It's Only Running...

                                          Photo credit High Terrain Events. 'I can't be arsed' had become something of a refrain by the time I toed the start line at Glentress Marathon on the last Sunday in February. And it wasn't just me. For all the bullshit that people (read: rank and file runners, for the most part) spout ahead of races - under-trained, too much beer last night, carrying  a few niggles, yada, yada, yada -  I got the feeling that there was a genuine enthusiasm vacuum among everyone I spoke to. I blame the rain. I have no idea of the statistics, and it's probably not the wettest February SINCE RECORDS BEGAN, but the prolonged spell of bad weather has certainly taken its toll. I don't give a shit about running in the rain, in fact, I quite like it, but unremitting dreichness at a time of year when we're supposed to be seeing the back of winter's wor...

Montane Lakeland 50 I’d only been running for a few months when I first heard about the Lakeland 50. I wasn’t much good at it, but neither was I quite as shite as I’d expected to be, and I like taking things to extremes (although I understand now that the 50's the soft option), so I resolved there and then to have a crack at this event sometime before I was 40. I was 31 at the time, so this wasn’t exactly an ambitious target and, far from being phased by the idea of continuous movement over 50 miles of roughish terrain (it’s only running), I figured my navigational ineptitude would pose the biggest obstacle. I’m not a daft lass though, surely I could learn to read a map? Fast forward two and a bit years and my running hadn’t improved as much as I’d have liked; many marathons had been entered and then subsequently sacked off due to my apparently limitless propensity for mangling my legs. I’m not sure whether it’s because I run like a complete twat (not according to ...