Don’t set out to impress. It’s childish, for one thing. Bloody childish. And for another, it will get you into trouble. Because when you’re out of the slips at quicker than flat 5k pb pace running up a lakeland fell, you’ll realise you’ve once again went off too hard. I glance around. What am I doing in fifth? This is lunacy. I’m not even performing at a level where I always accept the sobriquet of ‘fell runner’ so sitting in fifth in a race in the Lakes? Absurd. Sort your life out, Jobes. But also. Also, what if all of the Bob Graham training has transformed me into being half decent at this? Only way to find out is to push harder. At the mile mark I’d lost a few places but was still top ten and, having mocked Prefontaine last blog, I decided to employ another of his maxims:... View Article
Legend has it Steve Prefontaine said, “the best pace is a suicide pace, and today looks like a good day to die”. That’s all well and good when you’re bombing around a track in Oregon, but Pre never looked up at Skiddaw in the clag knowing he had over twenty hours of running ahead of him. He never skidded through the bogs as you start the climb from Threlkeld up to Cleugh Head in the dark. Or had to bomb off the top of Sca Fall trying to figure what gully to take for the 3,000ft drop into Wasdale. And I’d be very surprised if he ever had to drag his tired body up the fence post scramble onto Kirk Fell in a 50mph head wind, fifty miles into a day on the fells. I know that in two weeks I should be climbing them to fulfil one of my... View Article
Blood. I knew there had to be a way to identify other marathoners in the crowds running up the beach towards the finish. All race distances had different coloured numbers, but from behind that was no help. Luckily, mud caked, bloody and scratched legs were a dead give away. But that was later. Of course. At the end. We’d started almost four hours earlier, wide eyed and shivery in the shadow of Alnwick Castle. It was a surprisingly cold start to the day – or perhaps I just have a poor grasp of how cold clear mornings in February are. The event was Endurance Life Northumberland, with four distances culminating in a finish at Bamburgh. A friend and I plumped for the marathon distance, though it was of course a mile and a half longer because in trail world no one cares how long you hurt for. I imagine this... View Article
February 8, 2022,
by Pete
When I was very young, just an infant really, my mother dipped me in the shuddering waters of the River Styx. Holding me by my heels she submerged me in the inky flow to ensure I was invulnerable. And — in fairness to her — it almost worked. Almost. But those heels, the only area not to be dipped, would inevitably become my weakness. Okay. Not quite. I may have appropriated Achilles’ story a little. But I have a surprising degree of empathy for the lad at the moment. We both found ourselves engaged in quests of epic proportions. He took his ships to Troy, I took my S/Labs to Troutbeck. And both of us were let down by our weak spot. All of this to say, I hurt my heels. “Be strong, saith my heart; I am a soldier;I have seen worse sights than this.” -Homer, The Illiad One... View Article
January 11, 2022,
by Pete
I was just a couple of miles into my long run on Saturday morning when Goldfrapp randomly shuffled from a Spotify dance playlist. I’d kind of forgotten about Goldfrapp but within moments I realised that I too am having my life dictated by a Strict Machine. It’s called Bob. I didn’t particularly fancy a run on Saturday. It was cold. I’d been good at the eating part of training but the sleeping part went less well. There was ice on the ground. And I’m sure at the time there were some other excuses too, but I can’t remember exactly what they were. But here’s the kicker; I didn’t decide whether to run on Saturday morning. I decided whether to run when Georgia and I had a FaceTime and settled on a date for our Bob Graham round attempt. In that moment I made not just a decision on what to... View Article
December 22, 2021,
by Pete
The best adventures are almost always spontaneous. Going from the thought of an average few days ahead to adrenaline, dopamine and challenge in the blinking of an eye. No time to dwell, anticipate or expect, just go and get it. I’d planned to do a winter tea round last January, start as I meant to go on. Unfortunately it was illegal to travel alone to the hills, and I didn’t have enough cheese and wine to pass it off as a business meeting. The hills remained a dream until the end of March and the winter tea round was forgotten. Forgotten, that is, until I indulged my Thursday tradition of checking the mountain weather. Warm on the tops, it said, with a cloud inversion thrown in for good measure. The kind of forecast you’d happily take any time of year, let alone three days before the equinox. If ever there... View Article
November 26, 2021,
by Pete
If you’ve read many of my mountain race reports, you’ll know that nothing cheers me up like the sound of cow bell. So imagine the scene; I’m approaching the top of the longest climb of the day, the midday sun is filtering through the trees and I’m in desperate need of refreshment when I hear the sound of bells. My legs start to turn over that bit quicker, my head picks up, and my lips break into a smile. I glance around eagerly, tastebuds already sensing the coca-cola that the volunteers are somehow keeping ice cold, and realise I can’t see an aid station anywhere. I look to my right, my gaze following the sound of the bells up the slope. Goats. There’s always bloody goats. A whole herd of them, threading their way down through the trees, the largest of the group with a bell strapped to his neck.... View Article
October 10, 2021,
by Pete
I remember thinking, as I limped from my car to the Spar on Friday night, that maybe a sky race was not the best idea for the following day. Recovery had being going well. I was back to training as normal until a busy weekend and some misadventures in the north sea had plunged me back to limping, with occasional bags of frozen peas strapped to my knee as I drove. I’d come to worry it was Schrodinger’s knee – either recovering well and fine or the tendons were gradually peeling off the knee cap and I’d fall down with a ruptured quadricep. Unobserved, it was hard to decide which was true. But also, I was there. I didn’t get a ferry to Northern Ireland to watch other people compete. More than that, after a two month lay off my mind was clamouring for the clarity that only mountain racing... View Article
September 27, 2021,
by Pete
The Great North Run. One day, I’m going to have a proper crack at it. This was going to be my year. I’d ran a 1:28 in April at Dorney Lake and was feeling great until roughly the moment I picked an unexpected fight with Scafell Pike. Having hurt my quadricep tendon falling, it was touch and go whether I’d be back running at all. A proper effort was never on the cards. If you’d asked in July, I’d have told you I was frustrated with being in the orange wave as I was now running sub 90-min half marathons. Now I was more concerned that I’d start next too fast for my injured legs and fitness lacking lungs. The day before the run itself was the first day for a month I hadn’t limped. I took that as a good sign, slapped on some KT tape and headed for... View Article
There’s a beautiful section at the start of the Scafell Pike Trail Marathon. You skirt the side of Derwentwater, past jetties glistening in the morning sun, clouds breaking over the hill tops around about. The route undulates along trails and paths, behind Castle Crag and through the ferns into picturesque Borrowdale. If you’re not careful, you could start to think you were in for a fast and pretty trail race. You breeze into Seathwaite, the first drinks station, and feel unstoppable. Smiles all around. Someone asks a marshal if there’s coke, and they’re cheerfully told that’s for the way back down. And so we continue on with the sound of cow bells ringing in our ears. Leaving Seathwaite there’s another mile of gentle undulation before the mask slips and Dr Jekyll transforms suddenly into the evil Mr Hyde. We start to climb steeply into the rocky corridor route and the... View Article
