going but come the second hour I thought my legs were going to give up on me. There I was thinking I was a mountain goat overtaking everyone on the path and then at about 3/4 the way up everything gave up. The lungs felt like they were about to give up, the legs had just about packed in and had I not been in such a public place I'd have more than likely collapsed in a heap. Once the fourth pensioner had overtaken me though, I pulled myself together, took a breath and cracked on.

For a first attempt I was actually most impressed with our time up the mountain. 2 hours up to the top which is what I was aiming for at a second or third attempt. Coming down was a lot easier, we took a diversion down the face of the mountain to the miners track which then allowed us to do a bit of jogging down. Coming down we made it in 1.5 hours. Including stops we travelled up and down Snowden in 4 hours.

General Update - 24/11/07

Another few weeks on from the last update and things are going well. I’ve not heard anything from the chap who was considering carrying out the challenges with me so I’m taking that as confirmation that Challenges for Charity 2008 is going to be a solo effort. At least I’m only responsible for myself now and to be honest this just makes the years events even more challenging, which in my opinion is a good thing. The more of a challenge the better. Let’s just hope I complete them otherwise I’ll look like a right spoon.

My equipment list (and wish list) seems to be getting longer and longer. Luckily Christmas is coming up so I’ll be asking Santa for a few bits and pieces! Who'd have thought there was so much equipment involved in walking up a small mountain....... Having spent a second thinking about it, there's probably not that much equipment needed, I'm just a saleman's dream customer. Show me a gadget, or tell me how it would save my live heading up Everest and all of a sudden it's my next 'must have' item.

29th October 2007

Another week another update. The team still stands at two with Phil deciding whether to go forward with the challenges due to the risks involved with only a couple of us carrying them out. I'm busily planning to make a few last ditch attempts to entice people onto the challenge but have decided against putting up a poster requesting volunteers at the local gym just in case I leave myself open to prosecution should anyone fall and break a leg. At least if I fall and break my leg I can't sue myself!

With regards to training it's been a fairly quiet week. I ran a 10k run for Cancer Research last weekend but have done nothing this weekend. I've been running like crazy man at the gym during the week so hopefully that's doing some good. I am concerned I look like a complete idiot
running with the treadmill set at an incline of 8 and gasping for breath the whole time I'm on there! At least I can manage more than 2 and a half minutes now though!

Other news? Well, I weighed myself this morning and came in at quite a hefty 13' 8 or 86.3kgs. I'm starting to look like the Michelin man in a few of my tighter t-shirts so it's time to look at what I'm eating and what I shouldn't be. To be honest that's fairly easy, you see, I'm a biscuit munching machine. I can't stop at one, I can't even stop at four if I'm completely honest. Biscuits to me are what cocaine is to Amy whats her house. You let me near a pack of biscuits and it's like
a blur! We've all seen the Matrix and the dodging bullets scene, if Trinity thought Neo was fast she ought to see me go at a pack of biscuits. So it's time to go on a healthy eating drive. No more chocolate, no more crisps and no more biscuits!! Well?. Until Christmas anyway then I'll be forced to take a two week break. But for now, it's fruit, cereal and sandwiches for the next month (with maybe the odd cake here and there ? I can't punish myself too much now can I!?)

A Team Crisis!

After a couple of weeks of mentioning what we're doing and trying to persuade people to get involved our team numbers need amending from three of us to two of us! My powers of persuasion are obviously lacking. Si has had to pull out of the event due to other pre-arranged commitments but has very kindly offered his services in terms of helping raise money and possibly assisting with the driving.

Phil is currently in the process of trying to persuade one of his mates to take part and also assessing the risk if only two of us attempt the challenges. Now from the start I've been thinking of the possibility of having to complete the challenges by myself, it's not a nice thought as I still lack basic navigation skills (and more obviously, common sense!), however, I have decided that if need be, the 3 peaks challenges will be carried out solo next year.

As a friend has pointed out, this motivation seems to have affected my senses. I firmly believe now that I'll be able to complete the challenges, after all, anything's possible when you put your mind to it. I'm at a point now where defeat isn't even an option, even if I do have to do this by myself. Right, now I've finished persuading myself that I can do this, a couple of pictures to brighten the page up.

I'm looking forward to this:

(from http://www.path.unimelb.edu.au/~bernardk/terragen/ben_nevis/)

but I'm not looking forward possibly climbing through this in the dark:

(from http://www.madaboutmountains.com/51123.htm)

If there's anyone up there, let's hope they look after me!

Training 01 - 13/10/2007

As I write this on the 14th October reality has been drilled into me. These challenges are most definitely not going to be a walk in the park as I had hoped.

Yesterday I decided to add the Severn Way walk to my list of challenges. This will be a solo challenge so the other chaps on the team (still only two others!) need not fear me trying to persuade them to do this one. The Severn Way walk is the longest river walk in Britain (at 210 miles), tracing the route of the Severn, from its source at Plynlimon to the sea at Bristol. I'm not foolish enough to do this in one go so I'll be attempting the walk on weekends over the course of a couple of months. An overview of the Severn Way can be seen here.

So, yesterday I attempted a leg of the walk from Welshpool in Mid Wales to Montford Bridge in Shropshire (between 20 and 22 miles). To be perfectly honest my planning was dire. I wore a brand new pair of walking shoes (not yet broken in) and forgot to have any breakfast. My packed lunch consisted of a flask of coffee and a half eaten pack of chocolate digestives. The stuff of champions! I packed a GPS navigation machine but forgot to buy any maps so it was pretty much useless. Luckily I did have this book which isn't half bad. I'm an idiot by the way, just in case anyone reading this hadn't yet figured it out.

The walk itself started off well, the boots were a little sore on the ankles but other than everything was fine. In fact the first 10 miles of the walk went by pretty much without incident. The scenery was fantastic, the cows were relatively friendly and I hadn't quit. And I didn't actually feel that bad about munching on the biscuits as surely the walking would burn off the evil calories and stop me turning into a biffa!

The problems arose just past Llandrinio. Now I'd heard at work that a farmer in the area had a number of water buffalo which I'd assumed was a complete lie told to me by someone who thought I was gullible. As it happens, I came across a small field about 100m across which contained two buffalo and two calves (or maybe just giant cows with extra long horns - as I've never seen a buffalo I can't be certain). The book made no mention of this obstacle. After a 5 minute rest and some careful deliberation I decided something weighing over half a ton couldn't really run that fast. This conclusion is on a par with my thoughts that the three challenges wouldn't be that difficult. A quarter of the way across the field one of the animals decided to saunter onto the path and cut off my exit. A half way across the field the buffalo obviously became offended by my puffed up chest and odd mooing noises and ran at me. I have a feeling at that moment in time not even Linford Christie could have outrun me. Unfortunately my jumping wasn't as good as my running and a clattered into the metal gate instead of over it winding myself rather badly. Luckily the buffalo had decided he'd had enough fun for the day and sauntered off, no doubt to await the next person foolish enough to enter his field.

It was from this point the pain set in. Unfortunately it didn't stop either. The only way of easing the way pain was to try a number of silly walks in order to take the pressure off the left foot. I sure anyone that noticed me probably thought I'd escaped from somewhere! Finally though, having set off at 11:30, I made it to the Swan pub at Montford Bridge at 18:20. So overjoyed was I at seeing the pub I even managed to run the last 1/2 km waving my hands in the air. The people there also thought I'd escaped from somewhere!

The results of the walk? Well, today I can barely walk. My back hurts, my feet hurt, my blister hurts, the back of my thighs hurt and behind my left knee also hurts. I appreciate now why no-one wants to carry out these challenges!

Organisation

My god there seems to be a lot of stuff to sort out. I thought this would be an easy 'get a few people together, do a bit of training then carry out the challenges'. Not a bit of it!

After a touch more investigation realism is slowly entering my world. I need to figure how to read an OS map properly with the aid of a compass and I need to make sure everyone else is fairly proficient at this also. I need first aid training just in case someone gets injured - a band aid may not cut the mustard. I need to try and visit each peak and sort out a route, I have to visit Scafell Pike in the dark and try the route so it's not too much of a shock during the actual challenge.

I've still not even walked more than a couple of miles so I'm guessing this is going to be the first thing to get sorted. Can I actually walk 25 miles without needing the Air Ambulance? At the moment I wouldn't be able to say with any certainty that I could. This weekend should sort out that question anyway as I intend to try and walk 20 miles along the Severn Way or Glyndwr's Way. Oh well, let's try and hold reality back till the weekend and assume it should be a piece of cake!

The Team

I'm beginning to wonder whether organising the challenges is going to be more difficult than actually completing them! Getting together a team is proving more difficult than expected. I'd imagined people jumping at the chance to complete a challenge like this, and in aid of charity as well. But no. So, the team so far is as follows:

1. Me
2. Phil Mclachlan
3. Simon Cassidy (for the Yorkshire 3 peaks and the national 3 peaks)
4. Chris Berridge (provisionally for the Yorkshire 3 peaks and Longmynd Hike)
5. Martin Caswell (provisionally our driver and support for 3 peaks challenge)

The initial challenge would appear to be to find a team. We have a couple of people (friends of Si and Phil) who are maybe's. It looks like I'm going to be approaching strangers in my gym to make up the team!

The Charity - Hope House Children's Hospice

Choosing a charity was actually a lot more difficult than I anticipated. There are a huge number of good causes out there but I decided that a local charity would benefit more from the money I raised than a national charity.

After some searching around for local charities I have decided upon Hope House Children's Hospice

(From their website) -

Hope House Children’s Hospices provides respite, palliative care and terminal nursing for life-limited children.

The organisation runs two hospices – Hope House in Oswestry and Ty Gobaith in Conwy.

Support is also offered in the family home by the Community Care Team. Bereavement support and counselling is available to all family members for as long as it is necessary.

Hope House makes no charge to families, and receives a limited amount of statutory funding – voluntary income is therefore essential to ensure the continuation of the service.

Hope House is a registered charity. The annual running costs of the organisation is £3.5 million, including the cost of running two hospices, our extensive social work services, counselling, our community nursing service and, of course, fundraising and administration. For the next three years the Department of Health has promised an annual sum of £300,000. This is a welcome boost to our funding but in reality it will only fund our work for one month a year and means we continue to rely on the generosity of the general public for the majority of our income.

Suddenly Motivated!

And so it begins... Two weeks ago, I became suddenly motivated. I can't actually remember why now, but it happened. And two weeks on I'm in the process of organising a number of challenges for the coming year in order to raise money for charity.

Having never really completed any serious physical challenges before, and having only ever ran down to the corner shop and back you'd have thought it sensible to start off with a relatively easy challenge. But no, as usual I've managed to come up with a harebrained plan which involves a ridiculous amount of planning and a crazy amount of training. So, the challenges for the year ahead:

• The Yorkshire 3 Peaks Challenge (in 12 hours)
• The Three Peaks Challenge (in 24 hours)
• The Welsh 3000s (possibly in 24 hours)
• The Longmynd Hike
  

Having only ever ran to the corner shop and back, and having only climbed Haughmond Hill in Shropshire (a heady 140m high!) I'm wondering whether my unwavering self belief that 'I can complete anything I put my mind to' is leading me into a year of trouble, pain and disappointment.

But hey, enough of the realism, how difficult can it be to climb a few hills and stay awake for 24 hours anyway! Easily done.