As I’ve said in a previous post, I’ve been lacking any real motivation or direction since this year’s lakeland 100. It’s been too easy to say,im still recovering or i cant do that i ran a 100 last month. (Lakeland was July ,Its now Oct so time to give myself a kick up the arse!)

So how do we do it?

So what’s the plan, how do I go from “cuddly” to being a vert eating, descent gliding, bog jumping, multi day event smashing, dragon slaying athlete with great teeth, hair and a chiselled six pack?

OK Ok, maybe not the the bog bit, no one dodges those.

Well, I’m a big fan of Racing myself fit, yes it’s not for all and it’s certainly not the most economical way of training, but I always work better if I use B races as mini hurdles. I know if I’ve paid £x for a race I’m more likely to get out of bed and do it, if it’s just a session alone then I can easily become the king of procrastination.

I will often tell the athletes I work with, especially the ultra runners that using a race as a supported training run (if funds allow) is a really great idea. It’s so much easier to use a 50k race as a training run, than parking the car up, taking a train and running back, running endless loops of your local housing estate or heaven forbid, asking your other half to drop you into the wilderness like a shit special forces operative at 4 am in the morning.

Plus if its hot, the aid stations at a min will have water, which saves you having to lug litres and litres of fluids around in your lovely new Salomon race vest.


I will of course be running some long runs alone, and on the actual course of the dragons back (Elon musk I am not, and to race every week in this current climate would probably equate to 17 bazillion pounds) i think one event every month to six weeks will, as it has done in the past keep me on the straight and narrow.

Just some of the races i have planned

• Tour of Pendle
• Langdale Marathon
• Tour de Helvellyn
• chester ultra 50 mile
• Manchester marathon
• Pennine Barrier 50 mile